Genres: Western, cattle drive, cowboy, pioneer, Indian, Native American
I can't believe that THAT'S the sentence it ends on. Well, Mr. Hiles, my junior year English teacher did always say, "if you're done, just end it." He hated conclusion paragraphs or summarized arguments at the end of essays. I guess Mr. Larry did too.
Years after retired Texas Rangers Captain Woodraw Call and Captain Augustus McCrae set up a shabby residence outside of the town Lonesome Dove, one last adventuring prospect rides into town as their old rangering buddy Jake Spoon. He brings tales of Montana being a cattleman's paradise, blue skies, plentiful grass, hardly any dust, no ranches set-up as the Army continues to clear out the natives, and best of all, probably the last unsettled country left. Call and McCrae rustle up their little livery gang, recruit some more cowboys, rustle up cattle and horses in Mexico, and pick up their way to heaven on earth.
Words can't express the gravity that exists in every chapter of this book. Not saying everything's depressing, but there's a seriousness and back-of-the-mind desperation to survive a long journey in the literal Wild West. There's traveling points-of-views at each chapter, keeping things interesting. Well, besides the beginning (Part 1). Part 1 is a bit slow, but once the stride is set then it keeps pace admirably and doesn't stop until you reach the climax of it all. And then you can't look back. And then you might wish you'd never left Lonesome Dove in the first place.
The preface may say that the theme is unspoken parental claim or whatnot, but I don't think that's what's going on here. It's only one facet of the diamond in the dust. All of the characters bring something new, something diverging, something that only could have happened in these specific set of events also influenced by their background and circumstances.
Woodrow Call is our Messiah figure, the one who can do no wrong, and does all of the planning and thinking for the outfit. He's the reason why we're making this journey in the first place. He's a stoic, quiet, serious rancher and it takes a lot to rile him up, but once you get old Woodrow going, he's going and nothing can really stop him (except for our favorite guy Augustus McCrae). As the journey progresses we rarely spend a lot of time with him, because he's like the trusty bull of the herd, point him somewhere and the rest will follow. His morals and his ideals are his strength and his downfall.
I admit Gus annoyed me a lot in the first chapter; all we could do is get annoyed at how he perceives himself as everyone's intellectual superior because he received some college schooling and knew a little bit of Latin. He's portrayed as inept and lazy he is compared to Call, but a deal smarter and more sly compared to the rest of their original crew. Over time, Gus worked his charm on everyone and he is probably my favorite character. Gus is the type of guy who flourishes with work, though he probably wouldn't admit it. He probably also wouldn't admit easily that he loves rangering and roaming around discovering new places and getting his adrenaline up. The quiet life suits him okay, too. With Gus, his bite is just as good as his bark.
Lorena Wood, the local prostitute, is a dreamer who's been lived through terrible events, and just surviving day-to-day. A devastating beauty with waterfall consequences for ALL the menfolk (except Call I suppose). With Lorie, we get the woman's touch. What it's like being the only available woman surrounded by men and boys, in a rural small town and while traveling. How would a mature survivor deal with traveling across a hard frontier, always accompanied by a man?
Newt, the son of the previous prostitute Maggie, lives with the boys in the rundown barn and shack and really, really just wants a father figure in his life. The preface or introduction or whatnot says that he is the lonesome dove, the one who's yearning for a father he's never known and Gus and Call, specifically the saintly Call, is the one he wants to at least interact with him more and express approval for anything he's doing. The journey does this well for him, as he rapidly gains new skills and experiences learning from the others on the cattle drive and quickly becoming a dependable young member everyone likes and trusts.
And it'd be real remiss of me to exclude Sheriff July Johnson from this list. A city-living sheriff of a civilized town in Arkansas reluctantly put to the traveling road to catch and punish the person who killed the mayor-dentist, who also happens to be his brother. As far as I can tell he wasn't lacking in a father figure per se, but he certainly lacks a strong pioneer man's example as he leaves the Deep South for the Southwest.
There are other characters we follow, but none for as extended an amount of time. Even when we follow the diverging storylines all across the South- and Mid-West, they all eventually converge towards the same gang, Call and McCrae. And true to how we're expecting a Western to go, the cattle drive is affected by natural opponents like the flora and fauna, pockets of hostile or friendly Native Americans, bandits, and dwindling hope of making it to Montana.
