Mr. Thompson,

I am a CRNA, one of Anthony's teachers in anesthesia school.  For Christmas he gave me a copy of your book.  I have finished reading it, and I want to give you a little feedback.  I think the book is excellent.  Your mission of remembering everything was an ambitious one.  I don't know that anyone could actually do that, but you did remember so much.  What you remembered and wrote about is important to you and interesting to a lot of other people.

I particularly liked your recollections of the rural lifestyles of your family and your grandparents.  A lot of your stories reminded me of my grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncles.  I didn't have as "country" an upbringing as you did, but a lot of what you wrote about still rings true for me.  On a larger scale, your stories are an important record of how West Virginia people lived in earlier times. 

I recently told my father about your book.  He is 84.  He was raised in Madison, in the heart of the city, as I was.  He is anxious for me to give him the book to read.  He is different from you in that he is not very forthcoming with experiences from his childhood.  My mother is from Montgomery.  She will talk more about when she grew up, but I have to prompt her to get her started.  I do like to hear about and learn how things used to be.

So, thanks for writing River of Memories.  Reading it opened up a river of memories of my own.