Customer Reviews (1)

Rare novel of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings depicts life in rural Florida
Anyone who's ever visited the Gulf side of Florida, away from the sights of Orlando has seen the wonderful "hammocks" or wooded swampy areas that cover the more rural side of the state. The twisted trees, saw palmetto, draped in Spanish moss are evocative of a time when Florida was a wild land populated by farmers, ranchers and fishermen.

Rawlings writes the story of two orphans Luke and Allie, living in the hammock and how they survive the difficulties of scratching out a living on the land. The story then takes a turn to add drama by mixing the country orphans with wealthy landowners and their own difficulties.

This is one of Rawling's more rare novels, and her ability to evoke the natural world is as sharp as it is in "The Yearling."The story is a good novel, but I especially love it because when I drive through the citrus growing areas of Florida, the scenery comes alive through Rawling's description. ... Read more

Book Description
The Classic Book on Southern Cooking

First published in 1942, Cross Creek Cookery was compiled by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings at the request of readers who wanted to recreate the luscious meals described in Cross Creek -- her famous memoir of life in a Florida hamlet.

Lovers of old-fashioned, down-home cooking will treasure the recipes for Grits, Hush-Puppies, Florida Fried Fish, Orange Fluff, and Utterly Deadly Southern Pecan Pie. For more adventuresome palates, there are such unusual dishes as Minorcan Gopher Stew, Coot Surprise, Alligator-Tail Steak, Mayhaw Jelly, and Chef Huston's Cream of Peanut Soup.

Spiced with delightful anecdotes and lore, Cross Creek Cookery guides the reader through the rich culinary heritage of the deep tidal South with a loving regard for the rituals of cooking and eating. Anyone who longs for food -- and writing -- that warms the heart will find ample portions of both in this classic cookbook. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Rawlings Humor and Recipes
A great read... both for the recipes and for a large dose of Marjorie Rawlings' folksy humor.Loved it from cover to cover.

Much more than a cookbook
A big fan of MKR, I stumbled over this little book at a booksale several years ago----it's paperback and coming apart from use, and the pure pleasure of reading Ms. Rawlings' commentary and recollections of living at Cross Creek. Her biscuit and hoe-cake recipes are worth the price, as they evoked memories of my grandmothers kitchen where it wasn't a meal without fresh, hot bread.
Highly recommended---even if you're not a cook!

A Must For Any Rawlings Fan, Cook or Not!
I've been a fan of Rawlings since I first read her as a teenager.Reading her biography many years ago, I learned of her pride in her cooking.I didn't even know she'd issued a cookbook until I came across this edition!

Upon reading the book I was immediately reminded of the "Alice B. Toklas" cookbook.The structure and literary emphasis are much the same.Thus, for the same reason, it's a joy to read even if one doesn't cook!

However, like "Toklas", the recipes are also a treasure.Many of the recipes contain ingredients too exotic for the average cook, but many more are easily prepared.This can also be a pleasurable and valuable resource for those, like me, who enjoy reading and preparing recipes from old cookbooks.Our eating styles have changed enormously in the nearly sixty years since Rawlings wrote this book.

If you are a fan of Rawlings, buy the book whether you ever plan to cook any of its recipes.Its reasonable cost is a further bonus!

Fantastic recipes of Southern cooking
As the other reviewer has mentioned, this is a collection of recipes, filled with anecdotes of central Florida life in the 1930s and 1940s. The recipes are fantastic and one wants to try all of them (although it may bedifficult to prepare alligator-tail steak). And, what a pleasure it is toread a cookbook written by an accomplished author. You just keep picking itup.

