Amazon.com
On a ranch in southeastern Texas, soon after World War II, a group of solitary, inarticulately lonely men gathers to work animals as the sun sets for good on the mythic American West. All of these men nurse losses both personal (siblings or wives) and collective (a shared lifestyle and philosophy). Among them is John Grady Cole, the adolescent hero of the first book in Cormac McCarthy's Border trilogy, All the Pretty Horses. John Grady remains the magnificent horseman he always was, and he still dreams too much. On the ranch, he meets Billy Parham, whose own tragic sojourn through Mexico in The Crossing, the second book of the set, continues to quietly suffocate him. The two form a friendship that will nurture both but save neither from the destiny that McCarthy's characters always sense lurching to meet them.
Soaked in storm-heavy atmosphere but brightened by the ranch-hands' easy camaraderie and gentle humor, Cities of the Plain surprises with its sweetness. The awkward doomed-romance plot at the center of this tight, concise novel fails to convince, but, remarkably, does little to undercut the book's impact. What lingers here, and what matters, are the brooding, eerie portraits of the plains and the riders, glimpsed mostly alone but occasionally leaning together, who slip across them, over the horizon into memory. --Glen Hirshberg
Book Description
In this magnificent new novel, the National Book Award-winning author of
All the Pretty Horses and
The Crossing fashions a darkly beautiful elegy for the American frontier.
The setting is New Mexico in 1952, where John Grady Cole and Billy Parham are working as ranch hands. To the North lie the proving grounds of Alamogordo; to the South, the twin cities of El Paso and Juarez, Mexico. Their life is made up of trail drives and horse auctions and stories told by campfire light. It is a life that is about to change forever, and John Grady and Billy both know it.
The catalyst for that change appears in the form of a beautiful, ill-starred Mexican prostitute. When John Grady falls in love, Billy agrees--against his better judgment--to help him rescue the girl from her suavely brutal pimp. The ensuing events resonate with the violence and inevitability of classic tragedy. Hauntingly beautiful, filled with sorrow, humor and awe,
Cities of the Plain is a genuine American epic.
Customer Reviews:
Omit epilogue.......2007-09-05
I think the epilogue adds nothing to the novel, unless somehow I missed the point entirely. C. M. has elsewhere more skillfully put forth his theme that our destinies are predetermined practically from the "big bang" and that, appearances to the contrary, we really have no choices. The last thirty pages get to sound like a harangue.
Besides, I would have welcomed a novel about Billy's later life. I love C. M.'s beautifully descriptive language, and the series is ending too quickly for my taste.
Plain Spoken.......2007-07-22
If I'd known this was the third in a trilogy I never would have read it, not having read the other two. Might have been nice of the publisher to have put that somewhere on the cover--front or back--so people who are just browsing the shelves (like me) might have some idea what we're getting into. Just a suggestion.
Anyway, I suppose McCarthy's writing is fine if you enjoy the Hemingway style, which I don't. I'm not sure what's so beautiful about sentences that go "He shaved and showered and toweled off and got dressed." Seems kind of ugly actually. Reminds me of the stories I wrote in junior high. But he has a Pulitzer and a National Book Award and I don't. Take that!
So the conclusion to this supposed trilogy no one bothered to tell me was a trilogy is basically a Western-style "Romeo & Juliet" or "West Side Story" where two kids from opposing sides fall in love. In this case John Grady Cole is a cowboy on a small New Mexico ranch in 1952 and the girl is a 16-year-old Mexican whore. If you know anything about "Romeo & Juliet" you know how this is going to turn out.
A few of the author's style choices left me more than a little confused. Let's go down the list:
1. McCarthy doesn't use quotation marks so sometimes it's hard to know when someone is talking and when McCarthy is narrating.
2. McCarthy is adverse to using proper names so you end up with confusing pronoun use like: "After Oren had gone he sat over his coffee for a long time." Who's "he?" Oren was the last guy referred to but it doesn't make any sense if he left the room to be sitting over his coffee. This is especially a problem when the author starts out a new section or chapter with "He" and then we have to wait a few sentences to figure out the "He" in question.
3. Most aggravating of all is that the girl speaks only Spanish and McCarthy puts her lines IN Spanish. So tough luck if you don't know any Spanish. I wasn't too bad off since I took a few Spanish classes in high school, but some terms still threw me--and I didn't have a Spanish-English dictionary handy. If this were a movie we'd have the benefit of subtitles but in a novel we have to try and interpret the gist of it from the character's actions, sort of like playing charades.
I suppose that would have been fine for the unimportant characters, but a character central to the plot I sort of like to know what she's saying. Imagine if you were reading "Romeo & Juliet" and Juliet made all those romantic speeches to Romeo in Klingon? It just wouldn't have quite the same impact.
