| Title | : | Streets of Laredo (Lonesome Dove, #2) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0684857537 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780684857534 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 547 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1993 |
Captain Woodrow Call, August McCrae's old partner, is now a bounty hunter hired to track down a brutal young Mexican bandit. Riding with Call are an Eastern city slicker, a witless deputy, and one of the last members of the Hat Creek outfit, Pea Eye Parker. This long chase leads them across the last wild stretches of the West into a hellhole known as Crow Town and, finally, into the vast, relentless plains of the Texas frontier.
Streets of Laredo (Lonesome Dove, #2) Reviews
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“On the ride back across the gray plains, the young cowboy – he was just twenty – looked rather despondent. [Charles] Goodnight ignored his despondence for a while, then got tired of it. What did a healthy sprout of twenty have to be despondent about?
‘What’s made you look so peaked, J.D.?’ Goodnight inquired.
‘Why, it’s Captain Call, I guess,’ the young cowboy said. He was glad to talk about it, to get his feelings out.
‘What about Captain Call?’ Goodnight asked.
‘Why, wasn’t he a great Ranger?’ the boy asked. ‘I’ve always heard he was the greatest Ranger of all.’
‘Yes, he had exceptional determination,’ Goodnight told him…”
- Larry McMurtry, Streets of Laredo
How do you follow up Lonesome Dove, one of the greatest novels ever written?
You don’t.
At least, you should not try.
Streets of Laredo, Larry McMurtry’s sequel to his Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, is not a bad book. It is, in fact, a great book. I will argue, in a moment, that it is better than Lonesome Dove in many ways, though I will always love the tale of Gus and Call’s last cattle drive more, and cherish it among the best of the best novels I've ever read.
But in a very real sense, Streets of Laredo did not need to be a follow-up. It would have worked just as well as a stand-alone with new characters. I can appreciate the many, many (many, many, many) joys of Streets of Laredo while still bemoaning the rather dismissive way that McMurtry treats his finest creation.
***
The toughest part of Streets of Laredo is overcoming the brutally abrupt way in which McMurtry dispenses with Lonesome Dove. The first time I read this, many years ago, I never recovered from my shock at the direction McMurtry takes. Within the first thirty pages, the legendary Hat Creek Cattle Company is summarily dismissed as an entity. It is as though McMurtry did not want to bother with them.
Without providing too many details, the most striking instance of this faithlessness is McMurty’s handling of Newt Dobbs. Readers of Lonesome Dove will recall that the mystery of Newt’s parentage, with Call the presumptive father, played a huge role in the formation of the characters of both Call and Newt.
Here, that entire storyline is dispensed with in a couple unsparing sentences. More than that, there are no repercussions whatsoever. In Lonesome Dove, the men of the Hat Creek Cattle Company were dogged by the past. That was a major part of that novel’s melancholy beauty. In Streets of Laredo, Call can’t be bothered to spare a thought for the boy who might be his son. This is especially striking given an extended sequence of self-flagellation, with Call musing on his mistakes, without ever mentioning young Newt. There are times in Streets of Laredo wherein it feels like McMurtry forgot the contents of the previous 900 pages he'd written about Call.
I am still not entirely ready to forgive McMurtry for sullying my memory of Lonesome Dove. Having finished this a second time, though, I am a bit more able to focus on its virtues, rather than dwelling obsessively on its shortcomings.
***
When Streets of Laredo opens, we learn that the former Texas Ranger Woodrow F. Call has become a bounty hunter. He has been hired by a railroad man named Colonel Terry to hunt down a vicious young Mexican bandit named Joey Garza. Eventually, Call gathers a low-IQ posse that includes Eastern dandy Ned Brookshire, hapless Deputy Ted Plunkert, and former Hat Creek cowboy Pea Eye Parker who, we learn, is improbably married to Lorena Woods.
(It took me a long, long time to accept this pairing. Certainly, during my first read-through, it did not make sense that the Lorena from Lonesome Dove would end up with droopy old Pea, a capable cowhand but a man who must have been dropped on the head repeatedly as a child).
McMurtry utilizes an omniscient third person viewpoint, constantly shifting perspectives among his characters. As is his style, there are a lot of players, scattered all over Texas and Mexico. The decision to give Pea Eye (uncharismatic, slow-witted, the anti-Gus McCrae) such a starring role is questionable. However, McMurtry is generous with his supporting actors and actresses. There is Brookshire, “the salaried man,” an accountant from New York who feels like the wind is going to blow him away; Famous Shoes, a mythical tracker who can walk as fast as a man can ride a horse, and who brings a touch of magical realism to the proceedings; and Billy Williams, a once-respectable scout who has gotten old and blind and who falls asleep while pooping – thereby losing his horse – in his introductory scene.
Unlike Lonesome Dove, Streets of Laredo features a number of real-life figures, and McMurtry absolutely nails their characterizations. A brusquely humane Charlie Goodnight serves as a Greek chorus, while there are memorable cameos from self-appointed Judge Roy Bean (heavily fictionalized) to a sly, oddly-sociable John Wesley Hardin.
