CATTLE

by Winnifred Eaton

Four Alberta ranches are the scene of this story. Of these, three were quarter sections of land in Yankee Valley, and the fourth the vast Bar Q, whose two hundred thousand rich acres of grain, hay and grazing lands stretched from the prairie into the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, where it spread over the finest pastures and the "Chinook"-swept south slopes, where the cattle grazed all winter long as in summer-time, its jealous fingers, like those of a miser who begrudges a pinch of his gold, reaching across into the Indian Reserve.

200 pages

Published April 26, 2021

About the author

Winnifred Eaton is the real name for Onoto Watanna.

Reviews

[Stef Rozitis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slow paced and very very sad book (a redemptive ending but it's hard not to think it all comes too late and is too insecure)

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somehow I had never heard of Winnifred Eaton or this book, until I came across a passing reference to this book in an article. I think it deserves more recognition as an Alberta classic. It tells the tale of Bull Langdon, the acknowledged "King of Cattle" in Alberta's Foothills, and his obsession and victimization of Nettie, a young hired girl. Bull's character is brutal and utterly believable, and other historical details also ring true (Eaton and her husband ranched in Alberta for a time). I found the descriptions of the Spanish flu coming to Alberta eerily similar to my own memories of the early days of the COVID pandemic.

This a little bit Steinbeck, a little bit Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Maybe not quite in the same league as those two as the author does a bit of a U-turn at the end of this grimly bleak novel with an ending that is not exactly happy, but hopeful.