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nuthatch's review
4.0
Readers who grew up in small towns in the Midwest will identify with this book. It may help city folk understand why we still live here.
inkstndfngrs's review against another edition
2.0
Okay, so don't take the 2-star rating to mean that I didn't enjoy this book. I did. In theory. I listened to the audiobook, and Michael Perry is one of the few authors of whom I don't mind reading his own writing --probably because it's much easier to listen to nonfiction memoir style writing from the person who actually lived the experience. He has a very masculine-ly dulcet tone that makes listening to him quite enjoyable.
But oh my god. He writes in a stream of consciousness that kind of just annoys the crap out of me. One minute he's talking about jumping in a truck for a run, and then he's telling a story about some class he took, or waxing poetic about life's little happenstances. Eventually he winds back to the original premise of the chapter but by then I've sort of forgotten what's going on because: audiobook dude. I listen in about 15-30 minute chunks. More if I decide to take the long way home or if I'm road tripping.
So, yes, I did "like" the book in the grand scheme. It didn't make me want to turn it off after the first disk and chuck it out the window (not that I would have; it was a library copy). But I feel like he wanted to cover a lot of information in a short amount of time that could have been, over all, better organized. Hopefully he has worked on that particular technique and I look forward to listening to Truck: A Love Story next.
But oh my god. He writes in a stream of consciousness that kind of just annoys the crap out of me. One minute he's talking about jumping in a truck for a run, and then he's telling a story about some class he took, or waxing poetic about life's little happenstances. Eventually he winds back to the original premise of the chapter but by then I've sort of forgotten what's going on because: audiobook dude. I listen in about 15-30 minute chunks. More if I decide to take the long way home or if I'm road tripping.
So, yes, I did "like" the book in the grand scheme. It didn't make me want to turn it off after the first disk and chuck it out the window (not that I would have; it was a library copy). But I feel like he wanted to cover a lot of information in a short amount of time that could have been, over all, better organized. Hopefully he has worked on that particular technique and I look forward to listening to Truck: A Love Story next.
samiswanhorst's review
4.0
This book got better and better as it went on. The author gives a unique perspective to Fire/EMS and what it is really like for some.
bookish_wendy's review against another edition
3.0
I enjoyed this! I little saccharine but good. I love small towns.
jenniferdenslow's review
4.0
Population: 485 is both a love letter to a small Midwestern town and a meditation on life and death from the point of view of a volunteer firefighter. Perry introduces us to his brothers-in-arms, but he also maps the town by describing the lives and deaths of the people therein.
andrewk35's review
5.0
Population 485 by Michael Perry
This book was recommended to me, a few times, by my mother. On the surface I could see why. A small town midwestern guy who enjoys literature and decides to become a first responder. Okay. I’ll get to it. I was raised well enough to listen to my mother, so I gave it a crack. I was expecting to enjoy it. She has excellent taste after all. I don’t know why but I didn’t really expect to connect to the book on a deep level. I also didn’t expect a book about a small town firefighter to talk about the Pleistocene Epoch when describing the topography of the region and relate the contoured countryside to a particularly hazardous bend in the road that lead to a traffic fatality and it’s impact on the small rural community.
Community is the keyword here. Mr. Perry is a volunteer firefighter for a small town. We also learn how the town came to this name including a humorous tale of the founder’s disagreement with the township permitting the sale of alcohol and asking that his name be removed and the other city leaders discovering that the town name of Auburn had recently been claimed by a nearby hamlet leading to the very original “New Auburn.” The sense of the town comes through in the pages and it’s inhabitants. Mr. Perry recounts historical records where the township appears to haggle for the purchase of a firefighting apparatus and although the acquisition is a foregone conclusion he attests that the small town folk know they are rubes but don’t’ want to be taken for rubes. He also discusses the modern occupants of the town. The standout is fellow volunteer firefighter “The Beagle” who is a cross eyed butcher who’s country styled aphorisms are as sharp as his instruments of slaughter.
The author bio on the cover informs the reader that Mr. Perry is the only volunteer firefighter to have missed a monthly meeting for a poetry reading. He incorporates literary allusion and poetry throughout the book which on a few occasions felt a little shoehorned in. Occasionally the book dips into the history of firefighting in general or goes down rabbit holes of township history in the midst of a different story or rumination about the frailty of human life. I think in lesser hands this would have been more distracting or disorienting but was well done here, if noticeable in the divergence.
