She encourages women to play frequently and competitively, removing whatever garments might restrict them from sending their balls in perfect rotation down the lanes. The bowling alley that Bertha creates is the first all-female bowling alley in America - from the moment Truitt Alleys opens their doors, Bertha refuses to ban women from playing, and refuses to segregate them from the men. But unlike Rip, who is disappointed by the passing of time and the ways his world changed while he slept, Bertha charges headfirst into the new life she awakens to, leaving the stories (and possible crimes) of her past behind her.Įlizabeth McCracken, photo courtesy of Edward Carey. Though nobody really knows, dead grass remains on the ground where her body was found. 5, Bowlaway is has been called the 'feminist Rip Van Winkle.' In a way, it is: Bertha may well have been asleep for 20 years when she’s discovered. And so begins Bowlaway, a wild and weird novel that spans a century in the life of small-town New England, and in particular, one candlepin bowling alley. According to Bertha, one can bowl away anything: financial troubles, a bad marriage, grief, time.

Laden with a bowling ball, a candlepin, 15 pounds of gold, and a disrobed corset, she awakens on the frost covered ground, limbs akimbo and spirits high, ready to proselytize Salford’s citizens to her one true religion: bowling. It’s no matter Bertha holds no mysteries about what she’ll make of herself. When asked what she was doing, sleeping on the frozen grass beneath the Pickersgills family obelisk, she simply replies, “I was dreaming of love.” The residents of the small, early twentieth century Massachusetts town in Elizabeth McCracken's first novel in 18 years don’t know what to make of her. When Bertha Truitt’s body is found in the Salford Cemetery - above ground, alive - no one, including Bertha, knows how she got there.

Bowlaway elizabeth mccracken