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Painted Horses: A Novel
The national bestseller that “reads like a cross between Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain and Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms” (The Dallas Morning News). In this ambitious, incandescent debut, Malcolm Brooks animates the untamed landscape of the West in the 1950s. Catherine Lemay is a young archaeologist on her way to Montana, with a huge task before her. Working ahead of a major dam project, she has one summer to prove nothing of historical value will be lost in the flood. From the moment she arrives, nothing is familiar—the vastness of the canyon itself mocks the contained, artifact-rich digs in post-Blitz London where she cut her teeth. And then there’s John H, a former mustanger and veteran of the U.S. Army’s last mounted cavalry campaign, living a fugitive life in the canyon. John H inspires Catherine to see beauty in the stark landscape, and her heart opens to more than just the vanished past. Painted Horses sends a dauntless young woman on a heroic quest, sings a love song to the horseman’s vanishing way of life, and reminds us that love and ambition, tradition and the future, often make strange bedfellows. “Engrossing . . . The best novels are not just written but built—scene by scene, character by character—until a world emerges for readers to fall into. Painted Horses creates several worlds.” —USA Today (4 out of 4 stars) “Extraordinary . . . both intimate and sweeping in a way that may remind readers of Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient . . . Painted Horses is, after all, one of those big, old-fashioned novels where the mundane and the unlikely coexist.” —The Boston Globe
386 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 5, 2014
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July 7, 2014
Tom McIntyre, himself a damn good writer, once explained to me why he wouldn't read any of the NY Times ballyhooed best sellers:
"They're all written by middleclass kids from nice middleclass suburbs who went to good schools and good colleges, and then on to the Iowa Writer's Workshop, and then moved to Brooklyn where they all write about the terrible trials and tribulations and pressures and neuroses of growing up in nice middleclass suburbs and going to good schools and good colleges and on to the Iowa Writer's Workshop and then moving to Brooklyn where they write..." You get the picture. And he's right. There is a certain sameness that pervades even the best of what critics rave over, and most of it leaves me wondering what the hell I wasted my time for. And those are the reasons why you should, must, read Malcolm Brooks' "Painted Horses." Neither Brooks nor the characters he has created come from nice, safe middleclass backgrounds, and the one who comes the closest to that paradigm in "Painted Horses" has the guts and intelligence to break free and fight for something she believes in. Brooks' creations are unique, singular, extraordinary people unlike any you have ever met before, people you will never want to leave.
The story is complex and wide-ranging, and clearly Brooks has something to say about America, about the West, and about what things are and are not important, but what drives any literate work of art--and this is a work of art--are the characters and the language with which the book is written. Brooks has created men and women who are so singular, so intriguing, so compelling, that you find yourself falling a little in love as you read. More than a little. And the world these people live in is so well and truly drawn that it's hard to remember you're reading fiction. I read this while recuperating from a horse accident, and when I came to a passage where one of Brooks' men has had a horse accident, I had the eerie feeling I was reading about myself, as if my experience, my pain and fear, had been taken and used without my permission. It was that real, that vivid, that evocative.
But the other part of the literary art is language. You may love Cormac McCarthy or you may hate him, but no one can deny he uses language the way Velazquez used pigment. Brooks wields a more subtle palette, but one just as compelling in its combination of opposites: rich and spare; lean and voluptuous; and perhaps most important (to paraphrase Wyatt Earp) deliberately fast. The late Sir John Betjeman, Poet Laureate of Great Britain, once wrote:
"For endless changes can be rung
On church-bells of the English tongue."
Malcolm Brooks knows how to ring changes with the best of them, and even as you're wriggling with delight at his use of the English tongue, you will find yourself falling in love with men and women and places. And Painted Horses.
"They're all written by middleclass kids from nice middleclass suburbs who went to good schools and good colleges, and then on to the Iowa Writer's Workshop, and then moved to Brooklyn where they all write about the terrible trials and tribulations and pressures and neuroses of growing up in nice middleclass suburbs and going to good schools and good colleges and on to the Iowa Writer's Workshop and then moving to Brooklyn where they write..." You get the picture. And he's right. There is a certain sameness that pervades even the best of what critics rave over, and most of it leaves me wondering what the hell I wasted my time for. And those are the reasons why you should, must, read Malcolm Brooks' "Painted Horses." Neither Brooks nor the characters he has created come from nice, safe middleclass backgrounds, and the one who comes the closest to that paradigm in "Painted Horses" has the guts and intelligence to break free and fight for something she believes in. Brooks' creations are unique, singular, extraordinary people unlike any you have ever met before, people you will never want to leave.
The story is complex and wide-ranging, and clearly Brooks has something to say about America, about the West, and about what things are and are not important, but what drives any literate work of art--and this is a work of art--are the characters and the language with which the book is written. Brooks has created men and women who are so singular, so intriguing, so compelling, that you find yourself falling a little in love as you read. More than a little. And the world these people live in is so well and truly drawn that it's hard to remember you're reading fiction. I read this while recuperating from a horse accident, and when I came to a passage where one of Brooks' men has had a horse accident, I had the eerie feeling I was reading about myself, as if my experience, my pain and fear, had been taken and used without my permission. It was that real, that vivid, that evocative.
But the other part of the literary art is language. You may love Cormac McCarthy or you may hate him, but no one can deny he uses language the way Velazquez used pigment. Brooks wields a more subtle palette, but one just as compelling in its combination of opposites: rich and spare; lean and voluptuous; and perhaps most important (to paraphrase Wyatt Earp) deliberately fast. The late Sir John Betjeman, Poet Laureate of Great Britain, once wrote:
"For endless changes can be rung
On church-bells of the English tongue."
Malcolm Brooks knows how to ring changes with the best of them, and even as you're wriggling with delight at his use of the English tongue, you will find yourself falling in love with men and women and places. And Painted Horses.
March 29, 2014
I am a sucker for a Western novel. Give me sage brush and quaking aspens, horses and scuffed saddles. My family lives in Big Sky country and I have shelves of my favorite authors such as Annie Proulx, Ivan Doig, Stanley Gordon West, Mildred Walker, Thomas Savage, Larry Colton, and Craig Johnson. Unfortunately, Painted Horses by Malcolm Brooks is one Western novel you might want to pass up.
In this sprawling debut novel, we meet twenty three-year- old archeologist Catherine Lemay who is on a train to Montana. It’s the mid- 1950s, and she is headed to an area south of Billings where a dam is to be constructed by Harris Power and Light. Catherine is working for the Smithsonian, who hires her to examine the area and canyon for any archeologically significant site. Harris Power and Light has informed Ms. Lemay that it is a “natural alley” in the project, even though a delay or halt to the project would affect their time-table and bottom line. To complicate matters, part of the canyon she is inspecting is on the Crow Indian reservation and not everyone there is in favor of this project.
