The Rif Raff Book Club met Sunday, August 30th for the book selection The Fall of the Year by Howard Frank Mosher at a Book Club Member's house.

The Rif Raff Book Club was treated to a traditional northeastern USA 'boil' in keeping with the theme of the book. This boil included sausage, shrimp, corn, potatoes, onions and other things that tasted good. One could have imagined being in a northerm Vermont town.

The Fall of the Year by Howard Frank Mosher

September is the start of the Fall of the year and the timing of the book was good. After the tragedy of 9/11/01, this book was able to bring one away from reality and escape into a fantasy world when things were simpler. The story itself was several tales about the colorful characters in the Vermont town. The author's descriptive narrative made one think of a Norman Rockwell painting and a perfect naive world. Normally that would make me vomit, but with with so much trauma now in the world, I enjoyed reading the book. My favorite characters in the book were the misfits studying to become US citizens. Dr. Rong was a funny character too - "after 40; eat less", "Be good to ginseng, ginseng be good to you." The ending was very predictable but in keeping with the fantasy world, it worked.

I really liked this book. It was a nice easy read with a few good life lessons. I particularly like the character Dr. Sam Rong. The author used a simple setting that allowed the characters to develop fully as separate individual types all connected to Frank Bennett. Although it was fiction, you could see where the author drew on his own history to tell the story.There was no doubt how things would turn out. No twist ending or bizarre whacked out loser type thrown in for shock value. At times you did have to suspend disbelief to get through the story. Mr. Mystic and his show girl and some of the Molly the town circus girl stuff was rather out there. Because this was a September book suggestion and we all were witness to the terrorist attacks on the 11th, it was nice to get away from the coverage and just immerse into a small Northern Vermont town somewhere near the Canadian border. The book allowed that kind of escape and I was glad it was chosen for this month. The meeting hosted was nice and cozy. The shrimp boil was great and the conversation lively.