Overview

This National Book Award-winning story, a tour de force of historical reportage, rescues an iconic chapter of American history--the Dust Bowl that terrorized the High Plains in the darkest years of the Depression--from the shadows. Following a dozen families and their communities through the rise and fall of the region, Egan tells of their desperate attempts to carry on through blinding black dust blizzards, crop failure, and the death of loved ones. Brilliantly capturing the terrifying drama of catastrophe, Egan does equal justice to the human characters who become his heroes, ""the stoic, long-suffering men and women whose lives he opens up with urgency and respect"" (New York Times). In an era that promises ever-greater natural disasters, The Worst Hard Time is ""arguably the best nonfiction book yet"" (Austin Statesman Journal) on the greatest environmental disaster ever to be visited upon our land and a powerful cautionary tale about the dangers of trifling with nature.

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9780618773473

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Reviews

[A] fierce, humane account of the dreams and extremes that crashed head on during the nearly decade-long calamity of the Dust Bowl. The New York Times [A] vivid and gritty piece of forgotten history.USA Today The Worst Hard Time provides a sobering, gripping account of a disaster whose wounds are still not fully healed today.Boston Globe The Worst Hard Time is a haunting work of narrative nonfiction.The Baltimore Sun Egan has admirably captured a part of our American experience that should not be forgotten.The San Francisco Chronicle Egan is a passionate and accomplished writer...Read this for history, not inspiration or entertainment.The Denver Post Egan's account of the Dust Bowl era is a final, terrible rebuke to the policies of America's dying days of frontier expansion.The Seattle Times THE WORST HARD TIME is a flat-out masterpiece of historical reportage.Seattle Post-Intelligencer

[A] fierce, humane account of the dreams and extremes that crashed head on during the nearly decade-long calamity of the Dust Bowl. The New York Times [A] vivid and gritty piece of forgotten history. USA Today The Worst Hard Time provides a sobering, gripping account of a disaster whose wounds are still not fully healed today. Boston Globe The Worst Hard Time is a haunting work of narrative nonfiction. The Baltimore Sun Egan has admirably captured a part of our American experience that should not be forgotten. The San Francisco Chronicle Egan is a passionate and accomplished writer...Read this for history, not inspiration or entertainment. The Denver Post Egan's account of the Dust Bowl era is a final, terrible rebuke to the policies of America's dying days of frontier expansion. The Seattle Times THE WORST HARD TIME is a flat-out masterpiece of historical reportage. Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Author Information

TIMOTHY EGAN is a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and the author of eight other books, most recently The Immortal Irishman, a New York Times bestseller. His book on the Dust Bowl, The Worst Hard Time, won a National Book Award for nonfiction. His account of photographer Edward Curtis, Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher, won the Carnegie Medal for nonfiction. He writes a biweekly opinion column for the New York Times.

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