Books I Read in June 2023: Gothics and Westerns

 Six books this month.

The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole (Oxford University Press, 2014) First published 1764.

The Castle of Otranto is the first gothic novel. Just as Manfred’s only son Conrad is to be married to Isabella, Conrad is killed. Manfred decides to divorce his wife and marry Isabella himself. The novel has a haunted castle, a prophecy of doom, damsels in distress, secret passages, a duel between knights, ghostly apparitions, and secret identities. 

I enjoyed the story, the atmosphere, the imagery, and all the melodrama. Some parts read smoothly, but the paragraphs are quite long and all the dialogue runs together. This made most of the novel a bit of a struggle to read. Important historically as many of the plot devices and character types show up in later gothic novels.

The Vampire by John William Polidori (Open Road Media, 2017) First published in 1819.

Aubrey, a naive young man, befriends the mysterious Lord Ruthven and begins traveling with him through Europe. Aubrey soon realizes that Ruthven has a sinister side and decides to leave him. While in Greece, Aubrey falls in love, learns about vampire folklore, but also learns that leaving Ruthven wasn’t as easy as he had thought. 

Published decades before Bram Stoker’s Dracula, this is considered the first modern vampire story. It came about as part of a contest among Polidori, Mary Shelly, Lord Byron, and Percy Shelly, the same contest that produced Mary Shelly’s novel Frankenstein. 

Short, atmospheric, and dark, but I thought Aubrey was a little too clueless as to what was happening around him.

June on the Range 

For the rest of the month, I read westerns for a YouTube/BookTube reading event called June on the Range. 

True Grit by Charles Portis (The Overlook Press, 2012) First published in 1968.

In 1878, fourteen-year-old Mattie Ross convinces U.S. Marshal Rooster Cogburn to help her track down the man who murdered her father. The writing drew me in from the first paragraph. I loved the story, the prose, the characters, and especially Mattie’s voice as she narrated the story. Outstanding. My favorite book of the month.

The Films 

After I finished True Grit I watched both film adaptations. The 1969 film stars John Wayne, Kim Darby, and Glen Campbell. I knew Kim Darby from an episode of Star Trek titled “Miri.” Star Trek is my favorite TV show, so it was a lot of fun recognizing three other actors who guest starred on the show. The 2010 film stars Jeff Bridges, Hailee Steinfeld, and Matt Damon. 

I enjoyed both films. I like that they both use a lot of dialogue straight from the book, but I prefer the 2010 version for a couple of reasons. It follows the book more closely, and as much as I like Kim Darby’s portrayal of Mattie, Hailee Steinfeld took it to the next level. 

The Hell Bent Kid by Charles O. Locke (Open Road Media, 2015) First published in 1957.

After being forced to defend himself at a dance, Tot Lohman winds up killing Shorty Boyd, the son of a powerful rancher. Tot decides it’s best to leave the ranch where he’s working and then soon finds that he's made the right decision as the Boyd family is out for vengeance. The writing was straightforward but didn’t grab me. I enjoyed parts of this book, but I thought some sections were slow. It got more interesting towards the end which felt very noir.

The Tall Stranger by Louis L’Amour (Bantam Books, 2012) First published in 1957.

Fast talker Mort Harper convinces a wagon train of settlers to take a different trail, going against the advice of their scout Rock Bannon. Eventually Harper convinces the settlers to start a town on land claimed by someone else. Trouble ensues. 

It starts off strong but becomes predictable with no real character development and the characters make some head scratching decisions. The story also seems to jump around a bit. The strongest aspects of the book are the descriptions of the characters, the landscapes, and the action scenes. A quick, light read with no surprises.

After reading other reviews and doing some digging, I learned that this book is an expanded version of one of L’Amour’s novellas, “Showdown Trail.” One reviewer wrote that L’Amour’s books can be placed in three categories: great, classic, and cheesy/corny, and that The Tall Stranger is of the latter. I agree. 

The Name’s Buchanan by William Ard writing as Jonas Ward (Piccadilly Publishing, 2020) First published in 1956.

Here we go. This was pretty much the total opposite of The Tall Stranger.

Buchanan is a former hired gun for the Mexican Revolution. He just wants to leave that behind and return to the US when he rescues a young woman who has been attacked. After she’s brought to her family he plans on heading out, but he winds up getting caught up in a fight between two families on either side of the US/Mexican border. 

This book was written by William Ard writing as Jonas Ward. He also wrote detective novels, and it really shows. It often felt like a western noir. It was fast paced with some hard-boiled dialogue. There was some humor as well. It had a great cast of characters and the conflict between them all was well done. I loved it. My second favorite book of the month.

The Name's Buchanan is the first in a series. William Ard wrote the first five and most of the sixth. Robert Silverberg finished the sixth one, Buchanon on the Prod. Brian Garfield wrote the seventh one, Buchanan's Gun and rest were written by William R. Cox.

The picture I included above is of the of the original paperback, but I actually read the Kindle version which has a generic cover. For some reason the Kindle numbering is incorrect. Books 1-6 are numbered as books 18-23.

