NOTHING TO DO BUT STAY: My Pioneer...

NOTHING TO DO BUT STAY: My Pioneer Mother by Carrie Young (Laurel: $8.95; 164 pp., illustrated). In these warm reminiscences, Young chronicles the lives of her Norwegian ancestors who homesteaded the North Dakota prairie during the late 19th Century. The evocations of the food, smells and chores on a remote farm recall Garrison Keillor’s tales about Lake Woebegon. Most of Young’s recollections focus on the pioneer women who raised children, boiled laundry, cooked meals, made clothes and tended animals under primitive conditions. Her affectionate, honest stories recall the love, worry and loneliness of life a century ago.