Last Bus to Wisdom

Ivan Doig's Last Bus to Wisdom is fiction writing at its finest: colorful characters, intriguing plot, plenty of surprises, and beautiful writing.

Eleven-year-old Donal Cameron (not Donald, mind you!) is rather dreading the summer of 1951. Instead of staying on the Double W ranch in big sky country, Donal is being shipped east to relatives he's never met while his grandmother undergoes an operation and is nursed back to health by the nuns. Actually, he's taking himself east, heading there by way of the "dog bus," as he and his grandmother call the Greyhound, which he'll ride deep into Wisconsin.

Once in Manitowoc, Donal is faced with a formidable great-aunt and the enigmatic Uncle Herman, aka Herman the German. After a few too many adventures and a particularly harrowing afternoon of canasta, Kate packs Donal off to whatever fate awaits him (a foster family? an orphanage? Donal hasn't quite worked out the details, but he knows it will be awful) by way of the same dog bus that brought him. Much to his surprise, though, Herman has decided he's had enough, too, and catches the same bus west. And here the fun really starts with one improbable, but wonderful, adventure after the other.

No doubt, Last Bus to Wisdom feels improbable, but Doig so captures his characters, their surroundings, and the entire zeitgeist that everything come together in the most delightful way possible. This is truly one of the most fun books I remember reading and I heartily recommend adding it your summer reading list if it's not there already.

Five stars.