After reading this book I watched the film adaptation, Buchanan Rides Alone from 1958. Although the script makes a number of changes, the changes work, and the script includes a number of lines from the book. It’s directed by Budd Boetticher and stars Randolph Scott. The westerns that Boetticher and Scott worked on together are known as the Ranown Cycle, named after Scott's production company, which combines the first few letters of Scott's first name with the last few letters of producer Harry Joe Brown's name. The films are well regarded and so far, I can see why. 

Next Month 

I'm thinking about participating in two other YouTube/BookTube events, Book Tube at War and Book Trek 2023. I may read some Richard Sharpe books by Bernard Cornwell and I have a few Star Trek Books that have been on my TBR list for a while. As always, we'll see. 

Early Western Short Stories of Bret Harte

 “Bret Harte was the first important American writer to use the early western mining settlements, the colorful lives of prospectors, gamblers, early ranchers and frontier women, and stage coach and derringer in his stories. He little knew that he thus was founding the most perennially popular type of American reading — the “western.” And because he actually lived during the colorful era of the early west and was undeniably a talented writer, his stories are not only the first but among the finest “westerns” ever written.” — From the inside flap of Bret Harte Stories of the Early West 

I decided to read some westerns this month for a YouTube/BookTube event called June On the Range. After I discovered Bret Harte in a western anthology, I found a collection of his short stories during a recent visit to a used bookstore, Stories of the Early West: The Luck of Roaring Camp and 16 Other Exciting Tales of Mining and Frontier Days (Platt & Munk, 1964).

These stories are pre-westerns in a sense, as many of them are about the men and women of mining camps and early settlements, as opposed to stories about cowboys, cattle drives, and Native American Indians. I found them to be an interesting look at life in the early west. 

How Santa Claus Came to Simpson's Bar (3/5)

After a small settlement is cut off by flooding, the men of the town decide to do something to help a sick young boy celebrate Christmas. There's a wild ride at the end as one of the men braves flooded rivers and a bandit as he’s trying to return in time.

Tennessee’s Partner (4/5)

This story is about the friendship between two men with the nicknames Tennessee and Tennessee's Partner, in a gold mining settlement. Tennessee is a gambler and drinker with a sense of humor but his partner is more serious and hardworking. The partner sticks by Tennessee’s side even after being betrayed by him and after Tennessee is accused of theft. An interesting story about friendship and loyalty. 

An Ingenue of the Sierras (4/5)

Stagecoach driver Yuba Bill has to deal with bandits and a mysterious young passenger who says she is eloping. Bill is smart and resourceful, he’s not perfect, but he has a sense of humor. Great characters with a great ending that had me laughing. 

The Outcasts of Poker Flat  (5/5)

Four “undesirables” who have been banished from the town of Poker Flat and a young couple traveling to the town get caught in a snowstorm. They find some shelter but have limited provisions. I thought the story was really moving. I loved the prose, the characters, and the various decisions that characters made. 

The Luck of Roaring Camp (5/5)

An orphaned baby brings changes to a California gold mining camp. Harte brings the camp to life as he describes the miners taking care of the baby, how they stop fighting and gambling, and how they work together to improve the conditions of the camp. Beauty, humor, and tragedy all in a few pages. Excellent. 

The spaghetti western Four of the Apocalypse (1975) directed by horror master Lucio Fulci is based on this story and "The Outcasts of Poker Flat." 

Poetry 

Harte was also a successful poet. Many if not all his poems are available to read for free online. I read a few of them on the All Poetry website and I like what I’ve read of it so far.

The Mark Twain Connection 

Bret Harte met Mark Twain when Twain was a freelance journalist and moved to California. When they met Harte was the more established of the two and he mentored Twain. In a letter to editor Thomas Bailey Aldrich (included in The Life of Thomas Bailey Aldrich by Ferris Grenslet, Riverside Press, 1908) Twain wrote:

 “...Bret Harte who trimmed and trained and schooled me patiently until he changed me from an awkward utterer of course grotesqueness to a writer of paragraphs and chapters that have found a certain favor in the eyes of even some of the very decentest people in the land….”

Twain of course would go on to be more well known than Harte, who’s fame and fortune did not last long. Unfortunately they had a serious falling out and Twain never forgave him even after Harte passed away. I find it interesting to contrast that with the events in Harte’s story “Tennessee's Partner.”

Fun Fact

Singer-songwriter Neil Young had a dog named Harte, which he apparently named after the author. 

In Conclusion 

Bret Harte seems to be little remembered today but there was a time in the 1870s when he was the best-known and highest-paid writer in America. I’ve read some reviews that compare Harte’s stories to the work of Charles Dickens regarding his plots, characters, sentimentality, satire and humor, both in a positive and negative way. I can see that based on the ones I’ve read, but so far I see it as a positive comparison. I like Harte’s writing style, his place descriptions, and especially his characters. I’ll be reading more. 

Harte’s short story collection The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales (1870) and his poetry collection Complete Poetical Works (1872) are available on Project Gutenberg.