Highly acclaimed, award winning author Donald Davis wants us all to remember and share our family stories. Among other tall tales, he writes about how his uncle hung onto the multitudinous Democratic votes of the Ratherton clan while at the very same time keeping them from shooting Davis' squirrels in a lean year; how he got Phyleete, wife Jolly, their eleven sub-natural sons and one forgettably natural daughter to move their log house from the unlikely place they'd built it; and how he tried to solve the problem of the chatty Misses Lena and Lucy Leatherwood, who clogged up the eight-party...

A winding highway, children fighting in the back seat, parents suggesting diversionary games and holding onto their own hopes and fears for the vacation ahead: it's not an uncommon scene. However, it is Donald Davis's genius that turns a lackluster family vacation into a week to remember. The 1950s-era plastic seat covers were not the only thing to leave a lasting impression. In her spontaneous (and desperate) invention of games like Cow Poker and See Rock City, Mother keeps the rules one step ahead of the back-seat contestants, until one-too-many choruses prompt a detour the family never...

Donald Davis grew up in the mountains of western North Carolina hearing stories that most American children have never heard. He did not know he was hearing anything special, but he was, in fact, learning a number of stories that came to America through Scots-Irish immigrants. These stories were still told in the Appalachians during the 1950s and centered around Jack, a universal legendary figure who, by various names, is found in nearly every culture. Jack is that everyman who encounters trials common to all: earning a living, winning a mate, subduing tyrants and ogres of all kinds. Jack...

Stop talking You're supposed to be working on language overheard in an elementary classroom by award-winning writer and storyteller Donald Davis. From the moment they are born, we encourage children to talk. We enunciate for them, applaud their expanding vocabularies, and hang on their every word. That is, until they enter school. At that time, we expect them to stop talking and measure their language abilities through a new medium: writing. While the educational system focuses on the written product as the sole measurement of language development, many children fail to measure up to...

Maybe it's because his mother was a teacher. Or maybe it's because he has spent most of his life in classrooms - as a wide-eyed first grader, a naive college student, a seminarian, and now as a visiting writer in residencies across the country. There's something about school that infuses the work of Donald Davis and he has collected his all-time favorite school stories in the book. Whether we're traveling around the world with Miss Daisy, the fourth grade teacher who was integrating arithmetic, geography and English before the term -whole language- ever surfaced; or watching in awe as a...

Born on January 1, 1900, on a family farm in the mountains of North Carolina, Medford McGee grows up awestruck by the rapid changes that blazon the new century. With the Sunday Nashville Banner, sent each week by Aunt Louise and read by Father on the porch, comes news of turbulent international politics and revolutionary new technology automobiles with electric starters and airplanes that can cross continents. Fans of Donald Davis will recognize in Thirteen Miles from Suncrest the same heartwarming wit and incisive characterization that has earned him a place among the best of American...

The 20 chronologically arranged stories follow Davis from his early years terrorizing his younger borther, Joe, through his teenage travails of getting braces and discovering he isn't quite man enough for Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Davis's stories have been described as "absolutely hilarious and unpredictable as well as emotionally reviving." This collection reaffirms why he is considered by many to be the father of the family tale.