Another thing that bothered me is the characters are all so opaque. We never get inside their heads, so it's almost like a movie or TV show. The advantage of novels versus those mediums is that in a novel you can get inside the minds of the characters to see what makes them tick. Maybe since this was the conclusion of a trilogy the author figured he'd covered all that background already. But really I might as well have just popped in a DVD of "Unforgiven" or "Open Range" or something like that.
It's not all bad, though. Though I really can't substantiate it McCarthy seems to have a good eye for the period details. And there's some nice rapport between the cowboys that makes for good dialog. So at least it's not a boring read, except for the 30-page epilogue 50 years in the future that's mostly some old unnamed guy rambling on about dreams. I'm not sure what the point of that was.
Anyway, I suppose if you've read the other books in this supposed trilogy you'd be a lot better off than me.
That is all.
A fine book.......2007-06-20
This novel concludes the Border Trilogy. It follows protagonists from "All the Pretty Horses" and "The Crossings" through a final epoch. John Grady falls in love with an epileptic prostitute in Mexico and the men go down to try to rescue her. Grady intends to marry her.
This was the least interesting of the three books. McCarthy documents the day-to-day life of a ranching culture fast dieing out. Most of the dialogue lacks the brilliance of the previous books. Many of the scenes and much of the dialogue are simple give and take, with little revelation or philosophy. The epilogue is the exception. A brilliant conversation, falling in and out of reality, probing the meaning of death and purpose of life, takes place between an aged Billy Parham and a stranger. This final chapter is classic McCarthy.
Unlike the other books, which can be read on their own, much of the gravity of this book relies on previous books. The book would have little meaning to the reader who did not read the previous works. And this perhaps takes something away from the work itself, though I don't know how one could conclude a trilogy without falling back on the previous works.
But there is something else that the book lacks. It meanders for the first 150 pages, seemingly without purpose. John Grady is in love with a prostitute, the army is buying up ranch land, a way of life is dieing out.... The other books begin with a very clear direction, and though that direction shifts, there is always a strong sense of purpose to the narrative. The characters are driven and their actions and dialogue are inspired. There is tension. "Cities" falls short of that expectation. It is not a bad book, but it is not nearly as good as the others.
So much of the book is written in Spanish. There are entire paragraphs of conversation. McCarthy offer no explanation or restatement. I don't know what it would be like to read the book and not be able to read the conversations. I suspect that it would be annoying. But as a reader who can follow both conversations, the use of the Spanish seems authentic and almost expected.
masterpiece of the west..........2007-05-09
be sure to read ALL THE PRETTY HORSES and THE CROSSING before jumping into the third of this trilogy by Cormac McCarthy..it brings you John Grady Cole from PRETTY HORSES and Billy Parham from THE CROSSING..working as ranch hands in New Mexico..their life consists of trail drives, horse auctions and stories by the campfire...their lives change forever when John falls in love with a Mexican prostitute..Billy agrees to help resuce her and the ensuing events told in the masterful words of Cormac McCarthy make for a classic story that will stay with you for a long time..
The Measure of a Man.......2006-10-03
About 20 years ago, I bemoaned the lack of heroes in our society. The "anti-heroes", the good-bad guys had taken over and there were only the ones you love to hate in the spotlight. Cormack McCarthy wrote the first volume of his trilogy around the same time and I found some of the heroes I'd been looking for. McCarthy hasn't created his cowboy heroes, he communicated or maybe "channeled" them. It really seems to me that like some of the ancient storytellers, he serves as a medium for the ancient voices. That is not meant to minimize Mr. McCarthy's talent. No-one has been more successful as he in capturing the language and personalities of real cowboys.
"Cowboy" is more than a little ambiguous in our language. Some use the word to describe those who would take advantage of opportunities to scratch advantage from others without regard to conventional ethics or morality but for me and others, it suggests the rugged individualist who follows his own path, his own code, in the pursuit of his goals.
Maybe there's no place for cowboys in our current society and maybe that's too bad
Book Description
(Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)
Available together in one volume for the first time, the three novels of Cormac McCarthy's award-winning and bestselling Border Trilogy constitute a genuine American epic.
Beginning with All the Pretty Horses and continuing through The Crossing and Cities of the Plain, McCarthy chronicles the lives of two young men coming of age in the Southwest and Mexico, poised on the edge of a world about to change forever. Hauntingly beautiful, filled with sorrow and humor, The Border Trilogy is a masterful elegy for the American frontier.
Customer Reviews:
Adventure!.......2007-01-04
I love All the Pretty Horses and have read it three times. The other stories aren't quite as good as the first in the trilogy but the package is a good value.
One of the best.......2007-01-04
I love a book that takes more than a day to read. I'm still thinking about the characters months after I have read these book(s) Reading a good book twice is something I rarely do, planning a rereading of this one soon.