Perhaps surprisingly, Streets of Laredo is really about the women. Much of the novel follows Maria Garza (Joey’s mother) and Lorena Parker (Pea Eye’s wife) as they try to undo the messes made by the men in their lives. To a large extent, the story runs through them. More than that, McMurtry’s excavation of toxic masculinity – the leers, the entitlement, the sexual aggression – feels very of-the-moment.
***
McMurtry is a natural storyteller. In that sense, there is no drop off in quality between Lonesome Dove and Streets of Laredo. He still employs his wide-angle lens, following a disparate and often disconnected group of characters. He is still spinning yarns within yarns, giving us backstories of even minor figures. He is never really worried about plot, and for much of the novel, the various storylines run parallel to each other. He relies heavily on coincidental meetings, and his west is never so large that one person cannot immediately find another.
Despite the failures I noted above, Streets of Laredo does provide some fan service. Characters from Lonesome Dove show up in unexpected places. Even better, we are given Round 2 in Woodrow Call’s never-ending struggle against “rude behavior.”The minute he struck the blow, the Captain seemed to change. He didn't stop with one blow, although Doniphan was knocked flat, and his pistol went skittering across the floor of the jail. Call continued to hit the sheriff with the rifle. Once, when the sheriff turned to try and escape, the Captain knocked him in the ear with his boot, so hard that Brookshire would not have been surprised if Doniphan’s head had flown off.
At times, Streets of Laredo suffers from a bit of overkill. McMurtry spends a lot of time creating the chilly, randomly-homicidal persona of Joey Garza. In scene after meticulous scene, he becomes a super predator, one that is more than a match for Call. (Indeed, Garza is so supernaturally good, that McMurtry eventually has to inject some really bad decisions into his bad-guy in order to make the fight fair).
For whatever reason, though, McMurtry apparently did not feel like Garza was enough. So, like any good comic book movie, he adds another super-villain. This second killer is Mox Mox:Mox Mox killed short people because they reminded him of himself…He killed tall people because he envied them. He could be a killer, but he could never be tall. He could never be blond, because he had red hair; and he could never look you straight in the eye, because one of his eyes was pointed wrong. It looked out of his head at an angle. Mox Mox hated being short, regretted the smallpox that scarred his face, and was sorry that he was not blond, but the thing he hated most about himself was his crooked-looking eye. His greatest, most elaborate cruelties were reserved for people with well-set, bright blue eyes. When Mox Mox caught such a person, male or female, he tended to do the worst things to the eyes. If the person with the perfect blue eyes was tall and blond, then so much the worse for him or her.
Mox Mox once rode with Blue Duck, and was with his gang when Lorena was captured in Lonesome Dove. I understand the impulse on McMurtry’s part, to give Lorena some added motivation in her actions. The problem, of course, is that Mox Mox never appeared in Lonesome Dove. Retrofitting a character is always extremely awkward, and that is the case here.
***
Up to this point, I have been back and forth on Streets of Laredo. This is the point wherein I make my pitch for its greatness.
Fantasy and sci-fi readers will often talk about how an author creates a “system,” the ways in which a particular fictional world operates.
Though set in an entirely different milieu, McMurtry does something very similar. He develops an overarching cosmic order that is utterly cold and terrifying. There is no god in the heavens, no fate or destiny. Instead, everything in the world of Streets of Laredo is ruled by blind chance. No matter how good you are, no matter how careful, no matter how well you train or prepare, luck is the only arbiter.
More than Lonesome Dove, more than most novels, in fact, Streets of Laredo has a powerful thematic consistency. Most of the characters we meet are dealing with the fact that all of them, at some point, will slip. Sometimes it is a wild horse that bucks a rider; sometimes it is a river that washes you away; sometimes it is a bullet, fired on a blind trajectory; sometimes it is illness; and if one escapes all these, there is age, relentless age, which has never lost a match.“Woodrow Call had his time,” [Goodnight] said, finally. “It was a long time, too. Life’s but a knife edge, anyway. Sooner or later people slip and get cut.”
Streets of Laredo is dark, a far darker novel than its predecessor. At times, it put me in mind of a more readably entertaining version of Blood Meridian. Hewing to his system, McMurtry cavalierly kills off a number of beloved characters, as though even he, the author, lacks the power to save them.
Yet, this is also a compassionate book, a work of deep humanism. For all the murderers and man-burners and thieves and rapists, there are also people willing to lend a hand. Streets of Laredo is balanced between hope and despair, between sentimentality and dispassion. It is set in an uncaring universe populated by dangerous men. But ultimately, it puts all its faith in people, in their relationships, and in love. -
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Big step down from "Lonesome Dove", but still a fun old western story in it's own right. Full review coming soon. -
Streets of Laredo (Lonesome Dove #4), Larry McMurtry
The book opens with former Ranger Captain Woodrow F. Call (now a bounty hunter) and Ned Brookshire, the "salaried man" of the title. Brookshire has been sent to Texas from New York City by his boss, railroad tycoon Colonel Terry, to contract Call's services in apprehending a bandit.
The bandit in question is a young Mexican named Joey Garza, who has cost Terry significant business and money through his deadly train robberies. Brookshire is surprised that the old man he encounters has such a reputation, though he notes that Call does have a rather dangerous and respect-demanding aura about him.
