Hello All!
I am continuing my reading of western award winners--this title was Tallgrass by Sandra Dallas. The book won the 2008 Western Writers of America Spur Award for Best Short Novel.
This was another "western" that surprised me, as it took place during WWII, and was the story of a Japanese internment camp being built near a small town in Colorado, and the effects it had on the community. This is a very well written, interesting book, told from the viewpoint of a young girl. Rennie Stroud is just becoming a young woman, and the Stroud sugar beet farm is located next to the internment camp. The book covers several years of the Strouds' lives, as they cope with Mrs. Stroud's heart troubles, the results of hiring internment camp detainees for help on the farm, the rape and murder of a neighbor girl who is the same age as Rennie, and the telegram that arrives, telling them that Rennie's brother is missing in action in Europe. Throughout all this, the rhythm of farm life is constant. Sandra Dallas also incorporates quilting into this novel, as she did in The Persian Pickle Club.
From the Western Writers of America website:
The Spur Awards, given annually for distinguished writing about the American West, are among the oldest and most prestigious in American literature. In 1953, when the awards were established by WWA, western fiction was a staple of American publishing. At the time awards were given to the best western novel, best historical novel, best juvenile, and best short story.
Since then the awards have been broadened to include other types of writing about the West*. Today, Spurs are offered for the best western novel (short novel), best novel of the west (long novel), best original paperback novel, best short story, best short nonfiction. Also, best contemporary nonfiction, best biography, best history, best juvenile fiction and nonfiction, best TV or motion picture drama, best TV or motion picture documentary, and best first novel (called The Medicine Pipe Bearer's Award).
Winners of the Spur Awards in previous years include Larry McMurtry for Lonesome Dove, Michael Blake for Dances With Wolves, Glendon Swarthout for The Shootist, and Tony Hillerman for Skinwalker.
This somewhat explains to me why the novels I'm reading are not "westerns' in the sense of the old west, as I originally expected from the Spur Awards. But as I am a recent transplant to Arizona, I am very interested in my new part of the country, and so will continue to read novels about the west, as I am enjoying it very much.
Happy Reading!
Patti
Showing posts with label western genre. Show all posts
Showing posts with label western genre. Show all posts
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Friday, August 1, 2008
Checking Out Award Winners
Hello All!
There are all sorts of book awards out there, and if you only read award winners, you quite possibly wouldn't read anything else. I do try to sample here and there, in other fiction genres than my usual mystery one, and I've found wonderful books that way, and also terrible books (like Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee, which won the Booker Prize--I personally did not get why it won an award but it did make for a terrific book discussion!).
On to some good stuff, according to me :) :
A recent wonderful find was 2006 Spur Award Winner (from the Western Writers of America) was Willard Wyman's High Country. This title won two awards that year, Novel of the West, and Best First Novel; I think that's why I chose to read it. The writing in this book is cinematic--you are there in the Montana mountains of the 1930s, as a boy becomes a man as he learns how to run mule trains into the wilderness. Mistakes are made, WWII comes and goes, and one's mentor passes on, but the story of the West, despite changes, remains a big story and a vast place. Highly recommended
Another find was Beth Ciotta's All About Evie, which won the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award for Contemporary Romance. I chose this title as I had read another book by her, and because I thought it was a standalone. Several bonuses were found in this book for me--it's screwball romance, which is my favorite kind, the main character is over 40, and it's not a standalone! The second title just came out in February, and is called Everybody Loves Evie. I had a lot of fun reading this, and I also definitely recommend All About Evie--I'll read the second one soon.
Happy Reading!
Patti
There are all sorts of book awards out there, and if you only read award winners, you quite possibly wouldn't read anything else. I do try to sample here and there, in other fiction genres than my usual mystery one, and I've found wonderful books that way, and also terrible books (like Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee, which won the Booker Prize--I personally did not get why it won an award but it did make for a terrific book discussion!).
On to some good stuff, according to me :) :
A recent wonderful find was 2006 Spur Award Winner (from the Western Writers of America) was Willard Wyman's High Country. This title won two awards that year, Novel of the West, and Best First Novel; I think that's why I chose to read it. The writing in this book is cinematic--you are there in the Montana mountains of the 1930s, as a boy becomes a man as he learns how to run mule trains into the wilderness. Mistakes are made, WWII comes and goes, and one's mentor passes on, but the story of the West, despite changes, remains a big story and a vast place. Highly recommended
Another find was Beth Ciotta's All About Evie, which won the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award for Contemporary Romance. I chose this title as I had read another book by her, and because I thought it was a standalone. Several bonuses were found in this book for me--it's screwball romance, which is my favorite kind, the main character is over 40, and it's not a standalone! The second title just came out in February, and is called Everybody Loves Evie. I had a lot of fun reading this, and I also definitely recommend All About Evie--I'll read the second one soon.
Happy Reading!
Patti
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