She encounters the stock-in-trade loner cowboy John H. as she just steps off the train to stretch her legs. John H. has literally painted his horse—handprints on the rump and stripes on the animal’s legs. He is on his own quest to capture horse culture in paintings and a lost herd of mustangs.
Catherine acquires a guide Jack Allen, a despicable cowboy who wrangles mustangs for the pet-food industry (cue the tension between John H. and Jack). She also has a Crow teenager Miriam to help her. Jack, who is on the payroll of Harris Power and Light, is more interested in leading her around the canyon and showing her everything but what she is looking for. Miriam is trying to help her look for any signs of early habitation by humans which would hinder dam construction.
The sprawling nature of the story also includes Basque culture and sheep raising in Montana, cave paintings in Europe, post-World War II Paris, kidnapping, stolen horses, and army desertion.
There are lyrical passages that author Malcom Brooks’ writes of life in Montana and the life of the cowboy, and he clearly loves horses and horse culture. But he also tests our level of credulity. The plot rests on the idea that the Smithsonian would be called in to make an assessment of a US Corps of Engineers projected project, and the only candidate is an unproven and untested archeologist who has never set foot in Montana. One has to think that Montana’s two state universities could have supplied an archeologist/geologist for the task—not greenhorn. This was the time of oil exploration refineries in the Williston Basin—there would have been plenty of talent pouring in.
While the story tells us that Catherine has some experience in London, she never spends her time in Montana mapping anything, or writing up notes or photographing what she is seeing. She brings along a movie camera that she doesn’t know how to use. She decides to follow up a lead and heads out into the canyon on her own, gets lost and runs out of food and water.
My second issue with the story is why would John H., who deserts from the Army in Italy during the War, head back to Montana? He is still up for charges of desertion. And gosh, doesn’t one of his old cow-punching buddies and fellow Army mate (Jack) recognize him.
Catherine is self-absorbed with no cultural sensitivity, yet she goes on about Rome and London. She is a blond-haired cliché that was raised in a Wedgwood-lined life whose only skill was the piano. In one example, it’s Miriam who stops Catherine from entering a saloon because it is “white’s only,” and she, Miriam might not get served. Catherine’s response, “Are you telling me it’s dangerous?” Although she is only 23, she comments on her own youth culture when she tells Miriam that Rock and Roll is something that “is just a fad for teenagers” and that “it’s known to bring out the worst in people.” In another Catherine and Miriam go to the movies to see “The Blackboard Jungle” and she explains to Miriam (who lives on an Indian Reservation) that the movie is about kids, “in a tough part of New York. Poor kids. . . You know what I mean.”
Verdict: Even with its Big Sky setting and lyrical descriptions of horses and wide-open spaces, I could not get past the basic plot. Like the song says, “Git along, little dogies” and pass this one up.
In this sprawling debut novel, we meet twenty three-year- old archeologist Catherine Lemay who is on a train to Montana. It’s the mid- 1950s, and she is headed to an area south of Billings where a dam is to be constructed by Harris Power and Light. Catherine is working for the Smithsonian, who hires her to examine the area and canyon for any archeologically significant site. Harris Power and Light has informed Ms. Lemay that it is a “natural alley” in the project, even though a delay or halt to the project would affect their time-table and bottom line. To complicate matters, part of the canyon she is inspecting is on the Crow Indian reservation and not everyone there is in favor of this project.
She encounters the stock-in-trade loner cowboy John H. as she just steps off the train to stretch her legs. John H. has literally painted his horse—handprints on the rump and stripes on the animal’s legs. He is on his own quest to capture horse culture in paintings and a lost herd of mustangs.
Catherine acquires a guide Jack Allen, a despicable cowboy who wrangles mustangs for the pet-food industry (cue the tension between John H. and Jack). She also has a Crow teenager Miriam to help her. Jack, who is on the payroll of Harris Power and Light, is more interested in leading her around the canyon and showing her everything but what she is looking for. Miriam is trying to help her look for any signs of early habitation by humans which would hinder dam construction.
The sprawling nature of the story also includes Basque culture and sheep raising in Montana, cave paintings in Europe, post-World War II Paris, kidnapping, stolen horses, and army desertion.
There are lyrical passages that author Malcom Brooks’ writes of life in Montana and the life of the cowboy, and he clearly loves horses and horse culture. But he also tests our level of credulity. The plot rests on the idea that the Smithsonian would be called in to make an assessment of a US Corps of Engineers projected project, and the only candidate is an unproven and untested archeologist who has never set foot in Montana. One has to think that Montana’s two state universities could have supplied an archeologist/geologist for the task—not greenhorn. This was the time of oil exploration refineries in the Williston Basin—there would have been plenty of talent pouring in.
While the story tells us that Catherine has some experience in London, she never spends her time in Montana mapping anything, or writing up notes or photographing what she is seeing. She brings along a movie camera that she doesn’t know how to use. She decides to follow up a lead and heads out into the canyon on her own, gets lost and runs out of food and water.
My second issue with the story is why would John H., who deserts from the Army in Italy during the War, head back to Montana? He is still up for charges of desertion. And gosh, doesn’t one of his old cow-punching buddies and fellow Army mate (Jack) recognize him.
Catherine is self-absorbed with no cultural sensitivity, yet she goes on about Rome and London. She is a blond-haired cliché that was raised in a Wedgwood-lined life whose only skill was the piano. In one example, it’s Miriam who stops Catherine from entering a saloon because it is “white’s only,” and she, Miriam might not get served. Catherine’s response, “Are you telling me it’s dangerous?” Although she is only 23, she comments on her own youth culture when she tells Miriam that Rock and Roll is something that “is just a fad for teenagers” and that “it’s known to bring out the worst in people.” In another Catherine and Miriam go to the movies to see “The Blackboard Jungle” and she explains to Miriam (who lives on an Indian Reservation) that the movie is about kids, “in a tough part of New York. Poor kids. . . You know what I mean.”
Verdict: Even with its Big Sky setting and lyrical descriptions of horses and wide-open spaces, I could not get past the basic plot. Like the song says, “Git along, little dogies” and pass this one up.
April 26, 2014
Malcolm Brooks’ PAINTED HORSES has a beautiful cover. The blurb on the back of my copy of the book reads almost as beautiful. Few readers wouldn’t get hooked by the romanticism and untouched landscape alluded to by talk of the open Montana range in the 1950s. It’s another time and it’s another place, one that is recent but not too recent that we know it too well.
As a woman, I was caught by the idea of a female archaeologist – a childhood dream of mine – working the ancient native lands there.
So to say I entered PAINTED HORSES with high hopes would not be an understatement.
To say I left PAINTED HORSES with a sense of unfinished disappointment would also not be an understatement.
It’s clear that Brooks knows what he’s talking about when it comes to horses, the American West, and World War II. Had the story truly been focused on that, it might have been so much better.
