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Cadillac Jack
Cadillac Jack is a rodeo-cowboy-turned-antique-scout whose nomadic, womanizing life -- centered on his classic pearl-colored Cadillac -- rambles between the Texas flatlands of flea markets and small-time auctions and Washington, D.C.'s political-social life of parties, hustlers, vixens, and spies. Along the way he meets a cast of indelibly etched characters: among them, the strikingly beautiful, social-climbing Cindy Sanders; Boog Miller, the tackily-dressing millionaire good ole boy who patronizes Jack's business and who has more political muscle than a litter of lobbyists; Khaki Descartes, the pushy, brain-picking, Washington woman reporter; Freddy Fu, an undercover CIA agent working out of a greasy barbecue joint called The Cover-Up; and Jean Arber, the mother of two and a fledgling antique-store owner who can't quite figure out if she'll marry Jack or not.
370 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1982
311 people are currently reading
927 people want to read
About the author
Larry McMurtry
150 books4,093 followersLarry Jeff McMurtry was an American novelist, essayist, and screenwriter whose work was predominantly set in either the Old West or contemporary Texas. His novels included Horseman, Pass By (1962), The Last Picture Show (1966), and Terms of Endearment (1975), which were adapted into films. Films adapted from McMurtry's works earned 34 Oscar nominations (13 wins). He was also a prominent book collector and bookseller.
His 1985 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Lonesome Dove was adapted into a television miniseries that earned 18 Emmy Award nominations (seven wins). The subsequent three novels in his Lonesome Dove series were adapted as three more miniseries, earning eight more Emmy nominations. McMurtry and co-writer Diana Ossana adapted the screenplay for Brokeback Mountain (2005), which earned eight Academy Award nominations with three wins, including McMurtry and Ossana for Best Adapted Screenplay. In 2014, McMurtry received the National Humanities Medal.
In Tracy Daugherty's 2023 biography of McMurtry, the biographer quotes critic Dave Hickey as saying about McMurtry: "Larry is a writer, and it's kind of like being a critter. If you leave a cow alone, he'll eat grass. If you leave Larry alone, he'll write books. When he's in public, he may say hello and goodbye, but otherwise he is just resting, getting ready to go write."
His 1985 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Lonesome Dove was adapted into a television miniseries that earned 18 Emmy Award nominations (seven wins). The subsequent three novels in his Lonesome Dove series were adapted as three more miniseries, earning eight more Emmy nominations. McMurtry and co-writer Diana Ossana adapted the screenplay for Brokeback Mountain (2005), which earned eight Academy Award nominations with three wins, including McMurtry and Ossana for Best Adapted Screenplay. In 2014, McMurtry received the National Humanities Medal.
In Tracy Daugherty's 2023 biography of McMurtry, the biographer quotes critic Dave Hickey as saying about McMurtry: "Larry is a writer, and it's kind of like being a critter. If you leave a cow alone, he'll eat grass. If you leave Larry alone, he'll write books. When he's in public, he may say hello and goodbye, but otherwise he is just resting, getting ready to go write."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 103 reviews
May 24, 2019
”I make my share of mistakes, but one I never make is to underestimate the power of things. People imbued from childhood with the myth of the primacy of feeling seldom like to admit they really want things as much as they might want love, but my career has convinced me that plenty of them do. And some want things a lot worse than they want love.”
Larry McMurtry or Cadillac Jack
Cadillac Jack derives his name from the transportation he preferred to use for travelling all around the countryside, a ”pearl-colored Cadillac with peach velour interior.” He is a retired rodeo cowboy who has found his true calling in life, chasing down antiques along with a series of women in every port of call. Love and lust are indistinguishable, whether he is talking about a gold leafed, quadripartite, Russian icon or a long legged, curvy, antique store owner. He does sometimes play up his ancestry from Texas, especially when he is seducing women in, say, the Washington D. C. area.
”What I supposed, when I finally set off for Georgetown, was that even a lady who owned three trendy stores might derive a faint buzz from the combination of doeskin jacket, yellow boots, albino-diamondback hatband, and Valentino hubcaps, not to mention six feet five of me.
In the event, Cindy hardly gave the combination a glance.
‘It was a little over-studied,’ she said later, with characteristic candor.”
Over-studied or not, Cindy, though engaged to be married, does the be bop bang with Cadillac Jack.
He has an ex-wife, Coffee, who calls him nearly every day. He is never far from a woman he knows he can spend some time with, whether he is in Spokane, Washington, or Hope, Arkansas, or Montpelier, Vermont. If he thinks he will lack for company, he can always talk some woman into going on the road with him in search of the next great find.
Needless to say, Cadillac Jack has impulse control. If it sounds good, he doesn’t hesitate. If he could just find one new object or meet a new interesting woman every day, how could he ever die?
”One of my firmest principles is that those who sell should not keep. The minute a scout starts keeping his best finds he becomes a collector. All scouts have love affairs with objects, but true scouts have brief intense passions, not marriages. I didn’t want to own something I loved so much I wouldn’t sell it.”
You might have to get Jack good and drunk before he would ever admit it, but he feels the same way about women. He is romantic, but to keep the blush alive, he has to drift in and out of their lives and keep searching for that next woman with object issues of her own. The women who are in the trade, whether they are sellers or buyers, are most likely to understand him, however briefly, anyway.
Jack also makes a lot of lifelong friends along the way. One of them I felt an instant affinity for, as well. ”On nights when he wasn’t too drunk to hold a book, he read himself to sleep with Thucydides, Livy, Suetonius, Gibbon, and Napier. Every ugly suit he owned had a raggedy Penguin paperback in the inside pocket, always history.”
When Jack finds out that the Smithsonian is selling off warehouses full of objects, so much blood goes to his groin so quickly that he nearly passes out. He spends a good part of the book trying to get a line on a score to beat all scores, but at the same time, if he swings a deal like this, will he ever be satisfied with a pair of boots once owned by Billy the Kid or with a set of Rudolph Valentino hubcaps? Climbing the mountain to the top just might ruin his life.
Larry McMurtry
It has been a long time since I’ve read a Larry McMurtry book. He came into my mind the other day because I was thinking about one of the times I met him. He was doing a signing in Tucson. I brought up a first edition of All My Friends are Going to Be Strangers. He was tickled to see a copy. He offered to buy it from me. I said I might be more interested in selling it to you after you sign it (author signed it would at least double in value), which made him laugh. As I was reading this book, I couldn’t really separate the man that I had met on a few occasions with the man in the pearl-colored Cadillac.
