Smoke Bellew: Amazon.ca: Jack London: Books

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6 Reviews

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
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4.5 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)

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3.0 out of 5 stars interesting tales, April 25 2003

By	jan erik storeb� (norway) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Smoke Bellew (Paperback)

some interesting stories here. L can be sly, descriptive, philosophical, straightforward, psychological..... he shows his talents in this book. most of all, L can be interesting. it is easy to read and understand his stories, so it is never a great disappointment when he delivers a story that's not so great. there is little greatness here, though

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4.0 out of 5 stars Horatio Alger Pans for Gold in the Klondike, Nov 16 2001

By	James Paris "Tarnmoor" (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Smoke Bellew (Paperback)

After the success of CALL OF THE WILD and WHITE FANG, Jack London continued to capitalize on his Klondike experiences. SMOKE BELLEW is very much a boy's book. Its hero is a boy scout type who turns almost overnight from a life of urbane idleness into a buff and savvy prospector in a series of episodes that would do justice to a Horatio Alger story. We see Smoke devise a can't lose system at roulette (hah, fat chance!). Young women swoon over him with precious little effort on his part. And he even melts the heart of the half-breed daughter of his "White Indian" captor in the last episode. Alas, because she is part Indian, she must die for him so that he could hitch up with Joy Gastell, with whom he has a peek-a-boo romance throughout the book.

It sounds as if I didn't like the book, but actually, it's quite a bit of fun. Smoke Bellew is every boy's dream of mastery under romantic adversity. London's serious scenes seem a bit mawkish, but the chapters entitled "A Flutter in Eggs" and "The Town-Site of Tra-Lee" are comic gems that deserve to be anthologized. There is a good deal of fun poked at the insane stampedes and speculations of that time and place. I suspect that the reality was a good deal more gritty than London presents it, but he weaves a good tale that will insulate you from your cares for a few hours.

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5.0 out of 5 stars about russian translation, Aug 15 2000