Plopping myself near the fan at the cabin on Sunday, I opened up this book given as a birthday present to me a couple years back. Inspired by Chris who is an avid reader, I am trying to become more bookish myself. This delightful story can be read in one sitting, and the illustrations are sketches that add to the appeal of the story. Set in Russia during the 19th century, a young aristocrat dresses up as a peasant girl and takes a walk through the forest hoping for a chance meeting with the man she admires. Back in those days it was improper for her to seek out the affections of a man, so she planned this accidental meeting! After several secret rendezvous, the couple falls madly in love, but she cannot reveal her true identity because their fathers are feuding making a marriage between the families impossible.
With no background in Russian literature or history, some of the references went right over my head, but if you are looking for an entertaining read written with brevity, pick up a copy of An Amateur Peasant Girl by Alexander Pushkin. Chris even snatched it up after me reading it in one sitting.
Chris Wiesinger, the Bulb Hunter, founded The Southern Bulb Company to share his finds with the world. 
What a nice idea, recommending books. After all, we can’t garden all the time. Or, in August, I almost cannot garden at all. Enjoyed the book and thought I would recommend a writer to the two of you, an Arkansan whose characters spend most of their time in Texas.
. Portis has a southern wit that is so subtle and rare the humor sometimes almost hurts, especially if you must read him alone. When you read one of Portis’ books, you need someone around with whom to share it, so you can laugh out loud and not feel like an idiot.
I recommend “Norwood,” who is an East Texas boy with ambition who works at the Nipper Gas Station back when people worked at gas stations and who aspires to see the world. Or at least get to Shreveport and the stage of the Louisiana Hayride so he can be discovered, like Hank Williams and Elvis Presley. Norwood is an innocent and therein lies the story. The people he meets and lives around are all nuts of various sorts, kind of like the people most of us know. Such fun.
The second is a dab more complex–”The Dog of the South.” The friend who gave it to me wrote on the title page, “If you don’t love this novel as much as I do, PLEASE never tell me!” I loved it from the first paragraph, where Ray Midge begins, “My wife Norma had run off with Guy Dupree and I was waiting around for the credit card billings to come in so I could see where they had gone. I was biding my time. This was October. They had taken my car and my Texaco card and my American Express card. Dupree had also taken from the bedroom closet my good raincoat and a shotgun and perhaps some other articles. It was just like him to pick a .410—a boy’s first gun…. When the receipts arrived, they were in lumpy envelopes and the sums owed were such that American Express gave way to panic and urged me to call B. Tucker in New York at once and work out terms of payment. It was my guess that this “Tucker” was only a house name, or maybe a hard woman who sat by a telephone all day with a Kool in her mouth. I got out my road maps and plotted the journey by following the sequence of dates and locations on the receipts. I love nothing better than a job like that and I had to laugh a little as the route took shape.——–What a trip. What a pair of lovebirds! Pure Dupree! The line started in Little Rock and showed purpose as it plunged straight down into Texas. Then it became wobbly and disorderly….” And so the journey begins. Portis also wrote “True Grit” and “Gringos”(see reviews on Amazon.com)
August is too hot and breathless to live down here, but if you’re here, you might as well laugh.
Well said, Gaye….the heat is bad, but at least we haven’t lost our sense of humor…yet. Thanks for the recommendations!
I want to read this book!!!
Wow! So impressed that you’re reading Pushkin! I want to see that book!!!