Genre: Memoir
Description:
“From the moment he was born, Chester Oliver found life to be a
puzzle. Worse, it was a puzzle to which, it seems, he hadn’t been given all the
pieces. Even his name was a source of bafflement. For years, he thought his
name was Butch. Then, when he reached school age, he learned the truth. What
the hell! In those days, the name Chester conjured up images of Matt Dillon’s
limping, drawling sidekick on Gunsmoke. Chester Oliver might as well have
handed the bullies a ‘kick me’ sign. And that was just for starters. Like his
namesake, Chester Oliver shuffled his way through ticks and snakes, bicycle and
car wrecks, girls with clothes on and off—even an ornery horse aiming to throw
him. All the while, he was trying to answer the question: ‘How did I get here?’”
Author:
Born in Northern Wisconsin, raised in
Wisconsin and Texas, Chester Oliver has led a nomadic life, worked a variety of
jobs, and is now settled in Montana with his wife Jan where he lives in a “Victorian
house on a tree lined street.”
Appraisal:
This is billed as part 1 of “The Chester Chronicles,” so presumably there
is at least one more volume, maybe several, planned for the future. Odds are
you’ve never heard of Chester Oliver until now and may be wondering why you’d
want to read about his life in a series of memoirs. That’s a fair question.
I’ve had a theory that most random people, especially those who are “of
a certain age” and therefore have a lot of years of experiences to draw on
could, assuming appropriate writing skills, write a memoir that many (myself
included) would find to be an interesting read. I find myself going from comparing
my experiences (yeah, I remember what it was like to move to the new town and
be the new kid in the neighborhood) to nostalgia at time. Sometimes an
experience I hadn’t had, for example his frequent fishing at a lake cabin with
family, I’d imagine as much like those of a friend of mine whose family owned a fishing resort
in rural Minnesota. Experiences that aren’t like anything I or anyone I know
well have had are a chance to put myself in someone else shoes and hopefully
learn a bit about viewing things from a different point of view.
With the exception of one experience and it’s aftermath that didn’t
happen until fairly close to the end of the book, Chester’s experiences weren’t
a whole lot different from what many of us have experienced in life, yet they’re
still his unique combination of experiences and, I found reading about them
entertaining and a positive experience. To me, that’s what memoirs are about,
and there is often as much, if not more, to be learned from a normal person
than from someone famous, infamous, or outside of the norm in some way.
FYI:
Some adult language.
Format/Typo
Issues:
No significant issues.
Rating: ****
Four Stars
Reviewed
by: BigAl
Approximate
word count: 80-85,000 words
