Buffalo Gal

Growing up in the snow blower society of Buffalo, New York, Laura Pedersen's first words were most likely ''turn the wheel into a skid.'' This vibrant memoir shares the humorous ups and downs of the Pedersens, who, like many families subsisting in the frigid North during the seventies, feared rising prices at the gas pump, argued about the thermostat, and fought over the dog to stay warm at night. While her parents were preoccupied with surviving separation and stagflation, Laura became the neighborhood wild child, skipping school to play poker, bet on horses, and trade stocks. This led her to an illustrious career on Wall Street - she became the youngest person with a seat on the American Stock Exchange and a millionaire by age twenty-one. Combining laugh-out-loud humor with a genuine slice of social history, Buffalo Gal paints a vivid portrait of an era.