The Jump-Off Creek [Paperback]

Molly Gloss (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 15, 1999

PEN/Faulkner Award Finalist and winner of the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award. William Kittredge called The Jump-Off Creek "a truly beautiful piece of American storytelling." The struggles of a widowed homesteader braving the austere and unsparing Blue Mountains contain "enough valor to make an ordinary life seem heroic" (Los Angeles Times). Told with Molly Gloss's unsentimental reserve, this novel is an inspiring reminder of a rich and uniquely American past. (A Mariner Reissue)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Set in the high mountain country of Oregon during the 1890s, this first novel is a quiet, unsparing portrait of pioneer life, recounted simply and without romanticism. Drawing on pioneer diaries, journals and hand-me-down stories of her own ancestors, Gloss displays a deep awareness not only of the brutal hardships of frontier life, but also of the moral codes and emotional attachments of the people who settled there. Drawn by the freedom the West offers, Lydia Sanderson leaves a disappointing marriage in Pennsylvania and comes to Jump-Off Creek to homestead a place of her own. Tim Whiteaker, "gone cowboying" since the age of 13, and his partner, the half-Indian Blue Odell, raise cattle nearby. Three wolfers, squatting on abandoned property near Jump-Off Creek and walking the thin edge of the law in order to earn a marginal living, provide much of the tension within the novel. The author's intimate understanding of the harsh physical conditions and of the rituals and practices of frontier life (there are long descriptions of how to brand cattle and how to mend a roof) sometimes overshadows a deeper delineation of character. However, most of the scenes are handled with a restraint that communicates the characters' endemic loneliness, and the dialogue, though spare, is rich enough to convey their emotional conflicts.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Not a standard "Western," but a novel of the West notable for its accurate portrayal of life on a homestead and for the quality of writing that will make readers linger. At the height of the Depression of 1895 Lydia Sanderson, freed by the death of her husband, travels to Oregon where she homesteads on a mountain, living in a wretched hovel on land not fit to grow even a vegetable garden. Her companions are two mules, two goats, and hard work. Lydia's neighbors are few and far but bound together by a common struggle to survive. Their life is one of terse converse, kindness, and quick response to one another's needs. A rare treat of a first novel.
- Sister Avila, Acad. of Holy Angels, Minneapolis
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; 1st Mariner Books Ed edition (February 15, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0395925010
• ISBN-13: 978-0395925010
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,236,697 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

How I got started writing, etc., is a long story you can read on my website. But here are the highlights of my writing life: In 1996 I received a prestigious Whiting Writers Award--sort of a MacArthur grant in a minor key. But nobody knows what the heck it is, so how did it come to be prestigious?! Probably it's the substantial chunk of change they drop on your head without warning. ("Substantial" of course being a relative term. It's not MacArthur substantial. But we paid off our house!) The Jump-Off Creek is usually referred to as "a Pacific Northwest classic" and was winner of an Oregon Book Award and a Pacific Northwest Booksellers Award, and a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. The Dazzle of Day, which is a science fiction novel, received the PEN West Fiction Prize and was a New York Times Notable Book. Fairly unusual for a science fiction novel to win a major PEN prize, but the Notable Book thing, not so much--it was Notable only within the ghetto of science fiction. Go figure. Wild Life, set in the woods and mountains of Washington State at the turn of the 20th century, won the James Tiptree Award for literary fantasy, although at the time I wrote it I didn't think I was writing anything fantastical. My newest, The Hearts of Horses, has been the most popular of any of my works. Not sure why. Is it that attention-grabbing cover? or "horses" in the title?!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not the Romantic West, March 24, 2002

By 

RuthAlice "ruthalice" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Jump-Off Creek (Paperback)

A woman homesteads by herself in eastern Oregon. There are the standard dangers, problems, terrors and tragedies. This is saved from being trite by the stoic and undaunted character of the woman. Gloss also avoids the usual romantic happily-ever-after with the man next door.

Gloss has used journals and diaries of women in the West in hopes to draw out some of the nontraditional women's roles in the West, "I hope their strong, honest voices can be heard in this book." Showing that gender roles weren't fixed as many choose to believe, we see Lydia doing hard, manual labor, and Tim cooking and doing the wash. Lydia, the heroine of the book, abandons typical women's roles in the very beginning when she picks up and moves West alone to start a new life. "I'd rather have my own house, sorry as it is, than the wedding ring of a man who couldn't be roused from sleeping when his own child was slipping out of me unborn."

