Lake Wobegon Days » (Reissue)

First with his performances on Minnesota Public Radio's Prairie Home Companion and later in his books, Garrison Keillor has become a symbol of the small-town Midwest -- its absurdities, its stoutness, and its warmth. His popular, funny stories set in Lake Wobegon manage to evoke nostalgia for a town that never existed.

If you've ever marveled at the simple elegance of a weather-worn gazebo resting in a small-town America park, or sat down in a Main-Street diner and felt right at home with the locals, then you'll know the warm feelings and hidden charms found in Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon Days.

Celebrating the quirks and idiosyncrasies of small-town America, part town history, part family remembrance, Lake Wobegon Days is imbued with a sly humor that picks at the silliness and the earnestness that are woven so tightly together in a small town. With acute observations we meet all kinds of characters: a family so destitute they had a vacuum cleaner with such poor suction that hairballs had to be stuffed into it, and who believed that "air-conditioning" was for the weak and indolent." We also meet Pete Peterson, the duck-hunter's duck-hunter, who shot ducks from bed! The portraits are varied: warm and funny, honest and revealing. The state of Minnesota, where the fictitious Lake Wobegon exists, is nicknamed the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" and you'll be glad to lounge beside this one for a spell.

Veronica Geng

''Lake Wobegon Days'' is about the way our beliefs, desires and fears tail off into abstractions - and get renewed from time to time. . . this book, unfolding Mr. Keillor's full design, is a genuine work of American history. -- New York Times