This book has the virtue of being history that reads like a compelling, page-turner novel. Egan has a gift for capturing the argot of the people who lived through the dust bowl in the American Heartland. In a number of ways reminiscent of Steinbeck’s timeless novel, The Grapes of Wrath, this book gives voice to the people who stayed. Egan considers macrolevel social and political events such as ill-conceived tariffs, the over-plowing of grasslands, and, more generally, the social and economic incentives to misuse the land. The story is, in many ways, an old one. The people on the ground, such as the abjectly poor hard-scrabble farmers, were the most profoundly affected. There are many lessons in this book for the current century as well. This would be a strong addition to the reading list in a 20th century environmental history course.