SADDLE IN THE SKY

A newspaper reporter, at one time living in Texas, comes back to view the state again. He starts with El Pasco, and gets his start through Mister Pineapple, Mexican troubadour, owner of a curio shop, ex-pimp and one of the author's choicest and most colorful friends. He jumps from town to town, concentrating on the border and southwest, though Dallas, Houston, Wichita Falls, Tyler and a few others get brief mention. The whole tour, might be highlighted as a series of ""belive-it-or-not's"", incredible doings, with a grain of truth, but giving the effect of horns all round. Wild stories, cowboy songs, colorful expressions, a kind of ""oddities of Texas"", wild and woely and full of fleas. Texans certainly wont like it, and why should others be particularly interested? There is none of the flavor and balance of Carmer's books.