Good book! Good picture of how rough i t was to be a women in Man's world a long time ago! But then maybe its just the story of being property of man? Somethings never change. ! Sure there are women who know how lonely it can be to keep home and hearth going even today.

This book was the story of a young teacher named Ellen who moved to a prairie town in Wyoming for a year in the early 1900's to teach in a one room schoolhouse, but ends up staying because she falls in love with a cowboy. I love books about the settlers in the American west and the obstacles they had to overcome to be successful. This book was definitely filled with obstacles. Ellen has to deal with drought, snowstorms, hunger, snakes, loneliness and so much loss. There are so many difficult situations that the story is a bit depressing. However, it is honest and doesn't sugarcoat the difficulties homesteaders endured.
Overall I'm glad I read this, but it wouldn't be a book I want to read again.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an advanced copy of this book.

I have been a fan of Sandra Dallas since finding “The Persian Pickle Club” and was thrilled to review her latest novel, “Where Coyotes Howl.”

A master of her craft, Sandra Dallas will immerse her readers into a slice of history and leave them attached to unique but relatable characters. This novel is a great example of this. Wyoming at the beginning of the 20th century would not be an easy place to live. Ellen accepts her teaching job out in the West with little of the skills necessary to survive in such a rough place. There, she meets and falls in love with cowboy Charles. Yet, happily ever after is not possible when day to day survival is often dependent on factors outside your control.

This is not an easy story to read, but living in the Wild West during that time period was not an easy life to live. Sandra Dallas brings plenty of heart to her characters, and it’s their perseverance that makes you want to keep reading.

My thanks to the author, the publisher, and Net Galley for the privilege of reviewing this book.

This is a beautiful story. I loved the simplicity of the story but how in depth it also is about life on the prairie. I loved Ellen and Charlie and their love story. The love they had for each other is what pulled them through all the hardships.
I loved all the side characters too. It's just a lovely story of life coming up on the prairie. I was crying by the end.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC!

I love Sandra Dallas books, but this one was hard to read. It was hard to read because it did so well at describing life on the frontier. Settling this country was hard and required much from brave, strong people. Sandra Dallas does a good job making us care about those brave people. I received an ARC and am under no pressure to give a positive review.

Ramona Thompson

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.
Every year, I watch for Sandra Dallas's new book. I enjoy her stories of historical fiction.
This book was very depressing although she really depicts how life was on the prairie. Small towns really pull together for each other, even for those who aren't able to repay any favors. The hardships we're felt by everyone in the community.

That was my first novel by Sandra Dallas. I was so excited to jump into this one and I was in the mood for historical fiction that would take me away. This fit that bill, but I felt like I was reading Little House on the Prairie. I grew up quite a fan, and reading those books all of my childhood. Honestly, I felt that the writing style was so simplistic that an elementary aged person could read this. I also found it very depressing, though I realize that is what life on the paririe was all about. I have read other historical fiction adult books like this, but I never got the feeling but I was reading a children’s book. I just did for some reason. Sadly this one just wasn’t for me.

When new Iowa-based teacher Ellen Webster accepts a job offer in Wyoming, she expects snow-capped mountains and lush landscapes. Instead, she finds a 2-street town and a hardscrabble life on the high plains where one can almost see the curvature of the earth.

In Where Coyotes Howl, Sandra Dallas paints a gritty picture of life on the Western frontier a 100 years ago. Shortly after arriving, Ellen is swept off her feet by Charlie, a handsome cowboy with ambitions to build his own ranch. Ellen quits teaching to help him. But their simple life is not so simple with no electricity, no plumbing, no water on their property, no insulation in their roughed-in cabin and the closest neighbor living miles away. Making a go of life in this inhospitable but beautiful land is the center premise of the story, where Ellen and Charlie's love for each other gives them the strength to carry on when tragedy hits.

Sandra Dallas' novel portrays complex flawed characters who survive a bleak life thanks to strong values and an abundance of courage. This is not a "happily ever after" fairytale, so have tissues ready. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advance reader copy. Where Coyotes Howl is a very good read.

