An American Childhood by Annie Dillard—how many of you read this in school?

I adore this book, but I do feel some uncomfortable emotions about it because of the similarities to my life: growing up in Point Breeze, attending private school, going to dancing school… hallmarks of a privileged Pittsburgh upbringing, that not everyone has had—it feels a little prissy.

But I absolutely love the prologue—it’s a description of the topology of the Pittsburgh area intertwined with the coal-mining, steel-making history of the area.  Here’s a snippet:

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• Pittsburgh author Gary Link’s historical novels set in Pittsburgh are written up in the Examiner.
• The Tribune-Review reports that local author Kathryn Haines’ fourth book is coming out, and she’ll be doing an event at Mystery Lovers Bookshop 6/11.
• Michiko Kakutani gives Nathaniel Philbrick a mostly positive review in The New York Times.
• The Lost Cyclist is a new book about Pittsburgher Frank Lenz, who disappeared while attempting to bike around the world.
• And.. you can follow Books n’at on Twitter!

This book magically appeared on my bookshelf when I was in high school.  I don’t know how it got there,  I don’t remember anyone giving it to me, and I didn’t buy it myself.  I ignored it for months (maybe longer) because I thought it was a collection of stories about things you never understood about the ‘burgh, such as: how many bridges do we have?  What is the entomology of “slippy”?  Or perhaps it was a collection of unsolved mysteries in Pittburgh, relating to a theft of Mrs. Carnegie’s jewels…

But then one day I was bored, I had read everything on my shelves many times (everything from The Secret Garden to Clan of the Cave Bear), and so I grabbed The Mysteries of Pittsburgh and everything changed.  From the very first page I knew it wasn’t one of those books I thought it would be.  I must say, as cliché as it sounds, it changed my life.  Growing up as an only child in Pittsburgh, a somewhat lonely and bookish experience, I didn’t dream of escape, but I didn’t realize that adventure and love and life could happen right here—in Oakland, Shadyside, Squirrel Hill…

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