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Summary: The Great American Novel
Review: It's real simple folks. This is the great American novel. Which via mini-series', weekly half-hour TV shows and generalhype we'll grind into pop culture dust. Leave it be; it's one of the best books ever written
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Summary: My vote for best book to take on a loooong journey
Review: I read some books because I keep turning the pages for the need to see how it ends. Some books I read because I love the writers style or wit or turn of a phrase. Some books I read because I can care about or identify with the characters. However, Lonesome Dove didn't fit in any of these catagories. I would have to label this book as pure and unadulterated entertainment. As I got closer to the end of this 823 page book, instead of reading faster to see how it would end, I found myself reading slower because I didn't want it to end. I felt as though I could read this book every night before bed eternally. I am not a reader of westerns and never will be, unless McMurtry writes them. So if you are traveling from Sydney to Miami in a tramp steamer my advise to you would be: Pick up a copy of Lonesome Dove and your trip will be a whole lot more enjoyable
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Summary: A classic tale of the American West
Review: For those who want a dash of realism with their adventure stories, "Lonesome Dove" is the tale for them. It is the story of the American West: loss of beloved friends, love found and misplaced, cowboys who cry, and two old Texas Rangers well past their prime who succumb to the dream of seeing one last unsettled place before they "take up the rocking chair". This is not a John Wayne-esque tale in which the fellow in the white hat always wins. See a version of the West well aside from the movie serials of your youth. As you read it you too will feel as though you have saddled your best horse and ridden a piece on what is perhaps the most adventurous cattle drive in history. The suprises will astound you, and you will not be disappointed
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Summary: McMurtry Masterpiece
Review: A western beyond compare. McMurtry describes lives of cowboys and gamblers and the women who loved them. He paints a vivid picture of frontier life. One that was often brutal. You fall in love with these characters and will hold them dear all your life. Definitely one of the all time great reads
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Summary: Great read!
Review: Lonesome Dove is the story authors haven't told before. I have read two of the books Larry used to tell this story. Both books were dry bones, Lonesome Dove puts flesh on history. Marvelous from the Baptist Church that lent its name to this saga to the hardships the men and animals endured, you won't be able to put this novel down.
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Summary: What A Ride
Review: Add me to the already overflowing numbers of Lonesome Dove fans. McMurtry develops characters better than almost any author I have read. And his grasp of setting is wonderful. Augustus McCrae has to be one of the great characters in literature and in some unfathomable way has become a hero to me. If you love the West and you have always wanted to be a cowboy for awhile, Lonesome Dove will be the journey of a lifetime for you. From the country's southern border to its northern, there's nothing like riding alongside Augustus,Call, Pea Eye, Deets, and the others. Lonesome Dove reached far into my soul and grabbed me in places I didn't know existed. I won't soon forget Lonesome Dove
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Summary: Down to earth, Realistic.
Review: This is with out a doubt the finest book that I have ever
read. I love to read, and the American west is a favorite
subject of mine. Lonesome Dove is the story of two freinds that are as different as night and day. One is a tuff hard worker and the other is a "laid back western philosopher" that enjoys the simpler side of living. It is realy true of a lot of friendships one personality compliments the other even though they are different.
The story is about a dream that is put into action, to be the first to run cattle in the Montana Territory. But along the way the hardships take their toll.
I suggest that you don't start this book until you have some time on your hands, because once you start it is hard to put down.
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Summary: Stunning, vivid explication of "real life" in the Old West
Review: Enjoyable on every level--from action-adventure to art-piece and everything in between--McMurtry's *Lonesome Dove* is ostensibly about a couple of old Texas Rangers and Civil War veterans who decide to (literally) rustle up some cattle and move from the harsh realities of Rio Grande-country to the sweet hospitality of Montana. Things don't quite turn out the way they planned... Really, a description of the plot-line can't do it justice.
The most powerful western ever written (and possibly the greatest American novel since *Gone With the Wind*), *Lonesome Dove* transcends the genre to deliver a dynamite-charged message about the randomness of life and death in the "good-ol' days." A veritable primer of cognitive dissonance, *Lonesome Dove* manages to pack in lessons about the wisdom of innocence, the virtue of iniquity, the nobility of villainy, the intrepidity of cowardice, the hollowness of heroism, and the triumph of the weak--all the while confirming Frederick Jackson Turner's assertion about *The Importance of the Frontier in American History.* A picture painted subtly with bold colors, McMurtry's epic simultaneously offers an achingly sad story full of great jubilation and a joyous story full of incredible despair. Most of all, though, *Lonesome Dove* is a story of a great number of people who end up happy, even though none of them end up with what they want. Just like life.
Run, don't walk, to the "Buy Items Now" button, and purchase a copy for yourself plus at least one copy for a friend. You'll thank yourself later.
The best!
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Summary: Please read this truly outstanding book! You'll thank me!
Review: What a marvelous journey. If only this huge novel wasthree or four (or ten) times longer than it is. I couldbarely wait to return home from work and guiltily ignore my children so I could launch back into this fantastic trek across the expanses of the American midwest. The characters are so vivid that you will consider them friends and mourn at their loss. I've recommended this book to friends and family and all have thanked me for it; you will too!
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Summary: The Physics of the West
Review: I've lately been irritated with myself for not reading faster and more frequently and, almost to set a marathon for myself, I decided to tackle "Lonesome Dove," the Pulitzer Prize-winning, 942 page epic about a cattle drive from Texas to Montana in the years following the Civil War.
I'd read "Streets of Laredo" and "Commanche Moon" but for some reason -- maybe because I'd seen the miniseries -- I'd never read "Dove." But for three weeks, over Christmas and New Year's, I carried the book everywhere. The task undertaken in the novel, and the slow but steady progress of the characters, seemed to reflect my own endeavors.
It's quite a satisfying experience. The great McMurtry takes what could've been a closetful of cliches and turns them on end. Heroine Lorena isn't some Grace Kelly figure but a pragmatic manipulator who's likeable because McMurtry paints her honestly; the same goes for Clara, Jake, Dish, Po, Newt (though, admittedly, he winds up separated from the group a couple times too many) and even Blue Duck.
In terms of iconic characters, Gus and Call are basically the cut-up and the straight man, but they're also remarkably complex and I enjoyed the fact that, although the old Rangers didn't have a name for it then, the cattle drive is basically the result of their mid-life crises.
Ironically, the engine that drives "Dove" is the way the actions of men and women in an underpopulated land affect one another: Jake's actions affect July; July's affect Elmira and, in turn, Roscoe; and, most importantly, Call's decision to move the herd North affects everybody in the story. "I guess in New York there are so many people you don't notice the dying so much," says Clara. "Out here it shows more when people go...."
Of course, characters affect each other in every story but here the reactions are as clearly drawn as falling dominos, particularly in light of the novel's oft-repeated refrain, "Things would've been a lot better if we'd stayed in Texas."
"Dove" doesn't have the jolting brutality and arresting darkness of "Streets" or "Moon" (both of which I thought were great and beautifully downbeat) but it's brilliant and has some excellent moments (the fight between the bull and the bear; Gus' tussle with Blue Duck's thugs; a hanging and, much later, a funeral for one of my favorite characters that moved me more than anything I read all year. "Lonesome Dove" also has the wit and lyricism and episodic brilliance of a true classic.
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