Brookshire himself does not strike a particularly imposing figure, and soon proves not to be cut out for train or horse travel, inexperienced in the ways of the west or violence, and very homesick for his bossy but loving wife, Katie. Call, on the other hand, is the very picture of experience. Though he is old and seems almost to have trouble lifting his foot into the stirrups, his reputation speaks for him. He has spent forty years on the border and the frontier, many of those with his more talkative but equally respected late partner, Gus McCrae.
Protecting settlers in innumerable skirmishes with hostile Indians, rustlers, and dangerous gangs has earned him a great deal of respect and a reputation that generally strikes fear into the hearts of criminals.
تاریخ نخستین خوانش روز نهم ماه دسامبر سال2019میلادی
عنوان: خیابانهای لاردو کتاب چهارم از سری کبوتر تنها؛ نویسنده: لاری مک مرتری؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده20م
نویسنده ی کتاب «لری مکمرتری (زادروز سوم ماه ژوئن سال1936میلادی - درگذشت روز بیست و پنجم ماه مارس سال2021میلادی)»، رماننویس «ایالات متحده آمریکا»، دههها در بازآفرینی اسطوره ی «غرب وحشی» کوشیده اند؛ ایشان در «آرچر سیتی»، در ایالت «تگزاس»، به دنیا آمدند، و نوجوانی خود را در یک مزرعه دامداری بگذراندند؛ «مکمرتری» از آن زیست بوم برای آفرینش بستر داستانهای خویش بهره ی بسیار بردند؛ کتاب «کبوتر تنها» جایگاه ویژه ای در میان دیگر آثار این نویسنده دارد؛ داستان سفر «غرب» دو نظامی پیشین اهل «تگزاس» را بازگو میکند، که به دامداری روی آورده اند؛ نشر کتاب «کبوتر تنها» با پیشواز بسیاری از خوانشگران همراه شد، و جایزه ی نامدار «پولیتزر» را در سال1986میلادی، به نویسنده اش هدیه کرد؛ و سریالی تلویزیونی نیز بر اساس آن کتاب ساخته شد؛ «مکمرتری» خود نیز به شخصیتهای همین رمان علاقه بسیاری داشتند، برای همین این شخصیتها در چهار کتاب دیگر ایشان نیز بار دیگر نمودار شدند
آغاز داستان با رنجر پیشین «کاپیتان وودرو اف کال (اکنون یک شکارچی جایزه)» و «ند بروکشایر (مرد حقوق بگیر)» آغاز میشود، «بروکشایر» را رئیسش «سرهنگ تری، سرمایه دار راه آهن»، از شهر «نیویورک» به «تگزاس» فرستاده، تا برای دستگیری یک راهزن قراردادی ببندد؛ راهزنی که جوانی مکزیکی، به نام «جوی گارزا» است، که از راه دزدیهای مرگبار، از قطارها روزگار خوی�� را میگذراند، و کارهای او برای «سرهنگ تری» هزینه های بسیاری را به همراه داشته است؛ و ..؛
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 18/09/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی -
In order of publication:
Lonesome Dove (1985) *****
Streets of Laredo (1993) ****
Dead Man's Walk (1995) ****
Comanche Moon (1997) ****
In order of internal chronology:
Dead Man's Walk – set in the early 1840s
Comanche Moon – set in the 1850–60s
Lonesome Dove – set in mid-to-late 1870s
Streets of Laredo – set in the early 1890s -
I LOVED it! Possibly even more than
Lonesome Dove. This one picks up 15 years after the events of Lonesome Dove, and you definitely NEED to read Lonesome Dove before reading this one. I was a bit devastated in the beginning of this book when I realized we were only going to follow certain characters from Lonesome Dove in this one, but I did end up loving it.
Let me just say, Larry McMurtry does not care about coddling his characters. He treats them just like the Wild West would. Don't think anyone in this book is safe, ever. But that was also really refreshing because it made me *genuinely* worried for the characters, wanting the best for them but knowing ultimately, nature and evil people do often come out on top. How our main characters handle and stay true to themselves though is the ultimate story he's telling.
Oddly enough this reminded me a lot of George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series. The way he weaves together characters with different motivations, moving them across the landscape, sometimes making them run into each other, other times just missing one another, and revealing information to characters at the right moments—it felt a bit Game of Thrones-y! I liked that a lot.
I think this book has a much more clear and precise plot than Lonesome Dove. Whereas Lonesome Dove is a strong character driven novel, it's long and meanders. It's more about the journey, not the destination. This book is also a journey but has a strong plot and it's SO gripping to watch the events unfold. But in true McMurtry fashion, he does not neglect character development for plot. He masters both, while giving us stunning descriptions of the West along the way! -
This is on my short list of books that I have read more than once. In fact I think I've read it 2 1/2 times. A few years ago I picked it up one day, opened it somewhere in the middle (maybe I was looking for a particular passage), started reading, and couldn't put it down for a couple of days until I finished it (for the third time). That's how much the book drew me into the story that McMurtry tells, and the magnificent way he tells it. I think he's a fabulous writer, the greatest I've read for evoking a feeling (maybe a little romanticized) for the Old West.