Gloss attempts to break down the Western stereotypes for men. Tim and Blue are like real men we could meet if we were on the frontier, not larger than life heroes that commonly dominate Western myths. Unlike heroes admired for their independence, Tim and Blue are dependant on others and each other on the frontier . They become almost like children in their dependence on others, "He turned and looked at her, ducking his chin." Things don't come easily for them and they struggle like any human being would have, "Tim put the gun down in the mud and went, shaking, across the bloody wallow on his knees." Even being a cowboy is rejected in this book, "He said he'd seen years when a good cowboy couldn't by himself a job, but a good cook could pretty much always find work."

Besides narrations from characters, Gloss utilizes Lydia's journal entries to make the story more real, personal, and familiar. This helps us recognize and remember Lydia's real identity, while the central narration builds the events of her daily life in a flowing form. Dreams of easy success are shot down in The Jump Off Creek. Giving a truer picture of the West, The Jump Off Creek is not a romanticized myth of adventure and easy success. Gloss establishes a view that shows the desperation of lives in a West where there is nothing new and glorious to see and experience every day. We see the miserable and wretched hard lives that one might have encountered. Fantasies of ease and comfort in the West are gone in this novel. It isn't a fairy tale like the traditional Western, where the good guy always wins, and the hero can handle any problem successfully. This book doesn't contain a lot of action, but instead it brings out the monotonous daily life of establishing a new home in the West and centers on the domestic side of the West. Gloss tells us of the every day grind and challenges of lives where sometimes people fail and hours of hard work are only the beginning of more hours of hard work.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This is a simply beautiful story of pain and triumph., April 16, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Jump-Off Creek (Paperback)

The Jump Off Creek: A Book Review The nineteen nineties feminist movement has been slowly permeating every domain of society. Female empowerment has become an increasingly common protagonist theme among all genres of literature as well. The American western novel has become subjugated to a new hero. In Molly Gloss's novel The Jump Off Creek the feminist literature movement finds a graceful home.

Jump Off Creek tells the story of Lydia Sanderson, a widow taking up a claim in the Blue Mountains of Oregon. The text begins with a spring journal entry. This is the beginning of Ms. Sanderson's endeavor. The journal entries are continued throughout the story, not only to keep the reader aware of the time line of the story, but also to provide a unique first person account of Lydia's life story. Lydia says of herself, "I am used to being Alone, in spirit if not in body, and shall not be Lonely, as I never have been inclined that way. I believe what I feel is just a keenness to get to that place and stand under my own roof at last." Lydia's strong and independent character is a careful mix of gracefulness and ruggedness. Her resourcefulness and amazing endurance makes the Ingalls family look passé.

Yet the feminist tones of this book manage to make concessions and include some strong male characters to compliment Lydia. On her way to the homestead Lydia meets Tim Whiteaker. Tim is a John Wayne figure minus the capacity for conversation. Early in the text the model for Tim's behavior is clearly etched. One passage describes him as such: " He stood at the edge of the creek, not looking toward (Lydia), while he pushed his hair back up under his hat with the heel of one dirty hand. Then he gave the dog a word, took hold of the bay's reigns and started off afoot..." Gloss managed to soften this granite figure by making him an excellent cook. Tim even ends up taking up cooking at a nearby ranches when funds are running out. But while his bread baking and cattle branding may be time consuming, Mr. Whiteaker still manages to take time out to pay special visits to Ms Sanderson. It is through these visits that a fragile and special friendship blossoms just as Lydia's wildflowers.

Tim also serves as an avenue for another friendship to develop for Lydia. This being with Blue Odell. Blue triumphantly beats the so-called Indian side-kick role in this novel. He develops more three dimensionally than Tim. This is in part due to the relationship he has with Lydia. While these two characters have more dialogue, it is their physical interaction that speaks the true message.

Of course the standard Western elements are retained in this novel, even though the main characters have been assigned the opposite sex's code of conduct. Man still has to fight nature; the weather and a bear. The conflict of man vs. man is also important. In this case there is only one drunken fight, but the altercations between some unscrupulous wolf hunters and Lydia's male friends nourish the western need for violence.

Another important characteristic of a Western novel is the main character's quest for identity. Molly Gloss obviously wrote in the previous characters to aide in this task. But it often takes a character of the same sex on the opposite end of the personality spectrum to clearly define that identity. The definition comes via the means of Evelyn Walker. She is a young, rotund, bubbly, mother of three. Gloss's careful attention to these two women allow Evelyn's brightly smiling face to enhance Lydia's stern beauty, not diminish it any.