I loved this story. of the old West. Ellen is a teacher and accepts a teaching position in Wyoming. Charlie is a cowboy who becomes smitten with Ellen. The story is how they met, and how their llves turned out. The hardships they and their neighbors/friends endured but most of them were still very happy with their life. It was a very hard life - neighbors helping each other - babies being born and die - I just fell in love with this story and wasn't sure how it was going to end. I had felt many feelings for everyone and even shed some tears in reading this magnificent story I highly recommend this to anyone and everyone to read to appreciate what we have. In honesty, I would not have wanted to live in that time period but what is is. I definitely will look for another book by this author.

Thank you Netgalley & publisher for this e arc of Where Coyotes Howl by Sandra Dallas.
I love western US historical fiction
This is a recently release women's western historical fiction and romance novel. 4*.
Synopsis: "1916. The two-street town of Wallace is not exactly what Ellen Webster had in mind when she accepted a teaching position in Wyoming, but within a year’s time she’s fallen in love—both with the High Plains and with a handsome cowboy named Charlie Bacon. Life is not easy in the flat, brown corner of the state where winter blizzards are unforgiving and the summer heat relentless. In the end, it is not the trials Ellen and Charlie face together that make them remarkable, but their love for one another .."
3 things I liked:
1. Genre/love prairie type reads/settling west, etc.
2. Writing, easy to read, I loved her book Westerning Women
3. Characters/MCs are very easy to like
4. Themes, lessons, feeling
I disliked:
1. The end, I like when even very hard stories to read have some small light or positive end.
I was glad to read this one.

I decided to check out this book as I would be driving through Wyoming on a family vacation. I found myself hooked and thoroughly enjoyed the book. It reminded me of a grown-up version of Little House on the Prairie.

Ellen is a young woman who moves to the town of Wallace, Wyoming, for a teaching position. She encounters hardships and challenges living on the prairie, but she also discovers and appreciates the peace and beauty of her surroundings. She meets and falls in love with a cowboy named Charlie Bacon. This book tells the story of these two ordinary people trying to survive and make a living under harsh conditions.
I loved Sandra Dallas's descriptions of the prairie and the many characters she created in this novel. I found myself thinking about the story and the people in the book when I wasn't reading. I will probably try and check out another of her books, as I immensely enjoyed this one. If you were a fan of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books when you were growing up, you might enjoy this one.
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martins Press for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I enjoy the writing of Sandra Dallas so I was pleased to receive an advanced reader’s copy of “Where Coyotes Howl”. This is a well-written book depicting the trials and tribulations of these times, but it was so depressing that I found it difficult to read.

Where the Coyotes Howl is well-written but after a brief love story introduction, the book becomes a long litany of woeful events that happen to women. It seems that hardly any of the female characters in this novel are spared grief, abuse, or hardship. Many of the women have good-for-nothing husbands and feel trapped in their rotten relationships because of their children. The ones lucky enough to have supportive husbands work tirelessly and are smacked down by the hard life of a settler on the prairie anyway. While this is probably a realistic representation of life for women on a godforsaken prairie, it is no fun to read. I cannot recommend this book, even to those who liked Sandra Dallas'other novels.

This is a story about relationships--some great marriages and some terrible marriages, close sisters, dear neighbors, parents and children, teachers and students...all of which developed in frontier Wyoming. The main character, Ellen, like all of Sandra Dallas's main characters, is a hard worker, friendly toward everyone, and married to a man who treasures her. Of course, he is also the most handsome man around. Everyone in the book warms quickly to Ellen when she arrives to teach at the one-room school and readers will too, especially readers like me who enjoy books that immerse them in frontier living, even though it's harsh and indiscriminate. The forces of nature, including fire, weather, disease, and personalities, are perpetual challenges to these pioneers, but without those forces the relationships wouldn't thrive and there wouldn't be a story. I will recommend this book to library users who are navigating past tough times in their own lives as well as those who just enjoy a good old fashioned western novel filled with heroic women.

What a good book .. tells the story so good of the hard times , when the country was new and the unknown
Reminds so of the stories that my dad told , of homesteading.. I love how she learned to love the hard ..

Well... that was disappointing.

