What do you think?
Rate this book
Small Town
PAPERBACK
- GenresFiction
512 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published October 1, 1978
42 people want to read
About the author
Sloan Wilson
34 books29 followersSloan Wilson (May 8, 1920 – May 25, 2003) was an American writer.
Born in Norwalk, Connecticut, Wilson graduated from Harvard University in 1942. He served in World War II as an officer of the United States Coast Guard, commanding a naval trawler for the Greenland Patrol and an army supply ship in the Pacific Ocean.
After the war, Wilson worked as a reporter for Time-Life. His first book, Voyage to Somewhere, was published in 1947 and was based on his wartime experiences. He also published stories in The New Yorker and worked as a professor at the State University of New York's University of Buffalo.
Wilson published 15 books, including the bestsellers The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1955) and A Summer Place (1958), both of which were adapted into feature movies. A later novel, A Sense of Values, in which protagonist Nathan Bond is a disenchanted cartoonist involved with adultery and alcoholism, was not well received. In Georgie Winthrop, a 45-year-old college vice president begins a relationship with the 17-year-old daughter of his childhood love. The novel The Ice Brothers is loosely based on Wilson's experiences in Greenland while serving with the US Coast Guard. The memoir What Shall We Wear to This Party? recalls his experiences in the Coast Guard during World War II and the changes to his life after the bestseller Gray Flannel was published.
Wilson was an advocate for integrating, funding and improving public schools. He became Assistant Director of the National Citizens Commission for Public Schools as well as Assistant Director of the 1955-56 White House Conference on Education.
Source: Wikipedia
Born in Norwalk, Connecticut, Wilson graduated from Harvard University in 1942. He served in World War II as an officer of the United States Coast Guard, commanding a naval trawler for the Greenland Patrol and an army supply ship in the Pacific Ocean.
After the war, Wilson worked as a reporter for Time-Life. His first book, Voyage to Somewhere, was published in 1947 and was based on his wartime experiences. He also published stories in The New Yorker and worked as a professor at the State University of New York's University of Buffalo.
Wilson published 15 books, including the bestsellers The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1955) and A Summer Place (1958), both of which were adapted into feature movies. A later novel, A Sense of Values, in which protagonist Nathan Bond is a disenchanted cartoonist involved with adultery and alcoholism, was not well received. In Georgie Winthrop, a 45-year-old college vice president begins a relationship with the 17-year-old daughter of his childhood love. The novel The Ice Brothers is loosely based on Wilson's experiences in Greenland while serving with the US Coast Guard. The memoir What Shall We Wear to This Party? recalls his experiences in the Coast Guard during World War II and the changes to his life after the bestseller Gray Flannel was published.
Wilson was an advocate for integrating, funding and improving public schools. He became Assistant Director of the National Citizens Commission for Public Schools as well as Assistant Director of the 1955-56 White House Conference on Education.
Source: Wikipedia
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 2, 2020
Small Town
I don’t quite know what it is about Sloan Wilson, but his writing puts me under a spell that pulls me into his stories like an undertow. Small Town is about going home again, which Thomas Wolfe told us was something you cannot do, and if you try you’re a fool. (I’ve been a fool at least twice in my life.) Wilson talks to the soul of most Americans because he is “as American as American pie” and that’s why I like to read him. His canvas is broad like America’s.
Small Town is a love story—or two, or three. There’s a little “High Noon” atmosphere about it as well. It’s also a coming of age story. Small Town is a rich story, masterfully written, which is no surprise, since Wilson also taught writing at New York University and was writer in residence at Rollins College in Florida.
There is a resemblance of sorts between Small Town and Wilson’s Georgie Winthrop, which I have also reviewed. One thing I have to say is that I read this novel in short spurts, which was easy to do because Wilson’s books are knitted so well that it’s easy to put them down and pick up where you left off. I read it during the Covid-19 lock-down, and having been an admitted alcoholic almost all his life Wilson is constantly pouring himself a whiskey, which is one thing, but I found myself doing the same thing while enjoying reading the novel. We kind of toasted each other throughout. Maybe that’s why I like him so much. He kind of reels you in.
I don’t quite know what it is about Sloan Wilson, but his writing puts me under a spell that pulls me into his stories like an undertow. Small Town is about going home again, which Thomas Wolfe told us was something you cannot do, and if you try you’re a fool. (I’ve been a fool at least twice in my life.) Wilson talks to the soul of most Americans because he is “as American as American pie” and that’s why I like to read him. His canvas is broad like America’s.
Small Town is a love story—or two, or three. There’s a little “High Noon” atmosphere about it as well. It’s also a coming of age story. Small Town is a rich story, masterfully written, which is no surprise, since Wilson also taught writing at New York University and was writer in residence at Rollins College in Florida.
There is a resemblance of sorts between Small Town and Wilson’s Georgie Winthrop, which I have also reviewed. One thing I have to say is that I read this novel in short spurts, which was easy to do because Wilson’s books are knitted so well that it’s easy to put them down and pick up where you left off. I read it during the Covid-19 lock-down, and having been an admitted alcoholic almost all his life Wilson is constantly pouring himself a whiskey, which is one thing, but I found myself doing the same thing while enjoying reading the novel. We kind of toasted each other throughout. Maybe that’s why I like him so much. He kind of reels you in.
March 18, 2014
Written in 1978 by the same author who wrote The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit. About a small own in the Adirondacks near where we live in an even smaller town in the Catskills. I found it rather hopelessly out of date and a bit Peyton Place ish. The characters were not all that compelling or likeable or believable.....
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews