When fourteen-year-old Pauly takes a swim in the Clark Fork River one summer day, he doesn’t expect to see a boy drown. Surrounded by everyday violence in his Montana town, Pauly is determined to prove himself, navigating the awkward fumbles of boyhood against a backdrop of strikes, gang fights, soldiers headed for war, and Prohibition.

First published in 1941 and never before reissued, The Bitter Roots is a largely autobiographical novel full of evocative details of a time and place, including a glimpse of the young Norman Maclean, author of the classic, A River Runs Through It. It’s a frank, unvarnished portrait of an America struggling with racism, class prejudice, conflicts between labor and capital, and sexual stereotypes. A vivid coming-of-age story, The Bitter Roots reminds us that finding and holding on to your identity is one of the greatest battles there is.

Published jointly with the University of Montana Press.

Poet and novelist Norman Macleod was born in Salem, Oregon in 1906 and grew up in Missoula, Montana, the setting of The Bitter Roots. Active in radical politics in the 1930s, he helped found the Poetry Center in New York City and was friends with William Carlos Williams. He taught at several universities, including Pembroke State College, where he founded Pembroke Magazine. He died in 1985.

Joanna Pocock is a British-Canadian writer currently living in London. Her work of creative non-fiction, Surrender, won the Fitzcarraldo Editions Essay Prize in 2018.

Bruce Hardy is a retired pediatric cardiologist and now teaches at the University of Montana.