John H accounts for the half the story, and his story is told in snatches of the past using first person, present tense. He’s a man of the horses, I suppose one could say. He knows everything there is to know about them. His story is interesting enough.
It’s clear too that Brooks doesn’t really understand his female lead character. Catherine LeMay is the female archaeologist in a time when women were not in that profession. Half the story is hers, told in third person, past tense – even when the focus goes back to a few years earlier when she worked in London. She spent a lot of time worrying about her sunburn, her jagged nails, and how many sanitary napkins she needed to take on a camping trip when her time of the month came. Sure, she loved archaeology but it was as though Brooks wanted to make sure no one forgot she was a woman. It was a very 1950s-era portrayal of women.
And it irritated me.
The two supporting characters in the book – Catherine’s native guide Miriam and her range guide, and John H’s nemesis, Jack Allen – are the better written characters. I do feel like Miriam was created because Brooks thought Catherine needed a girlfriend, another irritating thing, but she served her purpose well. Jack Allen, the antagonist to everyone in the story, is by far the most interesting. I wanted to read more about him. He kept showing up, making discoveries, and wandering away. It was a letdown.
The worst part of the book is that Brooks tried, emphasis on that word, to write a sex scene from Catherine’s perspective. I don’t think he understands sex from a woman’s perspective. I almost threw the book when Catherine wanted to be “split like an atom” and “have him better explore her canyons.” (Both those phrases being paraphrases, of course.) And I won’t talk about the scene where she’s lonely and pleasures herself for the first time.
The best part of the book, and yet the most disappointing, is its potential to be more than it was. When I used my imagination, it was fantastic. It wasn’t all there. It wasn’t all it could be, but it was an excellent idea for a book. I only wish it had been more.
(I received a copy of PAINTED HORSES as part of the Goodreads First Reads giveaway program. This review is cross-posted between my blog & my Goodreads account.)
As a woman, I was caught by the idea of a female archaeologist – a childhood dream of mine – working the ancient native lands there.
So to say I entered PAINTED HORSES with high hopes would not be an understatement.
To say I left PAINTED HORSES with a sense of unfinished disappointment would also not be an understatement.
It’s clear that Brooks knows what he’s talking about when it comes to horses, the American West, and World War II. Had the story truly been focused on that, it might have been so much better.
John H accounts for the half the story, and his story is told in snatches of the past using first person, present tense. He’s a man of the horses, I suppose one could say. He knows everything there is to know about them. His story is interesting enough.
It’s clear too that Brooks doesn’t really understand his female lead character. Catherine LeMay is the female archaeologist in a time when women were not in that profession. Half the story is hers, told in third person, past tense – even when the focus goes back to a few years earlier when she worked in London. She spent a lot of time worrying about her sunburn, her jagged nails, and how many sanitary napkins she needed to take on a camping trip when her time of the month came. Sure, she loved archaeology but it was as though Brooks wanted to make sure no one forgot she was a woman. It was a very 1950s-era portrayal of women.
And it irritated me.
The two supporting characters in the book – Catherine’s native guide Miriam and her range guide, and John H’s nemesis, Jack Allen – are the better written characters. I do feel like Miriam was created because Brooks thought Catherine needed a girlfriend, another irritating thing, but she served her purpose well. Jack Allen, the antagonist to everyone in the story, is by far the most interesting. I wanted to read more about him. He kept showing up, making discoveries, and wandering away. It was a letdown.
The worst part of the book is that Brooks tried, emphasis on that word, to write a sex scene from Catherine’s perspective. I don’t think he understands sex from a woman’s perspective. I almost threw the book when Catherine wanted to be “split like an atom” and “have him better explore her canyons.” (Both those phrases being paraphrases, of course.) And I won’t talk about the scene where she’s lonely and pleasures herself for the first time.
The best part of the book, and yet the most disappointing, is its potential to be more than it was. When I used my imagination, it was fantastic. It wasn’t all there. It wasn’t all it could be, but it was an excellent idea for a book. I only wish it had been more.
(I received a copy of PAINTED HORSES as part of the Goodreads First Reads giveaway program. This review is cross-posted between my blog & my Goodreads account.)
October 15, 2020
In this sprawling saga, protagonist Catherine Lemay, a novice archeologist, travels from New York to Montana to evaluate if there is anything of historical significance in the area targeted for flooding to create a hydroelectric dam. The year is 1956. She has one summer to investigate a vast swath of canyon. She is ill-equipped to handle such a massive task. Her guide appears to be more interested in finding wild horses than helping with her assignment. She enlists the assistance of a young Crow woman. She meets a reclusive horseman and WWII veteran. We learn their backstories via flashbacks.
Brooks does an excellent job of describing the harsh Montana landscape, the wild bands of horses, and the perils of the plains. He sets up the opposing forces – historic preservation versus industrialization, human against nature, a greenhorn woman in a macho environment. The writing is expressive, in passages such as:
“The animal flared like a cobra, lips curling from yellow teeth as crooked as the fingers of a witch. She jumped back with her breath in her throat. The horse shook its head and stamped a hoof. This was no regular horse but a demon horse, garish and primeval with symbols in yellow and red, rings around one eye and bands up its legs and the splayed print of a human hand plastered on a flank. She fought to reject the notion she’d come face-to-face with the maniacal ghost of a war pony.”
It is an ambitious novel, maybe a bit too ambitious. It is slow in developing, where not much happens for long stretches. It involves a typical star-crossed romance. While it has its good points and drawbacks, I feel the was worth my time and I would read another by this author.
3.5
Brooks does an excellent job of describing the harsh Montana landscape, the wild bands of horses, and the perils of the plains. He sets up the opposing forces – historic preservation versus industrialization, human against nature, a greenhorn woman in a macho environment. The writing is expressive, in passages such as:
“The animal flared like a cobra, lips curling from yellow teeth as crooked as the fingers of a witch. She jumped back with her breath in her throat. The horse shook its head and stamped a hoof. This was no regular horse but a demon horse, garish and primeval with symbols in yellow and red, rings around one eye and bands up its legs and the splayed print of a human hand plastered on a flank. She fought to reject the notion she’d come face-to-face with the maniacal ghost of a war pony.”
It is an ambitious novel, maybe a bit too ambitious. It is slow in developing, where not much happens for long stretches. It involves a typical star-crossed romance. While it has its good points and drawbacks, I feel the was worth my time and I would read another by this author.
3.5
September 8, 2015
I loved this book! Everything about it. If it had not been for one of my reading groups I may never have heard of it and that would have been a shame.
A beyond plucky heroine, a young archaeologist, is hired by the Smithsonian Institute to find any historical relics that will end up under water once a new dam is built on former Native American ground in Montana. It is the mid 1950s and Katherine is dealing with being a woman in a completely man's world along with the strict upbringing she has internalized from her mother.
