Maw Books » historical fiction

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

Natasha Maw — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 06:26:22 +0000

Well, would you look at that? It’s a post! And not just any post but a book review post! It’s time to brush off the old keyboard and see if I can still call myself a reviewer!

Whenever somebody that I know offline would ask me what my favorite read of 2010 was (surprisingly a question I hear more offline than online), I without any hesitation or doubt would say Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. “Really?” and a blank stare is what I would almost always get back. People, this book was AMAZING. Every 945 pages of it. When it ended, I wished there was another 945 pages. I was not ready to let these characters go! Lonesome Dove has deservedly been called epic. But what makes a book epic? I think it’s just one of those things that you know it when you read it. And oh, was this book epic.

Larry McMurtry is a master storyteller. I was a tad daunted opening that very first page and I do admit that even 200 pages into the book I wondered if anything was ever going to happen. And even though it was off to a slow start, I wouldn’t wish it any other way. The background characterization that McMurtry gives his essential to the story.

The inside cover of my copy of the book lists the key characters with a short description of each. I loved the summary it gave so am taking the liberty of copying it here for you.

Augustus McCrae: ex-Texas Ranger. A fierce fighter, loyal friend, gentle lover, a boisterous spinner of colorful yarns. Gus years for adventure, and is drawn into Woodrow Call’s dream – a cattle drive to Montana, to the free and wild frontier . . .
Woodrow F. Call: Gus’s partner and friend, a driven, demanding man, a leader with no patience for weakness – and a secret sorrow of his own . . .

Jake Spoon: dashing gambler, former comrade-in-arms of Gus and Call, his passions plunge him into a terrifying fate . . .

Clara Allen: the woman of Gus’s young dreams. Out of the frontier’s cruelty and death, she forgers a life as generous, brave and unyielding as the land she learns to love . . .

Blue Duck: a renegade Indian with cunning heart of a vulture. He tortures and ills across the Plains, and savors his victim’s agony . . .

Newt: the brave, bewildered young cowboy who discovers his manhood, and his past, on the hazardous journey into Montana . . .

The Hat Creek Outfit: Jake, Deets, Pea Eye and the Boys . . . wranglers, tracers and scouts, they follow Gus and Call into the heart of the adventure, through sandstorms, stampedes, bandits, floods and snow . . . living on in the undying legends of the great American frontier.

If you don’t know who these characters are from having read Lonesome Dove yourself, I dare you to love them. I dare you to hate them.

I picked up this book in every spare moment of my day when I was reading it. And when I wasn’t reading it, I wanted to be reading it. I thought about it constantly. I know I haven’t gone into all the intricacies of why Lonesome Dove is so amazing but let me tell you simply- the characters! the story! the love! the friendships! the fighting! the determination! the devotion! the heroes! the outlaws! the whores! the Indians! the frontier! the forging ahead! the friendships again! And it’s also laugh out loud funny with some great one-liners and some beautiful passages. Definitely need those lighthearted and thoughtful moments between the gun slinging, the scalping, and the hangings.

Yes, my favorite book of 2010 was unabashedly a Western. A genre I didn’t really think I read. But did I tell you I loved this book? Oh, how I loved Lonesome Dove. Officially one of my most favorite books. Ever. Do you need more recommendation then that?

(I remember when the mini-series came on TV when I was little and we all watched it together as a family. MUST re-watch it now! )

Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, Western
Publisher: Pocket Books. 1985.
Paperback, 945 pages. ISBN 067168390X
Lonesome Dove is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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Three Rivers Rising by Jame Richards

Natasha Maw — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 10:00:45 +0000

When I was in New York City this past May I attended a book signing event at Books of Wonder with a good dozen debut authors. Three Rivers Rising by Jame Richards is one book that I picked up there because I simply couldn’t resist it.

One - it’s free verse.

Two – it’s historical fiction.

Now some of you may be inwardly groaning to yourself because you don’t like free verse or historical fiction. But for me it’s a match made in heaven. A guarantee that I’ll read the book. I love free verse novels. Adore. Combine that with historical fiction and Three Rivers Rising was a no brainer purchase for me.

Dust jacket summary:

Sixteen-year-old Celestia vacations with her family at the elite resort at Lake Conemaugh, a shimmering Allegheny Mountain reservoir held inplace by an earthen dam. Tired of the superficial cheer and sly judgements of the society crowd, she much prefers to swim and fish with Peter, the hotel’s hired boy. It’s a friendship she must keep secret – her parents would never approve – and when companionship turns to romance, it’s a love that could get Celestia disowned.

