Set in Louisiana during the Depression, The Year of the Sawdust Man is the lyrical story of a headstrong young girl coping with her free-spirited mother's departure. Nissa Bergen comes home from school to find her mother's room cleaned out, and the garden's rosebushes bereft of their purple blossoms. Mama is gone. Wading through small-town gossip as oppressive as the bayou heat, and watching her father's eventual determination to move on with his life -- even beginning to court another woman -- Nissa sees her dream of a reunited family slipping away. Her struggle to come to terms with the new shape her family is taking is both poignant and penetrating, a timeless story of the changing face of love.
- ISBN10 060617947X
- ISBN13 9780606179478
- Publish Date 1 October 1999 (first published 1 June 1998)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 13 March 2021
- Imprint Turtleback Books
- Edition Turtleback School & Library ed.
- Format Hardcover (Library Binding)
- Language English