I have some mixed feelings about this book by Lonesome Dove author Larry McMurty. On the one hand, it’s a powerful coming of age story. Raw and real and blunt. Probably a little scandalous, too. How do you resist that?
On the other hand, I wasn’t a fan of the writing. Parts just didn’t read well. There was an underlying awkwardness that was perhaps intentional. Regardless, when a sentence isn’t grammatically correct (incomplete is fine by me, especially as an agent of effect), but when it reads like a conversation you hear at Walmart and it’s narration, not dialogue, I get an itchy feeling under my skin where I just can’t scratch and make it go away.
So . . . on the scales of literary justice, the love and hate evens out to about a 4. A quick read good for a laugh, a gasp, and a WTF? I love books that reveal that depravity isn’t a recently grown branch on the tree of humanity. 4 stars.
Shannon Hollinger 
Leave a Reply