MKR "took more pride in her cooking than in her writing"
It is evident from her cookbook that Marjorie tasted of nearly everything and learned to make delicious dishes out of some very odd things:Poke Weed (on toast), Pot Roast of Bear, Smother-Fried Squirrel, Gopher Stew, Coot Surprise, Jugged Rabbit, a host of Pilaus, and an infamous blackbird pie.Of course this book is not simply a culinary freak-show.There are dozens of recipes for desserts, seafood, meats-found-at-the-A&P, jams, and soups, featuring ingredients of which we are all familiar and unafraid.She was proud to share them and claimed each recipe was nothing short of first-rate.Included among these is her piece de resistance, Crab A La Newburg, and the best Strawberry Shortcake ever.Accompanied by anecdotes of Florida rural living in the 1930s and 1940s, this book is a delight and an excursion from a mundane kitchen ... Read more

Book Description
Originally published in 1942, Cross Creek has become a classic in modern American literature. For the millions of readers raised on The Yearling, here is the story of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings's experiences in the remote Florida hamlet of Cross Creek, where she lived for thirteen years. From the daily labors of managing a seventy-two-acre orange grove to bouts with runaway pigs and a succession of unruly farmhands, Rawlings describes her life at the Creek with humor and spirit. Her tireless determination to overcome the challenges of her adopted home in the Florida backcountry, her deep-rooted love of the earth, and her genius for character and description result in a most delightful and heartwarming memoir. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (19)

Wonderful FL history
Wonderful view of an isolated place in FL (near Gainesville) circa 1930 written by a brave, independent woman.

A walk through old rural FL
Cross Creek is a series of entertaining if perhaps embellished anecdotes relating to Florida in the years preceding World War II told from the perspective of a educated emigré from the North. Some of the language, which was typical of the times, would no longer be considered politically correct and might be offensive to some. The book, however is totally delightful and gives some insight into life in rural Florida at the time. An excellent companion read is Tom Glisson's The Creek, which gives a native's view of the same time and area. Both books are a must read if you live or are interested in North Central FL.

A Classic of Regional Writing
Rawlings explores the lives and interations of the odd assortment of people living in Cross Creek, Florida in the early 1900s. It is often assigned reading for teens, but I doubt that most of them can appreciate it. Her accounts of neighbors feuding and subsistance living gives us many lessons in human behavior.
The lyrical descriptions of wildlife and the orange groves and wild landscape are very appealing. Your mouth waters as you read her essays on downhome foods like hush puppies. She turned those into a cookbook which I'll have to try out.
Modern readers squirm uncomfortably at her use of the N----- word and her characterization of blacks as irresponsible, drunken, immoral, etc. It is probably a faithful representation of common thinking at the time it was written, so recognize it as a snapshot of the times. Then move past that to luxuriate in the beautiful passages in the book. (I deducted 1 star for this)
The reader becomes absorbed in Rawlings' love of the land and the creation of a home. It gives much the same feelings as A Year in Provence or Under a Tuscan Sun.

OFTEN OVERLOOKED WORK
I have been familiar with this work for a number of years and have been rather saddened that more attention has not been paid to it.Yes, they did a sort of TV movie some years ago, but while pleasant, it certainly did not do justice to this particular work by Rawlings.As other reviewers have pointed out, this is a rather autobiographical story of one womans struggle at a time when struggling was common, particularly for women.I personally perfer this work over the Yearling, as I simply feel it is better written and far more insightful.This work gives the reader a glance at what this country was like earlier in the last century, both good and the bad.The author does have way with humor and is able to laugh at herself, something that is always refreshing.For a pure joy and a wonderful read, I would recommend this one highly.

A woman for all seasons
`Cross Creek' is an extraordinary book written by a woman with the keen ability and insight to draw out the poetic from the mundane. An educated cosmopolitanite from the northeast, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings plunged into the rustic life of cracker Florida with a ferocity belying her Leo sun sign. She longed for the farm life, which ran deeper in her veins than did the comforts of urban living. A Pulitzer Prize writer, a naturalist, and gourmet cook, Marjorie was also handy with a shotgun as a person or two found out who mistook her gender for a sign of weakness. Marjorie was a great observer and devotee of nature which she expressed with a resonance that lingers on the heart. She animated the inanimate and bestowed upon the humblest of Florida's creatures, personality. 'Cross Creek' has reached out to me from the deep past to quicken my present experience of living in Florida. I find myself looking expectantly for personality in the natural world. The evidence already exists in 'Cross Creek'. I wish that I had known Marjorie. She died the year I was born. ... Read more

Book Description

Book Description
In The Yearling, her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of 1939, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings wrote the bleak but noble life of the Florida Cracker into American hearts. She secured her popularity as a storyteller and her status as a major voice in American literature in 1942 with the instant success of Cross Creek, the autobiographical vignettes that highlight her ability to create short fiction.