I'd guess I'm quite likely to read this book again some day. -
I read it a while ago but it wasn't listed as READ so I am adding it now. (2019)
LOVE< LOVE< LOVE!! McMurtry is my favorite TOP 5 authors. Great story. Great Western. I didn't know I was a western fan until I got a hold of these stories now I can't go back and un-be one. -
As much as I enjoyed Lonesome Dove, that's how much I disliked Streets of Laredo. Larry McMurtry spent much of the earlier book demolishing the squeaky-clean John Wayne image of the Old West by showing it as realm of rape, sexual slavery, meaningless violence and random death, but he also showed the grandeur and beauty that drew men like Augustus McCrae. Gus is sorely missed in this novel, in which McMurtry seems perversely committed to focusing on the least interesting characters and reworking themes in the least interesting ways. The novel opens with Newt already dead and still unacknowledged by his father, the taciturn and emotionally stunted Woodrow Call, and the Montana cattle venture has collapsed. So, scratch two potentially fascinating plotlines for a tedious round of bandit-chasing. I never believed for a moment that railway men would hire an obviously way-past-his-prime Woodrow Call to hunt down the ruthless Joey Garza, just as I never bought the idea that Lorena would marry Pea Eye Parker, apparently for no other reason than have a reliable man on call. McMurtry does come up with an authentically terrifying villain in Mox Mox, a former associate of Blue Duck with a penchant for torturing his captives (especially children) before setting them afire. But for much of its excessive length, Streets of Laredo reads like less of a sequel than a kiss-off -- a backhanded rejoinder to anyone who loved Lonesome Dove.
-
This novel is the final story of the "Lonesome Dove" saga and tells what became of the characters at the end of the trail drive. McMurtry creates some unlikely heroes and some very bad hombres and some events were hard to stomach. But I always imagined that evil like in this book can exist and life on the frontier could have been just as described. It was a place where dreams were chased, life was cheap and people could do anything they wanted without having to answer for it.
No one tells a story like McMurtry. -
Lungo tutta la durata della lettura non ho fatto che ripetermi: "che peccato, che delusione". Sin dall'inizio si è rivelato pacchianotto e pedante, sarebbe servito un mezzo miracolo affinché potesse riprendersi. Ho tirato fino in fondo sperando in quel miracolo, e invece niente.
Una trama raffazzonata e sconclusionata che vuol parlare di rimorsi e fallimenti ma non arriva nemmeno a scalfire la superficie dei temi che dovrebbe trattare. Non è per niente all'altezza di Lonesome Dove, non lo è nella forma come non lo è nel contenuto.
Il meccanismo dei continui inseguimenti e ripensamenti su cui si basa questa trama, all'inizio può lasciar sperare che ci sia un "qualcosa" che sta per spiccare il volo, ma ben presto finisce per dimostrarsi un moto perpetuo grottesco e farsesco. Ancor più farseschi sono i ripensamenti dei "cattivi", utili più che altro a far sì che non si compia una strage definitiva la quale avrebbe posto fine al libro anzitempo, ma plausibili quanto un'arrampicata sugli specchi.
C'è una sovrabbondante farcitura composta di nuovi personaggi, tutti con le loro micro-storie e micro-paturnie, ma alla fin fine sono solo macchiette con tanta quantità e poca qualità, non rimpiazzano affatto i vecchi personaggi venuti a mancare già durante la trama di Lonesome Dove o quelli fatti sparire in modo frettoloso nello spazio tra un libro e l'altro.
A dire il vero, anche i vecchi personaggi che vengono qui riproposti, non sono più gli stessi: secondo gli intenti dell'autore dovrebbero essere sempre loro ma alle prese con la vecchiaia, o in ogni caso alle prese con venti primavere in più sulle spalle. Ma il risultato mostra il contrario: non sono le stesse persone semplicemente invecchiate, sono le caricature di quelli che erano stati proposti nel libro precedente.
Particolarmente pacchiana e infelice la scelta di porre in essere una sorta di "revisione" riguardo lo svolgimento dei fatti inerenti al rapimento di Lorena in Lonesome Dove. Per come viene descritto l'episodio nella versione originale, nulla da eccepire: crudo, violento, ma mai inutilmente splatter e mai in cerca di una dose extra di compassione. Invece qui mi tocca sentire Lorena che rievoca i fatti accaduti circa vent'anni prima aggiungendovi dettagli e personaggi che non erano mai stati menzionati prima: una aggiunta palesemente posticcia e palesemente finalizzata alla costruzione di un sequel che potesse in qualche modo aggrapparsi a quello che è l'evento emotivamente più drammatico nel romanzo precedente, dunque una evidente ricerca della dose extra di commozione. Ma il risultato fa lo stesso effetto di un gatto che cercasse di arrampicarsi sullo specchio di cui sopra.
Stavolta la smania del seguito non è stata premiante, avrei fatto meglio ad accontentarmi di un libro solo e molto bello, piuttosto che rovinarmelo così miseramente con un seguito in salsa di casa nella prateria. -
«Texas, ultimo scampolo dell’Ottocento. Il mondo è cambiato, ma la storia continua. Niente più mandrie di bestiame che percorrono praterie immense, ma treni che tagliano l’orizzonte.»
