I haven't read a lot of Westerns - I think Shane was the last, back in High School. So not a lot to compare this to.

I was surprised by several things about this novel, first published in 1939.

First was the prose style, deeply involved with characters' inner states and emotions, and oddly indirect. People seem to express many things with their eyes and the twitching of their lips. Paragraphs of internal monologue jump from image to image and, in some places, leave the reader to interpret exatly what is going on.

Second was the focus on character rather than action. A mosaic of intense and intriguing characters spend many pages observing each other, speculating on each other, and, in true Victorian fashion, struggling to express or suppress their powerful feelings about each other. I was involved and entertained by this drawing room drama, reminiscient of Thomas Hardy or Anthony Trollope.

In fact -- again strange for a Western -- the action scenes were the most uninvolving. Fist fights and gun fights seem poorly described and fail to thrill. Near the end is a long stretch of chase, hunt, flight and battle over intricately described terrain that left me mostly confused and bored.

Overall I enjoyed the novel very much, but almost felt that the writer, by style and temperament, would be more at home writing a romance than a western.



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