Pat Montandon was born in Texas and lived in Oklahoma as the daughter of a two ministers. At eighteen she became the tenth person in the world to undergo successful (blind surgery as it was then called) heart surgery.
When I learned to read at about age six, I found a musty storage closet and would nestle into one of my mother's patch work quilts and stay there reading-Pilgrim's Progress, David Coperfield, comic books,The Bible-until it was time for supper. I devour books like some eat popcorn, relishing every word. Thinking about the books that have influenced me, my mind flipped through a catalog of titles until I finally settled on the following books.
Roots: Alex Haley. Alex was a dear friend. During the time he lived in Rome, New York, he invited me there so he could show me how to write a book outline. He was patient, funny, and inspiring. Alex was a master storyteller. When he talked, in soft melodious tones, about the Gambia river, how he went to Africa to discover his roots,and what led him there, I would sometimes weep. He believed in me even when I didn't believe in myself. Alex was working on Before This Anger a book that was to become Roots. When Alex and his assistant George Sims and my beau went to New York City together. One day, outside fifth Avenue's Brentano's book store, Alex said, Patsy Lou, someday your book will be right here in this window. Do you really think so, I asked. Honey, I know so, he said. And it was.
Earth Abides, George R. Stewart. I recently re-read this book and was as taken with it as when I was first introduced to it many years ago. Stewart captures what it must be like to be a survivor when no one wishes to survive, in much the way McCormac does in The Road.
Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck. Having experienced the depression and Oklahoma's dust bowl when I was a kid, Grapes of Wrath reads like non-fiction to me. The Joad family, Rose of Sharon, Tom, are still working the fields in my mind. Steinbeck's delineation of character is a study in how it should be done.
