Mary E. Trimble

Calamity: A Novel is a work of historical fiction about the well-known western legend, Calamity Jane. Author Libbie Hawker writes about Martha Canary, aka Calamity Jane, in what is no doubt a more accurate portrayal than what was offered in the dime store novels written in Calamity’s own life time (1852 – 1903). The book is a Women Writing the West’s 2020 WILLA Literary Award Finalist.

Calamity Jane tells her story to a writer in a Deadwood saloon. She tells it honestly, without sparing details that taint her own reputation.

Martha Canary was orphaned at the age of twelve, the oldest of six children. Her mother had already died when her father packed up the kids and their few belongings to head west from Missouri. Martha saw her father shot and killed by an unhappy gambler, who also took her father’s winnings. Martha and the two older boys scraped by in the wilderness, caring for their three little sisters, one just a baby, finally stumbling into Salt Lake City, Utah. The siblings were separated then and Martha was on her own to earn a living.

Martha was never a pretty girl, and she was the first to admit it. Legends of the old west talk about her raving beauty and many talents, but in truth she had an ungainly body, tall as a man, with no redeeming features to call herself pretty. But she had many talents, was a successful oxen, mule and horse bullwhacker, and could shoot a pistol or rifle with great accuracy. Her greatest pleasure was to ride alone on a wilderness trail. She endured many hardships, and the disasters and calamities that befell her earned her the name of Calamity Jane.

At times her life ran smoothly, as was the period she spent with Wild Bill Hickok, the love of her life, albeit unrequited. In her later years she appeared in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show performing sharpshooting skills astride a horse.

The author superbly describes the people of the American West and the western landscape as it appeared then. In many respects the story is a sad one, but the author shows Calamity as a woman of courage, endurance, and independence, a woman who could find humor in tight situations.

I thoroughly enjoyed Calamity from beginning to end. It’s a large book, 497 pages in a hardback copy, but it’s a story alive with passion and warmth. I urge anyone who enjoys reading about “the old West” to read this highly entertaining novel.

Book Review: One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow

Posted on September 14, 2020 by Mary

One for the blackbird
One for the crow
One for the cutworm
And one to grow

This traditional proverb is a perfect description of Beulah Bemis’s philosophy of life in Olivia Hawker’s historical novel, One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow. Beulah, the wise, dreamy thirteen year-old daughter of Cora and Ernest Bemis, considers herself as one with the earth and with all that grows there. The novel is a Women Writing the West’s 2020 WILLA Literary Award Finalist.

Wyoming Territory, 1876, can be a dreary place when you have but one neighbor and no other settlers for miles. Ernest Bemis acts on impulse when he finds his wife, Cora, in a compromising situation with neighbor Substance Webber, resulting in one man dead, the other in jail. With her husband in jail, Cora Bemis and her four children are left without a husband and father, and widowed Nettie Mae Webber and Clyde, her only child, are left to manage by themselves.

Clyde, sixteen, doesn’t really grieve the loss of his father. Substance was a mean, harsh man who belittled Clyde’s gentle ways with their livestock. His mother, Nellie Mae, however, bristles with indignity and hate, though not particularly with mourning.

Winter is coming and it’s apparent that the Bemis family isn’t ready. Late crops are yet to be harvested, but the main worry is an adequate wood supply; without it the family will freeze in the harsh Wyoming winter.

Clyde is now the man of the Webber house and he takes this new responsibility seriously. Strong and capable, he tries to do the right thing by helping the Bemis family and tend to his own chores as well. Beulah steps in beside him and the two manage to get through the late harvest and prepare the stock for winter.

As winter bears down, it becomes clear that in order to survive, drastic measures must be taken. How the two families manage in the course of a year, and the surprising strong bond that develops makes One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow a memorable, remarkable novel. The author vividly describes the wild Wyoming landscape down to the tiniest detail. She paints each character with their individual personalities so perfectly I felt I’d know them in passing. I could feel the juxtaposition of love and hate as though it happened in my own family. I highly recommend One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow. It is a novel to cherish.

Book Review: The Glovemaker

Posted on September 7, 2020 by Mary

The Glovemaker:A Novel by Ann Weisgarber is a highly suspenseful novel that takes place in Utah Territories during the winter of 1888. The book is a Women Writing the West’s 2020 WILLA Literary Award Winner.

Samuel Tyler is past due. He left on a business trip and is late returning home. It’s possible that he’s found other out-of-the way customers. As a wheelwright his services are in high demand.

Deborah Tyler is worried about her husband, but common sense tells her that delays are not only possible, but likely. It’s the dead of winter and travel is hard—anything can happen. Deborah adds to the family income by helping her husband in their orchard, and she also makes fine leather gloves. But now all she can think about is her husband’s safety.