A voler scomodare Dumas e il suo Ciclo dei Moschettieri, anche McMurtry riprende i suoi moschettieri di Lonesome Dove – o almeno, quelli che ne sono usciti vivi … - e ce li racconta vent’anni dopo, con qualche acciacco in più e alle prese con un mondo che è cambiato senza che loro siano forse riusciti a stargli dietro del tutto. Non tutti almeno. Qualcuno si è sposato, qualcuno ha cambiato vita, qualcuno ha aperto un negozio di ferramenta, qualcuno ... è vivo per fortuna qualcuno è morto, c'è una vedova da andare a visitar …
Il Capitano Woodrow Call, il più famoso Texas Ranger di tutti i tempi, dopo la spedizione nel Montana, è di nuovo in Texas. Ci sarà da dare la caccia a vecchi brucia-cristiani e giovani, spietati banditi. Call troverà il tempo per andare a trovare il Giudice Roy Bean, The Law West of the Pecos, e il suo vecchio amico Charles Goodnight, ricco allevatore di bestiame.
«- Voi pp-piangete mai, signore? – chiese il baldo Georgie.
- Raramente, figliolo, molto raramente, - rispose Goodnight.
- Pp-per il fatto che avete la bb-barba? – chiese Georgie. Il vecchio gli era simpatico, anche se non parlava tanto.
- Sì, immagino sia per quello, - disse Goodnight.»
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQqB0Y...
Un modo duro, estremo, brutale, in continuo cambiamento, dove però determinazione, solidarietà, amicizia, amore, rispetto, dignità, si confermano, a dispetto di tutto, valori incorruttibili.
«Quando cantò Amazing Grace, la sua voce s’innalzò su quella delle altre, le cinque puttane e le donne di chiesa. Era limpida come l’aria.»
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogxLNl...
Terrific! A causa forse del mio personalissimo universo, fatto di sogni ad occhi aperti e roventi Colt 45, mi ha avvinto e procurato emozioni. Non saprei chiedere di più. -
4/10
As much as it pains me to give this McMurtry novel such a low rating, I couldn't in good conscience walk away from this gunfight without putting some sort of warning on the ranch gate. In fact, I'm wondering if I'm not being generous in assigning this to a 4/10. If this had been my first McMurtry novel, I can assure the world it would have been my last. As it is, I still can't reconcile the McMurtry of Lonesome Dove with the guy who wrote Streets of Laredo.
Excess is the operative word, as in violent excess: gun violence, knife violence, emotional violence, sexual violence -- the kind of violence that Tarantino would be proud of. But, truth be told, I haven't seen a Tarantino movie yet that so degrades women. Never have I seen a Tarantino movie that degrades the value of life itself to such a level.
Sexual predators are more plentiful than maggots on a 3-day coyote kill. In whatever direction a woman moves, there's a maggot there wanting to take her to her knees, or on her knees, or both.
The violence against children is utterly repugnant, especially in that it appears as a gratuitous flinging into the flames.
The violence against animals is revolting.
No one is safe from the violence: even those characters who appear as cameos are brutalized in some way.
I'm not a cringing damsel, with a hankie soaked in lavender-water held to my temple: I know the brutality of life; and I completely buy into the brutality that was the Old West. But ... this!
The arc of the story itself was a red, hot bloody mess. Literally, on the "bloody". McMurtry dropped valuable storylines with a dismissive wave of his .45 and decided to people his work with decided murderous psychopaths, sociopaths, malignant narcissists ... hey ... just let me quote the DSM-5 for a shorter list.
The characters who gave breath and backbone to Lonesome Dove herein appear as cartoon characters who are paper doll housewives and cardboard ex-rangers. While this novel was purportedly a sequel to LD, thus implying a continuation of it, it was let loose on the plains to ride like one of Stephen Leacock's characters who ... flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse and rode madly off in all directions.
What saves it from being tossed into the flames of the campfire is that there is just enough of the Lonesome Dove essence to ransom it: Call redeems himself -- as I ever knew he would. It seems that might have been the point of Streets of Laredo all along: for Call to have a final stab at redemption, ham-fisted though the result was.
And that's all folks.
Oh, Larry, Larry, Larry ... Sigh -
This is the sequel to Lonesome Dove and it's almost as good. The only thing that really didn't work for me was that he didn't seem to have a firm fix on what was motivating Joey Garza.
I found myself taking a meandering, slow journey through this book instead of rushing to finish it. His writing is very good and his characters are absolutely brilliant, with the aforementioned exception. In particular, McMurtry knows how to write women. You see so much these days about people wanting strong female characters, well I say that I want more than strong, I want a world full of Lorenas, Marias, and Teresas. They are truly extraordinary. -
I wanted to love this. Lonesome Dove is one of my all time favorite books. But this left me almost wishing I didn't read it. It is all sadness and violence and none even a hint of humor as was in the first. I still enjoyed it, but rushed through it so I could be done.