Perfect presentation of a perfect story.......2006-05-20
Just one example of the prose which has prompted me to read this three times:
PAGE 141 OF "ALL THE PRETTY HORSES" (punctuation is as the author intended)
"...They'd ride at night up along the western mesa two hours from the ranch and sometimes he'd build a fire and they could see the gaslights at the hacienda gates far below them floating in a pool of black and sometimes the lights seemed to move as if the world down there turned on some other center and they saw stars fall to earth by the hundreds and she told him stories of her father's family and of Mexico. Going back they'd walk the horses into the lake and the horses would stand and drink with the water at their chests and the stars in the lake bobbed and tilted where they drank and if it rained in the mountains the air would be close and the night more warm and one night he left her and rode down along the edge of the lake through the sedge and willow and slid from the horses back and pulled off his boots and his clothes and walked out into the lake where the moon slid away before him and ducks gabbled out there in the dark. The water was black and warm and he turned in the lake and spread his arms in the water and the water was so dark and so silky and he watched across the still black surface to where she stood on the shore with the horse and he watched where she stepped from her pooled clothing so pale, so pale, like a chrysalis emerging, and walked into the water.
She paused midway to look back. Standing there trembling in the water and not from the cold for there was none. Do not speak to her. Do not call. When she reached him he held out his hand amd she took it. She was so pale in the lake she seemed to be burning. Like foxfire in a darkened wood. That burned cold. Like the moon that burned cold. Her black hair floating on the water about her, falling and floating on the water. She put her other arm about his shoulder and looked toward the moon in the west do not speak to her do not call and then she turned her face up to him. Sweeter for the larceny of time and flesh, sweeter for the betrayal. Nesting cranes that stood singlefooted among the cane on the south shore had pulled their slender beaks from their wingpits to watch. Me quieres? she said. Yes, he said. He said her name. God yes, he said..."
A five-star book plus a five-star book plus a five-star book equals a fifteen-star book.......2006-04-04
Here are three amazing books, and one amazing saga, all together in one brimming volume you can throw into a backpack.
The first novel, "All the Pretty Horses" is one of the most beautifully told stories I've ever read. Not only is the writing here packed with imagery, and the story one of McCarthy's most accessible, but the textures of the words used to describe the images are as lush and as enfolding as anything F. Scott Fitzgerald ever wrote--even when McCarthy's describing the driest of desert plains, the most desolate of ruins, or the emptiest of lives.
The book tells the story of two young friends who leave home in 1948 Texas to ride south into northern Mexico in search of SOMETHING. What happens along the way is tragic and amusing, lovely and gripping, real and amazing. McCarthy seems to paint every scene perfectly, yet he does so using the fewest amount of words possible, and the simplest of details.
"The gray and malignant dawn." "Stars falling down the long black slope of the firmament." "The shelving clouds." "Their windtattered fire." "Narrow spires of smoke standing vertically into the windless dawn so still the village seemed to hang by threads from the darkness."
Long sentences shroud the reader in the events of every scene, and the author's trademark quote-sign-less dialogue gives every conversation a very biblical feel.
The trilogy's second book, "The Crossing" has only thematic and geographical elements in common with the first. The story deals with a completely different character, Billy Parham, a son in a late-1930s New Mexican ranching family. Billy traps a wolf that has been killing his father's cattle but realizes he morally can't kill it and has to return it to its home in the mountains of old Mexico. Billy crosses the border into Mexico, and as he does he crosses from real life into a world of dreams, where everyone moves as if the air was liquid, where every ruin has an irretrievable story, where soot and heat and danger hang in the air, and where nothing ever goes as planned.
The story is not as streamlined or as focused as its thematic predecessor, "All the Pretty Horses," but that's not necessarily a shortcoming. The book sprawls out like a wide hot desert--curling north and south, east and west, across the present and into the past. The writing is as good as any writing I've ever read ever, and certain metaphors and feelings will stay with you for years. For example: the coals of a campfire seeming like an exposed piece of the core of the earth.
The trilogy's concluding part is "Cities of the Plain." The book has some shortcomings, but it's still one amazing piece of work. YOU try writing something this good.
In this book, John Grady Cole--the genius horsetrainer of "All the Pretty Horses"--and Billy Parham--the kindhearted nomad of "The Crossing"--come together as ranch hands on a New Mexico estancia. Here, you can see why this actually is a trilogy. Both characters are older than they were in the previous books--Billy much older--but both are kindred spirits whose stories connect with and affect each another.
"Cities of the Plain" tends more heavily toward the lengthy philosophical monologues that appear only occasionally in the trilogy's earlier volumes, and the whole story at moments goes a little bit long if you've just read the two previous books right before.
However, the writing is gorgeous, and haunting. In one passage, a dead calf's "ribcage lay with curved tines upturned on the gravel plain like some carnivorous plant brooding in the barren dawn." Yeah. Yeah!
