Peeny Butter Fudge: Bilingual Nobel Prize-Winner Free With Cheerios

Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon was maybe the best American novel of the past half-century. The daughter of a shipyard builder, Morrison won the Nobel Prize for Literature a few years ago based largely upon the amazing quality of that one book, her best.So I was kinda surprised to see...

By Chuck Strouse

February 9, 2012

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Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon was maybe the best American novel of the past half-century. The daughter of a shipyard builder, Morrison won the Nobel Prize for Literature a few years ago based largely upon the amazing quality of that one book, her best.

So I was kinda surprised to see her name on a book that came free inside my Cheerios box this morning. She wrote Peeny Butter Fudge, which is selling on Amazon for $15. Told in poetry, it is the story of a great-grandmother. Morrison's son Slade helped co-write it.

I'm a fan of nothing. A curmudgeon. But this story melted my heart. Really, anything having to do with Toni Morrison makes me feel that way. And this one has a particular Miami flair. Parts of it were translated to Spanish by a guy named Joe Cepeda, who also illustrated the book.

So what the hell. Go buy some Cheerios.

Follow Short Order on Facebook and Twitter @Short_Order.

Chuck Strouse is the former editor in chief of Miami New Times. He has shared two Pulitzer Prizes and won dozens of other awards. He is an honors graduate of Brown University and has worked at newspapers including the Miami Herald and Los Angeles Times.

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