Reading a book about my hometown

Last night I started reading a book about my hometown. I came from a fairly quaint, 100,000 resident, mostly bedroom community; at least when I left that southeastern Ohio town. Strangely enough, I read an article about the book coming out and was surprised. I never thought that cute little town that was so clean when I grew up would ever be written about in a book. But apparently I was wrong. The economy of the town has gone south in the last few years, and the author is trying to diagnose why that happened.

It seems weird to read a book about a town that I have not been in since 2010. I kind of live too far away now. I guess I could still go for a visit. But it would be a long day trip (back-and-forth) and tiring.

Anyway I'm about to get this author's perspective of the town where he also grew up years later than me. It will be interesting to see what he writes.

I hate to say that I know the book will be somewhat negative. I don't know that he can write a positive book about the negative things that happened there. He's also going to place blame on the people he thinks are responsible for changing a major industry there...

I had to end up buying the book. But, only after I tried to get a copy from the author. Actually, I wanted a free PDF or Kindle edition so I could read it on my laptop. I contacted the author through Twitter, and he told me to contact the publisher. When the publisher rep asked me what publication I was writing review for, I told her I was not writing it for a publication. For some reason I did not think that would be a prerequisite. I even emailed the publisher again to say I would review it on Amazon or GoodReads, but she did not answer and I got no gratis copy.

My sister told me yesterday to just give up and buy it. She said everyone who grew up there is reading the book.

Last night, I started reading it after I bought it from Amazon. Then, my credit information did not jibe and it stopped downloading. I was chagrined. I tried to fix it and could not.

Thank goodness it was my bedtime and I had to give up anyway.

Today I was able to get my credit information correct and the transaction went through. Since I straightened up my account on my desktop, I am hoping I can download and read the book on my laptop.

Since I am a verified purchaser of the Kindle edition, once I finish the book, I plan to post a review on Amazon.