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The Whistling Season
- Narrated by: Jonathan Hogan
- Length: 11 hrs and 50 mins
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"Didn't need the underlying social message"
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Publisher's summary
A finalist for the National Book award, Ivan Doig, who has published 11 books, has been hailed as the "West's preeminent literary novelist" by the Denver Post.
Critic reviews
"The Whistling Season is a book to pass on to your favorite readers: a story of lives of active choice, lived actively." (Publishers Weekly)
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Set against the colorful and magical backdrop of Ireland, The Grey Horse chronicles a time when the Irish people suffered under harsh English overlords who sought to destroy their culture and way of life. Into the Irish town of Carraroe, a magnificent, completely grey stallion appears. The horse brings with him the promise of better times and magical happenings, for he is actually the shape-shifted form of Ruairi MacEibhir, journeyed to a time of danger in order to win the hand of the woman he loves.
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A good enough irish tale
- By Ellenaeddy on 03-20-13
By: R. A. MacAvoy
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This House of Sky
- Landscapes of a Western Mind
- By: Ivan Doig
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte
- Length: 11 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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A nominee for the National Book Award, Ivan Doig's brilliant memoir shares the experiences and culture that shaped his early years and made him fall in love with the West. From his childhood in a family of homesteaders through the death of his mother and his move to Montana to herd sheep, Doig shows his intimate connection with the American West.
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Early work by a favorite author
- By Doggy Bird on 09-06-14
By: Ivan Doig
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The Little Giant of Aberdeen County
- By: Tiffany Baker
- Narrated by: Carrington MacDuffie
- Length: 12 hrs and 29 mins
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Truly Plaice, an overly large and ungainly girl, is the polar opposite of her sister, Serena Jane, the epitome of feminine perfection. With their parents dead, Truly and Serena Jane are separated: Serena Jane to live a life of privilege as the future May Queen and Truly to live on the outskirts of town, the subject of constant abuse and humiliation.
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meh...
- By Victoria on 02-25-09
By: Tiffany Baker
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Room for Hope
- By: Kim Vogel Sawyer
- Narrated by: Kate Forbes
- Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins
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Neva Shilling has a heavy load of responsibility while her husband travels to neighboring communities and sells items from his wagon. In his absence, she faithfully runs the Shilling Mercantile, working to keep their business strong as the Depression takes its toll, and caring for their twins. When a wagon pulls up after supper, Neva and her children rush out - and into the presence of the deputy driving a wagon carrying three young children.
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Amazing! My new favourite!! One of my best!!!
- By JasmineNj on 10-07-16
By: Kim Vogel Sawyer
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Plots and Pans
- By: Kelly Eileen Hake
- Narrated by: Sharilynn Dunn
- Length: 10 hrs and 13 mins
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Order dictates Tucker Carmichael’s life - his orders. On a cattle drive, a moment’s hesitation can mean death. The Chisholm Trail is dirty, dangerous, and no place for women. After years at school, Jessalyn Culpepper has come home and is determined to show everyone that a woman can manage everything from cooking to cattle - whether they like it or not! Tucker tries to manage his partner’s headstrong sister, horrified when she wants to join the cattle drive.
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Sweet Story, if a Mite Predictable
- By C. ALLINGER on 03-25-14
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Beneath a Prairie Moon
- By: Kim Vogel Sawyer
- Narrated by: Pilar Witherspoon
- Length: 12 hrs and 55 mins
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Abigail Brantley grew up in affluence and knows exactly how to behave in high society. But when she is cast from the social registers due to her father's illegal dealings, she finds herself forced into a role she never imagined: tutoring rough Kansas ranchers in the subjects of manners and morals so they can "marry up" with their mail-order brides. Mack Cleveland, whose father was swindled by a mail-order bride, wants no part of the scheme to bring Eastern women to Spiveyville, Kansas, but as time goes by, his heart goes out to the teacher.
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Loved
- By Amanda on 04-10-18
By: Kim Vogel Sawyer
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The Pale Blue Eye
- By: Louis Bayard
- Narrated by: Charles Leggett
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
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When the body of a suicide victim disappears at West Point Military Academy in 1831, only to be discovered hours later missing its heart, the Academy calls on retired detective Gus Landor to investigate. Landor is something of a legend among his peers, noted for an uncanny, Holmesian ability to read people. When Edgar Allan Poe, a new cadet, comes forth with his own cryptic conclusion—that the man Landor is looking for is a poet—Landor is intrigued and enlists Poe as his assistant.
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Could not get through it
- By Amazon Customer on 10-25-15
By: Louis Bayard
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Fair Play
- By: Deeanne Gist
- Narrated by: Kate Forbes
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Saddled with a man's name, the captivating Billy Jack Tate makes no apologies for taking on a man's profession. As a doctor at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, she is one step closer to having her very own medical practice - until Hunter Scott asks her to give it all up to become his wife.
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Total flop!