Still, no assessment of the full range and power of her talent has been possible without this volume of all twenty-three of her published short stories, collected together here for the first time. Most appeared in Scribner's Magazine, The New Yorker, Harper's Magazine and the Saturday Evening Post.

Scribner's printed Rawlings's first short story, "Cracker Chidlings," in 1931, just three years after she moved to an orange grove in the backwoods of north-central Florida. With a mix of frontier morality, ingenuity, and humor, the story introduced readers to Fatty Blake's squirrel pilau and 'Shiner Tim's corn liquor. Just as important, it brought her work to the attention of Maxwell Perkins, the famous Scribner's editor, who recognized her talent for storytelling and her eye for detail and who encouraged her to capture human drama in more "Cracker" stories.

Though Rawlings was at home in a man's world, much of her short fiction is told in a woman's voice. She is merciless in "Gal Young 'Un" as she bores in on two women, both competing for the same man and struggling for their dignity. The story, published in Harper's, was awarded the O. Henry Memorial Prize for best short story of 1932 and was made into a prize-winning movie in 1979. Her most autobiographical story, "A Mother in Mannville," describes the sense of personal loss endured by a childless woman writer.

Often at her best combining satire and sarcasm, Rawlings wrote a series of comic stories that featured Quincey Dover, her alter ego. "She is, of course, me," Rawlings wrote, "if I had been born in the Florida backwoods and weighed nearly three hundred pounds." One story Quincey narrates, "Benny and the Bird Dogs," reportedly amused Robert Frost so much that he fell off a rocking chair in a fit of uncontrollable laughter while listening to Rawlings read from it.

Like others who wrote about the South, Rawlings grappled with the problem of how to portray honestly, yet without racism, the situation and the language of her neighbors. Her empathetic description of blacks and her portrayal of the Florida Cracker contribute a valuable perspective on twentieth-century American culture in transition. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Unforettable Yarns & Touching Stories
Many of these fictitious stories were gleaned by the author who lived with, closely observed, and listened to backwoodsmen in the Florida scrub country in the 1930s and 40s. Some are hilarious, others poignant. Even the most tall-tale accounts have a tone of factual basis. Today's reader may well squirm at the racial overtones which Rawlings authentically portrayed, but these give an honest picture of life in her beloved/adopted home. The reader finds that the author relished her experiences with moonshining, cockfighting, etc. These are rich tales. Rawlings' grand desciptions of nature and characters are wonderful. One excellent story,"A Mother in Manville," is out of print elsewhere and worth the price of the book. ... Read more

Product Description
The timeless story of a man, his family, and his land - beautifully told by one of America's most beloved authors.Not long after the publication of THE SOJOURNER came the new of Mrs. Rawling's death. It was bry sad new for her many friends and admirers, and it marked a great loss to the world of literature. Her work will live on...THE SOJOURNER is in itself a splendid testimony to her talent, her warmth and human understanding. ... Read more