These affairs of the heart become all the more wrenching on a single, tragic day in May 1889. After days of heavy rain, the dam fails, unleashing twenty million tons of water onto Johnstown, Pennsylvania, in the valley below – the town where Peter lives with his father.

Told my multiple narrators, Jame Richards’s searing novel in poems explores a cross-class romance, the random hand of disaster, and a tragic and indelible event in American history.

What I really liked about Three Rivers Rising was how nostalgic it felt. How I was really taken back in time not to just a different time but to a completely different way of thinking. To a time where family appearances meant more than that actual family. Where one doesn’t hesitate to sacrifice the limb to save the tree, so to speak. To a time where romance between the classes was merit for being disowned. I loved the struggle between the characters as they simply tried to love each other.

I enjoyed the free-verse quite a bit. I always do. I have found with other readers that free-verse is something that either you love or hate. I’m solidly on the love side. However, I found the free -verse here to read more as prose rather than poetry making me wonder how the novel would have fared simply as prose. But it’s fair to say that I’m glad it wasn’t prose but instead free-verse.

I had never heard of the Johnstown flood prior to reading Three Rivers Rising and Richards does an excellent job building up the tension prior to the dam breaking and describing the ensuing disaster and recovery. While Johnstown wasn’t the only city hit in this flood, there were more than 2,200 deaths in that area alone. Reading about this incredible disaster against the backdrop of family and forbidden romance was exciting.

Jame Richards includes an author’s note, a South Dork Dam chronology, and further reading recommendations. I have found that I like this kind of extra information in the historical fiction that I read.

I simply loved this book.

Links of interest: Jame Richards website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Free Verse Historical Fiction, Young Adult
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers. April 10, 2010
Hardcover, 304 pages. ISBN 0375858857
Copy source: Purchased from Books of Wonder, NYC
Three Rivers Rising is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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A Fine White Dust by Cynthia Rylant

Natasha Maw — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 02:12:06 +0000

A lot of Newbery reviews this past week. A Fine White Dust by Cynthia Rylant is a Newbery Honor book from 1987. This is one of those books which has benefited from a face lift. Sadly, the book that I own is the cover on the right (blech!) but I love the book cover shown here on the left.

At 106 pages, A Fine White Dust is a very quick read. 13-year-old Pete has always loved to go to church. It has always been one of his most favorite places to be. In second-grade he’d invite himself to go with the neighbors, by fourth-grade he’d get up and go by himself, and by fifth-grade he became very serious and religious about church.

I didn’t want to go to hell. I wanted somebody to tell me I wouldn’t go to hell. I’d look at me and I’d see a boy who never did seem to be good or holy or worth anybody dying for. Just nothing real special. And I guess I wanted somebody to make me better. To save me from hell.

Pete was looking for somebody to understand him. With his best friend, an atheist and no desire from his parents to go to church, he felt alone in his desire to be close to God. To be saved. That all changes when a traveling preacher, James Carson, comes to town. Pete finds in him an answer to his prayers. Ardent with a near frenzy call to faith, Pete decides to run away with the preacher as his new disciple leaving behind his friend and family. But his is faith misplaced? When he is helplessly betrayed, Pete must come to terms with his faith in God and himself.

Pete is working out who he is independently of his parents and best friend and I really liked that about his character. He’s also very naive though, thinking that he can simply run away and begin a new life with the preacher. He learns the hard way that not everything will go according to plan and that one shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket – so to speak. He certainly learns about heartbreak and betrayal but it also seems that his character is slightly more or less the same than at the beginning of the book.

I’m glad I read this one but also not one that will stick with me for a long time. But well worth the read because I haven’t read many books about young children who are navigating the world of faith and God. A very positive book in that regard. It is not his faith that fails (in fact – his faith in God only becomes stronger) but rather he learns to beware the folly’s of man.

Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Middle Grade Historical Fiction
Publisher: Atheneum. Reprint 2006. Originally published 1987.
Paperback, 112 pages. ISBN 1416927697
Source copy: Own
A Fine White Dust is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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The Door in the Wall by Marquerite de Angeli

Natasha Maw — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 15:00:52 +0000

Written in 1949, The Door in the Wall by Marquerite de Angeli won the 1950 Newbery Medal. To tell you the truth, I don’t have much to say about the book except that I read it. And I liked it. I found it entertaining and authentic.

