An entertaining, discerning take on the connections between the Old and New West.
A mixed martial arts fighter draws on the spirit of his mountain-man ancestor during a precarious Western journey in this debut novel.
Brendan “Bear” Glass is an MMA combatant whose raw power has won him some fame. In his latest match, he is beaten to a pulp by his opponent and ends up in a bloody pile on the floor. He is astonished to learn that his manager had given him rat poison in order to make the bout gorier. Badly injured, he won’t fight again, so he connects with his nephew, Branch. Brendan plans to build an enormous marijuana-growing facility under the guise of a luxury gym and resort in Montucky—backwoods Montana. The goal will be to transport the weed from California to the new site without getting stopped by the police. Two hundred years earlier, Hugh Glass, Brendan’s ancestor, an old mountain man, takes the same journey, though for Hugh it is just after the Lewis and Clark expedition. Hugh is a former sailor, plunderer, and survivor of a notable bear attack. He’s killing time as a fur trapper, waiting six years before he and his partner go back to retrieve some treasure they hid after stealing it from a French pirate. In the present day, Brendan is gripped by a sudden pain and detours to an abandoned sweat lodge, the same one that Hugh recovered in after the bear attack. There, Brendan makes a mystical connection to his ancestor that may help him with his uncertain future. Gaddis’ novel unleashes a flurry of Western sights and sounds that stretch from St. Louis to Mendocino, California, in two wildly different centuries. The old times, inside Mandan Indian villages and Colonial forts, are described in forthright, heedful language, while the contemporary story holds on to similar circumspection (“Now it’s an arid collection of collapsed lean-tos, yurts, willow benders and dilapidated canned ham trailers amid weed-ridden garden plots with fallen fences”). Amid the book’s brisk plot, the exploration of the roots of Western families is impressive, depicting the players as cunning self-starters in a diverse world of opportunity and peril. While Brendan’s dreams of a hydroponics empire aren’t quite as alluring as the tale of Hugh and the bear, they are similarly scrupulous and analogous in spirit.
An entertaining, discerning take on the connections between the Old and New West.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9981646-1-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Shitaree Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
