Lonesome Dove

BY LARRY MCMURTRY

If you aren’t a fan of Westerns, please make an exception for Lonesome Dove. The 800-page epic starts slowly, as McMurtry introduces readers to a couple of former Texas Rangers and their bumbling ranch hands in 1870s South Texas. But once the crew sets out on a fateful cattle drive to Montana, confronting the hazards (both elemental and human) of the still-wild West, the novel becomes a dizzying adventure, pulling more and more characters into its wide, braided narrative. And it’s those people, above all, who will keep you coming back. Even as he pushes the plot along, McMurtry gives them surprisingly rich interiority and complicated, deeply human motivations. Years ago, I spent an unhappy summer in New Orleans, with no car and little social life, and I passed the time with Lonesome Dove. Every afternoon was a countdown to the moment when I could go home and dig back into the story: I just couldn’t wait to find out what would happen to all my friends on the trail.  — Gilad Edelman