8.2 /10 1 Votes8.2
Language English Media type Print (hardback) OCLC 17316163 Originally published 1936 Page count 436 Publisher Macmillan Publishers | 4.1/5 Goodreads Publication date 1936 Pages 436 Genre Novel Country United States of America | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Similar The Day Must Dawn, Remember the End, The Gown of Glory, The King's Orchard, The Bishop's Mantle | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Rolling Years is the first novel by the American writer Agnes Sligh Turnbull (1888–1982) and it is set in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, just east of Pittsburgh.
It is a family chronicle (1852–1910) of three generations of Scottish-American Presbyterians in rural Western Pennsylvania and their struggles to maintain their strict faith. The first generation is Daniel and Sarah McDowell, a farm couple. Sarah bears 12 children (of whom five survive) to her dour Calvinistic husband; her bitterness about her repeated, difficult confinements is effectively shown. The second generation is about their children, David and Jeannie. David moves to Pittsburgh where he becomes a judge. Jeannie marries a minister who has been serving as the local school teacher to earn money to complete his education. Jeannie's daughter, Constance, represents the third generation. She becomes a school teacher and struggles to find her place in a changing world. The novel dramatizes the gradual weakening of the strict Calvinism of the Scottish immigrants in an increasingly secular society.