Let me try to summarize the story...

A privileged woman and her family arrive in a community, throw money they supposedly don't have to fix up a house and buy a store, but is probably more than most people in the community make in two years (or more), don't really see themselves (or to be fair - herself) as the problem and then proceeds to act entitled throughout the rest of the book.

From causing low-grade environmental disasters, continually doing things to tick off the locals and really showing no self-awareness beyond thinking she's being cute...she never learns who her audience is during her time covered in the book.

For the book (there's a theme here), she never learns who her audience is. It's not Vermonters since most of what she does, including taking a general store that was a staple of the community and the longest continually operating one in the country and running it into the ground - quickly. Maybe it's people coming to Vermont for vacation...but if they're enjoying the book because they relate to much of what Stimson is talking about...ugh. ( )

A Midwestern family (St. Louis) moves to their dream spot in Vermont; buys the local general store and runs it into the ground. Warm, funny, poignant - human. ( )

I thought it was time to mix things up a bit and get out of my cozy-mystery rut, and I had just received this book in the post so I thought 'why not?'

Mud Season is a memoir of sorts. Ms. Stimson discusses her family's move to Vermont and the subsequent trials and tribulations of those first 2-3 years as they try to fit into a new small town and start a local business.

First I have to say, I didn't laugh as much as I should have reading these stories. I don't know why - some of these stories are quite funny and the author has a great style of writing for telling them; still, nothing. And I feel quite bad about that really. This is a well written book that had me 'seeing' her family's life unfold as she told the stories.

The stories are more or less linear, but she does jump around a bit and foreshadow a lot. All of them lead to the culmination of what will be their biggest failure overall. But this isn't a doom or gloom story by any stretch (as long as you avoid the In Memorium at the back). Rather the overall theme of the book is a very tightly knit, close family overcoming a bunch of struggles in order to live a better life than the one they had. And while the author may not have made me laugh, she definitely succeeded with this theme.

Overall, a nice read for a rainy Saturday (in keeping with the title).

Best line from the book: "Um, do we even like Grandma?"

Recipes are included. ( )

Skimmed through the last half of the book. What started out as a would-be fish out of water, quirky adventure, soon devolved into an annoying, self-absorbed litany of the author's personality flaws. If I lived in the Vermont town the author steamrolled her way through, I would have wanted her dead within the first half-hour. ( )

I really wanted to like this book. In fact, I have to admit that it started well. But by the end of it, I found I had a visceral distaste of the author. Entitled, snobbish, holier-than-thou; those are just a few words to describe her. How anyone who claims to be an expert business person can make so many ill-advised, nay, stupid, decisions is beyond me. The woman is clueless! In her defense, maybe she doesn't realize how bad her decisions are, because before they play out, she abandons the situation and dumps them on someone else (drive your car in a snowbank, call your husband to get it out while you take a hot bath; take a successful business and drive it into the ground because you think you know more than anyone else, no problem, dump it on your husband and take a job in a different state; children out of control, must be the teacher's fault). Doesn't like her former business partner, her mother, the local townspeople, teachers, preachers, etc. Bankrupt and losing a business? No problem, take a vacation and order a barn built so she can raise a darned sheep! I feel sorry for her husband (he must be a saint), her family, and for the townspeople of her new town. And for myself, for wasting the time to read this book. ( )