Lake Wobegon Summer 1956

Lake Wobegon Summer 1956
by Garrison Keillor

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Book Summary Information

Author: Garrison Keillor
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2002-09-02
ISBN: 0571210244
Number of pages: 256
Publisher: Faber & Faber

Book Reviews of Lake Wobegon Summer 1956

Book Review: Honest and hilarious portrayal of small-town life
Summary: 4 Stars

Fourteen-year-old Gary tells it like he sees it during one seemingly sleepy summer in his tiny Minnesota hometown. It's 1956, and the Lake Wobegon community is caught in between -- some things are much as they always have been, such as Gary's family's strict religious ways and the townspeople's familiar routines. But the world around them is forcing changes every day, through things like rock 'n roll music, and simply new attitudes and behaviors about life in general.

All his life, Gary has admired his sophisticated older cousin Kate, now 17. Long partners in crime, Kate has begun drifting away from Gary this summer, largely due to her newfound infatuation with a local baseball star named Roger. Suddenly, Gary is just a tagalong little cousin, and he feels powerless to make things right with his beloved Kate.

On the other hand, there's Aunt Eva, who's always been like a second -- and often preferred -- mother to Gary. Yet the revelation of a long-buried, never-discussed family secret about Eva has made Gary uncomfortable in his aunt's presence. Eva, however, continues to dote on her nephew, and doesn't understand why he suddenly refuses to visit or have anything to do with her.

Meanwhile, Gary is proud of having landed a temporary freelance job covering baseball games for the local newspaper -- a perfect starting point for an aspiring writer. It's also a vantage point that gives Gary new connections to meet and better get to know various individuals in town that will ultimately help him grow up and understand just it means to be a grown-up in this new world that 1956 is bringing in...

Keillor manages to depict a world which is both ordinary and extraordinary, in that it is about everyday people and events, and yet so memorable and detailed that readers are bound to remember his work for a long time after and long to read further adventures about Lake Wobegon's residents.

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Summary of Lake Wobegon Summer 1956

A hilarious coming-of-age novel, Lake Wobegon Summer 1956 serves up the world according to 14-year-old Gary, an endearing geek, a self-described 'tree-toad', and a writer-in-the-making whose best friend is his Underwood typewriter. Always with humour, and often with great sympathy, charm and honesty, the author tells us a story that both satirizes and celebrates the traumas and the passions of adolescence. In this, his latest novel, Keillor takes us back to a newly-minted America. With its postwar optimism and Cold War suspicions of outsiders, the 1950s are evoked in unforgettable Wobegon fashion.

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