January Book Club

“Dandelion Wine” is a coming-of-age story which depicts an idyllic summer in the life of a 12-year-old boy in 1928, the last summer before the Great Depression. In vivid language it describes a magical time of green apple trees, mowed lawns and new sneakers; of grandfather’s dandelion wine and grandmother’s kitchen explosions; of the joy of life and the inevitability of death; of the imagination of youth and a young boy’s first glimpse of adult reality.

The author, Ray Bradbury, is best known for his science fiction and fantasy writing, especially Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles and Something Wicked this Way Comes. He grew up in a town (Waukegan) very similar to the fictional Greentown, Illinois, and the book is somewhat autobiographical. The Apollo 15 astronauts recognized his achievements by naming an impact crater on the moon Dandelion.