Southern Illinoisan in Carbondale, Illinois

Summer of years gone by in a northern Virginia village

Russell Baker recalls a drought of electricity and plumbing in a rural Virginian crossroads town. He and his cousin fish on a creek bank, kill a copperhead, and watch summer days shaped by dirt roads, kerosene lamps, and old radios. The summer holds quiet pleasures and fears from bats to toads, while gossip and whisky secrets mingle with the routines of heat and dust.