- By irishred507 on 02-26-17
By: Deeanne Gist
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Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories
- By: Kelly Link - editor, Gavin J. Grant - editor
- Narrated by: Sarah Coomes, Nico Evers-Swindell, Shannon McManus, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 46 mins
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Imagine an alternate universe where romance and technology reign. Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and recraft a world of automatons, ornate clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, and intrepid orphans - decked out in corsets, clockwerk suits, and tall black boots - solve dastardly crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships.
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MMMM, Orca Bacon
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 09-14-13
By: Kelly Link - editor, and others
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Read this as book two and Dancing as book one
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Ivan Doig at his best
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Such a lovely final book.
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Early work by a favorite author
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Too profain.
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Such a lovely final book.
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Driven by the memory of a fallen teammate, TSU's 1941 starting lineup made Montana football history, charging through the season undefeated. Two years later, the "Supreme Team" is caught up in World War II. Ten of them are scattered around the globe in the war's various lonely and dangerous theaters. The 11th man, Ben Reinking, has been plucked from pilot training by a military propaganda machine hungry for heroes.
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Didn't really care for it.
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A Time in the Mountains.
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National Book Award finalist Ivan Doig had only a vague memory of his mother until he discovered a cache of her letters. They revealed a passionate, can-do woman who loved the lilting rhythm of words. A moving prequel to his acclaimed memoir This House of Sky, Doig’s Heart Earth highlights his childhood before his mother’s death and eloquently captures the texture of the American West, the fortunes of a family, and one woman’s indomitable spirit.
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Like a warm blanket on a chilly night.
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National Book Award finalist Ivan Doig writes about Big Sky country with raw authenticity. Set during the 1920s, Prairie Nocturne finds Susan Duff, the young songbird from Doig’s Dancing at the Rascal Fair, now a middle-aged singing coach living in Helena. When her old flame, Wes Williamson, asks her to mentor his black chauffeur, Monty, she agrees. But racial tensions erupt when Susan’s private lessons with Monty attract the attention of the KKK.
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Not to my liking!
- By Kathy in CA on 02-24-14
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A River Runs Through It is a universal story of family love and a lyrical masterpiece, as beautiful as the great trout rivers of western Montana upon which it is set. Its beauty is especially evident through the "near-perfect match" of reader Ivan Doig and author Norman MacLean.
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Lyrical - wonderfully done
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Terrific book, outstanding narration.
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good book bad reader
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Loved the Movie- and the Short Story is Better!
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Set in a middle-class neighborhood in Atlanta in the 1980s, Silver Sparrow revolves around James Witherspoon's two families - the public one and the secret one. When the daughters from each family meet and form a friendship, only one of them knows they are sisters. It is a relationship destined to explode when secrets are revealed and illusions shattered. As Jones explores the backstories of her rich yet flawed characters - the father, the two mothers, the grandmother, and the uncle - she also reveals the joy, as well as the destruction, they brought to one another's lives.
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underwhelming ending
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The Seed Keeper
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Rosalie Iron Wing has grown up in the woods with her father, Ray, a former science teacher who tells her stories of plants, of the stars, of the origins of the Dakhota people. Until, one morning, Ray doesn't return from checking his traps. Told she has no family, Rosalie is sent to live with a foster family in nearby Mankato - where the reserved, bookish teenager meets rebellious Gaby Makespeace, in a friendship that transcends the damaged legacies they've inherited.
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Wonderful Timely Story
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By: Diane Wilson
What listeners say about The Whistling Season
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Rick Just
- 12-21-06
Wordplay
With the passing some years ago of Wallace Stegner, Ivan Doig is probably the writer who now most personifies the West. English Creek, Dancing at the Rascal Fair, and Ride with me Mariah Montana are among my favorites. It was with great enthusiasm that I began to read his latest, The Whistling Season. It was for that reason, perhaps, that I was initially disappointed. It had the tone of a juvenile book, at first. There's nothing wrong with that—I write juvenile fiction myself. But this seemed just a note off from where it belonged.
True, the book is about a juvenile, through his reminiscence 50 years hence. There was something that did not ring true. I don't know if I got over it, or if the book improved. More likely I was picking something up in the narration that wasn't just right.
Ultimately, the book is not a disappointment, though not his best work. Early on you could see the happy ending rolling toward you like a train in the distance: recently widowed farmer with three boys sends for a housekeeper on the basis of a cryptic ad. Surprise, surprise, she's quite good looking. The real surprise is that she brings her brother with her. He turns out to be much more than we expect, and in many ways is the center of the book.
Much of the novel takes place in a one-room Montana schoolhouse, beginning in 1909. There are several sub-plots that provide the action. The real story is about the kind of education one could get in that kind of setting. A couple of years ago I was privileged to have the opportunity to edit the history of a similar school in Idaho. That kind of grade-spanning education, all but lost today, had much to recommend it.
There is some entertaining wordplay throughout the novel. We come dangerously close to learning a little Latin. In the end, the entire book turns on the definition of a word. A bold step that a lesser writer might not have pulled off. Doig does it with ease.
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46 people found this helpful
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Overall
- B. L. Cloud
- 12-08-06
A wonderful story!