McMurtry was known through the book industry as a wheeler and a dealer for books, as well as anything unusual or rare or beautiful. He was more a collector than a seller, but I’ve known of at least once when he sold off part of his book collection. Unique objects are wonderful to own, but sometimes they get used up, and one must depart on an odyssey for something new, something special.
I just briefly glanced through some of the reviews regarding this book before I started reading it. Like with most of his books, the reviews always seem to say something along the lines of, I’m not a prude, but the sex just got to be too much. I think anytime anyone starts a sentence with I’m not a prude followed by... but... they are defining themselves as a prude. Nothing wrong with that, but it is interesting that they don’t just say the amount of sex in the story made them uncomfortable. They are uncomfortable with their uncomfortableness.
I will close with a few lines that I really liked from the book that couldn’t be worked into the review. ”But a lot of hard-drinking, fast-fucking grandmothers had lost their hero.” Quite the visual McMurtry has placed in your mind, but how about this one? ”The juice of many men would stain her lips for a time, before she reduced them to mulberry-colored pulp.” Stain just really makes that line shudder worthy, or how about the bored, Rubenesque youngsters he meets in a hot tub whorehouse? ”That why we work at the Double Bubble. I’d rather suck off Congressmen than sit around the house.”
Consider yourself duly warned. If you are looking for a book that shows off his literary capabilities, grab a copy of his Pulitzer Prize winning novel Lonesome Dove. For me, I’m going to be thinking about Cadillac Jack for a long time. He might just pull up someday in my driveway with a book so perfect that it cleans out my bank account.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
Larry McMurtry or Cadillac Jack
Cadillac Jack derives his name from the transportation he preferred to use for travelling all around the countryside, a ”pearl-colored Cadillac with peach velour interior.” He is a retired rodeo cowboy who has found his true calling in life, chasing down antiques along with a series of women in every port of call. Love and lust are indistinguishable, whether he is talking about a gold leafed, quadripartite, Russian icon or a long legged, curvy, antique store owner. He does sometimes play up his ancestry from Texas, especially when he is seducing women in, say, the Washington D. C. area.
”What I supposed, when I finally set off for Georgetown, was that even a lady who owned three trendy stores might derive a faint buzz from the combination of doeskin jacket, yellow boots, albino-diamondback hatband, and Valentino hubcaps, not to mention six feet five of me.
In the event, Cindy hardly gave the combination a glance.
‘It was a little over-studied,’ she said later, with characteristic candor.”
Over-studied or not, Cindy, though engaged to be married, does the be bop bang with Cadillac Jack.
He has an ex-wife, Coffee, who calls him nearly every day. He is never far from a woman he knows he can spend some time with, whether he is in Spokane, Washington, or Hope, Arkansas, or Montpelier, Vermont. If he thinks he will lack for company, he can always talk some woman into going on the road with him in search of the next great find.
Needless to say, Cadillac Jack has impulse control. If it sounds good, he doesn’t hesitate. If he could just find one new object or meet a new interesting woman every day, how could he ever die?
”One of my firmest principles is that those who sell should not keep. The minute a scout starts keeping his best finds he becomes a collector. All scouts have love affairs with objects, but true scouts have brief intense passions, not marriages. I didn’t want to own something I loved so much I wouldn’t sell it.”
You might have to get Jack good and drunk before he would ever admit it, but he feels the same way about women. He is romantic, but to keep the blush alive, he has to drift in and out of their lives and keep searching for that next woman with object issues of her own. The women who are in the trade, whether they are sellers or buyers, are most likely to understand him, however briefly, anyway.
Jack also makes a lot of lifelong friends along the way. One of them I felt an instant affinity for, as well. ”On nights when he wasn’t too drunk to hold a book, he read himself to sleep with Thucydides, Livy, Suetonius, Gibbon, and Napier. Every ugly suit he owned had a raggedy Penguin paperback in the inside pocket, always history.”
When Jack finds out that the Smithsonian is selling off warehouses full of objects, so much blood goes to his groin so quickly that he nearly passes out. He spends a good part of the book trying to get a line on a score to beat all scores, but at the same time, if he swings a deal like this, will he ever be satisfied with a pair of boots once owned by Billy the Kid or with a set of Rudolph Valentino hubcaps? Climbing the mountain to the top just might ruin his life.
Larry McMurtry
It has been a long time since I’ve read a Larry McMurtry book. He came into my mind the other day because I was thinking about one of the times I met him. He was doing a signing in Tucson. I brought up a first edition of All My Friends are Going to Be Strangers. He was tickled to see a copy. He offered to buy it from me. I said I might be more interested in selling it to you after you sign it (author signed it would at least double in value), which made him laugh. As I was reading this book, I couldn’t really separate the man that I had met on a few occasions with the man in the pearl-colored Cadillac.
McMurtry was known through the book industry as a wheeler and a dealer for books, as well as anything unusual or rare or beautiful. He was more a collector than a seller, but I’ve known of at least once when he sold off part of his book collection. Unique objects are wonderful to own, but sometimes they get used up, and one must depart on an odyssey for something new, something special.
I just briefly glanced through some of the reviews regarding this book before I started reading it. Like with most of his books, the reviews always seem to say something along the lines of, I’m not a prude, but the sex just got to be too much. I think anytime anyone starts a sentence with I’m not a prude followed by... but... they are defining themselves as a prude. Nothing wrong with that, but it is interesting that they don’t just say the amount of sex in the story made them uncomfortable. They are uncomfortable with their uncomfortableness.
I will close with a few lines that I really liked from the book that couldn’t be worked into the review. ”But a lot of hard-drinking, fast-fucking grandmothers had lost their hero.” Quite the visual McMurtry has placed in your mind, but how about this one? ”The juice of many men would stain her lips for a time, before she reduced them to mulberry-colored pulp.” Stain just really makes that line shudder worthy, or how about the bored, Rubenesque youngsters he meets in a hot tub whorehouse? ”That why we work at the Double Bubble. I’d rather suck off Congressmen than sit around the house.”
