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The Truth About Unicorns
A Novel
Author: Bonnie Jones Reynolds

Price $25.95
Autographed by the Author: $30.95

Hardcover: Stein & Day edition, 1972, 369 pages
Condition: fresh from original packing box
Language: English

Doubleday Bookstore’s “Oppie” Award for Best First Novel of 1972
Northern California (San Francisco Chronicle) Best Seller List

* * *

They say that, in a certain place in America, in a dark and strange wood,
there is to be seen, if you look at the right moment,
a fleet and solitary white animal appearing as a horse, with a mane that sweeps to the ground.
It has a beard like a goat and a tail like a bull,
and a fine long horn in the middle of its forehead.
Some call it a unicorn. But unicorns do not exist.
Except in the finest reaches of our minds.

If you have never read The Truth About Unicorns, there is no time like the present. If you read it years ago, and would love to read it again, here is your chance. This book is ageless. Witness rave reviews and comments spanning thirty-seven years, below.

Reviews and Comments from 1972

“(Bonnie Jones Reynolds) is in form and frighteningly real in description. Oriskany Forks, in the 1920’s, seemed like any other sleepy American town, but then, aren’t all appearances misleading? Slowly, her writing draws us into the hushed madnesses of the Bascombs and the Westcotts, through the surrounding forest, where, if your eye is quick, you may catch a glimpse of a white unicorn. The strange powers of her fascinating characters hold the reader in the author’s grasp till the very last page. This is quite a first novel.”

DAVID GALLIGAN – Fashion Week

“The Truth About Unicorns is a compelling and haunting first novel … Passages … show Bonnie Jones Reynolds’ ability to write about human beings and their fiercely revealing moments—to explore the human heart. … She has written out of the depths of imagination and intuition, out of a brooding over the spectacle of existence, yet with a marvelous faculty of precise observation. … She had made an auspicious beginning.”

GEORGE COHEN – Chicago Tribune

“The author ties events, families, and witchcraft together so deftly that her book is fascinating. I could hardly put it down until I knew how it all came out. Believe me, this is a very fine first novel and one that you will want to read.”

DONNA KEMPIN – Cincinnati Enquirer

“I started reading your book yesterday morning, continued through the day, through dinner … all evening … past midnight, until the book literally fell out of my hands. I woke up, picked it up, and started in again … through breakfast, put off going in to work while I read more, let Joan drive me to the auto repair shop as I read the final pages. She got me there with two pages to go, so I sat in the car and finished it as a bunch of greasy mechanics eyed me suspiciously. Need I say I loved it?”

Letter from ALLAN BURNS – Producer, The Mary Tyler Moore Show

“I feel that no words can describe your book other than it is THE BEST BOOK I”VE EVER READ!”

Letter from JOYCE CREOLA – Faculty Wife, New York

“ … a story that is as chilling as those that used to come from behind the squeaking door.”

JEANNE CECIL BONHAM - Columbus Dispatch

“There is no guarantee that when you finish reading this book you will know ‘the truth about unicorns,’ but you will have a merry time trying to find out … … why try to find subtle, hidden meanings in an enchanted woods? Just suspend belief and inhale for a reading experience that is different.”

AUGUSTA GOTTLIEB – St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Internet Gleanings from the 21st Century

From mapelba.wordpress.com of August 21, 2007:

“Oh, the history of the dark and wicked woods in literature … the first book that I read where the woods made a lasting impression on me was … (a) novel by Bonnie Jones Reynolds…. The Truth About Unicorns … it was my favorite book when I was sixteen. I read it ten times before I left for college, and I had to check it out of the library. That book may very well be the root of my writing now … A mysterious wood, young people, mental illness, and a touch of magic … perfect.”

Kim Everett responded on Octotber 6, 2007:

“I read The Truth About Unicorns when I was in high school in the 70’s. I loved it. I’ve been trying to find another copy of it.”

On January 28, 2008 Shannon McRae said:

“I also read this book when I was 15 or 16, and it was a huge influence on my research and writing. It’s one of my top five favorites…I live … about 4 hours from the actual Spring Farm where the story took place. This weekend, I had business at Hamilton College (the ‘Franklin College’ in the book,) so I decided to drive by the farm. It was kind of a pilgrimage. I was kind of maybe hoping to see a unicorn (I spent years after I read the book hoping to catch a glimpse of one) … I didn’t. But bits of the woods described in the book are still there. They really are oddly dense and spooky.”

On June 6, 2009 Lisa Holstein Wells said:

“I too have loved this book. I read it MANY times from 1979-1983 – 9ith – 12th grades … as an adult I was able to get a copy … I am almost done reading it yet again, My husband said – you are reading that again? Oh, my yes. I cannot tell anyone why it resonates so …If Mrs. Reynolds reads this – please know that I have loved this book for more than 25 years!”

(My thanks to all of you ladies. I am delighted to have found your postings. BJR)

From Goodreads.com

Tara Jeanne wrote in December 2007:

“ … it definitely takes those turns the reader doesn’t want it to. Which keeps the reader guessing instead of predicting what will happen. The people you want to fall in love don’t and those you don’t want to fall in love, do…how frustrating.”

Heidi French-Taylor said on April, 8, 2009:

“I was enchanted by this book, it is one of those books that, when re-reading it, it brings back the smells of the previous summer and the sound of the wind through the trees from the last time I read it.”

From Amazon.com

A customer wrote on January 4, 1999:

“ … you’ll be hooked!”

A customer wrote on March 14, 2000:

“My favorite book – ever. … I was touched by the illustration of how events can spiral beyond the truth – even without malicious intentions – to inflict real and lasting pain. The way we deal with this fundamental injustice is what reveals our character, our courage, and our humanity. The struggle is truthfully and touchingly portrayed in a setting that has supernatural, mythical, and more sinister, satanical elements as its backdrop, making it all the more a page-turner.”

On July 16, 2007 Sharon R. Branigan wrote:

“I first read this book as a 17 year old and loved it. Crosses all age lines … this story should be brought to the masses and immortalized in the movies!”

(Again, my thanks to all of you. BJR).