Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

Overall Rating: 5 Stars

I saw a post recently on Threads (I’m a Threads guy now, give me a follow), about a book reviewer who wanted to read Dungeon Crawler Carl but was too afraid to because it is so hyped and he didn’t want to be disappointed. I feel that is usually how it goes. If a book has been hyped to such a degree, it can’t possibly live up to those standards, can it?

For so long, this was my relationship with Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove, a nearly one-thousand page epic about two former Texas Rangers who herd cattle from the Rio Grande to Montana. Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, and their team pack up everything they own and begin to traverse the harsh and dangerous countryside.

I love westerns in all mediums. From Red Dead Redemption on my PlayStation to Unforgiven on my television screen, I am no stranger to a story with some cowboys. But Lonesome Dove was something altogether different than I have ever experienced before. Not since reading The Secret History have I been so absorbed in the lives of characters. Let’s talk about it:

SPOILERS BELOW BUT THE BOOK CAME OUT IN 1985 SO EITHER READ IT ALREADY OR DEAL:

In the Introduction to Lonesome Dove, Taylor Sheridan, writer of. westerns like Hell or High Water, Sicario, and Yellowstone, discusses how he named his first born son Augustus after the Texas Ranger, Augustus McCrae. When I first read this, I was a little skeptical. Are people naming their sons Harry after Harry Potter? But as this book moved forward, it became abundantly clear why someone like Sheridan would want their child to share a name with this character.

Gus is an absolute standout. Brilliant, charismatic, and yet lazy and unmotivated, Gus presents a character who has it all, but isn’t all that interested in using it. However, Gus is so unequivocally himself that you can’t help but love him. He’s snarky, clever, and an expert marksman. He’s talented in areas that others can only imagine (like how he has eyesight that only Deets, the Scout of the outfit, can compare with), and he’s loyal to a fault.

Woodrow Call, on the other hand, is fascinating in a completely different way than his partner. Call is stoic, introverted, and a worker first and foremost. He’s intelligent, but in a far different way than Gus is intelligent. Gus can read Latin and snap back with a witty comeback, but Call can order a group of men from Texas to Montana. Call’s horse, fitting named “the Hellbitch”, is a terror, but a terror that only he can ride and others admire from afar.

The other characters in this novel exist around Call and Gus. I wish I could go over each and every one of them in this review, but that just isn’t possible. We could analyze Lorena, the whore who all men are madly in love with, or Deets, the Black scout who has been loyal to Gus and Call for over a decade, or Jake Spoon, who has all the terrible qualities Gus has and none of the good.

The one additional character that we do have time to get into more is Newt Dobbs, Call’s son, though for most of the novel he is unaware of this. Newt’s mother died long before the events of the book and Newt is a member of the Hat Creek with the man he doesn’t know is his father.

Newt is so interesting because, despite being so much of Call, he’s also so much of Gus. After spending so much time with the both of them, McMurtry presents Newt as almost a perfected younger version of two leading men. He’s smart and charismatic, like Gus, but he’s also a good worker and a leader, like Call. The whole novel, the reader waits for the moment when Call finally tells young Newt that he is his father, but that is a moment that McMurtry decided to keep from us. Call gives Newt the Hellbitch, his gun, and a pocket-watch that his father gave to him, but no words are exchanged. What an incredible, brave moment of restraint by McMurtry.

There are a lot of brave moves made by McMurtry in this novel, notably the (AGAIN SPOILERS) death of Gus late in the book, after the outfit has made it to Montana. After being run up on by natives, Gus takes an arrow to the leg and it grows infected. As opposed to amputating both of his legs, he chooses a quiet death instead. Call doesn’t understand it, but Gus is confident, and asks Call to bring his body back to Texas.

I’ve never been truly shocked in a book in a long while, but this really did shock me. Gus was so untouchable and invincible the entire book, that I did not see a world in which he was not alive on the final page. But sure enough, he leaves his cattle money to Lorena (who loved him desperately after he rescues her from a violent and terrifying Native named Blue Duck), and dies.

I saw the request by Gus to be buried back in Texas as his way of telling his best friend that he did not belong in Montana. He couldn’t say that to the stubborn Call, but he knew that his wish, whatever it was, would be granted. It’s small moments like these between the two men throughout the book that show their bond and understanding of one another.

Call returns to Texas. He’s wounded, tired, but still does his duty buries Gus where his friend wished. He heads into town and sees that the old saloon is gone. He learns that the owner, who was madly in love with Lorena, killed himself and burned it down after she left, and he rides off.

Lonesome Dove is an EPIC on such a grand scale that I don’t think my next book can be more than 300 pages.

I compared this novel’s characters to that of The Secret History above, but I would also compare the reading experience. Structurally, reading Lonesome Dove made me feel like I was on a journey, just like the characters. When they or other characters would stumble upon people (like the widow who has buried so many husbands and tries to marry Roscoe) it made the world feel so alive. It reminded me of how Donna Tartt used her structure to make me feel trapped, like her characters. Both of these novels are so immersive with such living, breathing characters that I can’t help but give them five stars.

There’s so little to complain about with this book. If anything, I didn’t love the sections with Elmira and July Johnson. Whenever the POV snapped back to Elmira, I would scoff, but this is more a testament to how much I loved Call, Gus, Newt, Dish, Deets, Pea Eye, and the rest of the Hat Creek outfit.

There’s so much to enjoy here. Five stars for Lonesome Dove. But I need a shorter book next. I feel like I’ve traveled from Texas to Montana on horseback.

My second novel, Medusa; Or, Men Entombed in Winter, releases in less than a month. Pre-sale coming soon!

Love you guys.

-KF

EDITOR’S NOTE: There was so much more to say in the review, but I felt like it was getting a little long. Speaks to the nature of this book. I could honestly write 10 pages on it. I should have included more about Lorena, but I also should have included more about Deets, more about Roscoe’s chance encounters, more about the Texas Bull, more about Blue Duck…

Just read the book.