David's Guide To Westerns - Last modified Book reviews

The Berrybender Narratives (2004)

Fri, 06 Dec 2019 11:46:22 +0000

A series of four novels (the date given is the publication date of the last one) about the misadventures of an aristocratic English family on a hunting expedition in the west. I read them essentially as one entity in a big collection and I think it’s best to do so – the end points of the individual novels seem somewhat arbitrary so it’s unclear to me how well they would work on their own.

I’m a bit uncertain how I feel about this. The characters are universally well-written, internally believable and interesting (especially the protagonist Tasmin, who impulsively marries an unsuitable frontiersman who she fancies, and her father, the hedonistic patriarch of the clan, who selfishly continues on his hunting expedition even as it collapses around him). I wasn’t convinced it has a satisfying overarching story though: it’s more of a series of events that befall the family (and their hangers-on). In some ways that doesn’t matter, since it’s supposed to be a dark, tragic farce, and probably more about the characters and their reaction to the situations they end up in than an overall story. In that sense it succeeds in what it was trying to do (and I did enjoy reading it). However, it isn’t my favourite of Larry McMurtry’s work, and does feel slightly haphazard.

The Unforgiven (1957)

Tue, 19 May 2015 07:14:02 +0000

Written by Alan LeMay (who’s most notable for writing The Searchers), The Unforgiven was also adapted into a film with Burt Lancaster (not to be confused with Clint’s similarly titled film). Unfortunately it’s been many years since I’ve seen the film, so I cannot manage any meaningful comparison.

This review is necessarily slight short, since I read the book then forgot to write a review, and in the meantime have forgotten many of the details. It concerns a family, their adopted daughter—who may or may not be a Kiowa Indian—a neighbouring family who hate Indians passionately and their response to rumours of the daughter’s ancestry, and finally the Kiowa’s attempts to recover what they believe is their lost child.

The book is well paced and generally enjoyable to read. It probably doesn’t quite count as great literature—it’s designed too much as an “action” book—but I would say it’s well written. It largely ties in with what I know about the period and it certainly seems as though the author knows his history, although I suspect I’m not the best person to judge this (I’ve only really read one historical book about region, the Commanches and their allies such as the Kiowa: “Empire of the Summer Moon”…). The only bit which didn’t ring true was the idea that a sufficiently fortified homestead would largely be left alone by the Indians, although I should reiterate that I can’t really judge this.

I think the book is currently out of print in the UK, although only recently, so it’s reasonably readily available.

The Stars in their Courses (1960)

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 21:25:37 +0000

Most notable for being the book that El Dorado was based on. Very little of the book was actually used in El Dorado: as far as I can tell, one character name (Nelse McLeod), a single scene where a young man falls asleep at his post while he's supposed to be standing guard and ends up being shot (at the start of the film, in the middle of the book), and the broad idea of the gunfighter crippled by medical problems (in the film a bullet wound, in the book heart problems).

To briefly summarise the plot: a noted gunfighter returns to town after an unsuccessful trip to Mexico, at the same time as a local rancher is throwing an 18th birthday party for one of his sons. A river that begins on the rancher's land dries up, causing other ranchers to get suspicious of his motives. This isn't helped by one of the main ranchers sons running off with someone else's wife. At that point things escalate....

One of the main themes of the book is destiny, and the idea that the events that take place are basically out of control of the main characters. I felt this bit of the book was possibly the weakest, and felt a bit "overwritten" or possibly just over-emphasised in places. The story as a whole was good, with interesting characters. Interestingly, the vast majority of the characters were sympathetic—if slightly flawed—despite the fact that they all end up fighting each other; there were no obvious heroes and villains. There was also a remarkable amount of sex in the book—especially compared to the film allegedly based on it—although all slightly implied (definitely not erotic novel territory!). In summary, it's pretty entertaining to read, but will never be considered a literary classic (although it's obviously trying to head down that route, rather than the action pot-boiler route).

I mostly bought this because I wanted to see how El Dorado was based on a book, when it was so obviously a remake of Rio Bravo. To an extent, the answer is "it wasn't", although the book was pretty good in it's own right. The book itself is long out of print, but I found a second-hand copy quite cheaply on the internet. The cover from the original 60s printing is wonderfully overblown in it's description of the old west (see the picture – sorry about the slightly dodgy picture quality!).