Out of the Ozarks

By William Childress

Book Overview

William Childress has roamed the Ozarks of Missouri, Illinois, and Arkansas for 13 years. His training as a poet--he has published three books of poems--helps him create splendor and grace in a description of a sunset or shape the mood of a rainy autumn day.

Through striking word-pictures of his life, you will meet Chilly's irascible, lovable stepfather, his three sons, and long-dead members of his family whose lives or deeds touched him and were chronicled. And you will laugh with his neighbors and friends, whose humor helps them through life in a county that has been called "one of the poorest in America." They are not all saints, nor are the Ozarks heaven--just "paradise with the gate left off."

For more than a dozen years, William Childress has written of southwestern Missouri in magazines like Reader's Digest, Sports Afield, McCalls, Country Roads, and Friends (the Chevrolet magazine that has carried his national column since 1979). But his millions of readers know him best through his thrice-weekly column in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, twice nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, and through his frequent personal appearances, where he sometimes sings his own songs and plays a mandolin, harmonica, and 12-string guitar.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0809313669
• ISBN13: 9780809313662
• Release Date: October 1987
• Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.5" x 5.4"

Customer Reviews

WONDERFUL STORIES BY A FIRST RATE STORY TELLER.

First read this one in the mid l980s and enjoyed every page and word. This is a loosly attached group of stories, one man's expierences living in the Ozarks of Missouri. Having grown up within a few miles of the setting of this work, I found the author captured the spirit of that wonderful place perfectly. It is a shame that this is considered a "regional work" as the author's wit and observations could quite well fill any setting. If you can get a copy, this is certainly one you will want to add to your library. Recommend this one highly.