The sheep business is in decline. Just this morning on NPR, I heard
Diane Josephy Peavy say that the situation is grave. It was quite
another story in the days of Emma and Tom Sweringen. Their story
begins on a large ranch 30 miles south of Salmon, Idaho, and Emma's
sheep number 7,000.

Emma and Tom's children are high-spirited but are kept in bounds by
Emma's sense of decorum; she pins her hopes on Beth, the family
beauty. So when the railroad comes in from Montana and one of the
young surveyors proposes to Beth, she is swept up by her mother's
plans for her and agrees to the marriage. The new Steinway for the
wedding present is ordered, the date is that close.

If only Beth and Emma had taken the Model T to attend Beth's bridal
shower rather than the train, their whole future would have stayed
on course. But, alas, on the train is Beth's true future --- a
handsome scamp and ne'er-do-well named Benjamin Harrison Burton. He
is selling advertising, as it happens, the kind that is plastered
on barns across the country: Arbuckle's Coffee, Sloan's Liniment,
and Horseshoe Plug. 

The Sweringen barn is white. The whiteness is dazzling. Imagine
Emma's shock when she steps from the train to find garishly colored
posters splashed across her barn and her daughter head-over-heals
for some fast-talking lothario. Here the story gains momentum like
the little train that has to be held back by heavy logs when it
comes back from Montana. Emma's business instincts are sound, but a
daughter in love is not something she's prepared to handle.

Like it or not, Beth and Ben are married. And the years pass. Tom
Burton, son of Ben and Beth, lives in Maine, as far from the old
ranch as he can get. Imagine his surprise one day to find that a
woman in Washington State is searching for details about her birth
parents, and that the trail has led her to Beth and the Sweringen
family. Both of Tom's grandparents are dead, and his mother as
well. How will he handle this and why does it matter so much?
 

Thomas Savage has a wit as tart as green apples. It lightens the
mix of sharp observations about families and life. I was reminded
of THE STONE DIARIES and THE SHIPPING NEWS for reasons that have to
do with places that stick in the mind and characters that hang
around as if waiting for another chapter to begin.

I can see this book as a movie. I can see that little train
struggling up the tracks to the summit, the sheep camps, the Basque
herders and their dogs, Beth on the fateful train ride with her
disapproving mother, old Tom watching the shearers, and the banker
in Salt Lake City. I can see scene after scene of cattle and horses
moving against the landscape. I can even hear the noises and music
in the background. Someone, call Steven Speilberg and John
Williams.