The Whistling Season

by Ivan Doig

Novelist Ivan Doig revisits the American west in the early twentieth century, bringing to life the eccentric individuals and idiosyncratic institutions that made it thrive.

"Can't cook but doesn't bite. So begins the newspaper ad offering the services of an A-1 housekeeper, sound morals, exceptional disposition that draws the attention of widower Oliver Milliron in the fall of 1909. That unforgettable season deposits the ever-whistling Rose Llewellyn and her font-of-knowledge brother, Morris Morgan, in Marias Coulee along with a stampede of homesteaders drawn by the promise of the Big Ditch--a gargantuan irrigation project intended to make the Montana prairie bloom. When the schoolmarm runs off with an itinerant preacher, Morris is pressed into service, setting the stage for the several kinds of education--none of them of the textbook variety--Morris and Rose will bring to Oliver, his three sons, and the rambunctious students in the region's one-room schoolhouse. A paean to a way of life that has long since vanished, The Whistling Season is Ivan Doig at his evocative best.

• ISBN10: 0151012377
• ISBN13: 9780151012374
• Publish Date: 1 June 2006
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 9 July 2021
• Imprint: Houghton Mifflin
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 345
• Language: English

Reviews

[ladygrey]

The interesting thing about this book is that the florid prose doesn't fit the setting at all. It fits the character very well, but still seems dissonant with the story.

And it's a well written book but from an older time. The pace and the plot splendidly reflect the setting and the time period. Very well written.

Just, not that interesting to me. I liked the turn but for the most part I had to keep reminding myself to read this because the characters never really engaged me and the plot never demanded that I keep going. But, again, I think this is stylistically spot on for the type of story he was writing. This is the way novels were written 50 and 60 years ago and [a:Ivan Doig|70540|Ivan Doig|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1247171564p2/70540.jpg] did a great job of what he was doing. It's like a western version of [b:A Tree Grows In Brooklyn|14891|A Tree Grows in Brooklyn|Betty Smith|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327883484i/14891._SY75_.jpg|833257].