We were growing up there back in the bad old days of Al Capone and Bugs Moran. Here is how the first chapter begins, "You wouldn't think we'd have to leave Chicago to see a dead body. Each August (starting in 1929 and ending in 1935), Joey and his younger sister Mary Alice leave Chicago to visit their grandmother who lives in a small town in Illinois. Seven are the consecutive stories of his summer vacations. There are eight 'memories' shared within the book that are the heart and soul of the book. The book does consist of loosely connected stories or memories told within a framework of an old man recalling his youth fondly. The title page calls it a "novel in stories" and that's a fair assessment. (It did win a Newbery Honor.) It's historical fiction. Are all my memories true? Every word, and growing truer with the years.Ī Long Way From Chicago is a book that is practically perfect in every way. But as the time gets past me, I seem to remember more and more about those hot summer days and nights, and the last house in town, where Grandma lived. Now I'm older than Grandma was then, quite a bit older. As the years went by, though, Mary Alice and I grew up, and though Grandma never changed, we'd seem to see a different woman every summer. And tough? She was tough as an old boot, or so we thought. She was old too, or so we thought-old as the hills. She was so big, and the town was so small. In our first visits we were still just kids, so we could hardly see her town because of Grandma. I was Joey then, not Joe: Joey Dowdel, and my sister was Mary Alice. It was always August when we spent a week with our grandma.
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