But she has a great passion for archaeology and a good bit of grit as well as the unconquerable urge to fight back against any restraints. She overcomes many barriers and fights with all she has but...no spoilers!
The writing is highly accomplished, as though this were Malcolm Brooks fourth or fifth novel instead of his first. A slew of complex characters and his political awareness of the depredations caused by progress, power, and high finance create so much drama and tension that I could not put it down.
Don't be dismayed by the marketing that calls this a Western. It is but mostly because of the setting and those amazing painted horses. Maybe you could call it a literary western. Just read it!
A beyond plucky heroine, a young archaeologist, is hired by the Smithsonian Institute to find any historical relics that will end up under water once a new dam is built on former Native American ground in Montana. It is the mid 1950s and Katherine is dealing with being a woman in a completely man's world along with the strict upbringing she has internalized from her mother.
But she has a great passion for archaeology and a good bit of grit as well as the unconquerable urge to fight back against any restraints. She overcomes many barriers and fights with all she has but...no spoilers!
The writing is highly accomplished, as though this were Malcolm Brooks fourth or fifth novel instead of his first. A slew of complex characters and his political awareness of the depredations caused by progress, power, and high finance create so much drama and tension that I could not put it down.
Don't be dismayed by the marketing that calls this a Western. It is but mostly because of the setting and those amazing painted horses. Maybe you could call it a literary western. Just read it!
Read
March 31, 2014 I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway.
The book opens with this sentence fragment: London, even the smell of it. As I continued reading, I quickly became confused. Is this woman in England or in Montana? I had to read the first section of Chapter One three times before I understood what was going on. I saw several more sentence fragments in this first section. Here’s another example: Minuscule horsemen galloping. In a later section of Chapter One I found this one: Eaten by the Apache.
Later in Chapter One, young archeologist Catherine Lemay heads alone into the Montana canyon wilderness driving a converted Dodge army ambulance. She encounters a man severely beating a horse, takes no action to stop this cruelty and continues her journey. Her vehicle bottoms out and, while trying to turn it around and head back, a rear tire is punctured. She’s never learned how to fix a flat tire and decides to make the long hike back to civilization. Somehow I couldn’t muster up any empathy for this character.
All of this and more happens in the first forty pages. Along the way I noticed problems with commas and questionable uses of the M dash and ellipsis. Author Malcolm Brooks has a bold and distinctive writing style but it sometimes gets in the way of telling the story. Since this version is an uncorrected proof, I hope the manuscript gets a good copy edit before formal publication in August.
I quit reading the book after the first chapter. In fairness to the author and publisher, I didn’t give the book a numerical rating.
The book opens with this sentence fragment: London, even the smell of it. As I continued reading, I quickly became confused. Is this woman in England or in Montana? I had to read the first section of Chapter One three times before I understood what was going on. I saw several more sentence fragments in this first section. Here’s another example: Minuscule horsemen galloping. In a later section of Chapter One I found this one: Eaten by the Apache.
Later in Chapter One, young archeologist Catherine Lemay heads alone into the Montana canyon wilderness driving a converted Dodge army ambulance. She encounters a man severely beating a horse, takes no action to stop this cruelty and continues her journey. Her vehicle bottoms out and, while trying to turn it around and head back, a rear tire is punctured. She’s never learned how to fix a flat tire and decides to make the long hike back to civilization. Somehow I couldn’t muster up any empathy for this character.
All of this and more happens in the first forty pages. Along the way I noticed problems with commas and questionable uses of the M dash and ellipsis. Author Malcolm Brooks has a bold and distinctive writing style but it sometimes gets in the way of telling the story. Since this version is an uncorrected proof, I hope the manuscript gets a good copy edit before formal publication in August.
I quit reading the book after the first chapter. In fairness to the author and publisher, I didn’t give the book a numerical rating.
February 7, 2015
Malcolm Brooks is a very talented writer. He consistently uses words to color his scenes so well that the reader can smell and hear what his characters are experiencing and the characters themselves emerge as complete and complex beings who evoke the full range of human emotion. The central character in PAINTED HORSES is a young woman archaeologist, Catherine Lemay. She has taken on a job from the Smithsonian to search a canyon in Montana for anything of historical significance, prior to its’ flooding as part of a hydroelectric project. An assignment for which Catherine feels she may be too inexperienced and ill-suited.
This novel is in many ways like an archaeological dig. Things are revealed as layers are peeled back. Sometimes this happens suddenly and unexpectedly as when the German bombing of London blew away more than a thousand years of English life to open windows into ancient Londinium, but more often revelation is achieved slowly by persistent scraping and digging. The people in this book require the reader to view how they act in response to the world around them to understand who they are, just as a single artifact needs context for its’ true purpose to be understood. Brooks has written a wonderful book, set in the post World War II American west, where the advance of what passes for civilization is rapidly changing the land and its’ people. It explores love and the concepts of freedom and justice. PAINTED HORSES involves you in the hopes and dreams of its’ characters and makes you wish for more when it is over. Don’t miss out, read this book!
This novel is in many ways like an archaeological dig. Things are revealed as layers are peeled back. Sometimes this happens suddenly and unexpectedly as when the German bombing of London blew away more than a thousand years of English life to open windows into ancient Londinium, but more often revelation is achieved slowly by persistent scraping and digging. The people in this book require the reader to view how they act in response to the world around them to understand who they are, just as a single artifact needs context for its’ true purpose to be understood. Brooks has written a wonderful book, set in the post World War II American west, where the advance of what passes for civilization is rapidly changing the land and its’ people. It explores love and the concepts of freedom and justice. PAINTED HORSES involves you in the hopes and dreams of its’ characters and makes you wish for more when it is over. Don’t miss out, read this book!
September 6, 2014
Uncorrected proof copy received through GoodReads giveaway program - thanks to Grove Atlantic for providing it.
This is an ambitious and engaging novel from first-time author Brooks. Painted Horses is being compared to Cormac McCarthy's Borderlands trilogy, but thankfully is not written in the same style; Brooks at least uses quotation marks when one of his characters is speaking. However, incomplete sentences or fragments are used and, while this may not detract from the narrative or mean much to the reader, it is a pet peeve of mine and a good story deserves better grammar.
There is some jumping back and forth between the time the novel is taking place (1950's Montana) and the past from its two main characters, pianist-turned-archeologist Catherine Le May (working on a dig excavating Londinium in the post-WW II era) and painter, soldier, fugitive, horseman John H (his early childhood and his time serving in the U.S. cavalry during World War II).
This is a story of myth, of history and the future, of love and loss, of romance and heartbreak, of heroism and betrayal. All that being said, there is a sense that the tale was not finished, but it may now only be left to the reader's imagination.
