In John Hassler’s “Days Like Smoke,” we first read about a birthday party for Jonnie Read, who was the narrator’s “first friend” (p. 13). Many memories Hassler has tell us a lot about his boyhood. I think we could all write a book about our early years. He remembers his “first haircut” (p. 14), where he vomited, because the scissors the barber was using scared him.

Now I see a full page photo of “Jon’s Parents’ Wedding Day” (p. 15).

At this point, I feel like I am in the book. It’s so personal and detailed.

The book begins with quotes from the Psalms in the Holy Bible, Proust, and Carol Shields. Then we see a photo of the author as a little boy. I’d say he’s about a year-and-a-half old, sitting outdoors on a chair. (You see that photo with this review)

Before I started to read Chapter 1 — Houses, I looked through the 130 page book to see all the photos. The last one is a photo of the author, probably taken when he wrote the book.

There is a lot of history as I continue reading. As I’m reading about his early life, I can’t help but remember my early life. Do you, my reader, have time to have these remembrances about your early life?

During the years of the Depression, the family moved from the house they were renting to an apartment.

When Hassler was old enough to begin kindergarten, he had chickenpox, so he had to start school a bit later.

Soon I read “The day after Hitler invaded Poland, I entered first grade” (p. 17). At this stage of the book, the author does narrate details quickly. These details are ups and downs. When he was at a friend’s birthday party, he had to go upstairs to the bathroom, but on the way, he stopped on the landing and watered a houseplant (peed on the plant).

Now we read about his dog Jippie. Do you sense that a troublesome situation happened here too?

Next we get to know a friend who was a girlfriend with the name “Peggy Pickernose” (p. 21).

The family moves in their 15-year-old DeSoto to a home in Plainview, MN.

In the house they are now living in, some rabbits were in the basement, and upstairs there was an unmarried woman. Next to the stockyards, the boys read comic books. That’s not the term they used, but I knew what they were reading.

Now the narrator’s father opens his grocery story in Plainview, and the son takes flyers and advertisements to houses nearby. His friend, a “fellow peddler,” helps him with this task. We read that they were 10 years old in 1943. (That’s the year I was born; I couldn’t help but have this memory.)

We read a reference to the town of Sacred Heart on page 30.

The family has farmyard picnics. One boy there is Rufus, who was eventually taken to an asylum.

Hassler’s father buys a “lawnmower driven by a gasoline engine” (p. 39), and the boy does begin mowing many lawns and making money for this work.

One of the persons he mows for is Vern Stephens, who is a bachelor who lives with his mother in the house where he was born. Vern works in a canning factory. I hope this size of the review interests you in reading the book “Days Like Smoke.”

Many of John Hassler’s books can be found in the Marshall-Lyon County Library’s Minnesota Collection, along with others of local interest, including the collections of “Our Rural Routes” columns from the Independent by Ellayne Velde-Conyers. Find more at marshalllyonlibrary.org.