Consider yourself duly warned. If you are looking for a book that shows off his literary capabilities, grab a copy of his Pulitzer Prize winning novel Lonesome Dove. For me, I’m going to be thinking about Cadillac Jack for a long time. He might just pull up someday in my driveway with a book so perfect that it cleans out my bank account.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
February 19, 2012
Treasure of the Rubbermaids 16: YUUUP!
The on-going discoveries of priceless books and comics found in a stack of Rubbermaid containers previously stored and forgotten at my parent’s house and untouched for almost 20 years. Thanks to my father dumping them back on me, I now spend my spare time unearthing lost treasures from their plastic depths.
When I was picking my next Rubbermaid Treasure to read, this one jumped out at me because Dan got me hooked on the A&E reality series Storage Wars. For those unfamiliar with the show, storage lockers with unpaid fees are auctioned off to bidders who only get a few minutes to look at the contents without going into the locker or opening any boxes. Some of these bidders are thrift store owners looking for stock and some are hustlers who make their living in the swap meet and flea market trade. While used clothing, furniture and tools make up the bread-n-butter of this second hand economy, what really gets all the bidders amped up is the possibility of finding valuables or rare collectibles that they can sell for a small fortune. Antiques, jewelry, coin collections, rare toys and other assorted bits of odd treasure are sometimes pulled out of the lockers and it’s that ‘JACKPOT!’ element that makes the show compelling.
Storage Wars and its spin-off Storage Wars: Texas are part of a bigger trend that capitalizes on everyone’s fantasy that Aunt Petunia’s collection of coffee cans you inherited are really worth a fortune or that vase you picked up at a garage sale for fifty cents dates back to the Ming Dynasty. Antique Roadshow, Pawn Stars and American Pickers all capitalize on this fascination with finding treasure among junk And if someone ends up with more trash than treasure, they get to be on Hoarders.
Larry McMurty’s publishers should think about re-releasing this book and doing some creative marketing to tap into this trend. Written in the mid-80s, the book’s narrator is Jack McGriff, a former rodeo cowboy from Texas turned ‘scout’ who makes his living by cruising America in his Cadillac and looking for valuables hidden in estate sales, flea markets and second hand stores. Jack loves buying objects like well made antiques or rare curiosities like the jewel encrusted hubcaps from one of Rudolph Valentino’s cars, but once he’s acquired something, he wants to flip it for a profit as quickly as possible so he doesn’t hang onto the things he buys. As a self-described superstar of the flea market circuit, Jack knows a variety of oddball traders and collectors all across the country.
Jack has journeyed to Washington D.C. to unload some merchandise and visit his rich friend Boog and his wife Boss. Jack seems to have the same desire to acquire women that he does for finding objects. He’s got two ex-wives in Texas, and openly lusts after Boss to Boog’s amusement. Then Jack starts a fling with a beautiful woman who owns an art gallery named Cindy.
Cindy is engaged and an unapologetic social climber who only wants a no-strings relationship, and Jack tries to keep her attention by proposing a western exhibit made up of cowboy boots that he’ll acquire, including the pair that Billy the Kid was wearing when he was killed. However, once Cindy starts making increasing demands on his time and attention, Jack becomes attracted to a single mother and antique dealer named Jean. Unwillingly sucked into D.C.’s social intrigue and batted about by strong willed women, Jack falls into a funk and begins questioning a life spent questing over oddities.
McMurty created a really interesting character in Jack McGriff, but then he just didn’t seem to know what to do with him. The best stuff in the book revolves around Jack’s stories of objects he’s found and the unique people he’s met in the process. There’s a lot of funny stuff in this, and when McMurty sticks with themes about the value we put on objects, the transitory nature of ownership and the types of characters who have built their lives around this, it’s a very good book.
However, far too little time is spent on those ideas and far too much is spent with Jack being a unreliable jerk to the women in his life yet somehow also putting up with far too much crap from them in the process.
For a guy who supposedly spends all his time drifting around looking for stuff, he spends the first half of this book in Washington D.C. dealing with overstuffed politicians and arrogant journalists. There’s an odd subplot concerning the outlandish idea that the objects of the Smithsonian are being sold off secretly while fakes are put on display that Jack seems like he’ll get involved with, but ultimately that just drifts by with no resolution or consequence.
When he finally does hit the road, it’s on a doomed quest to satisfy Cindy whose increasingly outlandish demands would make any sane man leave her at the nearest airport or bus station, yet Jack continues to play along for some reason.
It’s still an entertaining read with a unique main character, but more horse trading and less romancing would have made it a better book.
The on-going discoveries of priceless books and comics found in a stack of Rubbermaid containers previously stored and forgotten at my parent’s house and untouched for almost 20 years. Thanks to my father dumping them back on me, I now spend my spare time unearthing lost treasures from their plastic depths.
When I was picking my next Rubbermaid Treasure to read, this one jumped out at me because Dan got me hooked on the A&E reality series Storage Wars. For those unfamiliar with the show, storage lockers with unpaid fees are auctioned off to bidders who only get a few minutes to look at the contents without going into the locker or opening any boxes. Some of these bidders are thrift store owners looking for stock and some are hustlers who make their living in the swap meet and flea market trade. While used clothing, furniture and tools make up the bread-n-butter of this second hand economy, what really gets all the bidders amped up is the possibility of finding valuables or rare collectibles that they can sell for a small fortune. Antiques, jewelry, coin collections, rare toys and other assorted bits of odd treasure are sometimes pulled out of the lockers and it’s that ‘JACKPOT!’ element that makes the show compelling.
Storage Wars and its spin-off Storage Wars: Texas are part of a bigger trend that capitalizes on everyone’s fantasy that Aunt Petunia’s collection of coffee cans you inherited are really worth a fortune or that vase you picked up at a garage sale for fifty cents dates back to the Ming Dynasty. Antique Roadshow, Pawn Stars and American Pickers all capitalize on this fascination with finding treasure among junk And if someone ends up with more trash than treasure, they get to be on Hoarders.
Larry McMurty’s publishers should think about re-releasing this book and doing some creative marketing to tap into this trend. Written in the mid-80s, the book’s narrator is Jack McGriff, a former rodeo cowboy from Texas turned ‘scout’ who makes his living by cruising America in his Cadillac and looking for valuables hidden in estate sales, flea markets and second hand stores. Jack loves buying objects like well made antiques or rare curiosities like the jewel encrusted hubcaps from one of Rudolph Valentino’s cars, but once he’s acquired something, he wants to flip it for a profit as quickly as possible so he doesn’t hang onto the things he buys. As a self-described superstar of the flea market circuit, Jack knows a variety of oddball traders and collectors all across the country.