Amazon.com
Fighting off a pack of starving wolves, wrestling alligators in theswamp, romping with bear cubs, drawing off the venom of a giant rattlesnake bite with the heart of a fresh-killed deer--it's all in a day's work for the Baxter family of the Florida scrublands. But young Jody Baxter is not content with these electrifying escapades, or even with the cozy comfort of home with Pa and Ma. He wants a pet, a friend with whom he can share his quiet cogitations and his corn pone. Jody gets his pet, a frisky fawn he calls Flag, but that's not all. With Flag comes a year of life lessons, frolicking times, and achingly hard decisions. This powerful book is as compelling now as when it was written over 60 years ago. Read simply as a naturalist study of the Florida interior, it fascinates and entices. Add the heart-stopping adventure and heart-wrenching human elements, and this is a classic well worth its Pulitzer Prize. Earthy dialect and homespun wisdom season the story, giving it a unique and unforgettable flavor, and N.C. Wyeth's warm, soft illustrations capture an era of rough subsistence and sweet survival. (Ages 12 and older) --Emilie CoulterBook Description
In this classic story of the Baxter family of inland Florida and their wild, hard, satisfying life, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings has written one of the great novels of our times. A rich and varied story - tender in its understanding of boyhood, crowded with the excitement of the backwoods hunt, with vivid descriptions of the primitive, beautiful hammock country, with humor and earthy philosophy - The Yearling is a novel for readers of all tastes and ages. Its glowing picture of life that is far and refreshingly removed from modern patterns of living becomes universal in its revelation of simple courageous people and the abiding beliefs they live by. Winner of Pulitzer Prize in 1938, The Yearling was made available the following year in a special edition illustrated by the distinguished American artist, N.C. Wyeth. The original paintings have been re-photographed and new plates made for this handsome volume. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (92)

Part of growing up
I read this book as a young person while still in school.Now, while picking some books for a 10 year old nephew who is becoming an avid reader, I read it again.It is a beautiful book but it made me cry at 74 as well as when I first read it at about 14.I now live close to the Rawlings home in Cross Creek and have a keener apreciation of the setting but the writing itself is what makes the book.Of course the storyrepresents another era and a poor southern family but the characterizations are well drawn and universal.Fodderwing and his family are people that every young person should meet.
Just as the opening words, to my mind, of "Mr. Roberts" transcend good writing and are superb, so the final few sentences of "The Yearling" speak to me in universal terms about youth and "where has it all gone?"

the yearling
received my books in excellent condition as described and in a reasonable amount of time

The Yearling
The Yearling is one of the most emotionally provocative classics I have ever had the fortune to come across. Being a 12 year old myself, I empathize greatly with our young hero, Jody Baxter, who resides in a dense florida scrub, leading an agrarian lifestyle with his father and mother. Coming of age in the savage, untamed heart of late ninteenth century Florida is not an easy task, and Jody will need to mature swiftly if he wants to survive in the wild enviorment that is his own. Luckily, many things aid him, mostly indirectly, such as his pet fawn, that he cares for with such a passion, that in the end, a very difficult and demanding choice is required of him.
Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings writes this splendid tale with an honest and unwavering hand, thankfully not romanticizing the protaganist, as can be seen with novels of a lesser quality. Our heroe's flaws and redeeming qualities are portrayed in a realistic fashion, as Rawlings shifts between comedy and tragedy with the deft skill of a very gifted writer. This delightful story is bereft of all unconvincing melodrama that often plagues such novels, and tells this innocent boys experiences with vivid imagery. No matter how impassive the reader might be, Rawlings eventually delves into our minds, hearts, and memories.

I Feel Sorry for the So-Called "Kids" and Teens of the 1 Star
I originally wasn't planning to write another review for amazon.com, but the movie of "The Yearling" was on TV last night. Remembering how it touched me, especially the sorrowful end, I decided to take a look at the reviews posted here.

Most were brilliant, right to the point, and then I saw "kid's review" and a few others that found the book boring.

Sorry, children, that in an age of Paris Hilton and Lindsey Lohan, not to mention strumpets like Britney and Jessica Simpson you don't have the chance to come of age. Or to appreciate a classic, moving read. Yes, we're an image and media-driven society, and the negative effect of it all falls on these kids who not only hate a classic, but can't even write why they hate it in a meaningful review.
This the price we are paying when our kids can't feel struggle, pity, or hurt.

"The Yearling" was a very realistic tale of the life of a poor American family struggling to make ends meet in late 19th Century Florida, and of a boy who like many today, doesn't understand that there is bitter besides the sweet in life - especially when it comes to the loss of a beloved pet. I can only wish that some of the sorry weirdos who have recently murdered schoolchildren or another weirdo denizen of Florida had read this book, or the Twain and Jack London classics when they were children. They might have learned something good and moral beyond the twisted thoughts that they came of age with.