This is an ambitious and engaging novel from first-time author Brooks. Painted Horses is being compared to Cormac McCarthy's Borderlands trilogy, but thankfully is not written in the same style; Brooks at least uses quotation marks when one of his characters is speaking. However, incomplete sentences or fragments are used and, while this may not detract from the narrative or mean much to the reader, it is a pet peeve of mine and a good story deserves better grammar.
There is some jumping back and forth between the time the novel is taking place (1950's Montana) and the past from its two main characters, pianist-turned-archeologist Catherine Le May (working on a dig excavating Londinium in the post-WW II era) and painter, soldier, fugitive, horseman John H (his early childhood and his time serving in the U.S. cavalry during World War II).
This is a story of myth, of history and the future, of love and loss, of romance and heartbreak, of heroism and betrayal. All that being said, there is a sense that the tale was not finished, but it may now only be left to the reader's imagination.
August 31, 2014
This was a GoodReads Giveaway book that I won. As I have a passion for horses and an interest in Native Americas and the Western part of our country, I really enjoyed the descriptions of the area & the Native customs. I cringed with disgust at the behavior of "big business" but I have no doubt that this kind of behavior went on in that era. I was definitely "rooting" for Catherine & John H with their passion for seeking out archaeological finds and the "old" ways. It was a good book with a lot of "history" given on each character. I would recommend it.
October 10, 2014
What a different kind of story! A young woman becomes infatuated with archeology around 1955 instead of pursuing her musical love of the piano. She is hired by the Smithsonian to search for artifacts in the Montana wilderness before a dam project is started and everything is lost forever. She meets mustanger John H, a true patriot of this area, along with native Indians and those individuals determined to stop what Catherine is doing. There doesn't seem much of interest here when I describe the story in these simple words, but Brooks sneaks in so much more about the impermanence of this land and what we must do to maintain what the past has given us. Brooks writes about a vanishing earth and certain ways of life from the past. Through the determination of Catherine Lemay the reader sees how people fight progress and tradition and how important passion is to divert you from the road originally paved for you. I really found myself along side the characters in the story and hated it when I turned the page and there was nothing left to read. Brooks reminds me a little of Larry McMurtry with his Western themes, but Brooks takes the story a little farther into the future and provides us with where we all might be headed.
August 1, 2014
This is a fantastic first novel. It’s a bit of the classic western, with lots of wild horses and open spaces. Yet it takes us down new trails that lead to unexpected, but exciting places. A young woman archeologist, Catherine LeMay, fresh from university and an opportune find in the war torn rubble that still defines parts of London 10 years after the end of World War LL. Catherine is now headed to the American West. The Smithsonian and a Montana power and light company are sponsoring her to search a remote canyon for archeological finds prior to a major dam construction project. Has she really been chosen for her scientific credits or has she been chosen because she is a young woman in a male dominated profession? A young woman who might be overwhelmed by the immensity of the job and easily manipulated to give the expected report? Catherine will prove as tough in her own way as the weathered cowboy she meets on her first day in Montana.
John H. is as wild and weathered as the mustang he rides. He has another side, however, which Catherine discovers. He has turned a life long talent for painting into an homage for the horses he once caught and sold. John H. has a checkered past, but his love of the West and it’s wild horses is as true as his attraction to Catherine. Each will help the other to seek their goals, but there is much to overcome in a world now run by money and power. Book provided for review by Grove Press.
John H. is as wild and weathered as the mustang he rides. He has another side, however, which Catherine discovers. He has turned a life long talent for painting into an homage for the horses he once caught and sold. John H. has a checkered past, but his love of the West and it’s wild horses is as true as his attraction to Catherine. Each will help the other to seek their goals, but there is much to overcome in a world now run by money and power. Book provided for review by Grove Press.
November 28, 2017
An incredible debut novel! Set in the 1950s in the rough and tumble world of Montana with flashbacks to World War II (and earlier), it's the story of a young Eastern archaeologist who discovers the culture of the Crow and cowboys. It's the story of an Army cavalry vet who has a remarkable ability to communicate and train with horses, but not very well with people. It's also the story of industry coming to the West and the price that is paid for it.
This is a wonderful book on so many levels. One, it has great characters and a great plot. Two, c0ming from Eastern Washington State, the landscape (which is another character in the book) is very familiar to me. Three, the writing just kept me going the whole way through.
One thing about this story and the characters. I had to keep telling myself this was set in the 1950s. Unless they mentioned things like Thelonious Monk or the Blackboard Jungle, I felt like it could be happening today. I felt I knew people like they were describing in the book and that area of Montana probably hasn't changed much.
Highly recommend this book!
This is a wonderful book on so many levels. One, it has great characters and a great plot. Two, c0ming from Eastern Washington State, the landscape (which is another character in the book) is very familiar to me. Three, the writing just kept me going the whole way through.
One thing about this story and the characters. I had to keep telling myself this was set in the 1950s. Unless they mentioned things like Thelonious Monk or the Blackboard Jungle, I felt like it could be happening today. I felt I knew people like they were describing in the book and that area of Montana probably hasn't changed much.
Highly recommend this book!
September 28, 2021
This certainly didn’t turn out to be what I thought it would be. Because my sister is an archaeologist, I am drawn to books about archaeology. There is some of that with Catherine Lemay, a young archaeologist who goes beyond her knowledge to Montana to determine whether there are are historical artifacts before a dam will be built. But it is more the story of John H, who becomes an amazing horse handler and tames wild horses. I know nothing about horses, but surprisingly enjoyed the book, and maybe learned a little.
September 12, 2022
I believe that a review in the San Francisco Examiner put me onto this book when it came out in 2014. The story takes place near Billings, Montana in 1956. Catherine Lemay spent two years in London working an archaeological dig of Londinium, a Roman town buried beneath modern London. She has now been chosen by the Smithsonian Institute to conduct an archaeological survey of a vast canyon near Billings which is considered sacred by the Crow Indians. A hydroelectric dam is planned there, and the presence or absence of significant relics or ruins needs to be determined before the project is finalized. Her time there is destined to be intertwined with that of a number of locals, but significantly with John H, a WWII vet who has been an avid horseman since childhood, and who is entranced with a herd of wild horses who live in and around the canyon, some of whom seem to be descended from Spanish stock.
Brooks' writing is beautifully descriptive and evocative. I enjoyed this observation about English pubs and American bars:
"Despite its gauze of smoke the pub had a cheer she hadn't anticipated, with clean glass in the windows and the burnish of oiled wood. In America by contrast the small workaday bars had an almost willful pall - dank, windowless ratholes with sticky floors and dirty bathrooms, venues devised far less for socializing than serious imbibing."
As I read the flashback chapters, it struck me a number of times that I wasn't convinced that constructing the telling of the story this way was to its best advantage. At the very least though, Painted Horses is a good love story. I agree with critics who've compared Brooks' writing with Cormac McCarthy's. The two are clearly drawn to expressing similar philosophies through their characters and narrators. But I prefer McCarthy to Brooks - I believe that his style achieves its effect in a more streamlined way.