Jack has journeyed to Washington D.C. to unload some merchandise and visit his rich friend Boog and his wife Boss. Jack seems to have the same desire to acquire women that he does for finding objects. He’s got two ex-wives in Texas, and openly lusts after Boss to Boog’s amusement. Then Jack starts a fling with a beautiful woman who owns an art gallery named Cindy.
Cindy is engaged and an unapologetic social climber who only wants a no-strings relationship, and Jack tries to keep her attention by proposing a western exhibit made up of cowboy boots that he’ll acquire, including the pair that Billy the Kid was wearing when he was killed. However, once Cindy starts making increasing demands on his time and attention, Jack becomes attracted to a single mother and antique dealer named Jean. Unwillingly sucked into D.C.’s social intrigue and batted about by strong willed women, Jack falls into a funk and begins questioning a life spent questing over oddities.
McMurty created a really interesting character in Jack McGriff, but then he just didn’t seem to know what to do with him. The best stuff in the book revolves around Jack’s stories of objects he’s found and the unique people he’s met in the process. There’s a lot of funny stuff in this, and when McMurty sticks with themes about the value we put on objects, the transitory nature of ownership and the types of characters who have built their lives around this, it’s a very good book.
However, far too little time is spent on those ideas and far too much is spent with Jack being a unreliable jerk to the women in his life yet somehow also putting up with far too much crap from them in the process.
For a guy who supposedly spends all his time drifting around looking for stuff, he spends the first half of this book in Washington D.C. dealing with overstuffed politicians and arrogant journalists. There’s an odd subplot concerning the outlandish idea that the objects of the Smithsonian are being sold off secretly while fakes are put on display that Jack seems like he’ll get involved with, but ultimately that just drifts by with no resolution or consequence.
When he finally does hit the road, it’s on a doomed quest to satisfy Cindy whose increasingly outlandish demands would make any sane man leave her at the nearest airport or bus station, yet Jack continues to play along for some reason.
It’s still an entertaining read with a unique main character, but more horse trading and less romancing would have made it a better book.
May 31, 2024
Cadillac Jack is a good example of a novel written without the inspiration or even an inkling of a story. It’s akin to a doodle artist making the best drawing he can out of loopy squiggle. In the introduction, Larry McMurtry indicates as much when he tells of the day that he heard the name Cadillac Jack shouted out as a greeting to the driver of a passing Cadillac. From there, he proceeds to invent a story for the sole purpose of using that name.
The most glaring problem is that the main character is stagnant through the entire novel. He has plenty of opportunities to learn and become wiser through the people that he meets and knows, but instead, he simply passes by these opportunities. By the end of the story, he is the same person as he was at the beginning which left me wondering why I was taken along for the ride.
The other issue is that the story is a bit corny. McMurtry probably felt that if you're going to have a main character with a moniker like Cadillac Jack driving around in a vintage Cadillac, then the other characters better have esoteric names and eccentric personalities in order to help Cadillac Jack fit into his own story. This results in countless scenes with strangely named characters that are just short farfetched.
The novel is also firmly rooted in the 1970s meaning that women are mostly depicted as subordinate and inferior to men, especially when it comes to God’s gift to women, Cadillac Jack.
Overall, there’s not much to like. Fortunately, it’s an easy read with short chapters and plain-spoken English writing. One aspect of Jack’s character is that he is an antiques dealer of sorts, which strikes at one of my interests, but that element of the novel was mostly glossed over and underplayed.
The most glaring problem is that the main character is stagnant through the entire novel. He has plenty of opportunities to learn and become wiser through the people that he meets and knows, but instead, he simply passes by these opportunities. By the end of the story, he is the same person as he was at the beginning which left me wondering why I was taken along for the ride.
The other issue is that the story is a bit corny. McMurtry probably felt that if you're going to have a main character with a moniker like Cadillac Jack driving around in a vintage Cadillac, then the other characters better have esoteric names and eccentric personalities in order to help Cadillac Jack fit into his own story. This results in countless scenes with strangely named characters that are just short farfetched.
The novel is also firmly rooted in the 1970s meaning that women are mostly depicted as subordinate and inferior to men, especially when it comes to God’s gift to women, Cadillac Jack.
Overall, there’s not much to like. Fortunately, it’s an easy read with short chapters and plain-spoken English writing. One aspect of Jack’s character is that he is an antiques dealer of sorts, which strikes at one of my interests, but that element of the novel was mostly glossed over and underplayed.
June 19, 2019
This was a huge waste of time book. Do people like this REALLY exist???? I gave this book one star for Belinda (the only interesting person in the book).
August 17, 2025
This is my first Larry McMurtry book and now I might even be empowered to attempt Lonesome Dove because this was so good. The writing is so fine, really excellent turns of phrase, and I loved the sunny tone and the kooky, meandering story and colorful characters.
March 23, 2010
OMG what a boring book. Per the inside cover "richly comic, profoundly moving...Cadillac Jack : A Novel is one of Larry McMurtry's most memorable...novels". This is the second McMurtry novel I have tried to read,Lonesome Dove being the first. I made it about 5 pages into Lonesome Dove and quit. I probably should have done the same with Cadillac Jack : A Novel. This is the story of an antique scout. Jack wanders back and forth across the U.S. buying and selling antiques and having sex with multiple women. That is the book in one sentence. It took McMurtry almost 400 pages to say the same thing.
May 5, 2018
Well this was a waste of time. No real story line or plot. Just Jack driving to flea markets and auctions buying other people's junk and getting involved with several bizarre women. Many odd characters none of which bears discussing. McMurtry is a fine writer. Lonesome Dove is one of my favorite books but there is no reason to recommend this book.
Read
May 1, 2019This sat around my home until the second automatic renewal notice before I could muster up any enthusiasm for it and even then I took a bit to really get cooking on it but ultimately I frankly enjoyed the hell out of this book. Not a major “Mac” but quite funny and enjoyably aimless. A minor Mac is still a good day at the proverbial rodeo. (None of the action in this novel takes place at an actual rodeo.)