And the ending--the ending is amazing. It might not be quite what you expect or ask for, but it is thrilling in its perfectness, in its completess, in how true it feels. It gave me chills of ecstasy. It left me holding the book like a priceless religious relic, re-reading its back cover, flipping back through it to parts I had marked, reluctant and unwilling to let go of these characters or their world.
Reading these collected books is like having a vision: I feel as if I should tell the world about it, but at the same time it seems so sacred and personal that maybe I should just keep it to myself and try to figure out why it came to me, into my life, into my head. These are books that deserve readers. Pick this volume up, and let it seep into your skin, let it open you to other worlds and people and ideas, and let it change you. Let it open your eyes to the world, and to the West, and to the goodness and the hope and the sadness that haunts the lives of all of us.
This is a saga made up of all those ineffable things that most of us just can't put into words. But here, somehow, Cormac McCarthy has managed to do just that. Here is the intangible, but tangible. Here is the unnameable, but named. Here are the thoughts you could never express, expressed. Here is a book worth reading, a book that will change you--you, and the way you see the world.
apologia pro sua vita.......2006-03-23
My names Billy Parham and basically I get everyone killed one way or another for no particular reason. Mostly wrong and never did learn a thing. Is that about right cowboy?
Yeah you covered it nicely.
Boyd?
Like John Grady just said. You nailed it.
Book Description
ALL THE PRETTY HORSES
The first volume of the Border Trilogy–tells of young John Grady Cole, the last of a long line of Texas ranchers. Across the border Mexico beckons–beautiful and desolate, rugged and cruelly civilized. With two companions, he sets off on an idyllic, sometimes comic adventure, to a place where dreams are paid for in blood.
THE CROSSING
In the late 1930’s, sixteen-year-old Billy Parham captures a she-wolf that has been marauding his family’s ranch. But instead of killing it, he decides to take it back to the mountains of Mexico. With that crossing, he beings an arduous and often dreamlike journey into a country where men meet like ghosts and violence strikes as suddenly as heat-lightening–a world where there is no order "save that which death has put there."
CITIES OF THE PLAIN
It is 1952 and John Grady Cole and Billy Parham are working as ranch hands in New Mexico, not far from the proving grounds of Alamogordo and the cities of El Paso and Juarez. Their life is made up of trail drives and horse auctions and stories told by campfire light. They value that life all the more because they know it is about to change forever.
Customer Reviews:
Brad Pitt a Poor Reader.......2006-09-23
Buy the other, the All The Pretty Horses alone, with reader Muller (sp?) Frank. Brad Pitt does a very poor job, and I was amazed how poor. He hardly seems like a trained actor. He badly mispronounces Spanish (pronounces 'jefe' as 'jeffy')and his reading is like something a grade-school child would produce. He carries the question tone over to the 'he said' in interrogative sentences and does not change voice tone from one speaker to another. He sounds like a slacker who has been forced to read a high-school composition. This guy is an actor?
And the abridgement ruins the stories in all three novels.
Now I have to go back and buy the other because I love ATPH very much and want to hear it read by someone who has had voice training and a good voice.
excellent abridged version of McCarthy's work.......2005-01-16
Cormac McCarthy is undoubtedly one of the best American writers alive today. This is precisely why I purchased one of his works for my first venture into the "books on tape" world. I feared that hearing his works read to me my a Hollywood actor would diminish its impact, but I am happy to report that Brad Pitt does a good job of keeping the spirit and humor of his writing up to par. There are, however, times when he seems bored with the task as his voice takes on a particularly lullaby-like quality, so be sure to keep a cup of coffee handy if listening while driving!
I have read all of these novels before so I was familiar with the stories. The abridgement did cut out some of my favorite passages (especially in the Crossing) where McCarthy embarks on a style parade worthy of Fitzgerald's or Faulkner's attention.
My wife and I listened to the stories while traveling through the Southwest, and it was a delight to experience the landscape through the eyes of the stories. If you are planning a cross country drive or a long drive through the New Mexico-Arizona-West Texas area, I cannot recommend enough these books on tape as travel companions!
Amazon.com
Before his death in 1922, Marcel Proust accomplished the monumental feat of recording Remembrance of Things Past, a fifteen-volume literary history, much of which was based upon his own adventures and minute observations. The Guermantes Way is an installation in this collection and recounts, among other things, his childhood in Combray and the relevance of grasping the importance of particular events and people from his past in his development as a writer. Although autobiographical, Proust employs suspense and the observation of minutiae to illustrate our own subjective existence.
Book Description
Including THE GUERMANTES WAY and CITIES OF THE PLAIN.
Customer Reviews:
Proust (the revenge).......2006-02-15
Where as Joyce's Masterpice takes place in one day proust's Masterpiece Swans Way is only the begining. In the first Part Swans way we have the world of le boheim Part 2 or Guermantes way Opens the world of the bougios. A world of the rich in which image is everything...sex, obssesion, grandmothers...ect ect.. If you are reading this then you are familar with the obsesive beatuty that is proust's writing. Equally great however, personally there is a satifaction after Swans way,(first time with Proust's writing)that make the first volume my favorite.
