Idyll Banter: Weekly Excursions to a Very Small Town

Kliatt, July, 2004 by Sunnie Grant

IDYLL BANTER: WEEKLY EXCURSIONS TO A VERY SMALL TOWN. Chris Bohjalian. 2003. Read by the author. 4 cds. 4.5 hrs. Random House Audio. 0-7293-0914-5. $25.00. Cardboard; content notes. SA

As author Chris Bohjalian and his wife lay face down on a Brooklyn pavement outside a crack house that had just been raided by the police, they came to the conclusion that it was time to relocate to New England. Bohjalian narrates a series of essays he had written as magazine articles and weekly columns for newspapers, chronicling a 12-year span in their new life in rural Lincoln, Vermont. Tales range from the sublime to outrageously funny, as they adjust to town meetings, muddy roads, floods that destroy the town's beloved library, bat carcasses in the wood stove, barn cats, and adventures of navigating steep, icy roadways. Quaint, quirky, and quintessential life far removed from the fast lane. Sunnie Grant, Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, Ipswich, MA