November 20, 2023
This gets a 2.5 rating. Having just read McMurtry's biography I saw a lot of similarities between the main protagonist of this novel and McMurtry's own life. Like Jack McMurtry was a scout for books and he really enjoyed this occupation. The other similarity with McMurtry was his unconventional relationships with women. Both were involved with women, many who were married.
As for the story itself, I found a lot of the characters annoying. The focus on various antiques was fun and reminded me of the Lovejoy mysteries. The end just sort of dropped off and left one hanging.
As for the story itself, I found a lot of the characters annoying. The focus on various antiques was fun and reminded me of the Lovejoy mysteries. The end just sort of dropped off and left one hanging.
September 4, 2019
This was my first McMurtry (random thrift store pick), and probably a bad choice for that. Are all his male characters this obnoxious? Are all his female characters this needy? I expect he intended some grand statement about American attitudes towards things vs people, but all I got was a bunch of people I did not care about fumbling through life.
My main reaction was akin to seeing a mismatched couple. “What does she see in him?” Jack is smug, self-centered, and barely articulate, yet woman after woman falls quickly into bed with him. He’s clearly meant to be charming, but I saw no charm whatsoever. So I have to assume he’s incredibly handsome, although his looks are never mentioned. On the other hand, the women’s looks are discussed in depth; unluckily that is the only depth he gives any of them. The may be given a characteristic — social climber, ex-hippie, ex-wife — but never any personality.
As for the things, they are supposedly a Jack’s primary motivation, not just his job but his whole raison d’etre. But they too are rarely give more than the briefest description (truncheon, icon, Sung vase). A bit more rhapsodic prose about the various objects might not have redeemed the book, but it at least would have made it a more interesting read.
Almost quit reading a number of times, and probably should have. But I usually stick it out with books, just in case it redeems itself in the end. In this case, no redemption, either for protagonist or book. In fact, [spoiler alert] no real resolution either.
My main reaction was akin to seeing a mismatched couple. “What does she see in him?” Jack is smug, self-centered, and barely articulate, yet woman after woman falls quickly into bed with him. He’s clearly meant to be charming, but I saw no charm whatsoever. So I have to assume he’s incredibly handsome, although his looks are never mentioned. On the other hand, the women’s looks are discussed in depth; unluckily that is the only depth he gives any of them. The may be given a characteristic — social climber, ex-hippie, ex-wife — but never any personality.
As for the things, they are supposedly a Jack’s primary motivation, not just his job but his whole raison d’etre. But they too are rarely give more than the briefest description (truncheon, icon, Sung vase). A bit more rhapsodic prose about the various objects might not have redeemed the book, but it at least would have made it a more interesting read.
Almost quit reading a number of times, and probably should have. But I usually stick it out with books, just in case it redeems itself in the end. In this case, no redemption, either for protagonist or book. In fact, [spoiler alert] no real resolution either.
January 11, 2022
The story moves along well with some amusing caricatures but overall seems to lack any plot or resolution whatsoever. The main character lacks any depth and is such a cliche it is difficult to take any of his experiences as the point of the book either. I suppose it could be read as an outlandish tale considering the sheer amount of flat, dimensionless female characters who fall into his lap and on to his penis with little effort on his part. He seems to woo the world with happenstance gifts, charm we take for granted he must have as very little of it is displayed on the pages, or perhaps the fact he owns the “soft car”, his titular pearl colored Cadillac. Also some of his observations and comparisons regarding small children are a little worrisome. There are some good lines but doesn’t add up to a worthwhile book.
April 19, 2020
According to McMurtry's memoir Literary Life, "Cadillac Jack doesn't have that many fans. . . although John Mellencamp is one positive reader for whom I have great respect." Make of that what you will.
October 16, 2007
It made me kinda hate women a little bit.
Read
October 9, 2013Not his best writing but a personal favorite.
April 20, 2019
Could not finish it. Disappointing. I do generally like his books.
December 15, 2015
Choices.
We tell ourselves that the choices we make for ourselves are what stitch together the patterns of our lives; but perhaps choices that are made for us are even more vital, more important, and ultimately, more revealing.
One can’t disallow choices made for us by another person on a level of knowledge and understanding of who we are, and who we might want to be.
CADILLAC JACK, a lesser novel by Larry McMurtry (lesser only in that it isn’t the kind of book that wins Pulitzers, but since McMurtry already had one for the epic western novel LONESOME DOVE, he earned the right to write a modern comedic tale about men and women), is a book about the realization of why we do what we do, or, at least, the self-awareness to question why we live our lives and with whom.
We tell ourselves we make our decisions, but are these conscious choices, or merely following chance and circumstance? Is each of us a tragic figure fumbling through pre-ordained fate?
I’d like to think that is not the case, but then again, this novel was chosen for me to read – not sought out or discovered alone. For that reason alone, special attention must be paid.
Quote #1 – Jack on the female species:
“For no clear reason I felt responsible for their common feeling that life was somehow lacking. This strange, irrational sense of responsibility is probably responsible for most of my problems with women. At bottom I must think of myself as more like a chemical than a man. Once the chemical me is infused into the life of a woman the woman ought to feel competent and important, not skill-less and cipherlike, and if they don’t I feel guilty.”
The protagonist of the title is a man who spends his waking hours on the road in a plush Cadillac with one of a kind hubcaps, finding lost antiques and treasures to resell. His connections stretch across the country. He spends days and nights in auctions or at flea markets.
Oddly enough, for the story of a collector and “picker” who can’t be pinned down, the first third of the book is a comedy about the inner circles of the Washington elite. The beautiful and the bored aristocracy of American royalty strolling through rooms of ornate antiques prove to be as muddle-headed as the poorest among us. These interludes are amusing, but, as Jack ultimately figures out, also unimportant and soul-killing.
As one might imagine, Jack feels alienated in such surroundings, but being easily bewitched by the powers of a beautiful woman (one Cindy Sanders, an engaged Washington princess who appears not to think twice for having a fling with Jack), he strolls along for the adventure. Jack also has two ex-wives he talks to frequently, and also falls for Jean Arber (and her two little girls) – a practical woman who is diametrically opposite the luscious Cindy. Like Cindy, she has an antique shop. Unlike Cindy, she is grounded and gives a damn. So enter Jack, who is a bit of a white knight, or so he thinks. Jean is the first woman (ever?) to call him on his bullshit, which makes him both respect her all the more, and want to make her future wife number three.