Brooks' writing is beautifully descriptive and evocative. I enjoyed this observation about English pubs and American bars:
"Despite its gauze of smoke the pub had a cheer she hadn't anticipated, with clean glass in the windows and the burnish of oiled wood. In America by contrast the small workaday bars had an almost willful pall - dank, windowless ratholes with sticky floors and dirty bathrooms, venues devised far less for socializing than serious imbibing."
As I read the flashback chapters, it struck me a number of times that I wasn't convinced that constructing the telling of the story this way was to its best advantage. At the very least though, Painted Horses is a good love story. I agree with critics who've compared Brooks' writing with Cormac McCarthy's. The two are clearly drawn to expressing similar philosophies through their characters and narrators. But I prefer McCarthy to Brooks - I believe that his style achieves its effect in a more streamlined way.
March 12, 2015
This book was unexpected.
I went into it thinking it would be a nice, somewhat fluffy, romance in the American West where there was a happily ever after and everything is good.
That's not what I got at all and I'm completely okay with that.
Painted Horses follows the story of a young archaeologist sent to Montana to discover whatever she can about a canyon before it is flooded. She is fresh out of London where a historical dig resulted in the discovery of an ancient Roman temple and the West just doesn't hold the same deep appeal to her. But she has a job to do and intends to get it done. John H is a reclusive and mysterious mustanger who shows her that there is more beauty to the West than just its historical value. His story is wrought with loss and loneliness so while he is helping her, she is helping him overcome his past.
This book skips around to different times and locations using flashbacks. In order to fill gaps of timeleft by wandering around the land, the reader learns more about the history of the characters. It goes from New York, to London, to Italy and France and is a wonderful journey. The characters all have depth and history to them that isn't developed in just a huge info dump. Much like an archaeological dig, you discover things slowly and finally come to understand their lives and how they interact with others.
I also appreciated the environmental aspect to this. So many of our historical and environmental treasures were lost due to dam building in the West. It felt very similar to the Grand Coulee dam project and equally heartbreaking. I hate to see the landscape suffer for a very temporary solution to water shortages. This book makes the losses a little bit more real when considering how many dams have been built and are continuing to be built.
Unfortunately, this book did have some negative points for me. I thought that the addition of Catherine being engaged what somewhat unnecessary. She was fiercely independent and wasn't listening to her parents to begin with, so why even get engaged?
Second, the chain of command was unclear. Was she working for the Smithsonian? The power company? Why was she given so few resources? Even if she was set up to fail, they should have at least given her a vehicle worth of crossing the land. The illusion of the possibility of success was never established so I couldn't fathom why she was so surprised in the end.
Painted Horses is more than a romance. It's more than a Western. It's historical and diverse, crossing countries, oceans, and decades. While it was not one of my favorites, it is a good book and worth the read, especially if you are considering the environmental side of things.
Full review to be posted at
I went into it thinking it would be a nice, somewhat fluffy, romance in the American West where there was a happily ever after and everything is good.
That's not what I got at all and I'm completely okay with that.
Painted Horses follows the story of a young archaeologist sent to Montana to discover whatever she can about a canyon before it is flooded. She is fresh out of London where a historical dig resulted in the discovery of an ancient Roman temple and the West just doesn't hold the same deep appeal to her. But she has a job to do and intends to get it done. John H is a reclusive and mysterious mustanger who shows her that there is more beauty to the West than just its historical value. His story is wrought with loss and loneliness so while he is helping her, she is helping him overcome his past.
This book skips around to different times and locations using flashbacks. In order to fill gaps of timeleft by wandering around the land, the reader learns more about the history of the characters. It goes from New York, to London, to Italy and France and is a wonderful journey. The characters all have depth and history to them that isn't developed in just a huge info dump. Much like an archaeological dig, you discover things slowly and finally come to understand their lives and how they interact with others.
I also appreciated the environmental aspect to this. So many of our historical and environmental treasures were lost due to dam building in the West. It felt very similar to the Grand Coulee dam project and equally heartbreaking. I hate to see the landscape suffer for a very temporary solution to water shortages. This book makes the losses a little bit more real when considering how many dams have been built and are continuing to be built.
Unfortunately, this book did have some negative points for me. I thought that the addition of Catherine being engaged what somewhat unnecessary. She was fiercely independent and wasn't listening to her parents to begin with, so why even get engaged?
Second, the chain of command was unclear. Was she working for the Smithsonian? The power company? Why was she given so few resources? Even if she was set up to fail, they should have at least given her a vehicle worth of crossing the land. The illusion of the possibility of success was never established so I couldn't fathom why she was so surprised in the end.
Painted Horses is more than a romance. It's more than a Western. It's historical and diverse, crossing countries, oceans, and decades. While it was not one of my favorites, it is a good book and worth the read, especially if you are considering the environmental side of things.
Full review to be posted at
March 18, 2015
My thoughts:
This debut novel explored themes of preservation/environmental issues vs. progress, the complications of the past intruding on the present to fulfill future ambitions, and a peek into the expectations of women based on class and race. The primary setting for the novel is the 1950s Montana while flashbacks into the history of the main characters provided for me intriguing events that kept me reading when the storyline faltered for me.
The setup for the story was great and the prose transported to the canyons/open spaces of Montana – I vividly saw the landscape, one that I have not visited personally.
I will admit that my favorite character was the mysterious John H. – anytime he was on the scene I was engrossed in his storytelling.
I had mixed reactions to Catherine. I like it showed her character living her life by rote expectations based on her race and class but when she found something outside these expectations she allowed herself to take a chance to step outside the box. It was her pluckiness vs. her naivety that for me often did not sit right with me.
Another interesting aspect of the book was the exploration of the Crow culture and how they were also divided on the issue of preservation vs. progress. The young Crow woman Miriam was a nice contrast to Catherine and showed how similar outlooks on life are reflected by one’s culture and ethnicity.
All of the characters had to deal with their own ambitions, conscience, and what they believed was right.
This debut novel explored themes of preservation/environmental issues vs. progress, the complications of the past intruding on the present to fulfill future ambitions, and a peek into the expectations of women based on class and race. The primary setting for the novel is the 1950s Montana while flashbacks into the history of the main characters provided for me intriguing events that kept me reading when the storyline faltered for me.
The setup for the story was great and the prose transported to the canyons/open spaces of Montana – I vividly saw the landscape, one that I have not visited personally.
I will admit that my favorite character was the mysterious John H. – anytime he was on the scene I was engrossed in his storytelling.
I had mixed reactions to Catherine. I like it showed her character living her life by rote expectations based on her race and class but when she found something outside these expectations she allowed herself to take a chance to step outside the box. It was her pluckiness vs. her naivety that for me often did not sit right with me.
