If you happened to grow up in the rural South like I did, you are undoubtedly already well acquainted with country music legends, Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn. For those of you don’t know them, I encourage you to pull up your music app of choice and search “best of” playlists for both. Personal favorites of mine include “I Love You, Honey” by Patsy Cline and “You Ain’t Woman Enough” by Loretta Lynn. Solid gold, I tell you! Songs and lyrics aside, these two women are unmatched in spirit and stubbornness, two traits that brought them together as they climbed the country music charts to stardom.
Me & Patsy Kickin' Up Dust is a very personal account of a climb to country stardom amidst a backdrop of poverty, sexism, alcoholism, and even domestic abuse. Loretta Lynn was definitely not born with a silver spoon in her mouth, being one of eight children and becoming a wife and mother when she was just a teenager herself. Patsy Cline suffered her own financial hardships, dropping out of school at age 16 to work in order to support her family after her father abandoned them. Not to be deterred, she taught herself to play the piano and began working as a waitress and even in a poultry plant pre-stardom. You can actually visit the very restaurant she worked in, not a stone’s throw from Fairfax County, in Winchester, Virginia.
While Loretta Lynn pulls back the curtain on her own life in Me & Patsy Kickin' Up Dust, it is her description of the sophisticated and supportive Cline that reveals why Patsy was always introduced as "the one and only Patsy Cline." Of all I knew of Patsy Cline before reading this book, I never knew the pain she suffered or the kindness she shared in spite of it.
You don’t have to like country music to love this book. What really makes this account of their friendship so touching is its tenderness and honesty. While this memoir recounts their overlapping rise to fame and perseverance, it is not focused on their celebrity, but rather their sisterly love and mutual adoration. Loretta Lynn’s humility, honesty, and ultimate heartbreak at losing her dear friend Patsy Cline to an untimely death makes this memoir so soul-stirring, it will stay with you long after you put it down. And with a foreword by none other than Dolly Parton, why would you want to?
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