Small Town Boy Small Town Girl

Milbank and Mitchell, dissimilar in size and separated by more than two hundred miles, have more in common than might appear at first glance. In the first half of the twentieth century towns such as Milbank and Mitchell formed hubs for commerce, social activities, and culture. Eric Fowler and Sheila Delaney looked at their communities from different viewpoints, but their childhood and young adult memories of South Dakota share common themes.

Fast-moving Texan Tyler Aldrich thought it a fate worse than death to be stuck in rural Eden, Oklahoma, overnight. Imagine the Dallas CEO settling in for homemade meat loaf at the Heavenly Arms Motel! Yet something about quiet Charlotte Jefford made Tyler want to leave his worries behind for more than one evening. Was it their differences that drew Tyler in? The small-town girl was devoted to her family; he longed to escape his. Were they polar opposites thrown together by a wrong turn—or had God actually set them on the right path?

A revealing examination of small-town life More than thirty million Americans live in small, out-of-the-way places. Many of them could have joined the vast majority of Americans who live in cities and suburbs. They could live closer to more lucrative careers and convenient shopping, a wider range of educational opportunities, and more robust health care. But they have opted to live differently. In Small-Town America, we meet factory workers, shop owners, retirees, teachers, clergy, and mayors—residents who show neighborliness in small ways, but who also worry about everything from school closings and their children's futures to the ups and downs of the local economy. Drawing on more than seven hundred in-depth interviews in hundreds of towns across America and three decades of census data, Robert Wuthnow shows the fragility of community in small towns. He covers a host of topics, including the symbols and rituals of small-town life, the roles of formal and informal leaders, the social role of religious congregations, the perception of moral and economic decline, and the myriad ways residents in small towns make sense of their own lives. Wuthnow also tackles difficult issues such as class and race, abortion, homosexuality, and substance abuse. Small-Town America paints a rich panorama of individuals who reside in small communities, finding that, for many people, living in a small town is an important part of self-identity.

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HIS SMALL-TOWN GIRL Fast-moving Texan Tyler Aldrich is stuck in rural Eden, Oklahoma, for the night. Imagine the Dallas CEO settling in for homemade meat loaf at the Heavenly Arms Motel! Yet this detour might just change his life forever. Because there's something about quiet innkeeper Charlotte Jefford that makes Tyler want to prolong his stay…permanently. HER SMALL-TOWN HERO Oil rigger Holt Jefford needs to hire someone for the Heavenly Arms Motel so he can stop making beds and burning breakfasts. To his rescue comes a single mom carrying a baby boy—and secrets. Sweet Cara Jane seems scared of her own shadow. Holt warns himself not to trust his new employee, but she and her little one have already gotten through his guarded heart….

We live these days in a virtual nation of cities and celebrities, dreaming a small-town America rendered ever stranger by purveyors of nostalgia and dark visionaries from Sherwood Anderson to David Lynch. And yet it is the small town, that world of local character and neighborhood lore, that dreamed the America we know today—and the small-town boy, like those whose stories this book tells, who made it real. In these life-stories, beginning in 1890 with frontier historian Frederick Jackson Turner and moving up to the present with global shopkeeper Sam Walton, a history of middle America unfolds, as entrepreneurs and teachers like Henry Ford, George Washington Carver, and Walt Disney; artists and entertainers like Thomas Hart Benton, Grant Wood, Carl Sandburg, and Johnny Carson; political figures like William McKinley, William Jennings Bryan, and Ronald Reagan; and athletes like Bob Feller and John Wooden by turns engender and illustrate the extraordinary cultural shifts that have transformed the Midwest, and through the Midwest, the nation--and the world. Many of these men are familiar, icons even—Ford and Reagan, certainly, Ernie Pyle, Sinclair Lewis, James Dean, and Lawrence Welk—and others, like artists Oscar Micheaux and John Steuart Curry, economist Alvin Hansen and composer Meredith Willson, less so. But in their stories, as John E. Miller tells them, all appear in a new light, unique in their backgrounds and accomplishments, united only in the way their lives reveal the persisting, shaping power of place, and particularly the Midwest, on the cultural imagination and national consciousness. In a thoroughly engaging style Miller introduces us to the small-town Midwestern boys who became these all-American characters, privileging us with insights that pierce the public images of politicians and businessmen, thinkers and entertainers alike. From the smell of the farm, the sounds and silences of hamlets and county seats, the schoolyard athletics and classroom instruction and theatrical performance, we follow these men to their moments of inspiration, innovation, and fame, observing the workings of the small-town past in their very different relationships with the larger world. Their stories reveal in an intimate way how profoundly childhood experiences shape personal identity, and how deeply place figures in the mapping of thought, belief, ambition, and life's course.

When Liberty Watkins delivers flowers to the local auto shop owned by the Truax boys, who does she run into? Blade Truax. She hasn’t seen Blade in years, mainly because he’s been in prison serving a sentence based solely on the testimony of Libby’s sister, Mariam. Yes, Libby and Blade have history. In fact, that summer, right before he’d been charged with sexually assaulting her sister, Libby and Blade had been meeting secretly almost every day. And Libby had felt something for him—something major. She thought he’d felt it too. Was that why she still questioned her sister’s testimony, because she wanted so badly to believe in Blade? Or was it something else? Blade doesn’t trust women anymore, for obvious reasons, but he particularly doesn’t trust women with the last name Watkins. So, when Libby Watkins shows up at his family business, he isn’t happy. How dare she stand there pretending there had been nothing between them. Did she even remember that it was her he’d been waiting to meet that fateful night when his entire life went down the toilet? They should not be together. There is way too much pain down that road for any kind of redemption. But it looks like fate has other plans when, despite Blade’s objections, Libby is hired to be the auto shop’s new office assistant. The Small Town Boy's Redemption is the first book in the Small Town Boys series by award-winning author and Kindle All-Star, Jessie Gussman. Grab your copy today! Reviews for The Small Town Boy's Redemption: ★★★★★ "Yep, this book was amazing —from the first chapter to the epilogue. Libby and Blade’s story had me in a melted puddle." - Forevermooremom ★★★★★ "I stalk this author for her releases so I guess it's the good and approved kind of stalking. I always love her characters and the story and I get a welcome relief from all of the bedroom details other authors feel they need to make their stories work.” – Teri ★★★★★ “With an engaging plot and complex characters, it was a sweet, at times heartbreaking story about life, redemption, hope, new beginnings and the possibility of finding true love.” - Yvonne ★★★★★ "What a great story. I enjoyed the characters and how trials, bitterness, forgiveness and love are worked out in a really believable story line." - Kindle Customer ★★★★★ "The story is sometimes light & funny, then thought provoking...no matter where you are, it pulls you deeper & won't let you walk away." - Norma Books in The Small Town Boys series: The Small Town Boy's Redemption The Small Town Boy's Secret Romance The Small Town Boy's Second Chance