The rest of the book deals with antiques and collectibles, and Jack’s adventures in same. No spoilers here, but I will say the ending is 100% unsatisfying, but frankly, that’s McMurtry’s point in this rumination on how men and women relate – and while most would think my own predilections towards collecting rare books, records and other paraphernalia would be the reason why this book was chosen FOR me, instead, I took away different things from the novel.
Quote #2- Jack on “things:”
“I make my share of mistakes, but one I never make is to underestimate the power of things. People imbued from childhood with the myth of the primacy of feeling seldom like to admit they really want things as much as they might want love, but my career has convinced me that plenty of them do.”
I guess I don’t want things and stuff and items as much as I thought – for instead, I see more of myself in the desiring of love … and yet, I have rooms filled with treasures which have caused me no end of grief or pain in the last two decades of my life.
As many have said before me: “It’s complicated.”
And then there is the accurate notation (at least in my own experience) Jack makes on how women lack patience:
Quote #3 - Jack on female patience – and in regards to Cindy in particular:
“Her impatience made me nervous. I myself evidently have too much patience – a useful quality if one spends half one’s life waiting in auctions – and female impatience always makes me nervous, as if it were somehow my responsibility to hurry the universe.”
However, Jean ultimately turns that assumption back on Jack and points out some of his blind spots – ultimately rejecting him for the immediate future as he goes back on the road for another buying run. Jack’s musings are really where the novel should have ended, but instead, we get another chapter that I won’t be discussing here (no spoilers, remember).
Instead, I’ll close this obvious Five Star Review with a final Jack quote.
Quote #4 – Jack on relationships that failed for want of a word or a gesture:
“I should have been more conclusive, then, it seemed to me. If I had just said the right words, or if Jean had, we might have dispelled all the vagueness that afflicted our relationship – vagueness about what we both wanted, apart or with one another … for a while, I felt as if I were actually about to reach a conclusion, after which I would understand everything I needed to know about myself, about my experience, and about my relations with beautiful objects and beautiful women….”
So does he reach a conclusion? That is the question with no answer given by me. You’ll need to read the novel and decide for yourself. In my case, it took several days of pondering before coming to my own conclusion.
We tell ourselves that the choices we make for ourselves are what stitch together the patterns of our lives; but perhaps choices that are made for us are even more vital, more important, and ultimately, more revealing.
One can’t disallow choices made for us by another person on a level of knowledge and understanding of who we are, and who we might want to be.
CADILLAC JACK, a lesser novel by Larry McMurtry (lesser only in that it isn’t the kind of book that wins Pulitzers, but since McMurtry already had one for the epic western novel LONESOME DOVE, he earned the right to write a modern comedic tale about men and women), is a book about the realization of why we do what we do, or, at least, the self-awareness to question why we live our lives and with whom.
We tell ourselves we make our decisions, but are these conscious choices, or merely following chance and circumstance? Is each of us a tragic figure fumbling through pre-ordained fate?
I’d like to think that is not the case, but then again, this novel was chosen for me to read – not sought out or discovered alone. For that reason alone, special attention must be paid.
Quote #1 – Jack on the female species:
“For no clear reason I felt responsible for their common feeling that life was somehow lacking. This strange, irrational sense of responsibility is probably responsible for most of my problems with women. At bottom I must think of myself as more like a chemical than a man. Once the chemical me is infused into the life of a woman the woman ought to feel competent and important, not skill-less and cipherlike, and if they don’t I feel guilty.”
The protagonist of the title is a man who spends his waking hours on the road in a plush Cadillac with one of a kind hubcaps, finding lost antiques and treasures to resell. His connections stretch across the country. He spends days and nights in auctions or at flea markets.
Oddly enough, for the story of a collector and “picker” who can’t be pinned down, the first third of the book is a comedy about the inner circles of the Washington elite. The beautiful and the bored aristocracy of American royalty strolling through rooms of ornate antiques prove to be as muddle-headed as the poorest among us. These interludes are amusing, but, as Jack ultimately figures out, also unimportant and soul-killing.
As one might imagine, Jack feels alienated in such surroundings, but being easily bewitched by the powers of a beautiful woman (one Cindy Sanders, an engaged Washington princess who appears not to think twice for having a fling with Jack), he strolls along for the adventure. Jack also has two ex-wives he talks to frequently, and also falls for Jean Arber (and her two little girls) – a practical woman who is diametrically opposite the luscious Cindy. Like Cindy, she has an antique shop. Unlike Cindy, she is grounded and gives a damn. So enter Jack, who is a bit of a white knight, or so he thinks. Jean is the first woman (ever?) to call him on his bullshit, which makes him both respect her all the more, and want to make her future wife number three.
The rest of the book deals with antiques and collectibles, and Jack’s adventures in same. No spoilers here, but I will say the ending is 100% unsatisfying, but frankly, that’s McMurtry’s point in this rumination on how men and women relate – and while most would think my own predilections towards collecting rare books, records and other paraphernalia would be the reason why this book was chosen FOR me, instead, I took away different things from the novel.
Quote #2- Jack on “things:”
“I make my share of mistakes, but one I never make is to underestimate the power of things. People imbued from childhood with the myth of the primacy of feeling seldom like to admit they really want things as much as they might want love, but my career has convinced me that plenty of them do.”
I guess I don’t want things and stuff and items as much as I thought – for instead, I see more of myself in the desiring of love … and yet, I have rooms filled with treasures which have caused me no end of grief or pain in the last two decades of my life.
As many have said before me: “It’s complicated.”
And then there is the accurate notation (at least in my own experience) Jack makes on how women lack patience:
Quote #3 - Jack on female patience – and in regards to Cindy in particular:
“Her impatience made me nervous. I myself evidently have too much patience – a useful quality if one spends half one’s life waiting in auctions – and female impatience always makes me nervous, as if it were somehow my responsibility to hurry the universe.”
However, Jean ultimately turns that assumption back on Jack and points out some of his blind spots – ultimately rejecting him for the immediate future as he goes back on the road for another buying run. Jack’s musings are really where the novel should have ended, but instead, we get another chapter that I won’t be discussing here (no spoilers, remember).
Instead, I’ll close this obvious Five Star Review with a final Jack quote.
