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A review by sbn42
Last Bus to Wisdom by Ivan Doig
5.0
Ivan Doig’s final novel puts you right in the heart of family problems facing ranch hands and itinerant workers in 1951. Gram has told her grandson Donal that she needs surgery that will require her to be laid up in recovery for a couple months. As a result, she is losing her job as a ranch cook and sending eleven year-old Donal by bus to live in Milwaukee with her sister.
As always, the descriptions are well-crafted. The sights and sounds of the busses and terminals in Butte and Minneapolis were so accurate that I almost felt like I was on the dog bus with Donal revisiting those old haunts.
The emotions take you on a rollercoaster. Grams surgery frightens Donal as he is dispatched to his aunt, Kate. She does nothing to support him while he tries to find out how Gram’s surgery and recovery progressed. He is confined to an attic bedroom, a card table with 1000 piece puzzles, and a greenhouse where his uncle Herman hides all day tending plants.
Aunt Kate has no idea about dealing with children. She eventually tosses him on the return bus, where he imagines an orphanage is his next stop. Herman happens to abandon Kate at the same time and they join up on a bus to discover what Herman has read of the West. The friendship that develops helps them both get through bad times and good over the next months.
This is a satisfying ending to an author’s wonderful career.
As always, the descriptions are well-crafted. The sights and sounds of the busses and terminals in Butte and Minneapolis were so accurate that I almost felt like I was on the dog bus with Donal revisiting those old haunts.
The emotions take you on a rollercoaster. Grams surgery frightens Donal as he is dispatched to his aunt, Kate. She does nothing to support him while he tries to find out how Gram’s surgery and recovery progressed. He is confined to an attic bedroom, a card table with 1000 piece puzzles, and a greenhouse where his uncle Herman hides all day tending plants.
Aunt Kate has no idea about dealing with children. She eventually tosses him on the return bus, where he imagines an orphanage is his next stop. Herman happens to abandon Kate at the same time and they join up on a bus to discover what Herman has read of the West. The friendship that develops helps them both get through bad times and good over the next months.
This is a satisfying ending to an author’s wonderful career.