I am continuing my list of books to read in 2011- some you may have missed through the years. Here are some great reads by author Sandra Dallas. I discovered her by chance in a bookstore when I was intrigued by the title of her book - Buster Midnight's Cafe. I bought the book, fell in love with the characters and her writing style and have been a fan ever since that time.
4. Buster Midnight’s Café by Sandra Dallas Some of the most compelling and loveable characters in fiction are in this book. Small town Montana boasted a movie star hopeful (May Anna) and a heavyweight contender (Buster) but their two best friends Effa Commander and Whippy Bird (you’ll love her) stay back home in Butte as their pals find fame, fortune and ultimately tragedy. A beautifully written story that evokes war time rural America and all the glamour of studio era 1940’s Hollywood. A book I have gifted repeatedly… If you love this you’ll also enjoy The Persian Pickle Club (a quilting circle in 1930’s Kansas that provides life support and group therapy for it’s vastly different women - think Steel Magnolias at a quilting bee), The Diary of Mattie Spenser about a young Iowa wife on the Overland Trail (by covered wagon) on her way to Colorado. Getting used to a husband, a new land, and then a prairie home are all shared through her writings. And what a tale she tells… My other Dallas favorite is Whiter Than Snow, which takes place in a small Colorado mining town in the 1920’s and centers on the terrible wait to discover who has survived an avalanche that buried a school. Each of the families is detailed with their story woven through the continuing thread of fear and hope. It is a day when the haves and have nots of the town become equals and when the barriers of wealth and poverty have no distinction. A powerful narrative.
