You have to love a book with its first chapter titled “Rainy Days and Mondays Always Get Me Down.” I’m not positive but I think most of the chapters were song lyrics and most of them made me smile. Bootlegger’s Daughter takes place in a fictional rural county of North Carolina which vaguely resembles the surrounding counties where I grew up (thank you I-95).
As a part of my Junior AP Literature class we went to my local library (a link over on the right) and heard Ms. Maron speak. Afterward I remember having a brief conversation with her when I got my book signed, but remember very little of the talk or the conversation. I remember I loved Mysteries at the time, having started Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Milhone Alphabet series (A is for Alibi, B is for Burglar, etc.). If I read the book when I got it, I didn’t remember any of the plot. I don’t think I did for two reasons, I remember most plots after a few chapters if I’ve read the book before, and I kept my books looking brand new and probably held this even higher because of Ms. Maron’s autograph.
I won’t go into the plot too much as it is a mystery, but there were two major things that struck me about this book, aside from her witty and brilliant use of colloquialisms and ability to write the dialects.