Lydia's character is also enhanced in the story through a series of social gatherings at the Walker's. The reader admires her quiet, near invertedness among the chatty and whimsical fourth of July celebration. This process of the reader identifying with Lydia is a slow process throughout the story. In fact, the nature of the text never moves the reader to feel very strongly about any of the characters, because indeed, Lydia never demonstrates any strong emotions. Perhaps the only persons the reader may ever develop active feelings towards are Lydia's late husband and her parents, who aren't even active in the story!

The simple link that the reader develops with Lydia, and which Lydia in turn shares with the characters, is reflective of the style of prose in which this novel was written. The plain language is honest and appealing. The matter-of-fact narrative is believable. Simply put, the journey the reader embarks on with Ms Sanderson develops into a wonderful meditative exploration of self. I thoroughly enjoyed my journey and strongly suggest that other readers pack their bags for the trip.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A woman's portrayal of the harshness of the West., April 17, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Jump-Off Creek (Paperback)

Molly Gloss' The Jump-Off Creek is a story about a woman's independence in Western society. It follows the lives of the three main characters; Lydia Sanderson, Tim Whiteaker, and Tim's Indian friend, Blue. Throughout the book, Gloss tells her story by using the different perspectives of her characters. These changes in points of view allow the reader to understand the main characters personalities and to watch them develop. Gloss uses the harshness of the West and its winters to strengthen her characters, and she tries to show her reader that life in the West was not as easy as it normally appears to be in typical western stories. The Jump-Off Creek demonstrates life through hardships and trials. But, through them all, the main characters are able to persevere and are made stronger. It is my opinion that her portrayal of the West was well done and will challenge the reader to think differently about how he or she conceives the West. Gloss' book is a western which shows the reader how a woman saw the West. No longer is the western only about cowboys and Indians. Now, the reader is allowed to see how a woman, and an independent one at that, perceived the West and the trials that she had to go through just in order to survive the first winter. Lydia Sanderson's husband had recently died and had left their farm land to her. With a restless soul and the need for transformation, Lydia is driven West to find a new life. However, Lydia does not go West to find a new husband. She does not need any help from a man, and is rather reluctant to accept any help from the opposite sex. She intends to make it on her own, and throughout the book, she does maintain her independence. She does not conform to the lifestyle of the other women in the West. Gloss uses to reflect women's position in today's society. Gloss intends to prove that a woman and survive without a man. And, what better way to prove this for the young women of today than through a story of the harsh West? Gloss keeps the theme of her abnormal depiction of the West in her portrayal of Tim Whiteaker. Mr. Whiteaker was not a typical cowboy. In fact, none of the men in this story are. The men in this book depend on each other a lot more than the men are allowed to in other westerns. Tim and Blue rely on each other so much that, in the end when Blue dies, Tim becomes so lonely that he begins to rely on Lydia's company. These men are also quite squeamish when it comes to blood and injuries. For example, after Blue is injured during a fight with a bear, Tim calls Lydia to stitch up Blue as he cannot stomach the thought of doing it himself. Tim even feels the need to step outside while she is working. Tim shows that he is not a typical cowboy in many other ways. He is a cook, and he even gets a job cooking at a ranch during part of the story. He never finishes a fight, at one time he falls off of his horse, and many times the reader sees that Tim has bad aim while shooting a gun. None of these are characteristics of a cowboy, and may make one wonder how he has been able to survive the harshness of the West. In her journal entries, Lydia constantly refers to Tim in childlike terms, as she often does while she speaks to him. Throughout The Jump-Off Creek, the weather plays a big part in the characters' lives. Especially during the winters, the reader is able to see how hard a settler had to work in able to get through an ice storm. A settler did not only have himself to worry about, but any animals that he might have, as they could not care for themselves during this weather. If the animals were to die, the settler would have a hard year to look forward to as his livelihood would be gone. The toughness of the land, and the weather that came with it, eventually drew the characters closer as they tried to band together in order to survive. I feel that Gloss's portrayal of the sexes in her book are quite beneficial to young women in today's society. So many times, in literature and other areas of life, women are called upon to take the "back seat," or a supporting role. In The Jump Off Creek, Gloss shows that this secondary role is not necessary. She shows her female readers that they should feel free to take the reigns and strike out on their own adventures. No longer must a woman need a man. Also, Gloss shows her male readers that it is "O.K." to ask for help. They need not "do it alone" as so many men feel they need to do in today's society. I enjoyed this book, and I believe that while it may challenge a person's traditional view of the West, it does so thoughtfully. Now, the reader is allowed to make their own decisions about "how the West was won," and to consider the role of the female. Could the West have survived without the woman? Gloss does not think that it would have. And, she challenges her reader to think the same.