Whipstock: The Story of an Oilfield Pregnancy

Lynne Perras teaches communication arts at the University of Calgary.

Whipstock is an unusual and intriguing tale that metaphorically explores
both feminism and machismo in Western Canada. The novel’s heroine,
Nellie Mannville, leads an uneventful and predictable life as a waitress
in an oil company cafeteria until the day she finds herself compelled to
climb a drilling rig during an employee tour. After her descent, she
considers herself to be pregnant. The rest of the book recounts
Nellie’s experiences as she prepares for her baby’s birth, despite
all those around her—particularly her landman mother Flo—who doubt
her claim.

All the characters in Whipstock reinforce the book’s mockery of the
macho world of the oil industry and its insistence on traditional
masculine and feminine behavior. Nellie rejects fashionable maternity
clothes in favor of utilitarian garb. Flo works at a job not often held
by a woman, and Nellie’s deceased grandmother (who mysteriously
communicates with Nellie via e-mail) also worked in the petroleum
industry as a doodlebug (someone who looks for oil using unscientific
ways). The female characters are generally strong, capable, and highly
independent (if somewhat eccentric). The men, in contrast, seem
ineffectual and unnecessary. Not for every reader because of its bizarre
premise, Whipstock is a fast-paced and entertaining satire of the world
of oil and gas.