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Ivan Doig’s mother, Berneta, died on his sixth birthday, and he grew up with his father, Charlie, and his grandmother Bessie Ringer on ranches around Dupuyer, Montana. His memoir of those years, This House of Sky (1978), was a finalist for the National Book Award. He later earned a PhD in history at the University of Washington, and it shows in the fiction: the McCaskill trilogy, which begins with English Creek (1984), runs from Montana’s statehood in 1889 to its centenary in 1989. His last novel, Last Bus to Wisdom, came out in 2015, the year he died in Seattle. The ten writers below share his subject: ranch hands, homesteaders, schoolteachers and dam builders, and the long memory of one stretch of country.
By Lisanne Swart · 10 authors · The American West · Memoir and family saga · Updated October 2026
Quick answer
If you love Ivan Doig, start with Wallace Stegner, whose Angle of Repose (1971) is built, like Doig’s best books, from the records of a real Western family, and Norman Maclean, whose A River Runs Through It (1976) is a Montana family remembered decades later. A. B. Guthrie Jr. grew up in Choteau, a short drive from Doig’s Dupuyer, and wrote the Montana frontier in The Big Sky (1947). Further down are a Blackfeet novelist and a Scottish writer from the country the McCaskills left.
10 authors like Ivan Doig
Where to start if you loved Ivan Doig
If you want the Montana family memoir, read Norman Maclean.
A River Runs Through It (1976) is short and sits closest to This House of Sky.
If you want the history behind the West, read Wallace Stegner.
Angle of Repose (1971) rebuilds a family from its letters.
If you want the frontier before Doig’s Montana, read A. B. Guthrie Jr.
The Big Sky (1947) begins the series of novels he set there.
If you want the land from the other side, read James Welch.
Fools Crow (1986) follows a Blackfeet man in the 1870s, as settlers and soldiers close in.
If you want to go back to Doig, start with This House of Sky.
Then read The Whistling Season (2006), or the McCaskill trilogy from English Creek (1984).
Frequently asked questions about authors like Ivan Doig
Who writes like Ivan Doig?
Wallace Stegner, Norman Maclean and A. B. Guthrie Jr. are the closest: Stegner for family history turned into fiction, Maclean for a Montana family remembered, Guthrie for the frontier country Doig grew up in.
What should I read after This House of Sky?
Try Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It (1976), another Montana family looked back on, or Wallace Stegner’s Crossing to Safety (1987).
Is Ivan Doig like Wallace Stegner?
Closely: both wrote the West as history as well as story, and Doig received the Center of the American West’s Wallace Stegner Award in 2007. Stegner ranges across the whole West; Doig stays mostly in Montana.
What is the McCaskill trilogy?
Three novels about one Montana family: English Creek (1984), Dancing at the Rascal Fair (1987) and Ride with Me, Mariah Montana (1990), which together run from statehood in 1889 to the centenary in 1989.
Does Ivan Doig have a new book?
No. Doig died in Seattle in 2015, and his last novel, Last Bus to Wisdom, appeared that year. His papers are at the Montana State University Library.
Which Ivan Doig book should I read first?
This House of Sky (1978), his memoir; if you want a novel first, read The Whistling Season (2006).
Sources
List last reviewed 31 October 2026.
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