I’d recommend this as an enjoyable read, small town rube or otherwise.
This book was recommended to me, a few times, by my mother. On the surface I could see why. A small town midwestern guy who enjoys literature and decides to become a first responder. Okay. I’ll get to it. I was raised well enough to listen to my mother, so I gave it a crack. I was expecting to enjoy it. She has excellent taste after all. I don’t know why but I didn’t really expect to connect to the book on a deep level. I also didn’t expect a book about a small town firefighter to talk about the Pleistocene Epoch when describing the topography of the region and relate the contoured countryside to a particularly hazardous bend in the road that lead to a traffic fatality and it’s impact on the small rural community.
Community is the keyword here. Mr. Perry is a volunteer firefighter for a small town. We also learn how the town came to this name including a humorous tale of the founder’s disagreement with the township permitting the sale of alcohol and asking that his name be removed and the other city leaders discovering that the town name of Auburn had recently been claimed by a nearby hamlet leading to the very original “New Auburn.” The sense of the town comes through in the pages and it’s inhabitants. Mr. Perry recounts historical records where the township appears to haggle for the purchase of a firefighting apparatus and although the acquisition is a foregone conclusion he attests that the small town folk know they are rubes but don’t’ want to be taken for rubes. He also discusses the modern occupants of the town. The standout is fellow volunteer firefighter “The Beagle” who is a cross eyed butcher who’s country styled aphorisms are as sharp as his instruments of slaughter.
The author bio on the cover informs the reader that Mr. Perry is the only volunteer firefighter to have missed a monthly meeting for a poetry reading. He incorporates literary allusion and poetry throughout the book which on a few occasions felt a little shoehorned in. Occasionally the book dips into the history of firefighting in general or goes down rabbit holes of township history in the midst of a different story or rumination about the frailty of human life. I think in lesser hands this would have been more distracting or disorienting but was well done here, if noticeable in the divergence.
I’d recommend this as an enjoyable read, small town rube or otherwise.
cluckingbell's review
3.0
A bit overwritten and I didn't enjoy the fragmented writing style---kind of felt like he had so little to say on each subject or remembered so little about each event that he had to use many together to make a chapter, jumping from one to the next and all interspersed with history or other factual tidbits, and rarely did the conjoined subjects feel particularly cohesive. The book starts and ends with tearjerkers, and everything in between is a blur. But it was well-intentioned, with a respectably self-aware narrator, and reasonably interesting at times.
raechsreads's review against another edition
4.0
Great stories about life in a small town in Wisconsin.
worldlibraries's review
4.0
I heard Michael Perry read before I read him. What an engaging, hilarious storyteller! Michael Perry shared stories about “his people” back home in New Auburn, Wisconsin and it must be said that never have a people been so complimented by an observer’s eye.
I just finished reading “Population 485: Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time” which is the title everyone said I should read first. So many fans told me I’d need a dictionary by my side as I read it, I decided to keep track of how many words I came across that weren’t in my daily vocabulary (74).
As a Midwesterner like Perry, it’s impossible not to recognize one’s fellow citizens in this book and enjoy their portrait. They may live in New Auburn, but these folks are everywhere!
The writing, wondrous and tender, in the very first chapter, can’t fail to pull the reader in with it’s life and death subject matter about work as a volunteer paramedic. If you wonder what it’s like if it’s your job to fix the split second health disaster happening within your community, this book is for you. It’s suitable for all genders and ages.
I just finished reading “Population 485: Meeting Your Neighbors One Siren at a Time” which is the title everyone said I should read first. So many fans told me I’d need a dictionary by my side as I read it, I decided to keep track of how many words I came across that weren’t in my daily vocabulary (74).
As a Midwesterner like Perry, it’s impossible not to recognize one’s fellow citizens in this book and enjoy their portrait. They may live in New Auburn, but these folks are everywhere!
The writing, wondrous and tender, in the very first chapter, can’t fail to pull the reader in with it’s life and death subject matter about work as a volunteer paramedic. If you wonder what it’s like if it’s your job to fix the split second health disaster happening within your community, this book is for you. It’s suitable for all genders and ages.