Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
With abundant colloquialisms (“Law mercy!”) and the cadences of a seasoned storyteller, Johnson (The Cow Who Wouldn’t Come Down) resurrects a delectably macabre selection from Richard Chase’s Grandfather Tales. “Now, all preachers like chicken, but Old Dry Frye was the chicken-eatingest sermonizer that ever laid fire to a pulpit,” drawls the third-person narrator. Frye’s gluttony proves his undoing. At a generous family’s house, the preacher chokes on a chicken bone and keels over, a platter of food resting on his ample stomach. The hijinks begin when Frye’s would-be hosts hide his body in a henhouse. There, a widow mistakes Frye for a thief, conks him on the head with an iron skillet and fears that she has killed the already-dead preacher. Thus begins a slew of similar events as various townsfolk brazenly attempt to conceal the preacher’s death. In the author’s acrylic paintings, which resemble pastel rubbings on textured paper, Frye falls into mountain streams and rolls out of burlap sacks. The conclusion finds the cadaver bouncing along on a wild horse, transforming him into a satiric Sleepy Hollow legend. The tall-tale mood emanates from Johnson’s scenes of Appalachia and the exaggerated expressions of its inhabitants. This will be a read-aloud standby. Ages 5-8. (Sept.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
Grade 2-4 A gentler version of an Appalachian folktale told in Richard Chase’s Grandfather Tales (Houghton, 1973). Old Dry Frye, the preacher, loves fried chicken. While eating some at a neighbor’s house, he chokes on a bone and dies “right there on the spot.” Afraid they’ll be accused of murder, the frightened couple hide his body in a nearby henhouse, where the “widder woman” thinks he’s a chicken thief and hits him over the head. Believing that she’s killed the preacher, she decides to hide the body. During the course of the story, Old Dry Frye is thrown into a tree, placed in a sack in the river, hung in a smokehouse, and, finally, put on a mean-spirited horse. Observant readers will notice that the bucking of the horse actually dislodges the chicken bone, thus reviving the preacher. Full-page acrylic paintings detail the hilarious chain of events, while the repeated refrain, “Everybody knew Old Dry Frye,” and the down-home language create a rollicking read-aloud. Maryann H. Owen, Racine Public Library, WI
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
An Appalachian folktale is the basis of Johnson’s story of a fried-chicken-loving preacher whose untimely demise sets into motion an tumultuous chain of events as members of his flock frantically try to absolve themselves of the non-existent crime of murder. Old Dry Frye is so well known for his capacious appetite for fried chicken that when he chokes on a bone, his hosts, a distraught farmer and his wife, are convinced that everyone will suspect them of murder. To escape condemnation, they quickly hide the body in the widow’s chicken coop; she, fearing the preacher is a poacher, bops him on the head with her frying pan. Believing she accidentally killed Frye, she quickly gets “shed of” him. And so begins the wild journey for the hapless corpse as one villager after another stumbles upon him and assumes guilt for the cause of death. Johnson’s over-the-top, humorous portrayal of the citizens’ frenzied actions and reactions rescue the tale from excessive morbidity. Although the text does not refer to it, the illustrations show Frye coughing up his chicken bone during the chaotic and hilarious denouement. Told in the melodious twang of mountain vernacular, Johnson’s story rumbles along to its own beat, an outrageously ghoulish tale to make story-hour listeners shiver. (Picture book/folklore. 5-8) — Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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