Most helpful customer reviews
|
|
4.0 out of 5 stars
Takes a while to get going., Feb 12 2008
I found this book took me about two hundred pages to finally get into it. I think this time was mostly spent filling in back stories and developing characters. Once this was fulfilled the author picked up the plots pace with a relentless onslought of deaths. I found a major character dying every few chapters. A few times I was downright shocked. However, the more shocked I became the more I enjoyed the novel. I never could predict what would happen next and I never got over the brutality of the west described within the novel. I once wished I was a cowboy. If the west was even remotely like this book describes I never will wish I was a cowboy again.
|
|
|
4.0 out of 5 stars
Vivid Storytelling About the Old West, Aug 26 2007
The plot of STREETS OF LAREDO seems simple enough. Captain Woodrow Call, bounty hunter extraordinaire, is hired by Colonel Terry, the president of a railroad, to capture train robber and serial killer, Joey Garza. But there are enough twists and turns in Larry McMurtry's novel to turn a simple situation into a complex, risky adventure where both laws and human endurance are stretched to the limit, and often broken.
From the start, Call's quest is filled with obstacles. His colleague, Pea Eye Parker, refuses to join him on the hunt for the first time in years. Like Call, Pea Eye, is getting old and isn't sure he's up to another hunt, especially one that will take him far away from his wife and five children. Call is also accompanied by Colonel Terry's New York accountant, Ned Bookshire, a man who knows he's out of his depth in the rugged west, but who must accompany Call to keep track of expenses for the Colonel, or else lose his job. From there, things get worse, especially when more than one serial killer arrives in the area to cause trouble.
I've never read a Larry McMurtry novel before, and although I'm told STREETS OF LAREDO is a sequel to LONESOME DOVE, this novel stands well on its own, despite occasional references to the past. Especially interesting was McMurtry's use of back story to provide intriguing and useful details about main characters and a few secondary characters. I have to admit that some back stories were too long, though. Also, while point of view changed often and smoothly, nearly every character used the word "foolish" to describe their past mistakes. By the time Joe Garza reflects on his "foolish" mistakes, I'm wishing McMurtry had kept a thesaurus nearby while writing. Still, McMurtry's talent for detail, narrative description, and riveting storytelling made this novel a great read.
|
|
|
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great writer from Texas saves the day!, Feb 18 2005
LONESOME DOVE grabbed me right from the start. The reader is part of the action in a way that is rarely felt while reading a book. The first chapters are wonderful character developers and intertain us along the way. Gus Mcrae and Woodrow F Call are of course the heart and soul of the story, but Newt,Deets,Pea-Eye and Jake Spoon help to make up one of the most colorful casts that has ever been on paper. The great thing that Mr. McMurty was able to do, was to give us so many characters and not one time bore us while we get to know them. The book has a nice mellow start with Gus and the pigs, and this reader was lulled into just enjoying an old Texas Rangers perspective on life. That the book would take off and drag us on such an epic journey was mind boggeling. The description of the geography in the beginning was not compromised in any of the following chapters,and enriched the wonderful cast of characters and story lines. The vast plots and sub-plots were all tied neatly together in the end, and the ones that needed to be cut loose were done so with class. With great writing that you'll find in the books of Jackson McCrae (CHILDREN'S CORNER and BARK OF THE DOGWOOD) and expert pacing that can be compared to his STREETS OF LAREDO, this is one of the finest books I have ever read, and if anyone deserver a Pulitzer for their work it was Larry McMurtry. And he got it.
|
|
|
Most recent customer reviews
|