Quote #4 – Jack on relationships that failed for want of a word or a gesture:
“I should have been more conclusive, then, it seemed to me. If I had just said the right words, or if Jean had, we might have dispelled all the vagueness that afflicted our relationship – vagueness about what we both wanted, apart or with one another … for a while, I felt as if I were actually about to reach a conclusion, after which I would understand everything I needed to know about myself, about my experience, and about my relations with beautiful objects and beautiful women….”
So does he reach a conclusion? That is the question with no answer given by me. You’ll need to read the novel and decide for yourself. In my case, it took several days of pondering before coming to my own conclusion.
August 17, 2022
Full of quotable paragraphs, this is a really good Larry McMurtry book. Cadillac Jack's Cadillac takes him across the country to flea markets, auctions, and garage sales in his life as a "scout" for in-demand antiques and rare pieces. His love life flourishes and suffers simultaneously as a result of his nomadic existence.
July 21, 2025
“D.C.’s diffrunt from Waxahachie,” he maintained. “It’s filt up with them stump-suckin’ women.”
January 3, 2021
Cadillac Jake is full of peculiar people with strange names. Oblivia was my personal favorite name! Cadillac Jack is a womanizer with his own off-kilter sense of morality regarding women and life. The story really never goes anywhere, the whole purpose of the book seems to be introduce offbeat characters.
October 27, 2015
Jack is an amazing amalgam of America---and particularly of the American west. A tall and probably handsome Texan—although he never refers to himself as handsome in this first person narrative—he travels the country, in a white Cadillac convertible, buying bits and pieces of Americana and then reselling the pieces to eccentric and usually wealthy collectors. That's his business as an antique “scout”. In this age of eBay I've heard the terms “pickers”, and even “flippers” but never “scouts”; even that has a western flavor. Jack meets and interacts with some of the most bizzare and whimsical characters ever dreamed up, yet he never judges or even seems surprised, he merely observes, reports on their outlandish behavior and then moves on with his life and his obsessive scouting. Of course, most of the novel takes place in Washington D.C. society of the 1980's. so perhaps the fictional characters aren't really that screwy. He's befriended by all including most of the women he meets, but he's not really a womanizer, in fact, he feels his biggest problem is his tendency to fall in love, with all of the confusion and responsibility that entails. Jack just takes it all in stride and moves on. This amusing book of modern societal insight is one laugh after another, but a great deal more is going on beneath the surface if you just scout it out.
April 30, 2018
Jack is an antique scout that bounces between women and drives back & forth across the country searching for extraordinary objects. His contacts are many & varied some with good connections but he knows what they like and will buy to their needs. The scouting business in the book is really a background to Jack's search for a meaningful relationship. He finds someone who might be the one but he fumbles the opportunity. This was just one of the loose ends the book seemed to leave hanging. Once I could get a handle on multiple characters I enjoyed the read but felt empty with the lack of resolution ending. Of course that is how life is.
August 21, 2008
Jack is just the bestest picker ever. I have a signed first edition.
October 2, 2008
Cadillac Jack has got to be one of the most interesting characters I have ever read about. You must meet him. You'll never forget him.
June 10, 2012
confused man, trying to figure out what he really wants in life.
January 6, 2024
I had a fine time reading this book. There was no major plot, no page-turning action, no real tug pulling the reader to the end of the story to see how everything would turn up. The book overall was a lot like one of antique scout Cadillac Jack’s cross country roadtrips, meandering from paragraph to paragraph, with not too much direction, simply searching for the next treasure that might catch his — and the reader’s — eye.
And there were some treasures. McMurtry delivers them in the form of uniquely crafted characters, ones whose motivations and storylines are so unbelievable they must only exist in works of literature or on a TV screen. Nevertheless, they were enjoyable to read and get to know, and I was entertained by the imperceptability of their lives and their natures. McMurtry also has a way of producing enjoyable sentences and keen imagery that can be acknowledged with a sincere appreciation for his skill. Some sentences in the world are just fun to read, and McMurtry offers many of those scattered throughout the pages of Cadillac Jack.
The major conflict in the book is that Cadillac Jack loves too many women but doesn’t really like any of them. Much of the book is taken up by his escapades juggling a number of beautiful and interesting - yet notably insecure and jealous - female characters who he can’t seem to let go of despite knowing he probably should. And he lies to all of them, thinking he’s doing them a favor by sparing them the sting of the truth. But as we all know is the way with perpetually fibbing womanizers, all he does is get himself into deeper trouble, none of which he ever quite takes responsibility for. The one woman who seems like she might rescue Jack from his self-inflicted love mess comes in the form of single mother Jean Arber, whose own love for objects and springy curly-headed daughters capture Jack’s attention and his affections for a while. But yet again - quite unsurprisingly - Jack can’t really commit, and lets Jean let him go at the end of the book, releasing him to a life on the road in search of his next great affections, a life she knows he is meant for.
It seems that deep down, Jack agrees with Jean, knowing what he really wants is to be a free range man for life, carried by his desires from one passionate fling to the next, never quite figuring out that his lust does not fully equate to love. He is a true scout at heart, constantly searching, finding a treasure or two every once in a while - whether that be a woman or a Sung vase - and then passing them off once he’s appreciated their beauty or rarity for as long as it suits him.
In the end, Jack ends up right where he has been many times before, being carried across the Great Plains of America by his pearl-colored Cadillac, thinking about a woman he might love and objects he could be intrigued by. As a reader, you don’t really love Jack, but you don’t really hate him either - you are simply left to kind of passively acknowledge him as he is, an antique scout with a lust for women and a keen eye for hidden treasures.
Overall, I enjoyed the book, but I didn’t walk away feeling changed, or moved, or even greatly entertained. And maybe that is the point. Maybe it’s just a story, about just an antique scout from Texas, who just can’t quite figure out how to love.
And there were some treasures. McMurtry delivers them in the form of uniquely crafted characters, ones whose motivations and storylines are so unbelievable they must only exist in works of literature or on a TV screen. Nevertheless, they were enjoyable to read and get to know, and I was entertained by the imperceptability of their lives and their natures. McMurtry also has a way of producing enjoyable sentences and keen imagery that can be acknowledged with a sincere appreciation for his skill. Some sentences in the world are just fun to read, and McMurtry offers many of those scattered throughout the pages of Cadillac Jack.