-
You see, it’s as clear as day. Why, I’m a cowgirl. I love his stories.
Gus. STOP. In Rhode Island. STOP. Please can you come home. -
I loved this book. Unlike most sequels, this book does not pick up where the last one left off. It is fully able to stand on it's own which I find to be an amazing feat. I loved Lonesome Dove, but felt that the novel was complete and was ready to start a new adventure. Would I have liked to see a further continuation of Newt, Dish and even Clara? Sure, but I was so quickly wrapped up in the new characters and new setting that I was more than willing to go on the hunt for Joey Garza, Mox Mox and a myriad of new characters that only Larry McMurtry could have given voice to, in a land where the cowboy is nearing extinction. Well done.
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Streets of Laredo, the sequel to Lonesome Dove is a good book. If I had read this before Lonesome Dove, I’d have loved it, start to finish. However… (there’s the ‘but’) there were parts leading up to the end (avoiding spoilers) that I just didn’t want. And “I just didn’t want” should be read as a sentence from a petulant child (sparing everyone the fit). Lonesome Dove was of course better.
Streets of Laredo left me feeling sad, melancholy for Lonesome Dove. I felt the mention of characters was a basic wrap up, because McMurty had to mention (obligation ?) where those characters were. A few paragraphs of their landing was it. Yeah, yeah, this book wasn’t their continuation but I still felt a little left off. It was an abrupt conclusion for some characters. -
Although this one in the series is not as good as Lonesome Dove, I was still pleasantly surprised by just how good it turned out to be. Obviously Gus Mcrae is absent from this segment, but Captain Woodrow Call still stands out as a great character to build a story around. And as Call sets out to hunt down a murdering bandit, his old partner, Pea Eye joins him and stands out as a great player in Gus's absence.
As with the first novel, there were some huge surprises in this one, many that were introduced right from the get-go, but as new characters were developed and a new plot unfolded, all the surprises worked perfectly for the story as a whole.
One addition that Larry McMurtry used was bringing the real life outlaw, John Wesley Harden, into the tale. The old outlaw didn't really affect to outcome in any way but his presence did bring some nitty-gritty spice to the tale.
I am so glad that I found, not only Lonesome Dove, but this book as well. As a series they stand out as one of the best westerns I have read. Absolutely epic. -
I have to be the only dumbass out there who’s read all of the Lonesome Dove books except for Lonesome Dove. I just can’t make myself do it after I’ve seen the wonderful miniseries probably eight hundred times, especially 'cause that looks like a real brick-sized motherfucker. So I really can’t say whether or not this sequel stacks up to the original work. Thankfully at least a trillion people have posted reviews of this book on this site and Amazon, etc. so you can always just check those out. I can definitely say that this one was probably my favorite of the series, and came super-close to hitting the coveted five-star mark with me. I love McMurtry’s super-understated style and the characters and story were consistently great.
I always try to avoid any kind of spoiler action in my reviews but it’s kind of hard to when you’re talking about this book so for those who haven’t read/seen Lonesome Dove should probably just X out at this point. Fair warning given, this is a unique entry in the series in that the famous partnership of McCrae and Call is no longer and Call is on his own in this book, with the exception of reliable old Pea Eye. The vast majority of the book deals with Call tracking down not one but two sociopathic killers: the proto-sniper Joey Garza and the genuinely fucking scary “manburner” Mox Mox. The other main characters besides Call and Pea Eye include Lorena (returning from Lonesome Dove,) Joey’s long-suffering mother Maria, Call’s traveling partner and total dude Brookshire, expert Kickapoo tracker Famous Shoes, and a couple of real-life characters in the form of Charles Goodnight and famed killer John Wesley Hardin. All are drawn expertly and with often disappointingly human facets.
So this is a little bit of a deconstruction of the typical romantic western (maybe not as much as a soul-killer like Blood Meridian, but still) in that major western themes like frontier heroism and justice, the beauty of the still-untamed landscape, and the comfort of a simpler time are all pretty much gone here. One could certainly consider Call a hero but dude pretty much does what he does because that’s the only thing he’s really good at and doesn’t have much else to do as an old man. Life is unceasingly painful and violent and there seems to be no sense of karmic balance whatsoever; you’re as apt to die a brutal death as a gunslinger as you are just some poor bastard on a farmstead somewhere. When I mean unceasingly painful and violent I mean it, there is some of the most gruesome and senseless murder done in this book as any other I’ve read.