First, let me say that I by no means disliked this book. On the contrary, I adored this book up until about the 80% mark. This book had everything I love, and the story was so captivating despite it being so heartbreaking. My biggest let down is the ending. I just felt like it was rushed, and I have no sense of closure from it. Maybe withholding closure for the reader was the author's intent, but I definitely don't enjoy it when authors do that. I'm not even sad about the ending, just disappointed by it. I also understand that the book is trying to imitate real life, but it's fiction. I wanted this story to have meaning; however, it feels rushed and underdone.

This was my first experience with Sandra Dallas' writing. I've seen her other books around, but I was extra excited to read this one because of the subject matter/timeframe. I love any American West/cowboy historical fiction.
First off, I loved her writing. From the get go, I couldn't put this book down. I had to keep reading through the night. The way she describes the harsh setting of Wyoming and the realities of women living during this time was so descriptive that I could almost taste the dust of the flat land. Reading through the book, you will definitely understand the reason why the book is titled the way it is (which is perfect!).
I loved Ellen and Charlie and their relationship. While it didn't take very long for them to get together (no slow burn romance here), I still enjoyed the evolution of their relationship.
BUT despite loving the writing and not being able to put it down, I couldn't rate it 5 stars. It is so sad and depressing reading about one tragedy after another. And it's like that all the way to the very end. The ending wasn't hopeful or satisfying or tied with a bow (which makes sense since it was probably the reality of Wyoming living back then), but still. I feel like I went through a roller coaster ride but there was no redemption or a sigh of relief at all. It was just Wylie Coyote falling off a cliff and then it was over. I felt a little empty and cheated when I finished. That's the main reason I can't do 5 stars. However, I would still recommend this because of the excellent writing and not being able to stop reading. But just prepare yourself for the heartache and sadness throughout the whole book.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for providing an early e-ARC for me to read and review. All opinions are of my own.

This was a well-written book that could be classified as historical fiction. I had a few quibbles with the author's choices however, the storyline was a compelling one. The characters were engaging which made this book a quick and enjoyable read.

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me with an ARC of this book.

This has to be one of the saddest and depressing books I’ve probably ever read. It was written well and it was an interesting setting, trying to make it as a rancher family on the plains of Wyoming but dear God it was one devastating thing after another. I just wanted one thing to go right for them… I don’t mind sad points in a book if there is purpose and hope but there was absolutely none by the end of this one.

Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced copy of this book. All opinions are mine.

Where Coyotes Howl begins with Ellen's arrival in Wyoming, in search of a new life away from her family in Iowa. She has been hired to serve as the local teacher after the prior teacher lasted a year, in what turns out to be a trend in the community.

Within moments, it is clear that most of Ellen's clothing and her small allocation of personal belongings that made the trek are no match for the dusty, hardscrabble life on the prairie in the early twentieth century United States.

She boards at the home of Ruth McGinty and her husband, a truly foul human whose depths of depravity only descend further with each interaction. His relatively minor atrocities in the novel's early pages include him peaking through the wooden slats of Ellen's room from outside the house. Not only is that reflective of McGinty's creepiness but also a window into the type of house they live in: there are spots between boards where the inside and outside mix. In the winter, Ellen even awakens to snow on her bed. And the McGintys have an actual home compared to those who live in the earthen shoddies. At one point when Ellen nearly finds herself living in a shoddy, she quickly retreats when a rattlesnake squirms its way through the wall into the home. That is an image that will long stick with me!

Where Coyotes Howl introduces the reader to this particular time and place where neighbors - sprinkled at relatively vast distances from each other - have to rely on each other to survive. They are an eclectic bunch - those who found their way to the community through happenstance and those from comfortable existence in the East who decided to try their hand at homesteading. Most of these experiments are unsuccessful and lead to unsavory outcomes.

Ellen finds happiness in Wyoming, quickly becoming enamored with a cowboy named Charlie, and the novel follows their trials and tribulations in this rough terrain. Ellen is a lucky one in her marriage compared to several of the couples nearby, but that doesn't protect the couple from heartbreak in the land where the cold howl of the coyote, echoing across the plains, turns Ellen's blood to ice.

Where Coyotes Howl creates a vibrant community of colorful characters, and has an active plot moving them forward to their eventual outcomes that, in retrospect, seem fatalistically predetermined. But as a reader, I didn't want to look away.