Another interesting aspect of the book was the exploration of the Crow culture and how they were also divided on the issue of preservation vs. progress. The young Crow woman Miriam was a nice contrast to Catherine and showed how similar outlooks on life are reflected by one’s culture and ethnicity.
All of the characters had to deal with their own ambitions, conscience, and what they believed was right.
December 24, 2019
4.5 stars. This is a big, literary Western, my favorite genre, filled with horses and grand vistas and a bit of magical realism. It took a while to get into, but I am glad I stuck it out. It covers a lot of ground, and alternates between two characters: Catherine, a young archaeologist and John H, an almost mythical cowboy figure who is both artist and horse-whisperer.
I loved John H’s story, and raced through these parts, which took us all over the country, as well as to Italy, France, and Spain. Catherine was a less believable character to me, and when she traipses woefully unprepared into a wild canyon not once, but twice, (out of what - passion, ambition, stupidity?) I was left shaking my head at her. (Although I suppose this means I actually cared about this character, right?)
Loved the horses in this story, although there is a scene at the beginning, as well as one near the end, that might turn off the squeamish. The very last part of the book became a little too action-movie-like for me, but I was satisfied with the ultimate resolution.
All in all, not quite a 5 for me, but close.
I loved John H’s story, and raced through these parts, which took us all over the country, as well as to Italy, France, and Spain. Catherine was a less believable character to me, and when she traipses woefully unprepared into a wild canyon not once, but twice, (out of what - passion, ambition, stupidity?) I was left shaking my head at her. (Although I suppose this means I actually cared about this character, right?)
Loved the horses in this story, although there is a scene at the beginning, as well as one near the end, that might turn off the squeamish. The very last part of the book became a little too action-movie-like for me, but I was satisfied with the ultimate resolution.
All in all, not quite a 5 for me, but close.
October 1, 2014
It's not very often that I buy a BRAND NEW hardback book...but I was stuck in the airport and decided to splurge. I wish I hadn't picked this book.
If you're like me, you might be about half way through the book and checking reviews to wonder if you should even bother finishing it. If that's the case, I would suggest that you finish... somewhere around 300+ pages into the book it does improve some.
This book presents itself like a giant outline -- the basics of what could have been a wonderful story are all here. But the incredible, possible, what could be amazing detail are all lacking. There's something to be said for letting the mind of the reader fill in the blanks, but I felt like this book left everything to the imagination. There was so much possibility to paint a beautiful picture... but it just wasn't there. The author should have gone back through his outline and added all the adjectives, the descriptions, the beauty...
If you're like me, you might be about half way through the book and checking reviews to wonder if you should even bother finishing it. If that's the case, I would suggest that you finish... somewhere around 300+ pages into the book it does improve some.
This book presents itself like a giant outline -- the basics of what could have been a wonderful story are all here. But the incredible, possible, what could be amazing detail are all lacking. There's something to be said for letting the mind of the reader fill in the blanks, but I felt like this book left everything to the imagination. There was so much possibility to paint a beautiful picture... but it just wasn't there. The author should have gone back through his outline and added all the adjectives, the descriptions, the beauty...
August 17, 2024
Malcolm Brooks did a really good job on this one for the most part. The end was a bit rushed and convoluted, but I loved the rest of it.
Catherine Lemay is the MC, although I assume it was spelled with a "T" given some of the characters' pronunciation issues. I am confused because it shows spelled like this in the description, as I listened to the Julia Whelan-narrated version. Julia works her narrative magic to bring it to life!
It was fun to learn the history of the Crow and the Billings Dam from another place from my childhood.
Overall, it was a great way of showing how much slower Montana progresses than the rest of the world and how historical fiction can last longer in this state.
Solid 4 Stars!
Catherine Lemay is the MC, although I assume it was spelled with a "T" given some of the characters' pronunciation issues. I am confused because it shows spelled like this in the description, as I listened to the Julia Whelan-narrated version. Julia works her narrative magic to bring it to life!
It was fun to learn the history of the Crow and the Billings Dam from another place from my childhood.
Overall, it was a great way of showing how much slower Montana progresses than the rest of the world and how historical fiction can last longer in this state.
Solid 4 Stars!
September 8, 2014
This should have been a great book. The setting is awe inspiring, the characters well drawn and interesting, and the plot kept me reading when I wanted to give up on Brooks' very disjointed and sometimes downright confusing narrative style. I very nearly didn't read this book at all, the first two pages of description/memory/flashback/dream were probably the worst opening pages of any novel I have ever read. It doesn't get quite that bad again but I had to back track on numerous occasions when the paragraph I was reading wasn't making sense any more.
However, for me, a novel is mostly about the story and this is a great story.
However, for me, a novel is mostly about the story and this is a great story.
April 24, 2021
This book is sort of perplexing to me. It left me feeling good, loved the setting and liked the characters, but I can’t quite figure out how or why the two main characters in this book were put together. They are sort of two random characters that are just sort of coincidentally brought together. The book is set in the mid 1950’s. Catherine is a 23 year old woman that was raised with privilege, and sort of stumbles into becoming an archeologist. She is hired by a developer to survey a canyon in Montana before the construction of a new dam. Along the way, she meets and has a brief relationship with John H, a horseman living off the land. After thinking about it for a while, it was really the description of the landscapes and the John’s relationship with horses that I found most compelling. The rest felt fairly superficial.
April 4, 2019
Two stars out of five
I'll start by saying this book was not for me. I struggled to follow the format in parts and half-way through I almost gave up on it. I couldn't connect with the story. Overall the descriptions of the scenery throughout the book were very well done, but I felt that it lacked when it came to the characters. I like being able to connect with the characters as I read and found it hard to do that in this book. It seemed to be drawn out in sections, but then rushed the ending leaving me feeling disappointed.
I'll start by saying this book was not for me. I struggled to follow the format in parts and half-way through I almost gave up on it. I couldn't connect with the story. Overall the descriptions of the scenery throughout the book were very well done, but I felt that it lacked when it came to the characters. I like being able to connect with the characters as I read and found it hard to do that in this book. It seemed to be drawn out in sections, but then rushed the ending leaving me feeling disappointed.
January 25, 2022
I usually like stories that have multiple plot lines all moving toward each other. In this case, though, there might have been a few too many ideas all trying to make sense together. I really liked the flashbacks into the main characters' pasts, but some of their interactions in the present seemed a bit too forced.
August 18, 2024
3.5 - good writing but I didn’t care about any of the characters except John H and Miriam.
September 22, 2021
AUDIO. A little long in places with descriptions of horse training and philosophy but I enjoyed the story. Good narrator.
November 17, 2025
It’s not that this book was bad… it was well written. Just boring.
