Disclaimer: ARC via a giveaway on Librarything. The book comes out June 1.
Even
today, a woman crossing America on a horse with just a dog for company would be
a story. Jackass Annie - or Annie
Wilkins to be more exact, did this in the 1950s. She wanted to see California
before she died.
Elizabeth
Letts’ new installment in history of the horse world book (look, I just made
that up. It isn’t an official series,
but it should be because she is one of the authors who writes it) is about
Annie Wilkins’s trip. It isn’t a biography,
more like a travel biography - a history of a trip.
Letts
does give the reader some backstory about Wilkins – her family’s history in
Maine as well as what few personal details seem to be available. But the bulk of the book is about Wilkins’
journey across America with her horse (which becomes horses at a point) Tarzan
and her dog Depeche Toi. And as much as
she can, she gives the reader brief biographies of the animals as well.
In part,
Wilkins seems a product of her time. She
was able to do what she did because of the time period. It is difficult to imagine people today being
so welcoming to a stranger, even with news coverage. (I type this from the city where the roving
robot got destroyed). Additionally,
because of her race and sex, she had less to fear from the police. In fact, one of the most interesting facets
of the book is the fact that police stations were used as overnight stops or
rooms for people. It should also be
noted that Letts does address the difference in traveling that whites and African
Americans would face at that time.
Wilkins’
travel wasn’t done as a form of protest or even a money-making grab, but simply
because she wanted to and didn’t have many choices left to her after the loss
of her land. It’s true that the trip did
give her a degree of fame and that while she left with little money, she was
helped along the way by strangers, some of whom have their own fascinating stories.
In all honesty,
this is not, perhaps, the most exciting book to read. You know the outcome before you even pick
up. It is too Lets’ credit that her
prose makes reading the story a pleasure.
This is also true of how the chapters are designed, making the book easy
to dip in and out of.
There
are people who are going to undoubtedly ask, why does the story merit a
book. Here’s why. We live in a society that writes women off
when they reach 50, at the very least.
Letts’ book about a sixty plus year old woman taking herself across
country is important because not only does it challenge us to be a kinder society,
but also to realize that older people, in particular older women, still have
much to offer.
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| Annie Wilkins on Rex, Tarzan (pack horse) with Depeche Toi |
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