Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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Still not caught up on my reviews, but I’m working on it.

Streets of Laredo by Larry McMurtry

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

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I’m doing terribly at keeping up with my reviews this year, so I’m going to do a review dump. Streets of Laredo by Larry McMurtry (4.5/5) (Spoilers abound.) Lonesome Dove was a revelatory experience for me. It was that rare experience that I knew to appreciate while I was reading it. Rather than devouring the book and then mourning it’s end, I was able to savor the novel and drag it out a little bit. I was still a little skeptical about reading the follow-up, […]

An elegiac paean that didn’t convey what it’s author wanted

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

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In 1981, Bruce Springsteen was in talks with Paul Schrader to star in a musical that would, six years later, become Light of Day, and starred Michael J. Fox in one of his first non-comedic roles. The film was originally titled Born in the U.S.A., which Springsteen would use to title a song he’d been working on about a Vietnam veteran. After going through several home demo permutations, it would eventually be the center-point for his 1984 multi-platinum album of the same name, and helped […]

Et al

To Hold up the Sky by Cixin Liu

The Guermantes Way by Marcel Proust

Anything for Billy by Larry McMurtry

Dance to the Music of Time: The Valley of Bones by Anthony Powell

Dance to the Music of Time: The Soldier's Art by Anthony Powell

Dance to the Music of Time: The Military Philosophers by Anthony Powell

Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson

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To Hold up the Sky – 3/5 I really like the Cixin Liu novels I’ve read, and have felt that the short story collections are a mixed bag. The issue tends to be a lack of closing confidence. There’s also some cool premises, and some interesting premises explored in strange ways.  The opening story “The Village Teacher” splits the narrative between a simple country teacher and an intergalactic war, and the way in which these get resolved is really interesting.  Another story takes a huge […]

A Remembrance of Things Past

Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen : Reflections on Sixty and Beyond by Larry McMurtry

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I have great affection for everything about this book: the Dairy Queen cover photo, the West Texas rumination, the author’s cherishing of books and words. What a delicious book. That DQ photo reminds me of the Dairy Queen I’d often stop at in Goldthwaite, Texas, at the intersection of Highway 183 and 16. I used to go there as a teenager when driving to college. Now I take my own kids there now when passing through. A DQ can be a cultural hub in a […]

Roam on the Range

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

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Augustus McCrae and Woodrow Call are living legends. As Texas Rangers they cleared the borderlands and made the area safe for white settlers. After that work was done they settled into life as co-owners of the Hat Creek Cattle Company and Livery Emporium, where there days consist of breaking in wild horses and raising cattle. It’s hard work but the men are well-suited to it, especially the preternaturally driven Call. While Augustus might enjoy whiskey and afternoon naps, his talents as a Ranger and a […]

The old west gets fenced in

The Last Kind Words Saloon by Larry McMurtry

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This slight and swift-moving novella follows Wyatt Earp and his best bud, Doc Holliday, around an increasingly settled west. In addition to these two main characters, who do little but gamble, drink and very occasionally get into some gunplay, we meet Wyatt’s wife, Jessie, a rancher, Charlie Goodnight, a madam, San Saba, and an intrepid lady reporter, Nellie Courtwright. Several of the other Earp brothers are mentioned but exist mostly off-screen, as impetus for the plot (Virgil become sheriff, Morgan opening a new saloon). McMurtry’s […]



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