The Tylers and seven other families live in Junction, a small Mormon community with homesites scattered along the floor of a canyon. Junction’s citizens don’t believe in plural marriage and have splintered off from other Utah Mormons.

A desperate stranger pursued by a Federal Marshall appears at Deborah’s door asking for shelter for the night. She’s hesitant, but doesn’t feel right about turning him away. She offers the use of her barn for the man and his horse. As she dreads, a Marshal comes in search of the man, catching Deborah in the web of a spiraling chain of events. She learns the man she sheltered is a polygamist and is on the run from the U.S. government, which has ruled the practice of polygamy a felony.

When the Marshal is critically injured, Nels Anderson, Deborah and Samual’s close friend, also becomes involved in the deceit. In trying to do the right thing, they hide crucial evidence.

The Glovemaker is a well-written and thoroughly-documented novel. The village of Junction did exist and its citizens were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints (LDS). The citizens of Junction didn’t conform to the typical LDS beliefs and practices. References are made to the Mormons being driven from one state after another, often burned out of their homes. The incident at Mountain Meadows where Mormon militia in southern Utah seized a wagon train from Arkansas and brutally murdered 120 people was still viewed with bitterness, and troubled both the attackers and victims. Strong feelings prevailed and hiding a Mormon polygamist was a serious crime. The Glovemaker brings these incidents alive, but also vividly describes Deborah’s emotions: her unwavering love for her husband, her fears, and her determination to do the right thing.

Book Review: Bad Land

Posted on August 31, 2020 by Mary

Bad Land: An American Romance by Jonathan Raban, an Englishman who now lives in Seattle, is an intriguing social history of the homesteading movement in eastern Montana in the early 20th century. Seduced by the government’s Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909 granting individuals 320 acres of non-irrigable land, and lured by deceiving colorful brochures published by the railroad, future farmers and ranchers came to Montana to make their fortune, or at least to make a decent living.

Raban follows several families’ stories from when they first arrived with high hopes to how they were often defeated by blistering summers, minus forty-degree winters, and years of drought. Plus, the monotonous, endless prairie was demoralizing to many. Although homesteaders could obtain loans from local banks for expensive machinery, it was soon obvious that the land could not support the crops or livestock needed to repay loans. Some families were resourceful and managed to thrive, but there were few success stories.

I admired Raban’s ability to show the dignity and integrity of the descendants of early homesteaders. Most of them were proud of the accomplishments of their indomitable ancestors who worked hard to provide for their families under unbelievably harsh conditions. But mostly, the homesteaders’ dreams turned sour; there were simply too many hardships to overcome.

Raban also delves into modern day and the rebellious spirit often seen in rural Montana’s anti-government militia movements. These resentments often stem from long-held family beliefs that the government and big business conspired together against the “little folk.” The government made the opportunities by encouraging people to settle the land; the bank profited from farms and ranches being repossessed.

I enjoyed Bad Land and found Raban’s keen observations enlightening and fun to read. In researching the area, the author endured harsh weather, loneliness, and exposing himself as a “greenhorn” in order to delve into the reality of Montana’s “wild west.”

Book Review: Manhatten Beach

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Mary

Manhattan Beach, a novel by Jennifer Egan, captured my attention from beginning to end. The novel covers the early years of World War II through 1944.

When Anna Kerrigan, nearly twelve years old, accompanies her father to visit the lovely home of Dexter Styles, she has no idea that Styles is a gangster and that somehow there is a crucial connection between the two men. Styles’ beautiful seaside home is a marvel, its opulence unimaginable to her. Anna lives with her parents and severely crippled sister on the sixth floor of a tenement building.

Years later Anna’s father has disappeared and the country is at war. Anna works at the Brooklyn Naval Yard as the first female diver, a dangerous and exclusive occupation. At first experiencing hesitancy and even scorn from her superior and fellow divers, Anna proves herself a valuable asset as an underwater welder repairing ships that will eventually help win the war.

One evening Anna again meets Dexter Styles at a nightclub and begins to understand the relationship between him and her father. As Dexter Styles’ life unfolds, the reader is taken to a world few experience, a lifestyle that has its own set of scruples.

I very much enjoyed Manhattan Beach. The novel brings fresh detail and character to an era that changed the world forever. The author drew me in to the lives of the characters. I especially appreciated the precise details of the hard-hat atmospheric diving apparatus. Having worked as the only female at a professional deep sea diving school, I was particularly interested in the novel’s perspective of the diving profession, especially from a woman’s viewpoint.

