Bound Like Grass: A Memoir from the Western High Plains is Ruth McLaughlin's account of her own and her family's struggle to survive on their isolated wheat and cattle farm near Culbertson, Montana. With acute observation, she explores her roots as a descendant of Swedish-American grandparents who settled, with high ambitions, in northeastern Montana at the turn of the 20th century, and of her parents, who barely managed to eke out a living on their own neighboring farm.

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Bound Like Grass, McLaughlin's first book, won the 2010 Montana Book Award, an annual award that recognizes literary and/or artistic excellence in a book published during the award year.

During this program, Ruth McLaughlin talks with The Write Question producer Chérie Newman about growing up near Culbertson, Montana, and the legacy of physical and emotional poverty she inherited from her parents and homesteader grandparents.

Visit Ruth McLaughlin's Web site.

Read Jenny Shank's review of Bound Like Grass at NewWest.net

Bound Like Grass wins the 2010 Montana Book Award.

The Write Question is produced by Chérie Newman.

Read an interview with TWQ producer Chérie Newman on the Humanities Montana Web site.

Executive producer, Michael Marsolek.

Special thanks to Lisa Simon, David Moore, Barbara Theroux, and Kim Anderson.

This program is supported in part by Humanities Montana, enriching intellectual, cultural, and civic life for all Montanans. And by the Montana Cultural Trust.

The music in this program was written and performed by Aaron Minnick, and John Floridis.

Send comments to Chérie Newman.

Guests on the The Write Question are writers, publishers, and illustrators living, or working for an extended period of time, in the western United States. The Write Question is a production of Montana Public Radio.