A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana
Kimmel, H. (2001) A girl named Zippy : growing up small in Mooreland, Indiana. New York: Doubleday, c2001.
Haven Kimmel was born in 1965 in Mooreland, Indiana, a town of about 300 people. Originally a series of essays only intended to be shared with her mother and sister, they have been compiled into a touching, witty, and thoroughly enjoyable memoir.
Nicknamed Zippy for the way she raced around as a small child, she is a character in a town of characters. She is a scruffy tomboy who idolizes her father, and has one harrowing adventure after another - sometimes it seems a miracle that she survived childhood!
Each chapter is prefaced by a photograph, and I really enjoyed putting faces to names as I was reading. Kimmel's descriptions really provide a sense of place, and of the inhabitants of this tiny town. The voice of the book is both childlike and wise, and I found it to be an easy and enjoyable read. I believe teens and adults will both appreciate the book's real life situations, filled with both humor and occasional sadness.
I'm not generally a memoir reader, yet I found myself overjoyed when I discovered that she had written a follow-up. This is one memoir that really captured my interest!
Haven Kimmel was born in 1965 in Mooreland, Indiana, a town of about 300 people. Originally a series of essays only intended to be shared with her mother and sister, they have been compiled into a touching, witty, and thoroughly enjoyable memoir.
Nicknamed Zippy for the way she raced around as a small child, she is a character in a town of characters. She is a scruffy tomboy who idolizes her father, and has one harrowing adventure after another - sometimes it seems a miracle that she survived childhood!
Each chapter is prefaced by a photograph, and I really enjoyed putting faces to names as I was reading. Kimmel's descriptions really provide a sense of place, and of the inhabitants of this tiny town. The voice of the book is both childlike and wise, and I found it to be an easy and enjoyable read. I believe teens and adults will both appreciate the book's real life situations, filled with both humor and occasional sadness.
I'm not generally a memoir reader, yet I found myself overjoyed when I discovered that she had written a follow-up. This is one memoir that really captured my interest!
