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With the face of an angel and the determination of a telemarketer on commission, Dolly Parton is a mountain miracle, a world-class poet in a fright wig and stiletto heels. This early collection bypasses her Monument Records beginnings as a backwoods hopeful, but follows her arrival as a hillbilly savant ("Coat of Many Colors," "My Tennessee Mountain Home"), to her metamorphosis as a glitzy pop superstar ("Here You Come Again"). While it omits her duets with her Svengalian mentor, Porter Wagoner, most of the songs that forged her reputation as a songwriter are here ("Jolene," the original version of "I Will Always Love You"), even as it overlooks her underrated classics ("My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy," "Down from Dover"). With such clear-eyed, evocative writing, born on the breath of her shimmering soprano, it's easy to see how young Dolly turned the heads of country-rockers Emmylou Harris and Maria Muldaur, let alone the Grand Ole Opry set. --Alanna Nash