Jick McCaskill is 14. He's the younger son of hardworking parents. His father is a forester and fire-watcher for the National Parks, keeping an eye on the people using and farming in the Two Medicine National Forest. Jick's mother is a fiercely independent woman who runs the household and small holding and keeps the family organised. Jick's elder brother Alec is the brains of the family. His amazing ability with numbers has led to his parents saving their money to send him to college. They hope he might become more than a farmer or rancher. They want him to escape. But Alec falls in love and announces his desire to get married and stay on the farm. So begins English Creek and the story of Jick's transformative summer.
English Creek is one of those novels were little happens. We see Jick's world view transformed as he is on the cusp of adulthood. Still drinking pop and with time to spare around his chores he is just beginning to see how the grown up world works. His father hands him over for a few days to a transient worker, one of many older men who make their living doing various seasonal jobs. Jick gets drunk for the first time, but also encounters the wisdom of older people who show him the way the world of Two Medicine works.
In the few week's covered by the novel there are a few key events - a rodeo, a Fourth of July picnic and a horrific thunderstorm. The story, such as it is, culminates in a dramatic forest fire. But, to be honest, little else takes place. This is a novel about a time, place and people. Rural Americans whose life has been crushed by the depression, who are desperate for rain or higher prices for their cattle and sheep, and whose lives are closely intertwined, even if not obviously, to world events. The ending, is less of a plot conclusion, and more of a shock to the reader when we realise the context for Jick and Alec's lives.
Ivan Doig's books are not well known outside of the US (and probably Montana). This is a shame. His writing is sparse, but beautifully sharp. And their's plenty of vernacular - which flows both from the local accent and the immigrant communities - something explored further in the prequel. Jick's mother makes an unorthodox, and realtively radical speech at the July Fourth celebrations. In it she talks about her father and his friend Ben. Ben English, she says, "is gone from us. He died in the summer of 1927 of a strained heart. Died, to say it plainly, of the work he put into this country, as so many have."
English Creek is a celebration of that work, that hardiness and the despair that was the lot of so many Americans between the wars. Doig's book is a mighty fine celebration of those lives and struggles.
Related Reviews
Doig - This House of Sky: Landscapes of a Western Mind
Doig - Bucking the Sun
Doig - Winter Brothers: A season at the edge of America
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