The Hitchhiking Grandmother, Grace Small

The last I read Grace was traveling across the south. Grace went to Chattanooga to visit a few friends. She went back to Ed to see if he would take her back but he didn't want her. Grace was devastated. She traveled to N.Y. to get a job at a weapons plant for WWII. At her new job, she was higher up on the assembly plant as a man and it drove him nuts. Grace's mom also moves in with her, and dies while digging a ditch for her daughter.

This chapter was fun to read, she took a small break from hitchhiking which is probably good for her. Grace said that the government plowed down people's houses to put in these factories which suprised me because I never heard of this happening. I also think that it was rather astonishing for Grace to watch her mom die. Kind of scary aswell. I finished part 1 of the book, so I'm looking foreward to see what part 2 has in store for me.

The Hitchhiking Grandmother, Grace Small

Grace and her husband, Ed, got divorced after having 4 children and all of them had grown up and left. Grace didn't have anywhere to go or money, so she decided to hitchhike to visit one of her daughters in Beloxi, Mississippi. Many People scolded her for hitchhiking. She met a man who was hitchhiking as well and he told her some tips on hitchhiking.

This past reading has inspired me to hitchhike. It seems very fun, even though it is probably pretty dangerous. I'm sad that Grace and her husban got divorced but it's good that they did it after all their children moved out. It's kind of funny to think that he fell in love with young, women because they most likely wouldn't like him, because he's a poor old man. From what I've read Grace has only hitchhiked around the South. I'm hoping that she'll go through Atlanta.

The Hitchhiking Grandmother, Grace Small

Well, Grace's Father got a job at the local telephone company. He got it because it was a steady job and they gave him a house with it as well. Grace tells us the story of how she learned to read and of her marriage. She said that she got married because her father had died and she went through shock. The people who surrounded her arranged it for her and thought it would make her feel better. Before her father died, the phone company he worked for got cars and he became a mechanic. It was the only shop in the city so he got good business.

It seems as though back then people were more free to do what they wanted with their lives and could do things they wanted to do without degrees. It sounds much nicer to me. I think that it's pretty cool that Grace got to work for her father as a mechanic, she said she pulled cars out of ditches for her dad. She made it sound fun. She also described learning how to read in a good way. The woman who tought her to read must have been very smart because she tricked Grace into reading by getting her to come to her house everyday and using reverse psychology to get her to do so. I'm wondering what will happen to Grace and her newly wedded husband because she described them as opposites.

The Hitchhiking Grandmother, Grace Small

I am now reading: The Hitchhiking Grandmother, by Grace Small. Published 1990 by The Pilgrim Way Press. This book tells the story of a woman, Grace Williams, in Illinois. In the first 3 chapters Grace tells the story of her early childhood and all the places she moved to in Mclean county Illinois. Her dad had many jobs, mostly working on a farm. He once owned a hotel, which he liked the best because he was a people person.

I like this book much better than Life on the Mississippi. I think it is rather a humorous autobiography. I'm suprised with this book because I found two errors in the text, so I'm guessing that it was published by a small private company. I stopped reading after Grace told me the story about her father's hotel burning down so I'm excited to read about where her and her family moves next. I was also suprised to hear that her dad bought her a piano, from what I know, pianos are expensive, and I don't think that owning the hotel brought in much money from what I read.

Life on the missippi, Mark Twain

In the next chapter Twain discusses the history of the Mississippe more and in the one after that, he starts talking about the history but, then discusses a chapter in Huck Finn he wrote while he was on a raft in the Mississippi. The chapter tells the story of Huck swimming over to a raft to see what the people were talking about. Huck describes the raft as having atleast 13 men aboard and all of them were drinking. He also tells us the story of one of the men becoming drunk and started to sing.

I think the chapter that Twain talked about was an unpublished chapter, because I don't remember it in the Huckleberry Finn book, the header on the top of the page read "an unpublished chapter". I think that this book is going to be about Mark Twain's experience on the Mississippi and he is telling us random stories about things that happened to him on it. The book hasn't gotten very exciting yet so I'm hoping that something good will happen soon.

Life on the Mississippi, Mark Twain

I am now reading Life on the Mississippi by, Mark Twain, this book did not provide me with the information for when it was published. I would guess it was published around 1890. In the first chapter Twain discussed the history about the Mississippi. He was suprised that it took 150 years since De Soto had discovered the Mississippi for someone else to go back and visit it. He also discussed all the things that happened in Europe after the discovery of the Mississippi.
I thought the first chapter was a good chapter to catch the reader's attention, it caught mine. It caught my attention because Twain gave me a brief history of the Mississippi. I was suprised that he called De Soto a White man. I know that he was considered one but I'm not used to calling someone white who speaks Spanish as their native language. Even though he probably didn't speak Spanish. I think it's kind of funny that he made the Mississippi sound like the greatest thing in the world, I think it was to catch the reader's attention. I'm looking forward to reading the next chapter to see if he makes this book a biography or a fictional story.

Better a Dinner of Herbs, Byron Herbert Reece

In the last part that I read, The preacher slaps his wife and Enid gets really mad at him. The preacher leaves and on his way back Enid intercepts him on a road, Enid taunts the Preacher with a parable. During their talk we find out that Danny is the Preacher's bastard son. The Preacher gets his mare, that he is riding on, to run off and at the same time Enid pushes The Preacher off. The Preacher's left foot gets stuck in the reins and he is dragged to death. Mary finds out about her husbands death later that afternoon, they have the wake the next day, and the night of the wake Enid runs away and is never heard of again. When Danny finds out that his uncle is gone he goes through shock and it takes him awhile to get recovered.
The end of this book was alot different than I thought it would be, but the excitement of the end was what I wanted. I really didn't think that the end would be so sad, having a little inocent boy like Danny cry can really break someone's heart. I also thought that Enid was a little more level headed and really didn't expect him to kill the Preacher. I might think differently though if he had made my sister pregnant and if she died after giving child birth. I think that maybe this book might be much more frightening for an adult to read because these situations are more for adults and someone my age wouldn't probably see the full severness of some of the events that happened. All in all though I enjoyed this book and I would like to read more like this one.