In a wonderful follow up to Summer's Idyll, the book that first introduced his readers to protagonist "Billy" or "Junior," this second work, Winter's Descent continues this lovely story and will certainly keep readers enthralled from beginning to end. Following Billy and his life as he moves with his mother to the countryside of Ontario during the Second World War, the story is one that provides deeply personal historical detail that Gutteridge's fans have come to know and love. Billy is eleven now, and his father in fighting in the war. He attends a one-room schoolhouse, which serves as the main setting for this novel. With twenty-six students and an impressive teacher, Miss Neilson, the life of this boy and his friends from school S.S. No. 9 is one that any young reader, or any reader looking for a book that will lend them a great deal of nostalgia, will simply love! Author Don Gutteridge has again provided a story in which the reader will truly feel as if they have been picked up and placed in Ontario in 1945, no detailed is the work. For those who love a realistic and highly informative work of in a historical setting, this book is simply amazing.
Tracey A. Fischer for Readers' Favorite
Don Gutteridge was born in Sarnia and raised in the nearby village of Point Edward. He taught High School English for seven years, later becoming a Professor in the Faculty of Education at the Western University, where he is now Professor Emeritus. He is the author of seventy book. poetry, fiction and scholarly works in educational theory and practice. He has published twenty-two novels, including the twelve-volume Marc Edwards mystery series, and thinykive books of poetry, one of which, Copperrnine, was short-listed for the 1973 Governor-General's Award. In 1970 he on the UWO President's Medal for the best periodical poem of that year, "Death At Quebec." To listen to interviews with the author, go to http://thereandthemn.podbean.com. Don currently lives in London, Ontario.