Bingo Night at the Fire Hall: Rediscovering Life in an American Village
Holland (Endangered Pleasures, Little, Brown, 1995) left her advertising job in Philadelphia when she inherited a house in rural Virginia. Here she recounts her adventures in establishing a life for herself as a single woman in a small, isolated community in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Lonely, she finds a part-time job on the local newspaper, adopts a second cat, and makes friends with her neighbors in a society that moves at a slower pace and is almost crime-free. She tells her story in a voice that is genial, funny, self-deprecating, and always aware of the differences between city and country. Only occasionally is her city-wise voice intrusive, as when she comments on the transitory nature of an old-fashioned Sunday evening courthouse concert instead of letting the scene speak for itself. Her fears are justified, however, when the beginning of a subdivision sprouts in the cow pasture below her mountaintop home. A thoughtful work; highly recommended for public libraries.?Caroline A. Mitchell, Washington, D.C.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.