Overview:
A stark tragedy unfolds in Watson's taut, memorable novel, the winner of the publisher's National Fiction Prize. During the summer of 1948, a solid, middle-class family in a small Montana town is wrenched apart by scandal, murder and suicide. Narrator David Hayden tells the story as an adult looking back at the traumatic events that scarred yet matured him when he was 12. His pious Lutheran mother informs his father, Wesley, the county sheriff, that David's uncle Frank, a doctor, has been molesting and raping Native American girls during routine medical exams. Uncle Frank's latest victim is Marie Little Soldier, the Haydens' Sioux housekeeper. When Marie dies, presumably of pneumonia, David provides key evidence that implicates his uncle in her murder. Frank is arrested by his brother, who locks the confessed sexual abuser in the basement to save him from the embarrassment of jail. David confronts his uncle's racism and the evasions and denials his family has constructed to cover up the affair. In crisp, restrained prose, Watson ( In a Dark Time ) indelibly portrays the moral dilemma of a family torn between justice and loyalty; by implication, he also illuminates some dark corners of our national history.
•National Bestseller
• Milkweed National Fiction Prize
• Mountains & Plains Bookseller Award
• Friends of American Writers Award
• Banta Award • Critics Choice Award
• Shortlisted, IMPAC Dublin International Award
• ALA/YALSA Best Books for Young Adults
• New York Library Best Books for the Teen Age
• ALA Booklist Editor’s Choice Award
“As universal in its themes as it is original in its peculiarities, Montana 1948 is a significant and elegant addition to the fiction of the American West, and to contemporary American fiction in general.”
—Washington Post Book World
“Montana 1948 stands out as a work of art.A narrative that can be read purely for the pleasure of a good story. But Watson is after something smaller and larger—a quest for personal integrity within a community that doesn’t seem to want the truth; an understanding of the complexity of justice; a look at corruption behind the ideal of American white men as conquering heroes.”
San Francisco Chronicle
“The unspoken life of any small town, especially a small, hardscrabble western town, contains a motherlode of raw emotion, morally ambiguous and potentially devastating. Watson mines that vein with both unflinching honesty and complete respect, both for the dignity of the people and the implacability of the landscape.”
Booklist (starred review)
“Wonderful. . . . Be prepared to read this compact book in one sitting. Start at 10 P.M. By 11, you’re hooked. You finish in the wee hours, mesmerized by the fast-moving plot, the terse language, uncompromising characterization and insights into life. . . .”
Baltimore Sun
“Utterly mesmerizing. . . . There’s something eminently universal in Watson’s ponderings on the human condition, and it’s refracted through a nearly perfect eye for character, place and the rhythms of language. Fiction at its finest is sometimes hard to find; Montana 1948 amply fits the bill.”
The Nation
“Montana 1948 is a superbly rendered novel. The writing is clean, the characters finely drawn, the whole book deeply felt and honest. . . . It is a spare, unpretentious, but riveting book . . . with great sensitivity and subtlety.”
Houston Chronicle
“This short, swift novel . . . packs a wallop. . . . Watson sometimes evokes echoes of Ivan Doig and, of all authors, Harper Lee. . . . Quickly read (you’ll stay up till it’s done), this story will not be as quickly forgotten.”
Milwaukee Journal
“Taut, memorable. . . . In crisp, restrained prose, Watson indelibly portrays the moral dilemma of a family torn between justice and loyalty; by implication, he also illuminates some dark corners of our national history.”
Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Watson’s story builds beautifully to its surprising yet inevitable conclusion. . . . Montana 1948 is a satisfying read.”
Missoulian
“Larry Watson handles each of his characters with considerable skill. . . . The memoir-like tone of Montana 1948 is one of its great merits and pleasures; and Larry Watson, who grew up in nearby North Dakota about the same time, knows his isolated Montana locale inside out, from the distinctive redolence of Bentrock’s bowling alley to exactly where the trout lie on the Knife River.”
Washington Post Book World
“Pithy, elegiac. . . . Montana 1948’s efficiently drawn characters, understated Main Street setting and disturbing situations are always convincing. And David Hayden’s narration seamlessly combines youthful and adult perspectives in an authentic and urgent voice.”
Cleveland Plain Dealer
“A real page-turner. . . . Very thoughtful, very artistic, beautifully written. In short, it has everything. Watson’s portrayal of a small-town family at mid-century is zero to the bone. . . . And small-town life? Watson’s description recalls To Kill a Mockingbird. . . . So just go out and buy this book and read it.”
Minneapolis Star Tribune
“It is, first and foremost, a good story, told in a direct, seemingly artless prose. It’s a brilliant evocation of time and place. And it is the story of this country, of power and racism.”
Detroit Free Press
“A lean, gaunt narrative rich with implication. . . . A literary page-turner, morally complex and satisfying in its careful accumulation of detail and in its use of landscape to reveal character.”
Kirkus Reviews
“A smooth, gripping story.”
The Sacramento Bee
“Straight-to-the-kill . . . [with] vivid, living characters who speak truly. The style of Montana 1948 is as thin, clear and crisp as a North Dakota wind.”
Los Angeles Times Book Review
“Watson builds a simple but powerful tale. . . . The moral issues, and the consequences of following one’s conscience, are made painfully evident here. Watson is to be congratulated for the honesty of his writing and the purity of his prose. Highly recommended.”
Library Journal
“A novel whose power comes not just from fine writing, but from a fast-moving plot.”
The Sunday Oregonian
ENJOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!
And Blessed Are The Ones Who Care For Their
Fellow Men!
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