From the back cover:

Ever since he can remember, Robin, child of Sir John de Bureford, has been told what is expected of him as the son of a nobleman. He must learn the ways of knighthood. but Robin’s destiny is changed suddenly when he falls ill and loses the use of his legs. Fearing a plague, his servants abandon him and Robin is left alone.

A monk named Brother Luke rescues Robin and takes him to the hospice of St. Marks, where he is taught woodcarving and – much harder – patience and strength. Says Brother Luke, “Thou hast only to follow the wall far enough and there will be a door in it.”

Robin learns soon enough what Brother Luke means. And when the great castle of Lindsay is in danger, it is Robin, who cannon mount a horse and ride to battle, who saves the townspeople and discovers that there is more than one way to serve his king.

Shortest book review ever. But really, not much else to say. Noteworthy in the aspect that I don’t often read books set in the Middle Ages. A perfectly fine book.

Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Yearling. July 1990 later printing. Original publication date 1949.
Paperback, 128 pages. ISBN 0440402832
Source copy: Own
The Door in the Wall is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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Charlotte’s Rose by A.E. Cannon

Natasha Maw — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 02:09:08 +0000

The year is 1856 and Charlotte is twelve-years-old. In Charlotte’s Rose by A.E. Cannon, Charlotte and her father, newly immigrated from Wales and newly converted to Mormonism, are among a group of pioneers pushing their own handcarts from Iowa City to Utah.

Tired of being treated like a child and eager to make a grandiose impression on the older woman, Charlotte volunteers to care for a baby whose mother died in childbirth and who’s depressed father is not up to the task. The baby reminds her of her own mother, who also died when giving birth, and while she comes to love little Rose very much, the task is not what she expected. Taking care of a newborn while pushing a handcart across the plains is certainly no picnic. Charlotte’s gotten in over her head and while she wants to prove her worth to the company, it may be an assignment that she can’t handle.

The historical background for the book is fascinating. It’s less about the doctrine of the Mormon faith and more about the need for a family to belong to something larger than they are. It’s great to see historical fiction books in the mainstream markets which tackle this subject . A subject which I would love to find more of, as the very premise of the idea lends itself to incredible stories.

The company has a great cast of characters and Charlotte is touched by each of them in different ways. She’s determined to prove that she has what it takes but discovers that nobody can no anything without a little help. I enjoyed this coming-of-age novel and am sad to see it out of print. If you come upon a copy of it, snatch it up!

Links of interest: Ann Cannon blog, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Yearling. 2002
Paperback, 256 pages. ISBN 0440418402
Source copy: Own
Charlotte’s Rose is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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All Alone by Claire Huchet Bishop

Natasha Maw — Tue, 18 May 2010 15:55:04 +0000

All Alone by Claire Huchet Bishop is the 1954 Newbery Honor. Ten-year-old Marcel is entrusted with his family’s cows for the entire summer on the high French Alp mountain tops. Entirely alone. He has always been taught that it’s best to keep to oneself. In fact, his entire village all keep to themselves. Nobody is friendly with each other and nobody helps each other. It has always been each man for himself.

As he leaves for the mountain tops his father tells him, “You keep the cows on the Little Giant pasture, and don’t talk to anyone – to anyone, do you hear me? And you have nothing to do with other cows but your own. That brings trouble. Don’t visit, don’t interfere; keep to yourself, mind you own business. That’s the best way to stay out of mischief . . . suppose a cow gets hurt. You don’t want to give anybody a chance to say that it was your fault,, do you? So the best way is to keep to yourself and pay no attention to anything else except your own animals. That way you have nobody to blame, and nobody can blame you.”

Of course, All Alone is about what happens when Marcel does exactly the opposite of his father’s wishes. It’s always interesting to read a children’s book from fifty years back. I suspect that most children wouldn’t find this book relevant to them but the beauty of a book like this is traveling to a different time and place. It feels very nostalgic. Not my favorite Newbery by any means but I liked it just fine.

Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Scholastic. 1983 later printing. Originally published 1953.
Paperback, 95 pages. ISBN 0590457071
Source copy: Own
All Alone is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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Dovey Coe by Frances O’Roark Dowell

Natasha Maw — Mon, 17 May 2010 07:02:38 +0000

My name is Dovey Coe, and I reckon it don’t matter if you like me or not. I’m here to lay the record straight, to let you know them folks saying I done a terrible thing are liars. I aim to prove it, too. I hated Parnell Caraway as much as the next person, but I didn’t kill him.

The opening paragraph of Dovey Coe by Frances O’Roark Dowell had me completely hooked. Take into account that Dovey is only twelve-years-old and I’m even more hooked. I loved this book! The voice. Oh my goodness the voice. Dovey Coe’s character was simply amazing and has a voice that is simply unforgettable. And the sense of place. Oh my goodness again! It’s as if I was right there in the Appalachian mountains and with the mountain folk who lived there.

Dovey’s older sister is being courted by Parnell, the son of the richest man in town. There’s not much that’s very nice about him and Dovey’s afraid that he’ll stop her sisters dream of going away to college. On top of that, he’s real mean to her older brother who’s deaf which doesn’t mean he’s stupid. Dovey has always spoken her mind, so when Parnell turns up dead (no spoiler there – we find out he’s dead in that first paragraph but how he died is the mystery) the town turns to Dovey as the most likely suspect.

LOVED it. A great plot, fantastic characters and one heck of a voice in Dovey had me all giddy over this one. I almost want to put everything down and reread it right now and I’m not much of a rereader. Having ADORED Shooting the Moon also by Frances O’Roark Dowell, and now being two for two, I think I need to explore this author’s books even more. She’s becoming a fast favorite. Did I mention that I loved it?

Links of interest: Maw Books review of Shooting the Moon also by Frances O’Roark Dowell, Frances O’Roark Dowell’s website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Aladdin. November 1, 2001
Paperback, 192 pages. ISBN 0689846673
Source copy: Own
Dovey Coe is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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Witness by Karen Hesse

Natasha Maw — Sun, 16 May 2010 15:02:52 +0000

Witness by Karen Hesse is told from the viewpoints of eleven different townspeople in a small town of Vermont in 1924. A town in which the Klu Klux Klan has moved in and ultimately changes everything. I adore free-verse novels and Witness is as powerful as they come. Based on true characters, there are photographs at the beginning of the book naming each character. This brought to life to the reader that these emotions, thoughts, lives, and horrific events are not just a made up story. The Klu Klux Kan is a real organization that horrifically changed people’s lives.

Two examples of two different viewpoints of the same event:

johnny reeves
we took a pine
40 feet high and
lashed a cross arm
to it and set the
cross in the ground,
its arms stretching above the town, we soaked burlap bags
in kerosene and wrapped the bags around the wood.
at the foot of the cross i smashed
a railroad torch.
the fire took off so fast. a divine
sight, neighbor,
the flames spread
from the base to the
top. in a matter of
minutes the cross arm
pulsed with fire. the
flames leaping,
seeking heaven
neighbor, the white
crucifix scoring
the night
blazed perfect.
perfect.

leanora sutter

i woke up saturday night
because the light coming through
my bedroom window changed.

on the hill across the valley
i saw
a flame
rising.
but it was
no wild fire. it
was a
cross,
burning.

silently,
silently,
i crept down the hall,
into the closet
where,
at the back,
mamma’s cotton dress
still dangled over her shoes,
and the walls smelled of hair oil and oranges.

in that dark and narrow place,
i opened a hole for myself
but no matter how i turned,
the light from the cross
curled its bright claws under the door.

I did find it interesting but also a bit distracting that there was no capitalization in the entire book. I suspect that Hesse was stripping the text down to its most simple form.

I have yet to meet a free-verse novel that I didn’t like and this one was no exception. Hesse has taken on a grim subject matter and thoughtfully portrayed those who were caught up in something larger than themselves. Beautiful.

Links of interest: More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, free-verse, ages 9-12.
Publisher: Scholastic. March 1, 2003. Originally published 2001.
Hardcover, 168 pages. ISBN 0439272009
Source copy: Own
Witness is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr

Natasha Maw — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 10:00:02 +0000

I have a fascination with anything set around World War II and When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr continues that theme for me. Published in 1971, it is a semi-autobiographical novel of nine-year-old Anna and her family. Set just as Hitler comes to power in 1933, Anna’s father has campaigned against the Nazi party and the family flees from their home country of Germany to Switzerland, then Paris, then England.