Book Review: Moonscape

Posted on August 10, 2020 by Mary

Moonscape by Julie Weston is the third in the “A Nellie Burns and Moonshine Mystery” series. The mystery takes place in the 1920s around what is now known as Craters of the Moon, an ancient lava field that spreads across 618 square miles in southwest Idaho.

Sheriff Charlie Asteguigoiri and Nellie Burns, now on a first-name basis, have worked out an arrangement for Nellie to become his crime photographer. Three people have been reported missing and the Sheriff and Nellie, together with her dog, Moonshine, follow a lead that the threesome, a man and two women, have gone to the lava fields and haven’t been seen since. There is talk that the missing people were involved in a religious cult, but the investigation unveils lies, greed and dangerous relationships.

The lava fields are treacherous with caves, tunnels, sharp peaks and uneven difficult- to-navigate ground. Their initial investigation reveals one dead body, but that is only the beginning of a sinister, perplexing puzzle.

Author Julie Weston has again woven an intriguing mystery which includes an unusual landscape vividly described. The character Nellie Burns, a woman of courage and curiosity, is a skilled photographer with ambitions rarely seen of women in that time period. Although it isn’t necessary to have read the previous two mysteries in the series, Moonshadows and Basque Moon, to appreciate this novel, I enjoyed revisiting some of the previous characters in this latest mystery, Moonscape.

Book Review: My Name is Eva

Posted on June 29, 2020 by Mary

My Name is Eva by Suzanne Golding is an engrossing World War II historical fiction that takes place from modern-day England and back to Germany during the war years.

The year is 2016 and Evelyn Taylor-Clark, in her nineties, is in an English elder care facility. Although she is still quite alert, she pretends that she suffers from dementia. When her niece and an Inspector visit her, they ask questions about what the niece has found in the house on Evelyn’s large English manor. The Inspector particularly wants to learn what she knows about a Colonel Robinson.

The story reverts to 1939 when Evelyn writes to her husband who is serving in the British Armed Forces. She’s worried that she hasn’t heard from him, then learns that he has been killed on a mission. She’s distraught, but even more so when she learns that his superior officer, Colonel Robinson, sent the men on a mission bound to fail. Evelyn vows revenge.

It’s 1945 and Evelyn has joined the military service as an interpreter for the interrogation of prisoners of war. As she had learned beforehand, the leader of the camp is the same Colonel Robinson, and she finds him ruthless and cruel. She’s appalled at his inhumanity to the prisoners, so much so that she finds a way to leave that position and work at another military establishment.

Back in London, 1985, Evelyn still harbors the desire to avenge her husband’s needless death. She happens to see the Colonel at a concert and finds a way to “introduce” herself to him. She invites him to her English manor and he’s impressed as she shows him her bountiful countryside estate.

As the book toggles over a 70-year span, we learn much about the war and the grim after-effects as thousands of people try to put their lives back together. We see how one man’s inhumanity can dictate the outcome of so many lives. In contrast, we visit the English countryside with its lovely gardens and genteel life.

I enjoyed My Name is Eva. The author’s research is impressive; her wit and cunning shine as she takes us through history and one woman’s eventful life.

Book Review: The Cowboy Way

Posted on June 22, 2020 by Mary

Journalist David McCumber’s The Cowboy Way: Seasons of a Montana Ranch is a memoir of the author’s year learning what it means to be a real cowboy on an expansive cattle ranch. Bill Galt, owner of Birch Creek Ranch, agrees to hire David McCumber, 44, for one year with the understanding that he perform all the regular duties of any hired hand.

Montana’s Birch Creek Ranch comprises of 64,000-plus acres of deeded and leased land that supports beef cattle, hay and grain fields. The land is mountainous with rolling pastures, and creeks that support the ranch’s water systems.

During the year David performs all the grunt work expected of a newly-hired ranch hand. Immediately upon arrival he wrestles with huge bales of hay, flaking off feed for cattle. Although he’d thought he was in pretty good shape, his body tells him differently, but he keeps at it. As the seasons change he does it all—calving, feeding, fixing fences, irrigating, haying, moving cattle, branding and vaccinating. He fights weeds and fire. He helps maintain the numerous vehicles required for daily operation. By the end of the year he’s lost thirty pounds and several inches from his waist.

Much of what David does is dirty and physically-demanding work, but occasionally he has that perfect “cowboy day”: riding horseback gathering cattle, appreciating the exquisite beauty of this vast land under perfect skies. He also works through freezing conditions in the snow, slogs through mud during the spring thaw, and toils under Montana’s blazing summer sun. Along the way, he describes the beauty of what he smells, sees and hears–the bracing aroma of horse, leather and hay, the herds of elk, birds calling for their mates, sun shimmering off the side of the mountain. He learns to appreciate the strength and know-how of a good cattle horse.