Five big shining stars! This is the book for long trips alone. For that matter, it is the book for lots of short trips as well. A lovely story that is beautifully written and perfectly narrated. I found myself thinking about Oliver and the children, Rose and Maury throughout my day. These are characters that will stay with you long after the book is finished. Mr. Doig's description of Montana in the early 1900's is fascinating. This is a "slice of life" story with caring, honest people and real relationships. Take the long way home, look forward to traffic back ups and enjoy this one! I look forward to more writing by Ivan Doig, and will search for narration by Jonathan Hogan. What a perfect pair.
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34 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Everett Leiter
- 07-05-08
Entertaining, but rather juvenile
This is an entertaining read on some levels, but somewhat banal on others. It is the kind of book I would recommend without hesitation to a junior high or high school student. If nothing else, it gives some kind of picture of life in Montana a hundred years ago. It is good, clean, wholesome reading (if that's what is good for kids). Four-letter words are consistently avoided, and even some 8-letter words like "pregnant," which might presumably alarm some younger readers. If you have the sophistication of an adult, you may find quite a bit of it banal and that the characters don't fully ring true. This story centers around a family in Montana (around 1910) whose mother has died. The adolescent and pre-adolescent sons attend a one-room schoolhouse. The story narrated in flashback by one of the sons as an adult is mostly from the point of view of the boys. They occasionally get involved in nothing worse than innocent, cheerful mischief. They experience life with a widowed father, a new female housekeeper from Minnesota, and the erudite man she tells them is her brother. Much of the book has the feeling of a TV family sitcom. This family has few tears, no fights between the sons, no jealousies, no recalcitrance, no serious issues of discipline for the children, etc. What we get is a cheerful, amusing story with an occasional difficult situation thrown in to provide a moral lesson. Despite its shortcomings, the story moves along nicely. The narration is fine.
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20 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Amazing in Battle Ground
- 03-12-07
I so enjoyed this!
It was easy to get lost in this story. So well done by Mr. Doig. As a native Idahoan, my knowledge of Montana, Idaho and Washington, gave me even more of an experience of going home. Listen carefully and you will experience it as it is, for yourself.
A very talented author who captures the simplicity of the time, and intricacy of the characters.
One of the few Authors I would love to meet.
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17 people found this helpful
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
- Paige
- 01-26-12
Little House on the Prarie revisited
This book kind of meanders along when Rose shows up to help a widow keep his house and help with his three boys. Her brother comes along and you can't help but be facinsated by his character as well. Of course they have a secret which in the end is the focal point of this coming of age story.
I kind of wondered if it was just going to be a set of vignettes and never really get anywhere, but all the little pieces fall into place as it goes along. If you find it slow at first, just keep going (although sometimes it's easier to just move to something else.) The author did an excellent job of weaving the facts of the time with his historical fictional characters, such as Hailey's Comet.
I must admit I hated the narrator at first. And yet the longer I listened to the story, the more the narrator seemed to fit into it. So if you like Little House types of stories, this may be a good one for you. By the end I was excited to get in the car and listen and I found myself sitting in the driveway for extra time to listen befor heading in the house. I thought about this on long after I finished reading it.
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15 people found this helpful
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Overall
- MJN
- 08-10-07
Well Done!
Truly a wonderful experience to read this book. Ivan's words brought even the most ordinary everyday circumstances of a century ago to such vibrant life that I was living right beside a family I have come to know so well I now miss them. Frequently I caught myself in awe of his eloquence. The narration was superb. Well Done!
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11 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Richard
- 03-23-09
Good Story
Thought it was a creative and enjoyable story. Enjoyed listening. Worth it if you're not looking for violence, sex etc.
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9 people found this helpful
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Overall
- David
- 09-19-08
Simple and Nostalgic
As a Westerner who is currently living across the Atlantic this book made me nostalgic for the West and for my family's (and many a Westerner's) past. Simple and country-eloquent in writing and masterfully narrated. A great listen and maybe even a better read. For anyone who enjoys Stegner, Steinbeck or any of the other great American West writers, you'll love this.
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8 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Dawn
- 01-17-08
a wonderful book
The author did a brilliant job weaving this story. It was a real "page turner." I loved the characters - down to earth, honorable, yet endearing and humorous. The setting felt real and the events seemed authentic. Humor, sorrow, fear, anticipation... all of these feelings that were a part of my journey through this book.
Told from the perspective of the eldest son, this story demonstrates how even during the hardest times in life, the human spirit endures. This is an uplifting story with an appreciation for simpler times.
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8 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Barton
- 10-11-08
Like having warm apple pie at Grandma's.
Loved this book, I found it both profound and moving. Doig's book is as refreshing as a cool breeze on a long hot autumn day. The book doesn't have a cynical 21 century bone in its binding. The boys and father are moral, wise and courageous. It seems that almost every critically acclaimed book written in our times has to teach us how we are all the same. How America is racist, homophobic, misogynistic and/or greedy. It just gets to be so tiresome hearing this droning chant go on and on in modern literature. It is a great pleasure to have book that is both beautiful and wholesome.
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7 people found this helpful