This book, along with the aforementioned Twain and London classics, "Uncle Tom's Cabin", and Bill Bennett's "Book of Virtues" should belong on the bookshelf of any and all American mid-and upper-elementary school age children.

I teach 6th grade and I would not hesitate in recommending this book or any of the classics that I grew up reading to my students.

The Yearling
I remember checking The Yearling out of the library when I was 10 or 11. I read the first few pages and was so intimidated by the length of the novel that I returned it to the library two weeks later...unread. My loss. I just finished reading this book and it is a beautiful, poignant, rich story that I will hold in my heart forever. I appreciated Rawlings' detailed descriptions and her extensive character development. I felt like I was really there in the Florida scrub experiencing everything that Jody experienced. Jody's love for Flag is so lovely, touching, beautiful...and familiar. Have you ever had a pet whom you loved more than anyone else in the world and would do anything for? There is no other love like it...it is true devotion. The scene where Jody meets Flag is so enthralling that I wanted to read it over and over. I felt like I knew each character and I became so attached to Jody and Flag and their devoted friendship that I wept in more places than one.

Although I think this is an excellent book for children and adults, I'm not sure that there are many teenagers who will appreciate it. It is a harsh story in places, but it is not so much the harshness that I'm talking about. This book is about a time when people were more at one with nature and life was simple and slow-moving. There are no explosions, no sex, no swearing and no gratuitous violence. I loved the novel for those reasons. To many young people, this may spell "boring". Although I would have loved this story at any time in my life, had I read it when I was a teenager, I would have never had the patience for the rich detail. Now, I savor it. I loved the story for its slow-moving, simplicity and detail and because it was a total break from the warp speed and superficiality of today.

This is actually the best book I've ever read, and definitely the most touching. I can't wait to have children old enough to read it together with them. This is an unforgettable coming-of-age story...I think you have to have come of age yourself to really appreciate the landscape that Jody traverses with his cherished friend and where it brings him. I'm so glad I took the time to read this wonderful book and really savor it. I can't recommend it highly enough. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

An Amazingly Good Read
I join the other reviewers in praise of this book. I cannot believe that I had never heard about it before. Once started I could barely put it down. The characters are well-drawn, and the prose is lovely. The storyline of good and evil, the obvious love of the land, drew me in and wrapped me up in the story. I feel as though I know these people, particulary Ase, the main charactor. I was truly sorry to see the story end, althought he ending was deeply satisfying. Read this--you won't be sorry!

The Sojourner : Not a Florida Novel, but Just as Good.
The Sojourner, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings 1953.
Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. 313 pp.

Ase Linden, is a small farmer who adores his wife, loves and fears his lunatic mother and yearns for the return of a brother who fled the confines of an overly affectionate mother to never look back again. Over the course of the story, Ase is confronted with trials set upon him by family members. The story is surrounded by the theme of Ase recognizing his failures with his children, mother, and wife. He desperately wants to share with them his thoughts and feelings, but is unable to effectively articulate what he wants to communicate. This literary effort greatly contrasts with Marjorie Rawlings' earlier Florida writings. Critics tend to be hard on The Sojourner, probably due the enormous success of her previous Florida based novels. This criticism is unfounded. This story, though unlike her Florida novels is an impressive book. The readers will find themselves siding with Ase Linden and cheering him on in his pursuit of simple pleasures and joy through personal connections.

The Sojourner
What a wonderful book! The characters are vivid and captivating. Asahel Lindon is the type of warm, decent, honest human being we may all aspire to be. The author's simple, direct prose is enlivened by her appreciation of the central character's love for the land he tended for over sixty years. There is also much of the author's love for good food in evidence, with many country home-cooked meals described in mouth-watering detail.
But it is the caring, gentle nature of Lindon which is the real drawing point of the novel. I was sincerely saddened when I came to the end of the book. In leaving Asahel, I felt that I had left a very good friend whom I shall not soon forget.

Living Well
Although Asahel Linden would not have cared whether others considered him successful or not, it is a great encouragement to watch the protagonist of this book live with such an integrity and a highly developed ability toperceive beauty and wonder and delight and excellence that all with thecapacity to recognize such qualities see in him a great man.MarjorieRawlings writes honestly and well;her novel encourages us to live in thesame way.

