title: Winter Birds: A Novel
author:  Jim Grimsley 
description: The surface simplicity of this first novel-the story of a young boy who survives a violent Thanksgiving quarrel between his parents-masks an amazing voyage of self-discovery. Danny Crell comes from what must be the apotheosis of the dysfunctional family: his father, who has lost an arm in an industrial accident, is a mean and frequent drunk, and his mother appears to be a doormat for her husband's abuse. Danny and his baby brother are hemophiliacs, and metaphors of blood and bleeding permeate the book. Grimsley tells the story in the second person, with the narrator, who seems to be the grown-up Danny, offering sentences like this: "You brush bits of powdered grass from your fingers." At first, this device seems stilted and artificial, but as the novel gains momentum, one is swept into the story, and it almost feels as if the narrator is addressing the reader directly-and, occasionally, accusingly. Grimsley has created a harrowing southern gothic world, reminiscent of Faulkner or Caldwell. A remarkable first novel.
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  # Yankee Gypsies
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### John Greenleaf Whittier
  
  
  This page copyright © 2001 Munsey's.
  
  
  http://www.munseys.com
  
      
      
      
  
  
  Prepared by:
  
  
  Anthony J. Adam
  
  
  email: anthony-adam@tamu.edu
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
      
  
  
  "Here's to budgets, packs, and wallets;
  
  
  Here's to all the wandering train."
  
  
  BURNS.(1)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  I CONFESS it, I am keenly sensitive to "skyey influences."
  
  
  (2) I profess no indifference to the movements of that
  
  
  capricious old gentleman known as the clerk of the weather. I
  
  
  cannot conceal my interest in the behavior of that patriarchal
  
  
  bird whose wooden similitude gyrates on the church spire.
  
  
  Winter proper is well enough. Let the thermometer go to zero
  
  
  if it will; so much the better, if thereby the very winds are
  
  
  frozen and unable to flap their stiff wings. Sounds of bells in
  
  
  the keen air, clear, musical, heart-inspiring; quick tripping of
  
  
  fair moccasined feet on glittering ice pavements; bright e