A Season of Gifts
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If ever there were a character whose time has come, it is Grandma Dowdel. Able to bamboozle a banker into forgiving a widow鈥檚 mortgage and feed a train鈥檚 worth of hungry men from one day鈥檚 fishing, Grandma Dowdel should replace Superman as national hero for the duration.
Her Depression-era exploits 鈥� as narrated by her awed grandkids in 鈥淎 Long Way From Chicago鈥� and 鈥淎 Year Down Yonder鈥� 鈥� won her creator, Richard Peck, a Newbery Honor and a Newbery Medal. (He also picked up a National Humanities Medal 鈥� making him the only children鈥檚 writer ever to receive that honor.) Now, just in time for the holidays, Peck gives us A Season of Gifts.
It鈥檚 1958, and a new family has moved in next to the last house in town. Grandma, nearing 90, still eschews indoor plumbing and makes her own soap in a caldron over an open fire. Bob and Ruth Ann Barnhart are convinced she鈥檚 a witch 鈥� because she couldn鈥檛 possibly be a ghost.
鈥淪o we Barnharts had moved in next door to a haunted house, if a house can be haunted by a living being,鈥� 11-year-old Bob says. 鈥淪he looked older than the town. But she was way too solid to be a ghost. You sure couldn鈥檛 see through her. You could barely see around her.鈥�
Bob meets Grandma when the town boys tie him up and leave him 鈥� naked 鈥� dangling from a spider鈥檚 web of rope in her privy. Grandma famously has little patience for bullies, and she takes the Barnharts under her copious wing.
Little sister Ruth Ann follows Grandma around like a puppy, while teenaged Phyllis moons over Elvis and Bob tries to lay low at school and help his minister father. Their church lacks a few basic amenities 鈥� such as windows and a congregation. Grandma aims to fix that, in her own inimitable fashion.
Phyllis, it must be said, is something of a drip. And there are no episodes in 鈥淎 Season of Gifts鈥� quite as uproarious as in 鈥淎 Year Down Yonder,鈥� when Grandma has the DAR over to her house for tea, or takes in a boarder who likes to paint in her attic. Nor is there anything that can equal the pathos of the Armistice Day turkey shoot.
That may stem from the fact that Peck is trying something new here: Grandma鈥檚 grandkids were privy to her schemes (even when they didn鈥檛 know what was going on), while Bob and his family are the recipients of her generosity. Also, the 1950s just aren鈥檛 as desperate a time as the Depression.
There is, however, plenty of Peck鈥檚 wry humor and classic Midwestern sensibility, which reminds me of memoirist Jean Shepherd. For example, here鈥檚 Bob鈥檚 mom on her new home in Piatt County: 鈥淚 take back every bad thing I ever thought about Terre Haute.鈥�
And if Grandma Dowdel has mellowed a touch since 鈥淎 Long Way From Chicago,鈥� she鈥檚 still got her own unorthodox way of getting things done.
鈥淎s everybody knew, she didn鈥檛 neighbor and went to no known church. She was not only real cranky, but well-armed.鈥� And she will turn out to be the best friend the Barnharts could ask for.
Yvonne Zipp regularly reviews children鈥檚 books for the Monitor.