Continuing down the road........2005-12-29
Volume I of this Vintage series was a little bit overwhelming as a reading experience. Proust is dense, difficult and the diction takes quite a bit of getting used to. It was a relief for me that the reading experience got much easier by the time that I reached this volume. Nothing is going to leaven Remembrance or make it less dense, but if you make it as far as The Guermantes Way then you are bound to have come to some peace with the language.
The Guermantes Way and Cities of the Plain are full of both broad humor and deep sorrow. The treatment of the death of the Grandmother, particularly the way that she slowly retreats in dreams, is one of the most real and affecting sequences of its kind that I can remember in fiction. On the other hand, the comedy of manners at the society parties plays out like a kind of Belle Epoque Sex & the City. Proust skewers the foibles and fables of the relationships of the rich, and often left me chuckling to myself as I read.
The farther I go, the more I find these books to be one of the most memorable reading experiences of my life. Nothing in these books makes me lessen the recommendation that I read after reading Volume I. In fact, I find that my admiration is only increasing as I read.
If you can, try tackling Volume II as quickly as possible after finishing Volume I. It really helps a lot to treat Remembrance as a single book, rather than a series. It also avoids time re-learning the feeling of the Proust prose.
The Best Work of "Fiction" I've Ever Read.......2004-06-19
Moncrieff/Kilmartin's translation is still the best. Proust's life-work is the most psychologically acute novel ever written, and a perfect match between form and content. His form is the memoir, conceived as a piece of music, with themes and variations, codas and recapitulations. The content is a list of evolving concerns, from love (in all its forms) to aesthetic creation and appreciation, as well as a sort of living autopsy of the aristocracy of his time. His motives were manifold, but it seems Proust primarily wanted to get in the final word on those people he knew throughout his life, and show he both understood them (better than they themselves) and that they had little inkling of his amazing inner life. For all his encounters with and criticisms of snobs and poseurs throughout the work, and his tendency to fully absorb himself in his experiences, Marcel the narrator risks coming off as a snob himself; but quite the opposite, he denigrates himself constantly with reference to his own writing abilities, up into the very last section of "Time Regained" when the structural idea for the novel we have just read comes to him. He's disappointed many times by his own experiences, when they are is measured and conditioned by the background of his keen aesthetic imagination. His salvation is both the Idea for the novel, and a theory of time/identity which has been "calling out" to him with his famous episodes of "involuntary memory" (the most famous of which is the tea-dipped madeleine). As one reads on, there are times when it seems Proust has suspended all action and narrative in favor of impressions which resonate against one another. It may seem gratuitous or self-indulgent, but he is "performing" his theory at the same time he's telling you about it. They each have a purpose, and it seems he's trying to enact a philosophical theory of identity and experience: as if we the subject are nodes of activity that blend memory and present conscious experience.
"Remembrance of Things Past" can be a difficult work to read, but it is so very much worth it. One needs no guide to read this work; it's not as allusive as "Ulysses" nor esoteric like "Gravity's Rainbow". Proust's style is very reader-friendly (albeit he spins very long sentences). He respects the reader, and wants her to understand exactly where he's coming from, for this novel is like the map Borges once described in one of his "Ficciones": it's a representation so large and subtle and complex that it is as big as what it depicts.
If Proust were alive today, he'd probably be kibbitzing with Hollywood stars or the world's billionaire elites...And not much of this book would change!
French or Irish.......2001-11-29
It really is between joyce and proust....
Book Description
Erin Belieu's debut, Infanta, was selected for the National Poetry Series and quickly sold through its large first printing. Both The Washington Post and the National Book Critics Circle named it as one of the best poetry books for 1993.
Now, in her second book, Belieu is proving herself a poet worthy of all the recognition. Coaxing a voice of urban chic from the dirt-filled roots of rural tension, these poems, many of which have appeared in publications such as The New York Times and The Atlantic Monthly, are as captivating as any in American poetry.
"Here are freshness and art...a distinctive new voice, outpacing conventional expectations."-Robert Pinsky
BR>
Erin Belieu was born in 1965 in Omaha, Nebraska, and educated at the University of Nebraska, Ohio State University, and Boston University. In addition to winning the National Poetry Series, she has received the Academy of American Poets Prize. She teaches at Kenyon College in Cambier, Ohio.
Customer Reviews:
Funny, evocative, touching - a great read.......2003-07-20
Erin's poetry style is imminently readable, and a lot of the poems in One Above & One Below are positively fun. One of my favorites was "On Being Fired Again." The poet's wry sense of humor is evident even she deals with darker issues. She also has a remarkable ability to fashion a poem in a form to fit the content - you can tell the workmanship behind even casual-seeming phrases. I also recommend Infanta, which showcases a different, more melancholy facet of this writer.
