Leaning into the Wind: Women Write from the Heart of the West

Hearts of the West are unburdened in Leaning into the Wind, an anthology encompassing a wealth of experiences from farmers, ranchers, rangers, and other women who live and work in America's ofttimes harsh, sometimes beautiful high plains states shoehorned between the Mississippi and the Rockies. A New York newspaper writer transplanted to a hog farm on the "baking brown plains" sees a sagging trailer, rubbish, and waist-high weeds where her exuberant husband sees only promise. Waking on a bed of sweet straw after sobbing hysterically, she finds "dozens of piglets curled around me, nestled against my hips, tucked under my outspread arms, piled like a halo around my head." Other contributors wax poetic, describing an old pickup truck that "wanders down the road like a drunken goose" or steam coming off a newborn lamb in the chill night air. The selections tend toward rough-edged and gritty, but all are heartfelt.