McComber gives us personal views of how a ranch this size works, a look at the kind of person who runs a ranch of this caliber, and of the many men and women he works with. He observes tempers flaring, people who are dedicated to their work, and slackers (who don’t last long). He realizes how hard the 12-14 hour days, with rarely a day off, are on families and marriages. He shares with the reader not only the often dangerous and gritty work, but also the satisfaction of a job well done. The author talks about the economics of running a ranch this size and the necessity of sound business practices.

I very much enjoyed The Cowboy Way and reading this journalist’s experience of a year in a cowboy’s life on a modern cattle ranch.

Book Review: The Fault in Our Stars

Posted on June 15, 2020 by Mary

Award-winning author John Green’s gentle romance novel, The Fault in Our Stars, is funny, touching, tragic and, along the way, educational. The sarcastic and witty story is written in first-person.

Hazel, 17, in the regressive stage of lung cancer, wheels around an oxygen tank wherever she goes. Her mother realizes Hazel is depressed and insists her daughter attend a support group.The group, all teens except their leader, features a “rotating cast of characters in various states of tumor-driven unwellness. Why did the cast rotate? It’s a side effect of dying.”

At the support group she meets Augustus, 17, who has a slightly gaited walk due to a prosthetic leg, also the result of cancer. Augustus is handsome, quick, clever, and eager to know Hazel. Together they banter, make fun of their conditions, and find joy in their common interests. Their teenage wit and snarky comments are a delight, especially when the humor is directed at their afflictions. But they have their serious moments, too. Each wants to be there for the other when the end comes.

Hazel shares her favorite book with Augustus, a story by the reclusive author Peter Van Houten. Together they mourn that the ending of the beloved book leaves unanswered questions. They eventually learn that the author lives in Amsterdam and it is their goal to find out from him what happened to the various characters in the book.

Although the subject of children afflicted by cancer is serious, The Fault in Our Stars is nevertheless delightful. Hazel’s cynicism is refreshing and honest. In many respects she’s a typical teenager, embarrassed by her parents, resentful of her restrictions. At the same time she recognizes that her condition is a tragedy her parents have had to deal with. Their lives center around Hazel, and she worries about her parents when she no longer is with them.

I highly recommend The Fault in Our Stars. It’s a compassionate, well-written story, but more than that, it gives us insight as to how people deal with this insidious disease, especially when it affects children.

Book Review: All the Pretty Horses

Posted on June 1, 2020 by Mary

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Cormac McCarthy’s All the Pretty Horses, a novel set in the late 1940s, kept me spellbound from beginning to end. John Grady Cole’s grandfather has just died and the family’s east Texas ranch is for sale. His parents are separated, his father is ill, and it is evident that John Grady, 16, is now on his own. He and his best friend Lacey Rawlins, 17, begin a journey on horseback to Mexico. Along the way, they meet up with Jimmy Blevens, 13, a wild, strange boy who rides an obviously valuable horse. The three ride together for awhile, but along the way Jimmy disappears.

John Grady and Lacey eventually make their way to a large ranch in Mexico where they are hired. John Grady speaks fluent Spanish because of Spanish-speaking help on the family ranch. He and the rancher’s daughter, Alejandra, fall in love.

A tangled web ensues, and trouble for John Grady and Lacey follows. Their former association with Jimmy Blevens creates repercussions and they are suddenly in a situation with little hope.

Author Cormac McCarthy’s writing style kept me captivated throughout. I found his vivid descriptions of the Mexican countryside and its people lyrical. Ever present are the horses, the mainstay of John Grady’s life.

Much of the writing in All the Pretty Horses would make a high school English teacher blanch. There are no quotation marks in dialog; try as you might, you won’t find an apostrophe. The text is riddled with vague or ambiguous pronouns, yet the meaning is always clear. The dialect between the cowboys is natural, and therefore usually grammatically incorrect. Spanish is frequently used, but unfortunately there are no translations though meanings are usually subtly clear; other times I gave it my best guess. Proper nouns like “French” or even “American” often are not capitalized. There are rambling sentences with 65-plus words. As a writer, I found myself mentally correcting the obvious omissions, but in no way did these transgressions diminish my enjoyment of the book.

I happened to see the 2000 movie All the Pretty Horses before reading the book, and imagining Matt Damon in John Grady Cole’s role obviously added to my enjoyment of the story. I highly recommend this novel for people who love horses and who enjoy an authentic western experience.