Excerpt from Dust Bowl Girls by Lydia Reeder, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"But are you a team player?"

"I can be a team player."

"Good girl. Then I am prepared to offer you financial aid."

"Financial aid? To play basketball?"

"Yes, it would pay for your education."

Doll's jaw dropped, and she looked at Babb in disbelief. Being offered the chance to attend college and play basketball was a dream come true. For the past couple of years, Doll could never stop thinking about being recruited by a women's industrial team like the Dr Pepper girls in Oklahoma City or, even better, the Dallas Sunoco Oilers, last year's national champions. These big companies hired the best coaches and players to work in the factory and play basketball at night and on weekends. Winning sports teams generated lots of good publicity.

Thousands of screaming fans flocked to their games, and ever since she was a kid playing on a homemade dirt court with a peach-basket goal, Doll had dreamed of glory.

Her heart pounded so hard, she thought it might just launch itself right out of her chest. Maybe this wasn't playing for an industrial basketball team, but in a way, it was even better because she'd be able to go to college, too. She folded her arms, leaned back on her right leg, and began to tap her left toe out of sheer excitement.

"Doll, listen to Mr. Babb," said Mr. Daily, putting a hand on her shoulder to calm her fidgeting.

"Yes, sir." She inhaled a deep breath.

For several minutes, Babb continued telling her about OPC, a women's college, but housed on a campus where poor Indian kids also went to elementary and high school, paid for by the Presbyterian Church, of course. "OPC is nationally accredited, one of the best in the region, known for its quality of higher education," he said. Then he told her he wanted to meet with her parents, the next day if possible.

"Meet my folks?" Doll's voice cracked when she spoke.

"Is something wrong?" Babb said.

Yes, there was something wrong. While Doll was listening to Mr. Babb, thoughts of home began to percolate at the back of her mind. She saw the pail she used to milk the cow every morning, sitting in its corner in the barn, made of galvanized metal so heavy she couldn't lift it and had to drag it along the ground when she was a little kid. Her sister Verdie's long auburn hair braided with wild honeysuckle. The desperate look on her father's lean, tanned face when he told his family last October that because of drought, the wheat crop had shriveled to dust. Her shock when she found out that her parents quit eating the eggs from their chickens, selling them instead so that Doll could have new basketball shoes. She and her sister sometimes went without eating meat and eggs, too. Sinking into these thoughts, she stopped breathing—she knew she could never leave Caddo County.

The Great Depression was under way, and poverty lived like a king in western Oklahoma. Months of dry weather had lifted the crops right out of the ground as if the hand of God (or the devil) had pulled up row upon row of every corn, wheat, or cotton plant, exposing the roots and killing them. Fields and pastures had turned dead brown and seemed to rise on the wind like spirits yearning toward heaven, filling the air, sometimes, with sand storms and suffocating grime. Money for food and clothing was scarce. Many families ate what they could grow and supplemented that with what little they could hunt for. Where drought was worst, they gathered weeds—dandelions, sheep sorrel, and lamb's quarters—and ate them steamed with canned beans and lard. Squirrel hunting became an art. The hunter would scope out a squirrel's nest high in a cottonwood. Then he, or she, would lie on the ground and face the sky with a .22 rifle pointing at the nest in its sights. Sometimes they'd wait an hour or more for the squirrel to show its eyes. Squirrel gravy on eggs was considered a delicacy.

Excerpted from Dust Bowl Girls by Lydia Reeder. Copyright © 2017 by Lydia Reeder. Excerpted by permission of Algonquin Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.