Ida Mae and Her Passage to Chautauqua by Rick Taylor
Impressed by snippets from the creator’s life, Ida Mae and Her Passage to Chautauqua (Koehler Books) is a historic nonfiction narrative by award-winning poet and creator, Rick Taylor. The story spans two generations, recounting the journey of Ida Mae Glockley and that of her son Adrian from their childhood to maturity and their numerous adventurous travels.
The story begins in a small city in West Virginia known as Mammoth Falls. Ida Mae is a thirteen-year-old woman who, alongside together with her greatest good friend Jess, is navigating the sophisticated world of puberty, wild teenage hormones and sexuality. Whereas Jess’s mom encourages Jess to discover her sexuality, Ida Mae is raised in a house with robust Christian values, so is inclined to observe abstinence till marriage. Sadly, the highway to retaining her virginity isn’t as straight as Ida Mae anticipated it to be. It’s made particularly tougher since she retains listening to tales of Jess’ adventurous encounters with boys, tales which make Ida Mae “as sizzling as a Christmas Goose”. If she is to maintain her promise of abstinence, then she must discover a distraction.
Fortunately, Ida Mae meets Dodger, a banjo participant with an enormous coronary heart who provides her a much-needed distraction. He gives to show her how you can play the banjo, and fairly quickly, she begins singing too. As her new-found love for music grows, it diverts her on a path that adjustments the course of her life. At nineteen, Ida Mae is a fortunately married school pupil. Sadly, her happiness is short-lived when she experiences the tragic lack of her husband. This forces her to make a life-altering choice of quitting school and enlisting within the Ladies’s Military Corps in Vietnam. As Ida Mae’s journey into womanhood continues, she learns to battle the unpredictability of life, discover love and make adventurous travels together with her buddies and family members.
By Ida Mae and Her Passage to Chautauqua, Rick Taylor superbly captures the essence of what it means to reside a full unfiltered life. Taylor’s artistic writing expertise are evident by this story as He merges two superbly executed and equally attention-grabbing storylines into one, overlaying central themes of affection, loss, household, religion, resilience and the tragic outcomes of conflict.
Taylor has additionally carried out a wonderful job crafting the setting of the story, because it strikes from the small, charming valley of Mammoth Falls to the bustling streets of Pittsburgh, the Deep Creek Lake in Maryland, and the breathtaking view of Lake Chautauqua in New York. Though it is a fast-paced novel, I appreciated how the occasions within the story stream easily from one to the opposite, making it simple for readers to know and observe the narrative’s development.
One of many issues that makes this guide stand out from others is the incorporation of poetry within the narrative. I’m an enormous fan of poetry. So, I liked how the poems mix in with a number of the themes lined within the story and the way they add extra depth to the story, permitting readers to empathize with the characters’ feelings. Taylor’s expertise for poetry shines by on this guide.
General, Ida Mae and Her Passage to Chautauqua is a compelling story. Its numerous themes and pleasant characters pull on the strings of your coronary heart and makes you care about what occurs subsequent. You are feeling such as you’re part of her journey and may’t assist however preserve turning the pages to see what comes subsequent. In the event you’re into historic fiction with well-developed characters and a powerful sense of place, then you definately’ll get pleasure from this one.
Publish Date: 3/19/2024
Style: Historic Fiction
Creator: Rick Taylor
Web page Depend: 190 pages
Writer: Koehler Books
ISBN: 9798888242711