Paulette Jiles Stormy Weather

Some four years ago after only a scant few pages I was hopelessly and happily hooked by a stunning debut novel, Enemy Women. Written in spare, almost lyrical prose it was amazing. The author was poet and memorist Pauline Jiles who had married history and fiction to create an unforgettable story of strength, courage and love during the American Civil War.

At the time I was so impressed by this author's narrative skills that I couldn't wait to read her next book, yet I wondered if she could possibly live up to the praise soon heaped upon her debut. With Stormy Weather she has done just that and raised the bar.

Once again Ms. Jiles has taken her setting from the pages of our country's history - the Depression as endured on the merciless plains of Texas. It is a story of a family, the Stoddards, and four incredible women who not only survive but conquer.

Jeanine is the middle daughter, the one most favored by her father, and she adores him despite last night's " tormented shouting" between her parents, Elizabeth and Jack. Wise beyond their years, we read, "....Jeanine and her sister knew these were noises of pain. Their parents needed comfort." Yet, when she expresses her love to him, the reply is, "...you'll be mad at me too someday, Jenny," he said. "Before the world is done with me."

Many needed comfort in 1930s Cental Texas where life was more than hard, each day bringing a struggle for food, clothing, and shelter. However, these were proud people who believed "Hard times and collapsing marriages and heavy labor was nobody's business but their own."

Jack finds release from his failures in whiskey and gambling. An accident while working on an oil well causes him to slip from reality. A criminal act follows and he dies in jail.

Now widowed Elizabeth has no means of support nor a roof over their heads. The only option is to return to the home of her ancestors, the Tolliver farm. So they packed their belongings, Mayme, the oldest, and Bea, the youngest, doing their part. As they drove toward the farm on Highway 80 they saw cars loaded with household belongings moving from one oil field to another or to a cotton harvest. It was "People searching for work, as if it were a thing, a metal in the ground or a place."

To say the farm and house are run down is an understatement. But Jeanine is determined to make a go of it. It's their place and she'll repair the house and work the fields. Mayme eventually finds work, which brings in a small amount of money, and Bea goes to school. Bea's the reader, an intelligent child who nurtures her stray cat, and escapes from their hard scrabble life in the magazines she devours.

Elizabeth discovers that she's made of sterner stuff than she had imagined when she takes her place among men to invest in some wildcat oil drilling. As Jeanine struggles with the physical labor involved in the house and land, she also tries to come to terms with her desire for independence and two very dissimilar men who want to share her life.

Stormy Weather is a remarkable story, memorable and evocative. At its heart are the portraits of four women, each blessed with equal parts grit and grace. One more triumph for Paulette Jiles!

- Gail Cooke

Stormy Weather

Paulette Jiles

Morrow, May 2007, $24.95

ISBN: 9780060537326

In the late 1920s in Texas, Elizabeth and Jack Stoddard raise three daughters; beautiful Mayme, tomboy Jeanine and scholarly Bea. Her two siblings detest the fact that their dad makes no effort to hide that Jeanine is his favorite as she is his sidekick at the races.

When the drinking gambling Jack dies in 1937, he leaves behind four females needing to survive. They, accompanied by an aging capricious yet still fast racing horse Smoky Joe, move onto a run down neglected homestead overlooking the Brazos River. However, life proves hard as an extended drought has turned Central Texas into a dust bowl while the younger females begin seeing men.

This deep family historical drama brings to life the Depression in Texas oil country through the lives of the four female Stoddards. Each member of the Stoddard quartet is a unique protagonist so that the women bring differing points of view to what is happening to them especially when they return to the dilapidated ranch once Jack dies. Fans of dust bowl character driven tales will want to read STORMY WEATHER, a keenly vivid look at life in 1930s Texas.

Harriet Klausner