WHERE COYOTES HOWL
Beautifully rendered, Where Coyotes Howl is a vivid and deeply affecting ode to the early twentieth century West, from master storyteller Sandra Dallas.
Except for the way they loved each other, they were just ordinary, everyday folks. Just ordinary.
1916. The two-street town of Wallace is not exactly what Ellen Webster had in mind when she accepted a teaching position in Wyoming, but within a year’s time she’s fallen in love—both with the High Plains and with a handsome cowboy named Charlie Bacon. Life is not easy in the flat, brown corner of the state where winter blizzards are unforgiving and the summer heat relentless.
Beautifully rendered, Where Coyotes Howl is a vivid and deeply affecting ode to the early twentieth century West, from master storyteller Sandra Dallas.
Except for the way they loved each other, they were just ordinary, everyday folks. Just ordinary.
1916. The two-street town of Wallace is not exactly what Ellen Webster had in mind when she accepted a teaching position in Wyoming, but within a year’s time she’s fallen in love—both with the High Plains and with a handsome cowboy named Charlie Bacon. Life is not easy in the flat, brown corner of the state where winter blizzards are unforgiving and the summer heat relentless. But Ellen and Charlie face it all together, their relationship growing stronger with each shared success, and each deeply felt tragedy.
Ellen finds purpose in her work as a rancher’s wife and in her bonds with other women settled on the prairie. Not all of them are so lucky as to have loving husbands, not all came to Wallace willingly, and not all of them can survive the cruel seasons. But they look out for each other, share their secrets, and help one another in times of need. And the needs are great and constant. The only city to speak of, Cheyenne, is miles away, making it akin to the Wild West in rural Wallace. In the end, it is not the trials Ellen and Charlie face together that make them remarkable, but their love for one another that endures through it all.
- St. Martin's Press
- Hardcover
- April 2023
- 320 Pages
- 9781250277909
Buy the Book
$27.99
About Sandra Dallas
Sandra Dallas, dubbed “a quintessential American voice” in Vogue Magazine, is the author of over a dozen novels, including Prayers for Sale and Tallgrass, many translated into a dozen languages and optioned for films. Six-time winner of the Willa Award and four-time winner of the Spur Award, Dallas was a Business Week reporter for 25 years covering the Rocky Mountain region, and began writing fiction in 1990. She has two daughters and lives with her husband in Denver and Georgetown, Colorado.
Praise
“Dallas’ blunt, brutal latest explores the mythic soul of the American West…through a female lens.” —Booklist (Starred Review)
“Anybody who writes about a cowboy with a ‘spotted devil horse’ and a woman who ‘loved him more than the sunrise’ has a great story to tell. Where Coyotes Howl is addictive. Highly recommended!” —Paulette Jiles, New York Times bestselling author of News of the World
“What an extraordinary story done by a master storyteller. So many characters fully rendered, lives that grip the heart. I could feel the Wyoming wind in my face and smell the dust.” —Francine Rivers, New York Times bestselling author of The Lady’s Mine
“Dallas writes with a great sense of place and understanding of the harsh climate, isolation and loneliness women faced as Wyoming evolved in the early 20th century. This is not your traditional love story…it has far more grit and reality.” —Candy Moulton, Executive Director, Western Writers of America
“Dallas’s poignant love story exposes authentic life on the brutal but beautiful western frontier.” —Betsy Randolph, author and 2021-2022 President of Women Writing the West
“Paints an honest portrait of life on the Wyoming frontier in the early 20th Century, heartwarming, heartbreaking, and filled with the best and worst of human nature. This is the best Novel of the American West I’ve read since, well, the last Sandra Dallas novel I picked up.” — Johnny D. Boggs, Western Writers Hall of Fame author of A Thousand Texas Longhorns
“Sandra Dallas is an American treasure. She knows the history of the American West — its beauty and hardship — like few other writers. That’s why her fiction rings so true. Where Coyotes Howl is one of her best novels, a howling success.” —Tom “Dr. Colorado” Noel
Discussion Questions
l. Ellen knows nothing more about Montana than what she has read in Zane Grey books, yet she commits herself to teach for a year in Wallace. She is shocked to see Wallace, a desolate town on the High Plains, and even thinks about remaining on the train and continuing to California. What would make you pack up and move to a part of the country you’ve only read about in books? Would you have stayed when you saw how bleak the destination was? Could you have been a pioneer?
2. Ellen and Charlie fall in love at first sight. In fact, Charlie was smitten with Ellen’s picture long before he met her. Do you believe love at first sight is possible?
3. Ruth McGinty is abused mentally and physically by her husband. Because she’s barely educated and has no marketable skills, she has no option but to remain with him. What are abused women’s options today? How much different are they from those of women who lived a hundred years ago?
4. Miss Ferguson stays on in Wyoming after she discovers her lover was married and she gives up her son to his father after the judge’s Solomonic decision to send the boy to an orphanage. Was that a wise or foolish decision on her part? Why would she stay and face the scorn of her neighbors?
5. Julia Brownell’s sisters agree to adopt all the Brownell children except for Lucy, who is mentally challenged. Do you blame the sisters for not taking Lucy in an era when mental illness was considered a stigma? Did Ellen do the right thing in letting the Gurleys adopt her? How was raising a child like Lucy different in the 1910s than it is today?
6. In one of the saddest stories in the book, Gladys and Morris Turnbull’s two sons are killed when their house catches fire. Gladys isn’t aware of the fire because she is outside smoking. Do you understand why Gladys left and why Morris blames Gladys for the boys’ deaths? One of the most satisfying moments in Where Coyotes Howl is their reconciliation. How and why do you think that happened?
7. Hattie Young dreams of becoming a teacher. In fact, Ellen helps Hattie prepare for college, but Hattie decides to marry Pike instead. Why? Should she have waited?
8. Quilting plays a part in almost all of Sandra’s books. What is it about quilting that gave Western women pleasure? What’s behind today’s revival of interest in quilting?
9. Which character did you like best in Where Coyotes Howl? Which did you like the least? Why?
10. This is Sandra’s seventeenth adult novel. How do the story and the setting differ from her other books? What themes run through her books?
11. Discuss the ending. Would you have written a different one?