I remember back in the olden
days as a child, going to the library and simply grabbing a book because it looked
interesting…not because I’d heard of it or the author or because “everyone” was
reading it. I decided to take this
approach during my recent Seattle trip—extended several days thanks to weather
issues; more on this later—when I had the chance to visit the (rightfully)
famous Elliott Bay Book Company
book store in the fun and funky Capital Hill neighborhood.
My mission: buy some books, preferably west coast-oriented,
that I had never heard of, by people I had never heard of.
I spent a delightful two
hours wandering the aisles in what is, truly, the most inviting bookstore I’ve
ever been in. Lots of room, lots of
face-out books, lots of books period. I
took my time because I had it—nowhere to be, nothing to do (also like the olden
days)--pulling out anything that caught my eye due to title, color,
randomness. I read and pondered the
staff recommendation tags, which were exceptionally well-written and
descriptive. I ended up with an armload
of books—okay, one was by someone I had heard of—but all of my books focused on
either Seattle or the west.
The one I selected to read on
the airplane home was The Homesman by
Glendon Swarthout (first published in 1988, at the end of the author's life). On the cover is a
picture of a sod house on the prairie so it’s no surprise I was attracted. And then the premise: it’s the 1850’s and four women lose their
minds during the hard Nebraska winter and must be escorted back east where they
will be sent back to their families or an asylum. A hale and hearty young (by our standards) spinster
steps up to this sad and difficult task, enlisting the aid of a claim jumper
everyone wants run out of town or worse.
I worried this book might
be sappy or overly sentimental but by the bottom of the first page, I was
pretty sure it wouldn’t be when I read this line in a litany of woes suffered
by one particular family of homesteaders:
“Then one of their oxen got the warbles, worms under the skin. You could cut open the swelling and douse the worms with coal oil to kill them if you had any coal oil. Let be, the worms would suck the very soul out of the ox, Line [the wife’s name] was sure, and come spring, yoked up, it would fall down dead in the field, the poor creature.”
By page 9, something so
horrific happens I can’t tell you what it is.
And that’s just the beginning. I lost track of how many times I gasped or
murmured, “Oh my god,” as I read.
This book is totally
unsentimental and is definitely the dark side to the Laura Ingalls Wilder books
that I so loved back during the days I was wandering the Iowa City Public
Library. People go to the outhouse here,
and how people suffer—from events, from nature, from others, from bad luck and
poor decisions, from the fact that it was damn hard to scratch a living out of
that unforgiving land.
The book is well-researched,
and every now and then I felt that research weigh a bit heavy, but mostly what
I learned was fascinating, the bits of history that fall through the cracks
(for example, now I know both how to jump a claim and how to roust a claim
jumper). The narrative is spare but with
moments of immense beauty—like the landscape, I suppose—and just when I found
myself doubting an authorial craft choice midway through the book, it paid off
and wrenched my heart almost beyond reason.
I see this book is going to
be a “major motion picture” with Meryl Streep, Hilary Swank (good luck making
her “as plain as an old tin pail”), and a number of famous people. Do yourself a favor and read the book before
they prettify things up…though this story is so powerful, I hope even Hollywood
can’t wreck it.
Here’s more information about the
author, Glendon Swarthout, who seems to be defined as a “western writer”; many
of his books were made into movies. Time
to stop ghettoizing writers! Bring this
book into the canon! Read some sample pages here
and decide for yourself.
Then buy yourself a copy…here’s
the Elliott
Bay Book Company link.