I really applaud McMurtry for gritting his teeth and ending the series on a pretty big downer. Instead of the charming rustic isolation of Lonesome Dove we get the horrid nightmare that is Crow Town. Literally no one escapes in full from the whirlwind of violence the three killers that inhabit the book whip up throughout Texas and Mexico. I’m probably harping on the amount of darkness and violence this book contains and make no mistake, there is a lot of it, but I can’t leave out the doses of humor and true love and dedication that some of the characters bring to the table. Call is gruffly likable as always and everyone loves Pea Eye. It’s probably arguable but I’d say the book does end on a happy note with some real change and redemption possible for Call’s character. I definitely felt some manly eye-burn upon closing the book. It’s a harrowing experience, but not one without a real heart at its center. -
You wouldn't think it, but chasing bandits is not as exciting as driving cattle, but if you are a fan of Lonesome Dove you'll want to read the sequel and find out what became of the Hat Creek boys, and of course, Lorie and Clara. You'll learn the fates of Pea Eye, Captain Call, Newt (who I believe to be the lonesome dove) as well as becoming acquainted with a slew of new and interesting characters, two of which are positively evil. This book definitely misses Gus though, and some of the warmest parts are Woodrow's remembrances of his dear friend. There is also a lot of talk about railroads, businessmen, and the lack of Indians which gives this novel a fitting sad and 'I wish it was still the Wild West' sort of tone. However, this novel kicks its heels up at the end and has you racing for the last page, breathless.
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4 1/2
I've downgraded my rating from my first review for a reason that I'll explain below. I plan on adding more words, and maybe pictures, to the review soon.
But before I leave for now, a few words on why I reread the book for maybe the third and a halfth (??) time.
My wife and I flew away to West Texas (El Paso) on Nov. 6, and flew home on the 16th. In between we spent a couple days in El Paso, the rest of the time on a Road Scholar hiking trip to the Davis Mountains and Big Bend National Park. Setting a personal record, I took only one book with me on the trip. This one.
Selected because I knew that it was set in Texas. Little did I know, or remember, how much of the story takes place in areas that were in the Big Bend area of Texas. I loved reading it close to these locations. -
Venti anni dopo le avventure di "Lonesome Dove", ritroviamo qui tanti dei personaggi amati nel primo libro che non combattono più contro i Nativi per spostare immense mandrie di bovini, ma contro i banditi che dirottato e derubano i treni merci della neonata ferrovia.
C'è il capitano Woodrow Call nuovamente a capo di una spedizione, c'è Pea Eye sposato alla bellissima ex prostituta Lorena, ora maestra e proprietaria con il marito di una fattoria. C'è Bolivar, il vecchio cuoco di Lonesome Dove.
Ma c'è anche il malvagio e sanguinario Joey Garza, cleptomane assaltatore di treni cresciuto da violenti Pellerossa; sua madre Maria, personaggio vero e meraviglioso; Brookshire, ragioniere di New York che allo scopo di tenere la contabilità segue Call nell'impresa; Mox Mox, un indiano che uccide chiunque lo ostacoli bruciandolo.
Un romanzo pieno di colpi di scena, avvincente e adrenalinico, pieno di violenza, crudo e selvaggio, ma senza dimenticare mai quelle quote di fedeltà, amore, lealtà, amicizia e cura che rendono anche la vita più misera e disperata degna di essere vissuta. -
Boy oh boy, thassa lot of dead people!
McMurtry could really write, and if his purpose, or part of it, was to strip the romance from cowboy stories and replace it with some stark realism, then he achieved it in spades. For awhile there, I wondered if any of his main characters were going to survive this novel. It's a rough read in that regard, and so I assigned it to be the bathroom book, where I would only read a little at a time, up till the end, at least, when I had to carry it out of there to find out how things turned out.
Brilliantly written. -
If you are interested in this review, the question foremost in your mind is whether or not this is as good as
Lonesome Dove. The answer is: very nearly. -
Remember how in Harry Potter, every time one of the horcruxes was destroyed Voldemort lost some of his power?
How about in Game of Thrones, each time Beric Dondarrion was brought back from the dead he said that he lost a piece of himself, and felt a little bit less?
Or, do you remember watching Jeffrey Jordan play basketball?
I know I shouldn’t compare this book to Lonesome Dove but I can’t help it.
Lonesome Dove is one of my all time favorite novels. It’s a frozen winter morning on a barren stretch of land in North Dakota, bleak but beautiful. I’ve never been to North Dakota. Is that what it’s like?
Streets of Laredo is just...bleak. It’s a pale shadow of Lonesome Dove.
Whereas the predecessor was dark but humorous, hopeful yet brutal at times, Laredo is just depressing. Oh, so every girl basically exists to get raped? Great. We get to watch Captain Call escape from his bed in the old person’s home, wander around the forest behind the building in his nightgown with no pants on, and step in a bear trap? Awesome.
Am I being melodramatic? Absolutely. Is it deserved? Yep. Is this way too many rhetorical questions for one review? No comment.
Streets of Laredo isn’t bad. The antagonist Joey is cold as a polar bear’s toenail; a truly chilling villain. McMurtry’s female characters are sturdily built. But I found quite a bit of the writing to be redundant and felt it could have been one or two hundred pages shorter. I also didn’t experience any comedy in the banter, and the plot lacked a sense of grandeur.
The best thing I’ll say about Streets of Laredo is that it reminds me how brilliant Lonesome Dove is, and reminds me I should read it again, soon.
Story-6, Language-8, Ideas-7, Characters-7, Enjoyment-7, Overall-7 -
A novel about friendship, about loyalty to oneself, about friendships and ideals. A little about love, about hardships and rewards, about suffering and happiness. Maybe at first the narrative seems unhurried, but then it is the unhurriedness that attracts me so much to the series. Each character is so special and real, with their own unique personality, perfectly written out. You can't help but completely immerse into the story and wander along the characters through the desert.