An extraordinary book !
I had the tremendous good fortune to read "The Sojourner" in the early stages of my discovery of Marjorie Rawlings' works.As a result, I have read virtually all of her published writings.Anyone who wrote such a magnificent book as "The Sojourner", I decided, certainly deserved as much attention as possible.My loyalty has been richly rewarded. I cannot recommend this book too highly to anyone who enjoys a beautifully written, epic and inpirational story with an extraordinary protagonist.It amazes me that this book has never become better known.Rawlings' last novel, it shows her at the formidable peak of her powers. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Lament forthe Death of Old Florida.
SOUTH MOON UNDER is a page flipper and hard to set aside. Definitely 5 Star Quality.

True, it's a tale of the demeaned and marginalized Florida Cracker, who ekes a living from the Scrub, avoiding unnecessary contact with civilization; but Rawlings' anthropology is soaked with death. Her book is a lament for the death of Old Florida.

Civilization destroys the land and the critters and the people.

Life in the Scrub
South Moon Under is beautifully written with fascinating detail and plenty of suspense. Rawlings wrote this story of subsistence living in the Florida scrub country after living with a moonshiner family for several weeks. Thepicture of their struggle to eke a living in this marginal land makes forfascinating reading.

But the more important aspect of this novel is therevelation of what government laws and power mean in the every day lives ofpeople living only a hair's breath away from starvation. We see how immoraland corrupt laws and those who enforce them destroyed the delicate balanceof survival for the people of the scrub. I don't know if she intended it tobe, but this is an anti government, libertarian novel and an importantcontribution to the historical record. Every liberty lover would gain muchfrom reading this book. ... Read more

Book Description
RELIVE THE WONDER OF A CHILDHOOD FAVORITE THAT HAS BEEN CAPTURING THE HEARTS OF READERS FOR MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY.

An instant bestseller when it was released in 1938, this Pulitzer Prize winner has been read and loved by school-age children across the nation for more than fifty years. In this classic story of the Baxter family and their wild, hard, and satisfying life in remote central Florida, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings has written one of the great novels of our times. A rich and varied tale -- tender in its understanding of boyhood, crowded with the excitement of the backwoods hunt, with vivid descriptions of the primitive, beautiful hammock country, written with humor and earthy philosophy -- The Yearling is a novel for readers of all ages. Its glowing picture of a life refreshingly removed from modern patterns of living is universal in its revelation of simple courageous people and the beliefs they must live by.

This edition, complete with a new introduction by author Ivan Doig, will be cherished for years to come and will make a welcome addition to any booklover's shelf.

... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

A simple yet penetrating glimpse into the world of boyhood innocence.
In past reviews, people have speculated that if The Yearling were to have been published in today's times, would it still have been awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Literature. For me, I would have to say that that would be a resounding yes. I say so because the novel captures, with vivid simplicity, a bygone American era via the stark usage of the literaty resources available to Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings at the time, quite simply, the values, environment and language which surrounded her. Being the excellent and astute writer that she was, she transposed those raw yet natural elements to her characters, specificially the gruff yet loving Baxter clan.

In a time where people are adrift due to the constant onslaught of materialism, celebrity, technology, vanity, money, you name it, the Baxter clan are a refreshing anomaly, for all of the above was not really available to them, and if it was, it was to a very limited degree. But because of that humbling deprivation, they as a family and individualistically speaking, were interiorily richer in so many different capacities. Their lessons came from the law of the land, the primal yet earthy philosophy of kill or be killed. But it was also a deep almost religious respect of the land and its animals that could definitely shape the thinking and the ever evolving twists and turns that are in abundance in The Yearling. Ezra Baxter-Jody's father-to some extent, could be considered as the Atticus Finch of the Florida backwoods, for he respects the codes that govern the wilderness and for the wild animals who occupy it. And thus, he kills only when necessary; he imbues that code of ethics in Jody who is of a tremendously malleable age, especially by the Forrester family and their sometimes less-than-stellar behavior.

