This book touched my heart, making me cry, laugh, and mad in so many moments. Which has now become one of my favorite books ever. In fact, put a gun to my head and told me chose just one, and it’d bet more than money that Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry would be what I’d throw out there.
Which is completely ironic because at first, I didn't even want to read this book. It wasn't something I thought that I would like in the slightest. At first, I started this book because of my husband. Being a self-claimed cowboy himself, he loved the series, and as soon as I found out there were books to go along with it...I had to start there first. I'll be honest, in the beginning I had a hard time getting into it with nothing but talk about horses, beans, and pigs. But I don't think I even made it past the first 50 pages before I realized how invested I was into it.
The Characters
The characters in this story are more real than any other book that I have ever read. People I really grew to love. And I think that it had a big part in the fact that the book introduced them so well. Giving me an in-depth feel of who the characters were, allowed me to do something that I only did with one person in real life (my husband) - truly letting me to get to know each and every one of them in their background. It allowed me to sympathize with them and establish a genuine understanding to the motives behind every action, no matter how much I personally might have disapproved. And gave fates of them that were neither cornily predictable nor deliberately surprising. Allowing life to happen to them as it happens to all of us. I had the complete leisure to observe them carefully, and gladly go along for the "drive."
The Plot
The American West was not clean nor forgiving. And that's exactly what this book depicts. It does not pull any punches when it comes to setting the perfect mood for what it was REALLY like during the settling times in the American West. A time when America was still half-wild and anyone with the ambition could throw together a herd and go out into the world to make history. There are cowboys, bandits, whores, fur trappers, buffalo hunters, Native Americans, and much much more. It has everything that anyone could ever want in a story. There's intense western action, real moments, and heart breaking love stories. It also did a good job touching on some sensitive topics while keeping it real and not so uncomfortable. Such as women's traditional roles in the old West and Native American treatment. Those things happened. And I think that often times they can get misconstrued in ways that make it wrong in a sense and just down-right uncomfortable to read. Which I didn't find in this book.
Critique
My only criticism of the book is the way in which it plays slightly too much into classic Western stereotypes, particularly in its portrayal of nearly every Native American character as some brutal savage. Except for one character's brief mention of "well, they didn't invite us on this land," the issues surrounding white settlers effectively stealing the land of another people is not addressed. It's something to try to constantly keep in mind for sure, but not something to keep you from reading this fantastic book.