Customer Reviews

Hayduke Lives!: A Novel

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book could be a poster child for "The sequel never lives up to its predecessor."

Whether or not you've read The Monkey Wrench Gang, you will know exactly what is going to happen at every step of the way. Worse, Abbey takes shortcuts. For instance: all the old characters are brought back; all meet Hayduke again who asks for their help; all refuse and then suddenly, without explanation, all are on board to help him destroy the huge earth-mover, GOLIATH. The object of their sabotage and the fact that they are back together is very predictable.

Also, the final scene of destruction is disappointing. It too, "just happens".

The message is still great. The cast of characters still appealingly eccentric, Hayduke still a demi-god, but it does not come near to the overall excellence of The Monkey Wrench Gang. Due to the shortcuts, I would strongly recommend not reading this book unless you've read Monkey Wrench. Even then, you better have really loved Monkey Wrench and want some more of the same.

I've read alot of Abbey's books. His Essays are great, as are his fictional stories. HOWEVER, this novel falls far short of Abbey's earlier works. I found it to be very crude in most places, And chock full of the [people] that helped create the conditions that burned my house down this last summer.

I've met too many eco-radicals to find them amusing. I will hand it to Abbey, though - he did a great job of describing how these [people] act.

In my virulent opinion, skip this book and read ANYTHING ELSE he wrote. This book is bad.

Those who enjoyed The Monkey Wrench Gang will enjoy this sequel, which contains the same winning mix of ingredients as the original: biting satire, earthy humor, colorful characters, plenty of over-the-top action,and most importantly Abbey's underlying message that wild places are worth saving - even if one doesn't endorse the Gang's anarchistic approach. Those sympathetic to Abbey's lifelong cause of opposition to the forces of development and exploitation may also want to explore Carl Hiaasen's eco-terror comedies or the more complex and literary, but equally passionate, "Arcadia Falls" by Rand Johnson.

I really enjoyed this book, reading about the old gang joining together again. Abbey mentions names well known to those in the environmental movements. The immortal Hayduke certainly outdoes himself in this book. The only thing that made me a little uncomfortable was the murder-up to that point, it was a great book. Abbey betrayed the cause with that little turn of events.

Back in the old college days we as a class read some of Edward Abbey's novels from "Desert Solitare" to "Fire on the Mountain". And only reading it for a classroom assignment, I have to dig it back up and re-read it again after reading "Heyduke Lives". Being a native of the Four Corners area, a true native. Not those so called "native wanna be's" who claim to be from there. I can relate to the characters in Heyduke Lives! My favorite character though has to be Erika, the savy euro-proeco fem hottie stood out along with those of Heyduke himself. The desert of Utah and Arizona will be home to me and Ed as we are the stewards of this everlasting land. Lastly, from the Author himself wrote a warning: "Anyone who takes this book seriously will be shot. Anyone who does not take it seriously will be buried alive by a Mitsubishi bulldoser".

I've got to say I only read the first 100 pages or so. I was just put off by the foul language and sexual deviance. As much as I love Cactus Ed's writing, I have to say he seemed to become a dirty old man near the end. It was like reading a book by Quentin Tarrantino with the ... going off in every other sentence. He's got the right to write it and I've got the right to dislike it.

I think this book could have used a little more help from the editors, or perhaps the author. But in Abbey's defense, time was running a little short. This is classic Abbey, and the story does get rolling after a while. It got my blood flowing, and there's no lack of action. I'll say that. Abbey's ever-present push for anarchy is in full bloom, and it sometimes gets a little wearing. (The man seems to have a one-track mind.) His characterizations verge on comic-book, and holy cats and bananas, can this guy hyperbolate! Nevertheless, money well spent, and a good read.

Yes, by George, Hayduke lives! Fervent admirers of the Abbey oeuvre will not have doubted this contention for a moment. For those who are only just coming across this rascally desert rat for the first time, I should perhaps note that George Hayduke has appeared in a sister volume, the now infamous "The Monkey Wrench Gang." At the conclusion of that earlier work, George Hayduke's fate seemed to be hanging rather desperately in the balance. However, not even the untimely death of Edward Abbey, in March 1989, could deprive us of all news of this most obstinate of heroes.

It would be an easy thing to say that "Hayduke Lives!" is an unpolished novel. It does seem to fall short of the demands which Abbey made of himself in "The Fool's Progress," the last volume he published prior to his death. Yet the craft is certainly there and the willingness to create is as strong as ever. Mountains motivated Edward Abbey; mountains and everything natural (and even some things man-made, it has to be said) that lay around them. His actual landscape at the last, which was also the landscape of "Hayduke Lives!", was the canyon lands and desert country of Arizona and Utah (and everywhere). So his imagery is likewise grandiose and well suited to the theme of environmental vengeance which prods this plot along. Knowing Abbey, one can sense that he is willing the earth itself to open up and swallow the machines of man that make its surface tremble. Yet he contains himself, just, to the story in hand and lets George do the dirty work in his own inimitable style.

Abbey's long fight was unrelenting and unapologetic. He seemed to sense that people need to be shocked awake in order to react to the troubles of the world. Therefore his books have a hard edge, and are often full of disagreeable people and unpleasant events. His heroes are not pretty, they are bellicose and belligerent, and given to much cussing and ill-talk. They bewail the fate of man and his planet in new ways for us, like lonesome cowboys sitting up on far ridges crying to a full moon. They are both modern, like the industrial society they do battle with, and ancient, like the landscape which surrounds them and succors them when they've lost their faith in man. Along with Callenbach and Mowat, Edward Abbey surely takes his place in that wooded and hopefully sheltered pantheon that has come down from Thoreau.

Abbey's final novel is a worthy sequel to the Monkey Wrench Gang. Hayduke's stunts are the most outrageous Ed has cooked up by far. The climax and the grand finale should win the approval of any true Abbey fan. HAYDUKE LIVES!

Much as I enjoy Edward Abbey's work, I was very disappointed by this book. True, the characters are there, but nothing much happens to them. And sure, there is some monkey wrenching in defense of what is really important, but the story itself is barely there at all -- a succession of small and extraordinarily repetitive vignettes. There are humorous moments, mostly when he is poking fun at himself, but they're few and far between. Lots of sexual meandering, natural description of the Four Corners area, the usual avalances of wordplay, and some violence (most corporate, but a final Lone act that seems gratuitous). It's still Ed Abbey, but he's nowhere near his best. Given that it's only available in a pricey trade paperback, I'd skip it. The two stars are relative to his other work, not to books in general.