Although their lives are now less at risk then if they had stayed in Germany, with each move comes its own set of challenges. Anna just wants to make friends and attend school. Learning each new language is difficult and adjusting to living with less and less isn’t easy. What Anna and her brother learn is it doesn’t matter where you live, what really matters is being together as a family.

“Difficult childhood . . . ” she thought. The past and the present slid apart. She remembered the long, weary journey from Berlin with Mama, how it had rained, and how she had read Gunther’s book and wished for a difficult childhood to that she might one day become famous. Had her wish then come true? Could her life since she had left Germany really be described as a difficult childhood?

She thought of the flat in Paris and the Gasthof Zwirn. No, it was absurd. Some things had been difficult, but it had always been interesting and often funny – and she and Man and Mama and Papa had nearly always been together. As long as they were together she could never have a difficult childhood.

An excellent novel on the refugee experience for a child and one to introduce young children to the concept of war and it’s effects on families.

Links of interest: more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical middle grade fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile. Reprint November 10, 1997. Originally published 1971.
Paperback, 191 pages. ISBN 0698115899
Source copy: Library
When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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The Birth House by Ami McKay

Natasha Maw — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 05:20:03 +0000

I bought the The Birth House by Ami McKay because I’m a sucker for pretty covers. Knowing nothing about the book, nor having heard of it, The Birth House made its way home on the merits of the cover alone. I just love the imagery in it. And then when prepping for this post, I found these two additional book covers.

How lucky can an author get? All three covers would have gotten my attention. Beautiful.

A good synopsis from the book jacket:

The Birth House is the story of Dora Rare, the first daughter to be born in five generations of the Rare family. As a child in an isolated village in Nova Scotia, she is drawn to Miss Babineau, an outspoken Acadian midwife with a gift for healing and a kitchen filled with herbs and folk remedies. During the turbulent first years of World War I, Dora becomes the midwife’s apprentice. Together they help the women of Scots Bay through infertility, difficult labors, breech births, unwanted pregnancies and even unfulfilling sex lives.

But when Gilbert Thomas, a brash medical doctor, comes to Scots Bay with promises of fast, painless childbirth, some of the women begin to question miss Babineau’s methods – and after Miss Babineau’s death, Dora is left to carry on alone. In the face of fierce opposition, she must summon all of her strength to protect the birthing traditions and wisdom that have been passed down to her.

The Birth House is told in journal form from the point of view of seventeen-year-old Dora and also includes letters, news clippings, and advertisements. I really liked the Novia Scotia setting. It felt so wild and also romantic, particularly for this mountain town which demanded that its inhabitants carve out their life’s goodwill from what the earth would give them.

Dora is labeled as an anomaly as soon as she’s born. In five generations, the Rare family line has simply never had the birth of a girl. Dora grows up with six brothers and as she gets older her father tries to squelch her tom boyish ways. She moves in with the local midwife who trains her in catching babies, a skill that is a little prayer, a little magic, a little medicinal herbs, and a whole lot of knowledge of a woman’s body.

Dora has a fantastic voice. I loved her. In fact, I loved all the characters. Miss Babineau was fabulous. So wise and caring but with a witch-like quality to her. I felt a little sorry for the well-meaning Dr. Gilbert Thomas although you wanted to hate him too. I really wanted to smack Dora’s new husband, Archer, over the head. I wanted to know more about Charlie, Dora’s brother, whom she followed down to Boston when things got complicated at home. And I can’t forget Aunt Fran whom disproved of everything Dora did. I loved all the women in the town. They often got together and talked about everything under the sun and conversations not meant to have in front of the men.

Although the characters are the heart of this story, childbirth is the focus of it. Midwifery and modern medicine clash head-to-head and the women are caught in the very middle of it. I found techniques from both midwifing and the new modern medicine to be fascinating. Particularly, the treatment for woman diagnosed has having hysterical tendencies. You’d just have to read the book to find out about that.

An examination of a community of women, their society, and the families they held together through their shared friendships, rivalries, stories and knitting circles. Ami McKay wrote a incredible narrative and was one heck of a storyteller. I loved it.

Links of interest: Ami McKay website, blog, Twitter. More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: William Morrow. August 22, 2006.
Hardcover, 400 pages. ISBN 0061135852
Source copy: Own
The Birth House is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

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