One of Ours Review

I was really excited to read this book because I'm a fan of Willa Cather. She is most known for her books "My Antonia" and "Oh, Pioneers" and it was surprising that "One of Ours" was her prize winning book and one of her least known, at least to me. It started out talking about a young boy named Claude and his desire to make something of himself. He and his father had kind of a rocky relationship. I think that Claude was a little embarrassed of his father and definitely of his older brother, Bayliss. As he grew his desire to move on from their farm into the world to make something of himself and hopefully loose some of his awkwardness grew. He tried to go to the University of Nebraska, but his mother was adamant that he go to a little church college. Claude began to take some courses that he was excited about (one he took at the University, but I don't think he told his mother) and he made friends with a family. For some of this section you think there will be a romance between Claude and one of his friend's mother, but nothing comes of it and I have to say, thank goodness. When Claude returns home for his break his father tells the family how he bought a ranch in Colorado and his son, Ralph, will be going to run it so that would mean Claude had to stay and take care of his mother and the older black lady, Mahailey, that works for them, thus crashing all of Claude's dreams of becoming something other than a farmer. He takes it and runs with it though, which was something I was impressed with. He didn't do a lousy job of it, he threw himself fully into making the farm something great and he did it.

During this time he hooked up with some friends from high school and fell in love with one of the girls, Enid. With a name like that you have to know she's no good and she isn't. After they get married she denies Claude any marital enjoyment and becomes actively involved in politics and prohibition. Her sister in China becomes ill and so she leaves Claude (not in a divorce way, just in a leaving on a trip way) and goes to be with her sister. All in all, this made Claude happy. Before he got married he believed Enid would change to be like his own mother, but she was too modern and I think extremely selfish. I wondered why she even married him, she never seemed to love him. Admirably enough he stays true to his unhappy marriage throughout the book.

Soon after this the war breaks out in France (this is really the focus of the book) and Claude has a desire to become involved. At this point he joins the army and we catch up with him on his break before he ships off to France, when he's coming home to Nebraska. His farewell to his mother was one of the most touching points of this book, you could truly see the love this mother and son had for each other and I have to admit my eyes moistened.

The rest of the book, I hate to say, was not as enjoyable. It was very choppy. It seemed that the author heard some stories of the war and just threw them in; they didn't really connect to each other. We hear about a soldier he saw at one of the stops who was handicapped and he had a girlfriend. Claude becomes interested in them and follows them around, the next day he asks about this boy, but that is the end. The soldier never comes into the book. This is just one example, there are many stories that don't really pan out, they're just stories.

All in all, I could hardly put the book down at the beginning and when I came to the war I read only to see how he would die because you knew that finally Claude was making something of himself and it wasn't going to last. I think that the author should've won for her other books, but I'm glad she did win because she is a great author.