How To Really Live!
This book is amazing. It tells the story of Haze Evans who writes a column for a newspaper twice a week for 50 years. At the beginning of the book Haze goes to her birthday celebration and on the way home suffers a massive stroke.
The part I liked about this book, is that through her column, from 1964 to 2017, we get to see what her life was like from the beginning of her adult life with flashes to her childhood, up until her stroke. To say she is loved by the small town is unnecessary.
The newspaper decides to go into her archives of every column she ever wrote with letters from the readers, at the beginning mailed in and now in her emails! Susan the publisher comes up with this idea, and she quickly brings her moody, obtuse, teenager Sam, in to help read the files and see what he finds is interesting. With much resentment he goes with her to work and by the time time passes he gets to read about so many things; history, Kennedy's assassination, growing up, being in love, and he starts to make a 360* turnaround.
Susan starts publishing her old columns in the paper until she is able to come back, and all the town is in agreement of this. She gets so many visits from the townspeople, and the workers at the paper so she is not alone too often. On top of her columns, she also posted recipes, and the women loved it! She had all kinds of readers!
From the beginning she was a rebel of sorts, and she even started "Happy Tea" at work where they would all get together and drink tea and talk together. A few of the men brought liquor and homemade wine, and then it was moved to The Sundown Trap, where every friday they brewed tea for the office! Up until she went into the hospital every friday was spent this way, the brewing of tea passed on to the proprietor's daughter Chris Johnson, who still made tea on friday.
On October 29th, 2018 the newspaper reported that she had passed away. Everyone is saddened and she has a huge funeral, because the whole town attended, even Sam, the boy whose life she changed and now finally had the girlfriend he had been dreaming about in school for years!
There is so much hilarity and also a bit of melancholy on occasion in her columns, but she was real, and honest about her feelings and this made the book so awesome! I gave this book 5 stars!
The part I liked about this book, is that through her column, from 1964 to 2017, we get to see what her life was like from the beginning of her adult life with flashes to her childhood, up until her stroke. To say she is loved by the small town is unnecessary.
The newspaper decides to go into her archives of every column she ever wrote with letters from the readers, at the beginning mailed in and now in her emails! Susan the publisher comes up with this idea, and she quickly brings her moody, obtuse, teenager Sam, in to help read the files and see what he finds is interesting. With much resentment he goes with her to work and by the time time passes he gets to read about so many things; history, Kennedy's assassination, growing up, being in love, and he starts to make a 360* turnaround.
Susan starts publishing her old columns in the paper until she is able to come back, and all the town is in agreement of this. She gets so many visits from the townspeople, and the workers at the paper so she is not alone too often. On top of her columns, she also posted recipes, and the women loved it! She had all kinds of readers!
From the beginning she was a rebel of sorts, and she even started "Happy Tea" at work where they would all get together and drink tea and talk together. A few of the men brought liquor and homemade wine, and then it was moved to The Sundown Trap, where every friday they brewed tea for the office! Up until she went into the hospital every friday was spent this way, the brewing of tea passed on to the proprietor's daughter Chris Johnson, who still made tea on friday.
On October 29th, 2018 the newspaper reported that she had passed away. Everyone is saddened and she has a huge funeral, because the whole town attended, even Sam, the boy whose life she changed and now finally had the girlfriend he had been dreaming about in school for years!
There is so much hilarity and also a bit of melancholy on occasion in her columns, but she was real, and honest about her feelings and this made the book so awesome! I gave this book 5 stars!