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  • Whiskey When We're Dry

  • Written by: John Larison
  • Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
  • Length: 15 hrs and 24 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (14 ratings)

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Whiskey When We're Dry

Written by: John Larison
Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
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Publisher's Summary

Named a Best Book by Entertainment Weekly, O Magazine, Goodreads, Southern Living, Outside Magazine, Oprah.com, HelloGiggles, Parade, Fodor’s Travel, Sioux City Journal, Read it Forward, Medium.com, and NPR’s All Things Considered.

"A thunderclap of originality, here is a fresh voice and fresh take on one of the oldest stories we tell about ourselves as Americans and Westerners. It's riveting in all the right ways - a damn good read that stayed with me long after closing the covers." (Timothy Egan, New York Times best-selling author of The Worst Hard Time)

From a blazing new voice in fiction, a gritty and lyrical American epic about a young woman who disguises herself as a boy and heads west

In the spring of 1885, 17-year-old Jessilyn Harney finds herself orphaned and alone on her family's homestead. Desperate to fend off starvation and predatory neighbors, she cuts off her hair, binds her chest, saddles her beloved mare, and sets off across the mountains to find her outlaw brother Noah and bring him home. A talented sharpshooter herself, Jess' quest lands her in the employ of the territory's violent, capricious governor, whose militia is also hunting Noah - dead or alive.

Wrestling with her brother's outlaw identity, and haunted by questions about her own, Jess must outmaneuver those who underestimate her, ultimately rising to become a hero in her own right.

Told in Jess' wholly original and unforgettable voice, Whiskey When We're Dry is a stunning achievement, an epic as expansive as America itself - and a reckoning with the myths that are entwined with our history.

©2018 John Larison (P)2018 Penguin Audio

What the critics say

Mulan meets Deadwood in a Wild West novel narrated by its straight-shooting heroine.” (O Magazine)

“A smooth yet bracing Western yarn that both celebrates and subverts the romance of the Old West through more complex contemporary perspectives on gender and race…. As in Charles Portis’ classic True Grit, much of the appeal of the telling hangs upon the distinct voice of its narrator, and Jesse’s narration combines folksy vernacular with an easy loping gait.” (Seattle Times)

“Larison writes with unrelenting momentum and thoughtfully explores questions of gender identity, power, and violence.” (Outside Magazine)

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What listeners say about Whiskey When We're Dry

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fantastic journey

Loved this story and love this narrator. Was a beautiful and raw telling of the journey of family and the relationships along the way - complicated and deep.

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Riveting

I don't usually do "dusters", whether movies or novels but my dear friend highly recommend it so in I dove. And 'dove' is an apt word for this novel (past tense of dive, not the bird). The language was lyrical, not what you would expect from a duster so I quickly got hooked. The tale of a girl passing as a boy in that world had me riveted, catching my breath as I well knew what could happen if she was found out. Full of surprises and craziness ... oh I hope you read it and enjoy it at least half as much as I did.

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