Beauty and the Badlands.......2000-05-23
A spectacular second volume, this group of poems features settings as culturally central as Paris, but finds its home mostly in the badlands of Nebraska. Belieu places people in the most quotidian of circumstances (hanging out in the Dairy Barn parking lot, cooking stew in a pioneering sod house)and finds a way in each instance to reveal the richness of her character's imagination via an exact and lyrically rich procession of images. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the best that the youngest generation of American poets has to offer.
Average customer rating:
- Very poignant
- Not that great....
- Crescant City
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Crescent City
Belva Plain
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ASIN: 0440115493
Release Date: 1985-08-01 |
Book Description
She was the exquisite daughter of a wealthy Jewish merchant. From a charmed girlhood in opulent New Orleans, she would be swept into the cataclysm of the Civil War. Forced to choose between her duties as a Southern wife and mother and her love for a forbidden man, a forbidden cause, Miriam Raphael is at the center of the whirlwind in a spellbinding novel of divided loyalties and divided hearts.
Customer Reviews:
Very poignant.......2001-10-22
I found this book to be extremely poignant, with well defined, strong convictions, right or wrong. Family loyalties in the face of extreme differing opinions.. overcomed inner strugles.. unfulfilled affairs of the heart.. the whole gamut of what makes a readable story with heart pounding and mind absorbing.. I will make a point of reading more of Ms Plain's books.
Not that great...........2000-12-29
Belva Plain has created a story that is historically accurate and completely believable as you are reading it....but there is something that she just fails to capture in writing this book. As you are reading it you are not drawn to the characters and they really aren't deep characters at all but rather shallow and superficial. The plot, while interesting, is not a page turner and it is mostly concentrated on the love aspect. Also the ending in my opinion was rather disappointing.
Crescant City.......2000-02-08
This book swept me into the passion, politics, and struggles of the Civil War era. What amazed me about this book, page after page, was Belva Plain's vivid choice of words. I felt moved by every scene, however significant, through the book. Belva knows her characters intimately and draws you into their hearts. I read paragraphs over and over again because I was so moved by Belva's ability to bring the 1800's South to life and the emotions of love, commitment, duty, religion, and heritage. This is a book that will be cherished on my shelf forever and I will surely re-read when I want to escape to power that it offers.
Horrible.......1999-08-11
This book doesn't know whether it wants to be a short story or a novel. Belva Plain skios over many crucial parts and devotes most of her energy to sex scenes rather than story content.
Book Description
Railroads were responsible for establishing many towns in Nebraska, including Hastings. The location of the city was determined by the junction of two railroads, the Burlington and Missouri River, and the St. Joseph and Denver City. Hastings was founded in 1872 and named after railroad construction engineer Major Delmonte Hastings. ÝÝHastings: The Queen City of the Plains includes over 200 photographs from the Adams County Historical Society and the author, Monty McCord. You will see Heartwell Park, which was originally established as a private park by James B. Heartwell in 1886. Other images show the Fisher Rainbow Fountain, one of the most identifiable landmarks in the city, located in front of the utilities building. This book also showcases images of the U.S. Naval Ammunition Depot, which was built during World War II, and had a large impact on Hastingsí development. Ý
Book Description
The once-great traction city of London is now just a radioactive wreck, a ruin haunted by electrical discharges and the dashed hopes of the people who once called it home—people like Tom Natsworthy. Twenty years after he fled, intending never to return, he discovers that something stirs in the remains of the old city.
Tom and his daughter, Wren, aren't the only people interested in London. The desperate armies of the Traction Cities and the Green Storm are also closing in, certain that whatever is taking shape within the city holds the key to victory in their never-ending war.
But it may be too late. Even as Tom and Wren hurry to uncover the mystery of London, Hester Shaw—estranged from her husband and her daughter—tracks the resurrected Stalker Fang, who has found another way to end the war and all life on the planet once and for all.
Customer Reviews:
Fitting ending to a great series of books.......2007-07-18
A Darkling Plain is the fourth, and final, book in the wonderful "Hungry City Chronicles." Beginning with Mortal Engines, the world that Mr. Reeve has created is one of the best in the young adult science fiction that I have read. Period. The story takes place hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years after the 60 Minute War where humans unleashed every known weapon on themselves (biological, nuclear, space based energy rays). The books revolve around Hester Shaw and Tom Natsworthy and their adventures on mobile cities that try to "eat" each other. Hester, in my view, is one of the great characters in young adult literature: strong, ruthless, vulnerable, and determined to get her way. Tom, in contrast, believes in the basic goodness of people and it is, ironically, this belief that proves to save the day in this story. I won't reveal details other than to say that all four books are highly recommended. If you want action, although with a high body count, then these are for you. In fact, I have rarely had the emotional impact of a series of books stay with me as these have. The ending is absolutely draining, but perfect. Finally, I must disagree a bit with some of the other reviewers about the third book, Infernal Devices, where they wish that Hester and Tom had not gone from their teens in "Predators Gold" to their mid-thirties. One of the themes of A Darkling Plain is that life moves on: people grow up, fall in love, have children, and pass the world on to them. Thus, Tom and Hester have a child, Wren, and it is central to the book's ending that she is old enough to be out on her own and have her own life. I certainly hope that Mr. Reeve has other stories set in this marvelous world, but there is very little that I would change with Hester and Tom's.