The novel is about being a boy, about growing up and about sacrifice, and when Jody, a lone child, adopts a fawn whom he names Flag, the emptiness of being a lone child abates; the fawn, a cherished pet, is a co-experiencer with Jody of the highs and lows of living in the scrub country, and he is there for Jody's various milestones, his inching along toward the tower of manhood. But sometimes just doing the day-to-day obligations of life is simply not enough. Sometimes one has to go beyond what is expected, and the latter half of the book illustrates that sacrifice entails pain, large or small, for real love sometimes does hurt. The Yearling is pungent, pure, simple, true and very very giving, absolutely worthy of the 1939 Pulitzer Prize.

Classic love story of the South (not "Gone With the Wind")
This is one of my favorite books ever written! Maybe it's one of those sentimental things, but I suppose the best books are sentimental. And let's face it, any person that dares roll their eyes at the love between a human and an animal clearly is not a pet owner. It's a bond, true and simple, and Ms. Rawlings does an excellent job of combining that fact with a powerful story of the rough world of the backwoods and the human relationship with nature.

The idea is pretty simple--a boy finds an abandoned fawn an raises it as a pet--sort of like a dog. Jody is an awkward kid in ways that modern teen angst writers will never quite capture, a boy trapped between childhood and manhood (yeah, it's coming-of-age, but it is a classic scenario that will never die!) living in poverty with a family he doesn't quite understand and who in return don't quite understand him. This deer, this yearling, is something of his refuge.

Beyond this basic story is a collage of subplots that intertwine themselves in a believable, honest manner that relies in equal parts on character, plot, and fate without ever feeling contrived.

Rawlings' writing might bother some people, but it's no different from what plenty of other authors have done in a magical attempt to capture the way people talk. It's quirky, enchanting, and absolutely descriptive in setting and emotion.

The story of a boy and his pet deer instead of a dog. Why not?

Outstanding!
I was blown away by Rawlings amazing writing, and beautiful voice. I being a 13 year old that hates to read, found myself enjoying this book. I was amazed by the way Rawlings captured your heart with her in-depth descriptions of the character's feelings.

The only critisism I have is that the middle became to be a bit dragged out, and boring. She seemed to repeat herself, and the hunting scenes were a bit redundant.

I would suggest this book to ANYONE that can read, no matter their age.

One my lifetime favorites
I recently re-read this book after many years, having first read it when I was only ten years old. So moved by this story, even at that age, I knew that I was destined to become a writer myself.

Set in the Florida backcountry during the Post Civil War years, it is essentially a coming of age story about a twelve year old boy whose family is struggling daily just to survive. The difficulty in tending their meager crops and few livestock against harsh weather and predacious bears seems alien in our world today, yet was very real not so long ago. For me, it is the wonderfully descriptive prose that captured my soul. Every smell, the warmth of the sun, the sound of pattering rain, even the thrill of the hunt are written in such vivid colorful imagery that one feels drawn into these pages. As so with Jody's loneliness and isolation. His only friend is Fodderwing, a crippled boy who lives miles away, and his only pet is the family dog, who is loyal to no one but Jody's father, yet is too old to romp like a pup anyway. With the fawn coming into his life, he has a changed perspective. Jody is a little boy with a new friend and something to be responsible for, but most of all, something to call his own. Unfortunately, and as in most cases, trying to tame a wild animal ends up in tragedy, and twice in this story the reader faces along with Jody, the inescapable heartbreak that comes from having lost someone or something near and dear. The final result is that we witness his transformation to manhood.

Miss Rawlings must also be commended for the way her characters are developed. Simple yet thorough, by the time she's finished with each, it is as if you have known that person your entire life.

Probably for me, what drew such a strong connection to this book was the fact that I could find many parallels to the difficult life of my own maternal grandparents. Although they lived in the forest and prairie of Central Illinois, their speech was similar, and they endured much of the same hardships. Fortunately, because of their grown children and a successful, adult grandchild, most of that was behind them by the time I came along. Still, I understood what they had gone through to raise three kids on a small plot of ground miles from town, with no running water or electricity. Like Jody in this story, his boyish behavior of running off to the woods all day to play and explore was much like how I remember my time visiting the grandparent's farm. The same with my brothers and cousins.