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This is an excellent follow up to Lonesome Dove; however, this novel is completely different in scope, style, plot - pretty much everything.
This novel was brilliant and, in some ways, superior to the original - something I did not think possible. This novel chronicles Captain Call's last job as a ranger approximately fifteen years after the end of Lonesome Dove. He is much older here and at what the characters believe is the end of his career, the end of his greatness, the end of his days as a ranger and a killer and therefore the end of his identity. His legend as a Texas Ranger precedes him everywhere he goes in his mission to stop the unrelenting, remorseless bandit, Joey Garza. Unlike Lonesome Dove, which focuses solely on the white experiences of the west, Streets of Laredo examines all perspectives: Mexican, Native American, men, women, children - it's all here. I felt unable to judge the characters because I was able to understand them so well, even the villains. McMurtry employs Freudian psychology to illustrate Joey's motives and provides a thorough history of all the characters.
This novel raises so many questions about aging, life and death, murder, reputation, race and racism, feminism, and many other concepts. There are also many thoughtful passages about the passing of not only "the west" as a mythic, unexplored landscape, but also simply the loss of familiarity that is inherent to aging. I found this passage particularly moving:But Ben Lily was one of the old ones of the West. Ben Lily and Goodnight and Roy Bean and a few others. None of them were particularly likable, although Charles Goodnight had become friendlier than Call had ever expected him to be. But all of them, and those like them who had fallen - Gus McCrae and old Kit Carson, the Bent Brothers, Shanghai Pierce and Captain Marcy - had been part of the adventure. Gus McCrae had declared the adventure over before the Hat Creek outfit had ever crossed the Yellowstone. A few days after he said it, he had gone off adventuring and been killed. Gus had been both right and wrong. The exploring part of the adventure had ended, but not the settling part, and settling, in the time of the Comanche and the Cheyenne and the Apache, had plenty of adventure in it.
Now, the settling had happened. Ben Lily and Goodnight and Roy Bean and, he supposed, himself - for he, too, had become one of the old ones of the West - were just echoes of what had been. When Lily fell, and Goodnight, and Bean and himself, there wouldn't even be echoes, just memories.
This feeling of becoming part of the old generation and losing one's relevance is so central to this novel, even more so here than in the original, and this passage just nails one of the main points of the story. I came to feel so much pity for Call, particularly in his brave acceptance of losing his leg and arm and, in a way, his identity. I was also very moved by his attachment to Tessie, who was a wonderful character. While it would have been nice to read about Call becoming a father to Newt, this outcome makes more sense and falls more in line with Call's character: he is unable to accept any kind of paternity until he loses his identity as a killer for the government, allowing him to experience his humanity and thawing emotions he either denied or suppressed throughout his adulthood. I found this relationship very touching and felt my eyes tear up in a few places.
Call is not the only character to receive such intricate characterization, though. As I already stated, McMurtry examines every character's psychology and history. I enjoyed reading about Maria's life experiences and learning more about Lorena and Pea Eye. Joey's fixation on his mother was chilling to read about, as was the crimes committed against Maria by men of all races and class backgrounds, white, Mexican, Native American, rich, poor, etc. What this novel depicts so deftly is how there really are no "good guys" in this world; everyone with power exhibits some corruption, some evil, because of the nature of power itself. There is little distinction between the white men representing the US government and the Mexican killer, Joey. I found this especially compelling and very true.
In short, this novel was excellent and one that any self-respected Lonesome Dove fan should give a chance. -
I am so disappointed I can hardly stand myself. I love Lonesome Dove. Love, love, love. I can't believe this is what follows. I guess I should have reminded myself how much I love Gus and I should have known Call minus Gus does not equal as much love as just Call. The plot isn't bad. The characters aren't bad. The book isn't bad, in itself. But all the horrors, all the sad sadness just isn't balanced without the humor.
*****Spoiler alert*****
Also why oh why did McMurtry just abandon characters and plot between books? Why kill off Newt when we aren't watching, and shut down the ranch for no real reason before we could see what it's like, and why in heavens marry Lorena and Pea Eye without showing us how that happens? I was wishing the whole book through that I could have read that other book that disappeared before he got to this one. Sigh. I don't even know whether to read the other, now. That makes me sad. -
(Notes coming soon. Some big differences in context from Lonesome Dove but just as moving.)
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This book is the sequel to Lonesome Dove which I read that in December 2021.
Streets started for me similar to LD with a slow build up. We had to get to know some new characters and catch up with some from the first book. Parts 2 and 3 started to build the plot and we get to see such a great arc for one of the main characters in both books: Lorena. I don't want to say much about other characters as to not give away who came from book 1 to book 2, but just as in LD we get great characters going through difficulties we can't even imagine in our current time (or the time the book was written). The women in this book play a HUGE role in this sequel and while there were a couple scenes that involved sexual assault they were not too descriptive and can also be skipped over if necessary and you understand what happened so you can continue with the story after that. Those who love strong female characters will definitely get them here!
Highly recommend if you loved Lonesome Dove. I'll be reading the two prequels at some point.
