by Charlie Roll

To survive in rural Montana, an impoverished pedagogue is forced to live in two radically different worlds -one of thought and learning as a teacher, the other rough and vulgar, as a section hand working on the railroad. It is a compelling, ribald story full of humor, pathos, hope, and educational challenges some would say the rural counterpart to Frank McCourt's Teacher Man. The book is also a love story about a man who is moved by great poetry and conflicted by his passions, but who ultimately suppresses his more base desires and conforms to the norms of society.