I suppose this is considered a children's book, but I recommend it for everyone. Take the time to enjoy this wonderful story. I promise that you will not be disappointed.

James Hart Isley
Author of The Bear Hunter

Life knocks a man down
An incomparable story of growth and survival in the most difficult conditions. The Yearling, set in the scrubland of northern Florida a couple of decades after the Civil War, is the story of the Baxter family: little "Penny" Baxter, the father, a saintly figure who is wise, understanding, kind, brave, dutiful, stoic; Ory, the mother, whose essential goodness has been buried to some degree by endless toil and the death of several babies; and Jody, who is about 12 when the story begins, a good-natured sprite for whom nature is benevolent and everything is to be explored.

The Baxters live some 15 miles from the nearest town and four miles from their nearest neighbors, the Forresters, a family of massive sons who are variously good hearted and murderous drunks. In this environment, the little Baxter family scratches out its existence.

Two themes predominate: the loss of childhood innocence and Implacable Nature. The latter is depicted in a variety of ways: a legendary maurauding bear that is seemingly impossible to kill; a pack of hungry wolves several dozen strong; a flood that destroys everything in its path and leaves the plague in its wake; a terrible poisonous snake that threatens the life of one of the characters. In this unforgiving environment, Penny forges ahead at all times, hunting and farming to provide for his little brood, rarely at a loss despite the continual setbacks that afflict "Baxter's Island," the small territory that the family owns.

It's not all harshness, however. Moments of beauty break through at intervals, particularly when father and son are off on a leisurely hunt. There is often a great reverence shown for flowers, trees, waterways, birds, animals, and the landscape as a whole. A lovely character named Fodder-wing (of the Forrester clan) has a whole backwoods menagerie, one that young Jody would duplicate were it not for opposition from his mother, who knows all too well the trouble that animals can cause once they have grown to maturity.

The consolation prize for Jody is Flag, a fawn that he claims after its mother has been killed. Jody loves Flag as much as any 12-year-old boy in the world today loves his dog--much more, really, since it is the only thing in the world that is exclusively his.

Over the course of a year, Jody lives through all the terrors that nature--and, sometimes, man--can inflict and prepares, unknowingly, to eventually take over Penny's role as provider for the family. In the opening chapter, Jody has a particularly fine time off on his own, in the woods, and when it is over he cannot sleep because "a mark was on him from the day's delight, so that all his life, when April was a thin green and the flavor of rain was on his tongue, an old wound would throb and a nostalgia would fill him for something he could not quite remember." It is the last full day of his childhood innocence.

By the end, when events have taken their difficult course, it is Penny who must counsel Jody and explain how he wanted to spare Jody as long as he could from the rigors of adulthood. He explains, "A man's heart aches, seein' his young uns face the world. Knowin' they got to git their guts tore out, the way his was tore. I wanted to spare you, long as I could. I wanted you to frolic with your yearlin'." But, as he points out, life knocks you down, and when you get up, it knocks you down again. "What's he to do then? What's he to do when he gits knocked down? Why, take it for his share and go on." And Jody understands and takes up his new responsbility, to himself and to his family.

I haven't conveyed in this short review the brilliance of the descriptions of the landscape and all it contains, the richness of the many characters who populate the book, or the excitement of the twists and turns that befall the characters--but it's all there. I will close by saying that although The Yearling is catgorized as a sort of children's book, it is one that adult lovers of literature would enjoy; moreover, it would be difficult to read for those under the age of 15, I would think.

Also, for those considering reading this book to their children, as I just did, keep in mind that it's not for the squeamish. As Penny says, and as the book reveals, "You've seed how things goes in the world o' men. You've knowed men to be low-down and mean. You've seed ol' Death at his tricks. You've messed around with ol' Starvation. Ever' man wants life to be a fine thing, and a easy. 'Tis fine, boy, powerful fine, but 'tain't easy." ... Read more