The Rural Voice, 2002-07, Page 45Sellers
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ANIL It'
Marsha Boulton
Book Review
Wrg words of wisdom from a rural writer
Letters from
the Country
1V
Marsha
Boulton
Toronto:
McArthur &
Company,
2002
Softcover,
152 pgs.,
$14.95
Reviewed by Deborah Quaile
Marsha Boulton is our mirror for
rural foibles. Whether documenting
the great interest of neighbours —
almost like a coffee klatch, really —
when the septic tank is being pumped
out, or the "garbage Gestapo" that
keeps folk on the straight and narrow,
she accurately pinpoints country
differences from big city life.
Although the family farm is
disappearing in favour of factory
farms, and smog can be choking even
out of town, urbanites still step
forward with "a handful of seed
catalogues and a composter," to
accomplish their own version of
pioneering and foster a feeling of
irrepressible optimism in all.
In Letters from the Country /V,
Boulton tempts her readers with title
tidbits such as "The Myotonic
Goatherd," "Osama bin Cluckin
Meets His Match," or "Wally
Ballys." We hear about a nasty ram
named Crash Test Dummy who butts
the visiting neighbour in the derriere
and then proceeds to commit
patricide on his woolly dad. Exit
Crash Test Dummy and enter Bucky.
the small but plucky Rideau Arcott
who proves to be a true Lothario.
Soon afterward the Boulton fields are
checkerboards of black and white
sheep, or as she notes when they
come running to her whistle, "a
player piano keyboard on hooves."
Moments like that make a woman
want to run out and buy a spinning
wheel.
Small town news also proves to
have inspired her scope for
imagination, with some of the
choicest articles included in the text
Who can resist laughing at the
Speeder of the Week or the nudes
that parade their privates in front of
unwary women? The stories of local
endeavours, funerals and
engagements are never as titillating
as what flows from tongues in the
coffee shops. Boulton admits to
knowing about a steamy love affair
between a politician and town clerk
months before it hit the papers, but
that is admittedly part of the charm of
small town news — some of the best
stuff is often ignored as long as
possible, usually to save hurt
feelings.
As on any farm, there are poignant
moments of pain, like the loss of
stock that was a vibrant point of
interest and pleasure around the
homestead, or those who have
become friends. But the interspersing
of emotional highs and lows rounds
out the tales nicely, and others
become all the more humourous for
it.
Marsha Boulton writes with a
clean, easy style, using a frankness
that rests on readers' ears as if it
could be coming from across the
kitchen table over a cup of tea and
cake.
There is the lingering feeling,
however, that the publishers
completed this book in more haste
than its predecessors. Each of the first
three volumes ran over 200 pages,
and had such niceties as artistic
seasonal dividers between the
arrangements of stories. This book
had none, and was a slim 152 pages
in length. Still, for Letters from the
Country aficionados, the fourth book
of the series is a welcome,
humourous look at modem rural
living.0
Deborah Quaile is a writer in
Rockwood whose work is often found
in small town newspapers. She
recently published her first book.
Mrs. Merrv's Memories, a collection
of oral histories of rural life in the
late 1800s/early 1900s.
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JULY 2002 41