ETTA

Emmy Award–winning TV journalist Kolpan extends his resume impressively with this picaresque debut novel, focused on “the woman” who knew Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

Born Lorinda Jameson and forced to flee her Pennsylvania home when Sicilian “Black Hand” gangsters plot revenge for her late father’s gambling defaults, she moves to the West, first working as a Harvey Girl waiting tables at a Colorado railroad restaurant. Thereafter, the plot thickens every several pages, as the fugitive beauty now known as Etta Place turns her gun-toting and equestrian skills to violence, dispatching a would-be rapist, then hightailing it to Wyoming, where she falls for charming bad man Harry Longbaugh (aka “Sundance”); joins the notorious Hole in the Wall gang; and accompanies an ill-gotten treasure to safety in New York. There Etta encounters a virginal Eleanor Roosevelt (who, soon enough, becomes her beloved “Little Nell”), and she joins Colonel William Cody’s Wild West show (where she subs for the departed Annie Oakley). Are there more adventures yet to come? Yes there are. Reconnecting with “Sundance,” Etta joins him in Argentina, where Harry’s newfound revolutionary ardor does not dissuade him from attempting one last robbery. Consequently, Etta returns to respectability, fortune and the matured and muted love of “Little Nell,” who has been reinvented—as First Lady. Technically, there’s too much muchness in this sprawling narrative, which is festooned with newspaper stories, letters (Harry’s, sent to his respectable dad, are particularly delightful), journal entries and communiqués detailing investigations conducted by busy Pinkerton agents. But any reader who cherishes the beguiling tall tales spun by such masters as Charles Portis and Thomas Berger is unlikely to object. Few will have any more success resisting Etta than do the many men, women and other critters encountered during her memorable adventures.

Great fun and—beneath the hijinks—a surprisingly substantial novel.