The Last Days of Dogtown - Anita Diamant

The Last Days of Dogtown by Anita Diamant

This ... was ... a BEAUTIFUL book. It is the fictionalized true story (is that possible?) of this group of poor neighboors in northern Massachusetts in the ... 1800s? She found scraps of old documentation about these people and this town and then created their lives in a novel format. Each character "speaks" in the third person and it is always clear who is speaking. In the author's note, she says something along the lines of "these people and places are real, but I have created the story. They are all but forgotten people and a forgotten town -- what's the harm in believing the stories to be true?"

BIG fan. Five bookmarks. Highly recommended.

PS I actually took my time reading this and didn't get so excited that I missed paragraphs and pages -- I think it will be my new reading strategy. Patience. :o)