The Way of the Wind.

Zoe Anderson Norris.

The Way of the Wind.

New York:

self-published,

1911

Illustrations by William Oberhardt.

In Zoe’s last novel, a Kentucky couple homesteads disastrously in Kansas. Summer heat destroys their crops. Disease kills their young son. They return shellshocked to Kentucky. Their friend Cyclona takes over their property, where developers build Wichita, but she goes insane by the time her land is worth millions. Critics praised the novel’s “Thomas Hardy relentlessness,” but few copies sold. Zoe dabbed Chinese white paint on some books’ covers. Among past owners of my eight copies are Zoe’s relatives and Richard Le Gallienne, one of Oscar Wilde’s lovers. 

From the Collection of Eve M. Kahn.