August 25, 2014
This first novel turned out to be a great surprise, an entertaining Western story with well-done characters (both the bad guys and good guys/gals), actual action (too many contemporary novels lack action of any kind) and a satisfying, not-too-happy but not-too-sad ending. The writing was occasionally beautiful and less-occasionally overdone--fewer similes would have helped--but it never got so bad I felt annoyed. I was truly swept away by many of the descriptions of wild horses and Montana landscapes; for the first time in a while I remembered why, or rather *felt* the old feelings why, as a kid it was a dream of mine to live out west. I also respected Malcolm Brooks' detailed knowledge of his setting--I felt like he'd be a great guy to go hiking with.
Much has been made in reviews of how well Brooks created Catherine, an archaeologist and one of the two protagonists. There were some details I could quibble with: what pre-teen girl *ever* does a good enough job the first time she puts kohl liner on her eyes that a boy in her class whistles at her? Answer: NONE; most spend quite a while looking more like raccoons than like Cleopatra. And Catherine's still a little too perfect, a man's vision of the ideal woman--a musical prodigy, a rebel but not too much of one, beautiful (she'll get her hands dirty, but she'll also look hot for an evening out, and she can dance, too), raring to go in bed all night long once she meets the Right Man. At no point did I believe a 23-year-old could speak like she did; she sounded like a seasoned woman in her mid-40s. But for the most part I agreed that she was better sketched than most female characters by male authors--she was neither too confident a la Angelina Jolie in "Tomb Raider," nor too much of a princess on a pedestal, and I liked her sense of humor. The male protagonist, John H., was just as idealized as Catherine (picture the Marlboro-Man-meets-the-horse-whisperer plus an artist's palette minus the cigarettes), so at least they were balanced.
Malcolm Brooks isn't Cormac McCarthy, at least not yet, but I don't think we need another Cormac McCarthy (the one we've got does that job so well). What we do need are more writers who know how to craft a plot, real-life characters to inhabit it and a haunting landscape in which to place them. Brooks is on his way, and I look forward to his next book.
Much has been made in reviews of how well Brooks created Catherine, an archaeologist and one of the two protagonists. There were some details I could quibble with: what pre-teen girl *ever* does a good enough job the first time she puts kohl liner on her eyes that a boy in her class whistles at her? Answer: NONE; most spend quite a while looking more like raccoons than like Cleopatra. And Catherine's still a little too perfect, a man's vision of the ideal woman--a musical prodigy, a rebel but not too much of one, beautiful (she'll get her hands dirty, but she'll also look hot for an evening out, and she can dance, too), raring to go in bed all night long once she meets the Right Man. At no point did I believe a 23-year-old could speak like she did; she sounded like a seasoned woman in her mid-40s. But for the most part I agreed that she was better sketched than most female characters by male authors--she was neither too confident a la Angelina Jolie in "Tomb Raider," nor too much of a princess on a pedestal, and I liked her sense of humor. The male protagonist, John H., was just as idealized as Catherine (picture the Marlboro-Man-meets-the-horse-whisperer plus an artist's palette minus the cigarettes), so at least they were balanced.
Malcolm Brooks isn't Cormac McCarthy, at least not yet, but I don't think we need another Cormac McCarthy (the one we've got does that job so well). What we do need are more writers who know how to craft a plot, real-life characters to inhabit it and a haunting landscape in which to place them. Brooks is on his way, and I look forward to his next book.
October 13, 2014
This book is set in 1950's Montana. Young Catherine Lemay, an archeologist, is sent to a vast canyon in Montana to determine whether there is any historical significance before the construction of a dam commences.
When she arrives, she is out of her element, but proves herself by taking control of her situation and painstakingly navigates the area with a gruff guide, Jack Allen. Catherine also encounters an elusive horseman, John H, that she is drawn to, but can't fathom how he will influence her work.
We get the back story of Catherine and John H in flashbacks and these stories eventually intersect with their current lives in Montana. But a lot of the times, the flashbacks feel disconnected to the narrative and almost superfluous. And the tone takes an odd turn at the end that felt jarring and not in keeping with the rest of the book.
I think there is some interesting discussion here of women and their changing roles post-WWII. But I also felt the connection between Catherine and John H wasn't developed enough to truly believe in the end.
The scenes with horses and the encounters John H has with them are well drawn and I liked being in those moments.
When she arrives, she is out of her element, but proves herself by taking control of her situation and painstakingly navigates the area with a gruff guide, Jack Allen. Catherine also encounters an elusive horseman, John H, that she is drawn to, but can't fathom how he will influence her work.
We get the back story of Catherine and John H in flashbacks and these stories eventually intersect with their current lives in Montana. But a lot of the times, the flashbacks feel disconnected to the narrative and almost superfluous. And the tone takes an odd turn at the end that felt jarring and not in keeping with the rest of the book.
I think there is some interesting discussion here of women and their changing roles post-WWII. But I also felt the connection between Catherine and John H wasn't developed enough to truly believe in the end.
The scenes with horses and the encounters John H has with them are well drawn and I liked being in those moments.
August 4, 2014
Deep seated parental expectations collide with modern aspirations of youth. A young woman raised on Bach and manners , sent to Oxford to study piano, finds her love of archaeology as she digs in the depths of London's WWII destruction. Back in the states, working on a summer project for the Smithsonian to excavate in Montana prior to a massive dam and hydroelectric project, she finds herself in the middle of an entirely different experience.
Anger, hostility, resentment deep as the canyon. Progress vs. posterity and history. Soaring landscapes and searing heat and frenetic Tribal dancing. Wild horses and wild emotions. "White Only" bars that exclude Indians. Power means money and money means power, and those who want both will stop at nothing.
From New York to Italy to Basque Spain to Montana, the sweep of this debut novel is majestic, the difficult decisions are frightening and the implications troubling and fearful.
I read this ARC courtesy of the publisher.
Anger, hostility, resentment deep as the canyon. Progress vs. posterity and history. Soaring landscapes and searing heat and frenetic Tribal dancing. Wild horses and wild emotions. "White Only" bars that exclude Indians. Power means money and money means power, and those who want both will stop at nothing.
From New York to Italy to Basque Spain to Montana, the sweep of this debut novel is majestic, the difficult decisions are frightening and the implications troubling and fearful.
I read this ARC courtesy of the publisher.
March 20, 2015
Catherine Lemay was expected to further her talent as a pianist and marry an acceptable businessman. Her dreams, however, led her into archaeology. Although she had no experience in the west she was hired to do a study of a proposed dam site in Montana. Here she met with people who had different value systems and life experiences including a young Crow Indian girl who she hired to help her understand what she was seeing, a loner cowboy who had a love of horses and occasionally painted them – not just pictures of them, but actually painted on the horses, a rough “mustanger” who was her guide but had ulterior motives. And so forth…. The story had interesting parts, but really didn’t hang together well. The story of the horses was fragmented and I never really knew what was with the idea of the painted horses. The ending seemed rushed and unfinished.
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