A Full Circle.......2006-12-31
Finally I managed to finish the thickest book of this series! It was such a moving ending that it broke my heart but gave me satisfaction. A roller coaster ride from the first book, Mortal Engines, and it came in full circle in A Darkling Plain. It is far from the happy fairy tale but gave us hope nontheless but also reminded us what life is.
A bit odd about Mr Shrike though but that doesn't matter much. Perhaps I just have to re-read the first one. A full 20 stars for this series!
A darkling inspiration........2006-07-31
Have you ever noticed that it is only once in a while that an artist with incredible ingenuity, creativity, articulation, and vivid imagination will somehow cross your path and enrich the precious moments of your leisure time? I love it when this happens, whether it be fine art, music, film, or in this case, literature. Philip Reeve has yet again brought me with him in this latest, and last, book in the Hungry City Chronicles quadrilogy: aptly hailed A Darkling Plain. I will not bore you with an overview, as it would be grossly wrong of me to spoil any of the treasures this work has waiting for you, the expectant reader.
Living in Alberta, Canada, British author Philip Reeve is not as well known, and so it was quite by accident that I discovered the first 2 books in the series: Mortal Engines and Predator's Gold. These 2 volumes, which very much remind me of the quality and craftsmanship of creating Star Wars and then The Empire Strikes Back, harken back the ideas of fantastic new worlds, innocence and discovery, high adventure, romance, tragedy and character resolution which unfailingly culminates in this last Darkling volume.
If you are familiar with this brilliant series, I wonder if I am alone when I honestly say that I was heartbroken with the direction Mr. Reeve took in the third volume, Infernal Devices. I did not want Tom and Hester to instantly jump into my own mid-thirties age bracket and thus becoming secondary characters to the supposedly young readers these books are aimed at. Although we grow to fondly care about their daughter and her friends, I felt a huge stab of pain (not unlike Tom) and loss at the sense that our original heroes were relegated to the back of the bus. I also share your grief and dissappointment that our dear friends Freya and Caul were allowed such an early retirement--Shame on you, Mr. Reeve.
Despite the third and leading-up-to volume, I will say that our intrepid storyteller redeems himself and restores our faith in his genious by his deliverance of this beautifully crafted and intricately laid fouth "chapter" of our long journey. I can't tell you how sorry I am that it is over for me, having just ordered and read this last novel directly from Scholastc U.K. Believe me, friend, you're in luck. Treat yourself to this book and the whole series, because like one of those rare vacations where you actually relax and enjoy yourself, and you are just a little sad to return home, this endeavor will simulate just that.
As a sidenote, I should mention that I was shocked to originally learn that these books were targeted towards 9 to 14 year-olds. Although there is no profanity or overt sexual descriptions, the brutality, gore, and death count has occassionally brought to mind certain other writers such as Stephen King and Robert McCammon--if these were derrived films, they would not get away with "PG-13" in North America. Also, if anyone else cares to write a review and knows, could you please explain why our everlasting father stalker "Grike" in N.A. is written as "Shrike" in the U.K.?
Read and enjoy, I think you shall also be inspired.
Average customer rating:
- An excellent ghost town guide
- A good overall view of life on the prairie.
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Ghosts Of Colorado Plains
Perry Eberhart
Manufacturer: Swallow Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| United States
| Americas
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General
| State & Local
| United States
| Americas
| History
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Colorado
| State & Local
| United States
| Americas
| History
| Subjects
| Books
West
| State & Local
| United States
| Americas
| History
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General
| Americas
| History
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Folklore
| Mythology
| World Literature
| Literature & Fiction
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General
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| Literature & Fiction
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Ghosts & Haunted Houses
| Occult
| Religion & Spirituality
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ASIN: 0804008337 |
Customer Reviews:
An excellent ghost town guide.......2005-10-13
This is one of the classiest ghost town books I've seen. Eberhart writes about roughly 150 towns that were once in existence (most had post offices at one time), all located along the I-25 corridor or east of there on the high plains. He gives a thorough historical account of each place and includes a hand-drawn map of the town's location, making it easy to see where each was exactly (this important element is missing in many ghost town books). In addition, there are many dozens of photographs, some contemporary, some historical, of many of the places described. One of the best books on the subject I've seen. Great for the traveler/explorer as well as for the armchair historian.
