We learn more from deconstructing Elmore Leonard’s writing than from his famous top ten rules. He plotted a novel where everyone is in prison, from the inmates to the guard including the warden. Substance abuse, greed, and desire hold them prisoner, yet the protagonist we discover from the start is the only one truly innocent. Recently, I have pondered what the term classic western means. Louis Lamour and Elmer Kelton are certainly classic western authors. Despite Elmore Leonard’s success in crime fiction, his best works are his classic westerns. Novels like Get Shorty and Maximum Bob have a surreal quality to them. Yet, his westerns have a gritty authenticity, which makes them timeless. He also does a great job drawing strong women and Native American characters.
It was supposed to be impossible. No man could break out of the brutal convict labor camp at Five Shadows. Until they locked up Bowen. He was like dynamite--charged to go off, to explode out of that desert hell so he could clear his name. Already the deadly trackers have caught him, dragged him back through the mesquite and rocks, beat him and left him to rot in the punishment cell. But they can't stop Bowen. He's a different breed, a man who will go to any extreme to escape. Any extreme.
Only through a novel can a long-dead writer convey to a Texas farm boy what it is like to be a great opera singer. As much as I celebrate popular fiction, on rare occasions beautifully constructed prose pulls me to an author like Willa Cather. Like many of her fans, My Ántonia won me over. Song of the Lark paints a portrait of the artist, and it is not always beautiful. Talent drives an artist to perfection. They derive no satisfaction from the merely good. They can be insensitive, exacting and rude because the artist suffers pain from witnessing anything less than greatness. For example, she cannot compliment those whose talent does not match her own because their failure is repugnant. The artist suffers the wrong notes as much as she appreciates the right notes. This quality makes the artist unique. Only during the brief window when she achieves the pinnacle of her prowess as an artist is highest is she content. Exceptional talent leads to a selfish life and in many ways is a curse. I am hesitant to recommend it because it is a slow read, yet if you want a break from the top ten on BookTok, then it's worth it.
In this powerful portrait of the self-making of an artist, Willa Cather created one of her most extraordinary heroines.
Thea Kronborg, a minister's daughter in a provincial Colorado town, seems destined from childhood for a place in the wider world. But as her path to the world stage leads her ever farther from the humble town she can't forget and from the man she can't afford to love, Thea learns that her exceptional musical talent and fierce ambition are not enough.
It is in the solitude of a tiny rock chamber high in the side of an Arizona cliff--"a cleft…
Exciting, fun, delightful are all words to describe, Don’t Let the Devil Ride. The setting provides the reader a window into Memphis culture. The author serves as a tour guide from glimpses of the Old South with its complicated and archaic inequities to the King and Graceland, followed by the modern privilege, excess, and success of the New South. Likewise, the characters are equally eclectic including a Russian mobster obsessed with cowboy movies, a woman clinging to fame by her fingernails as a onetime Elvis co-star, the ultimate in geriatric cool private eyes, and a half dozen other mysterious individuals. The plot revolves around an unknown treasure sought by fascinating people who do not know what they are searching to find. The more literary minded could read the novel as a satire, yet it works so well on the surface as a page turning mystery/thriller.
'Full of wily humour and epic bad behavior, this is an ebullient, rollicking ride you don't dare miss' Megan Abbott
Hell is empty... and Addison McKellar's husband is missing.
Addison McKellar isn't clueless - she knows she and her husband Dean don't have the perfect marriage - but she's still shocked when he completely vanishes from her life. At first Addison is annoyed, but as days stretch into a week and she's repeatedly stonewalled by Dean's friends and associates, her frustration turns into genuine alarm. When even the police seem dismissive of her…
E.J. Kane is a disgraced former Texas Ranger working his last chance job as head of security at an energy company. An oilfield death leads to discovering an ingenious theft ring involving a sovereign citizens' organization. Losing his son in Afghanistan began a spiral, destroying his marriage and exacerbating his daughter's drug addiction. Addiction pushes his daughter into the hands of human traffickers. E.J.'s ex-wife's skill as an attorney reveals the identity of a murderer trying to take over a giant energy conglomerate. When the killer offers a deal to save his daughter, can E.J. rescue her and bring the guilty to justice?
