... an engaging, lively biography of an accomplished and complicated woman ... McCutchan quotes generously from...correspondence, offering intimate insight into the writer’s process ... McCutchan does not delve into literary criticism of Rawlings’ works but rather gives us the contexts in which they were written and the real people and places that the author brought so beautifully to life. Rawlings’ voluminous correspondence is put to effective use throughout the book ... Rawlings’ letters range from raucous humor to thoughtful dissection of her works in progress to abject expressions of self-doubt. All of it adds up to a rich portrait of a woman who loved Florida, and of a Florida that’s now all but vanished.
... fascinating and lively ... It’s the maverick quality that makes her letters, which Ms. McCutchan quotes with astute commentary, particularly revealing ... masterly and entertaining.
... plain-spoken ... McCutchan is a sensitive observer of Rawlings’s work, and of her deeply unconventional life in general ... It’s a pleasure to meet this cursing, hard-drinking, brilliant, self-destructive, car-wrecking, fun-loving, chain-smoking, alligator-hunting, moonshine-making, food-obsessed woman again on the page ... Come to this biography for Rawlings’s outsize personality, her quest to lead a life that felt authentic to her...Stay for the portrait of a woman whose writing meant everything to her.