A good overall view of life on the prairie........1999-07-05
I found this to be a nice and not overly deep view of life on the Colorado plains. An area that is generally overlooked or forgotten today, the prairie played an important part in the settlemnet of the west and not much is left for us to learn from, and this book presented some obscure facts and tidbits of information that I found fascinating. As a history buff, I find it very interesting to see where man has been and may end up in the future.
Book Description
This riveting inside story of the intense search for the Salt Lake City teenager who was kidnapped from her bed reveals never-before-told details of the largest investigation in Utah state history. Paced like a thriller, this true account moves between the parallel stories of the searchers and the abductor. The firsthand account of Tom Smart, Elizabeth's uncle and one-time suspect, reveals the details of the flawed police investigation, the media's manipulation of the family, and the eyewitness account of nine-year-old Mary Katherine Smart that went largely ignored by investigators. New research is presented on the family background of disturbed street preacher Brian David Mitchell, who kidnapped Elizabeth as part of a bizarre polygamous plot. Also examined is the critical role of the media, revealing the essential part played by John Walsh and others in facilitating Elizabeth's safe return, and the manipulative influence of Fox News and Bill O'Reilly. Going beyond a mere eyewitness account, the book includes information culled from interviews with more than 150 people involved in the search and investigation, notes from family meetings, and memos from law enforcement officials.
Customer Reviews:
the startling truth behind the elizabeth investigation.......2007-08-05
i enjoyed this book but thought elizabeth was being taken advantage of by her parents and uncle.she should of been kept in seclusion and not been subject to the public.i feel that in the future this young lady is going to have some problems.
Very disappointed in this one. .......2007-05-13
I read this book and I almost feel like it was a serious waste of my time. Tom Smart (uncle of Elizabeth Smart) seems like he is trying to take the stage in this account. Everything in this book you have probably already heard through the media. The book has a very slow start--almost excruciating to get through the first half. I was bored to tears.
I feel for Elizabeth and her Family and would have liked the focus to be on them, their reactions, their feelings,and on Elizabeth's recovery. The nation cares about Elizabeth and how this has affected her and not about Tom Smart's INSOMNIA.
One day in the far Future, hopefully, Elizabeth will write a book and let us know the story of being a survivor, her feelings, and her journey to overcoming this trauma. After all, no one else knows what she and her poor parents went through.
Bottom Line: I found this account to be One-sided and Exagerrated on the Author's part. Tom Smart wanted the Spotlight and Shame on him.
I would not recommend to a friend for Good Reading.
Read, Read ,Read!.......2006-06-13
The first time I Read this, I felt like Tom Smart was talking to me Everyday. I'ts so cool, I think the book should tell about everyone else but pervert and pervet Jr. I understand you have to see why he kidnapped Liz, but his mindset is that of President Bush, Stupid and hateful. Everything you need to know about her abduction is all in here. A great read. Don't read it too many times at once, It might scare you.
Interesting but her parents book is a little easier to read.......2006-01-28
I was completly stuck on the Elizabeth Smart case when it was all unfolding. I was graduating high school at the time and couldnt imagine with all the dreams I had having them all stolen in the middle of the night. The book is a good read and really details the case well. The only problem I had is the book seems very very one sided. The brother talks all about how much he did and the others did and I kinda felt like he was acting as if he was the parent. It may just be the way I read it but I did find it interesting to get a good profile of the people that took her. Its worth a read but dont forget to read her parents book too.
--Compelling--.......2005-12-17
IN PLAIN SIGHT is the story of the investigation to locate Elizabeth Smart, the teenage girl who was abducted from her home in Salt Lake City. Journalists, Tom Smart and Lee Benson wrote the book. Tom also happens to be Elizabeth's uncle and served as the spokesman for Elizabeth's family during the horrible kidnapping ordeal of his niece.
The search for Elizabeth went on for nine long months and this book is an account of what took place during that time period. Aside from the shocking fact of a young woman's abduction, is the story of the local police and FBI who searched for her, but often seemed to ignore the information that was brought forward by family members and volunteers. The authors also claim that the investigating agencies didn't seem to share the information that they had obtained with each other. There were several sightings of the girl, and the man who had taken her. At one point, after breaking into a building, he was arrested, but released when he said that he was just trying to make a home for his wife and daughter.
This book presents one side of the story, but the FBI and local police probably had other things to take into consideration with their examinations of the events. Apparently the family was investigated and we've all seen enough news stories to know that everyone is looked at when a crime is committed. Unfortunately, we've also heard a lot of stories about the lack of cooperation between different police agencies.
This was an informative book and hopefully the Smart family can overcome the horror that took over their lives. I'm sure the heart of every parent in the world goes out to Elizabeth.
Books:
- Close Your Eyes (New York Times Best Illustrated Books (Awards))
- Customer Mania! It's Never Too Late to Build a Customer-Focused Company
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- Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future
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- Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood
- Dry Ice (Dr. Alan Gregory Novels)
- Earthcore
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Suttree
