Whiskey When We're Dry
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Book Overview
Named a Best Book by Entertainment Weekly, O Magazine, Goodreads, Southern Living, Outside Magazine, Oprah.com, HelloGiggles, Parade, Fodor's Travel, Sioux City Journal, Read it Forward, Medium.com, and NPR's All Things Considered.
"A thunderclap of originality, here is a fresh voice and fresh take on one of the oldest stories we tell about ourselves as Americans and Westerners. It's riveting in all the right ways -- a damn good read that stayed with me long after closing the covers." - Timothy Egan, New York Times bestselling author of The Worst Hard Time From a blazing new voice in fiction, a gritty and lyrical American epic about a young woman who disguises herself as a boy and heads west In the spring of 1885, seventeen-year-old Jessilyn Harney finds herself orphaned and alone on her family's homestead. Desperate to fend off starvation and predatory neighbors, she cuts off her hair, binds her chest, saddles her beloved mare, and sets off across the mountains to find her outlaw brother Noah and bring him home. A talented sharpshooter herself, Jess's quest lands her in the employ of the territory's violent, capricious Governor, whose militia is also hunting Noah--dead or alive. Wrestling with her brother's outlaw identity, and haunted by questions about her own, Jess must outmaneuver those who underestimate her, ultimately rising to become a hero in her own right. Told in Jess's wholly original and unforgettable voice, Whiskey When We're Dry is a stunning achievement, an epic as expansive as America itself--and a reckoning with the myths that are entwined with our history.
"A thunderclap of originality, here is a fresh voice and fresh take on one of the oldest stories we tell about ourselves as Americans and Westerners. It's riveting in all the right ways -- a damn good read that stayed with me long after closing the covers." - Timothy Egan, New York Times bestselling author of The Worst Hard Time From a blazing new voice in fiction, a gritty and lyrical American epic about a young woman who disguises herself as a boy and heads west In the spring of 1885, seventeen-year-old Jessilyn Harney finds herself orphaned and alone on her family's homestead. Desperate to fend off starvation and predatory neighbors, she cuts off her hair, binds her chest, saddles her beloved mare, and sets off across the mountains to find her outlaw brother Noah and bring him home. A talented sharpshooter herself, Jess's quest lands her in the employ of the territory's violent, capricious Governor, whose militia is also hunting Noah--dead or alive. Wrestling with her brother's outlaw identity, and haunted by questions about her own, Jess must outmaneuver those who underestimate her, ultimately rising to become a hero in her own right. Told in Jess's wholly original and unforgettable voice, Whiskey When We're Dry is a stunning achievement, an epic as expansive as America itself--and a reckoning with the myths that are entwined with our history.
Format:Paperback
Language:English
ISBN:073522045X
ISBN13:9780735220454
Release Date:July 2019
Publisher:Penguin Books
Length:416 Pages
Weight:0.79 lbs.
Dimensions:0.9" x 5.4" x 8.2"
Customer Reviews
2 ratings
Beautiful, unpredictable, and unique storytelling
Published by AMBERUNNER , 1 year ago
I really enjoyed this... I felt completely transported to the time and place in this book... I have read it twice now and continue to buy copies for my friends and family. A must read.
"Give me a mountain and a game trail and I will ride for a thousand years."
Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 6 years ago
A struggle to get my copy of this book. Well worth it. The book follows our heroine Jessilyn Harney, from about age 15 to much later in life. Her mother died, soon after she was born, leaving her with Pa and Noah her 5 year old brother. They have a hard life in a soddy, near a lake. Food is plentiful, always something to shoot.
Pa and Noah got in a big fight and Noah left home. Jess and Pa kept the ranch together as best they could, always having to go after the cows in the mountains and thickets.
Noah went out west and started robbing trains, making himself well known as a bank robber, an outlaw.
Pa died alone in the mountains. Jess found that a family of one, a girl at that couldn't make a go of their ranch. She camouflaged her bits and rode out, thinking she was going to bring Noah home to help.
Jesse as she now called herself, ends up with a decent job, working for the Governor and being his number one shootist. No one knew she was a girl. She is working here waiting for the Governor's men to bring back some information on Noah.
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