My Home Is Far Away: An Autobiographical Novel

Dawn Powell was in the midst of writing one of her finest satires, A Time to Be Born, when she contracted a fever that brought childhood memories back so vividly that she stopped her novel and began scrawling reminiscences that were later collected in My Home Is Far Away. Although not true autobiography, the life of the main character, Marcia Willard, parallels Powell's life, including the death of her mother, life with a father who was on the road, and the traumatic remarriage of her father to a vicious and selfish woman. My Home Is Far Away is an excellent depiction of what childcare was like for motherless children in the 19th century in comparison to their family-oriented neighbors.