The major conflict in the book is that Cadillac Jack loves too many women but doesn’t really like any of them. Much of the book is taken up by his escapades juggling a number of beautiful and interesting - yet notably insecure and jealous - female characters who he can’t seem to let go of despite knowing he probably should. And he lies to all of them, thinking he’s doing them a favor by sparing them the sting of the truth. But as we all know is the way with perpetually fibbing womanizers, all he does is get himself into deeper trouble, none of which he ever quite takes responsibility for. The one woman who seems like she might rescue Jack from his self-inflicted love mess comes in the form of single mother Jean Arber, whose own love for objects and springy curly-headed daughters capture Jack’s attention and his affections for a while. But yet again - quite unsurprisingly - Jack can’t really commit, and lets Jean let him go at the end of the book, releasing him to a life on the road in search of his next great affections, a life she knows he is meant for.
It seems that deep down, Jack agrees with Jean, knowing what he really wants is to be a free range man for life, carried by his desires from one passionate fling to the next, never quite figuring out that his lust does not fully equate to love. He is a true scout at heart, constantly searching, finding a treasure or two every once in a while - whether that be a woman or a Sung vase - and then passing them off once he’s appreciated their beauty or rarity for as long as it suits him.
In the end, Jack ends up right where he has been many times before, being carried across the Great Plains of America by his pearl-colored Cadillac, thinking about a woman he might love and objects he could be intrigued by. As a reader, you don’t really love Jack, but you don’t really hate him either - you are simply left to kind of passively acknowledge him as he is, an antique scout with a lust for women and a keen eye for hidden treasures.
Overall, I enjoyed the book, but I didn’t walk away feeling changed, or moved, or even greatly entertained. And maybe that is the point. Maybe it’s just a story, about just an antique scout from Texas, who just can’t quite figure out how to love.
July 15, 2025
A real disappointment. Larry McMurtry's view of the 80s D.C. political scene seems intended as satire but he quickly disabuses that notion and the novel instead ends up being a rather toothless--and tiresome--series of events detailing a drifting antique dealer who winds up falling into bed with a number of women of various social strata and in the process continuously exposes his immaturity and thoughtlessness. That's the book, pretty much. McMurtry, writing in the first person, spends a lot of time ruminating about why Jack is like he is, and though it eventually wears him down, he never makes any real effort to change and in the end the novel goes poof. There's a blankness to just about all the characters--each one is of very little interest, is given very little to do and, more often than not, disappears off the face of the earth (at least until the pointless conclusion)--and there's never any real momentum in the set pieces, which primarily take place in auction houses, flea markets and at dinner parties of the powerful; they all just run together, repetitiously. McMurtry's depiction of women, usually sympathetic and astute, fails him here: they come off as either clueless, driven by ambition or living in the world inside their heads--we're not privy to any real understanding of them, with the exception of the book's last romantic interest, whose outspoken and articulate eloquence seems like a breath of fresh air. But she arrives after the book has already exhausted interest. It's clear McMurtry has a real affinity for these characters; it's puzzling why we do not. For those considering McMurtry, one of the great American writers (and my personal favorite), this, unfortunately, is not the place to begin.
October 3, 2019
I read this book because John Baxter wrote about it briefly in A Pound of Paper. He wrote that McMurtry's book and its main character, Jack, is the only book that accurately portrays the life of a book person.
The book is set during the 1980's. Much of the story line happens in Washington DC but also some of the scenes occur in Texas. Jack does not sell books but other kinds of collectibles. He is on the road all the time. And, he knows dealers and collectors all across the country. He buys in one state and sells in another.
This must have been the life of the book scout before the advent of the Internet. Always in motion and knowing who the players are. But, the Internet has eliminated a lot of the running around. And, it has taken away the ability to price gouge. If you don't like the price you are being offered, get on the Internet and see who else is selling and for how much.
The book was an interesting read in terms of reading an example of the amount of traveling a "scout" might do in order to find the kinds of collectibles he is looking for. And, Jack meets some unique characters. A significant part of success in this kind of vocation is being in the right place at the right time. In other words, luck and chance. And, having the kind of disposable money that allows one to make use of the opportunities at hand. As a character Jack is rather dull and flat. He has lots of sex with lots of different women and has been married twice but he does not seem to have much depth in his personality. He is confused about women but he does know he feels better when he is on the open road.
The book is set during the 1980's. Much of the story line happens in Washington DC but also some of the scenes occur in Texas. Jack does not sell books but other kinds of collectibles. He is on the road all the time. And, he knows dealers and collectors all across the country. He buys in one state and sells in another.
This must have been the life of the book scout before the advent of the Internet. Always in motion and knowing who the players are. But, the Internet has eliminated a lot of the running around. And, it has taken away the ability to price gouge. If you don't like the price you are being offered, get on the Internet and see who else is selling and for how much.
The book was an interesting read in terms of reading an example of the amount of traveling a "scout" might do in order to find the kinds of collectibles he is looking for. And, Jack meets some unique characters. A significant part of success in this kind of vocation is being in the right place at the right time. In other words, luck and chance. And, having the kind of disposable money that allows one to make use of the opportunities at hand. As a character Jack is rather dull and flat. He has lots of sex with lots of different women and has been married twice but he does not seem to have much depth in his personality. He is confused about women but he does know he feels better when he is on the open road.
October 26, 2022
I picked up this book thinking it was the true story of a man called "Cadillac Jack" the subject of a song by and movie starred in by Country Music artist Clint Black. I'd listened to the song many times and seen the movie at least twice and wanted the whole, unedited for television story of that particular "Cadillac Jack". When I grabbed this book on my way to the checkout in a store after spending around 2 hours in their book department purchasing several books. I did not take the time to read the book's description.
With that being said, this book was not a true story or a serious story. I must say I enjoyed it all the same as it was very entertaining. It had me laughing out loud on several occasions and even crying a few tears a time or two.
It was a quirky story about love between flawed people. (Some very flawed.) It was also about love between people and the objects they desired to own and/or collect. This story may give some people some insight into some of the people in their own life or that they've know and it may help them to understand why some people collect some things.
All in all I would recommend it to anyone who likes a good, entertaining read.
With that being said, this book was not a true story or a serious story. I must say I enjoyed it all the same as it was very entertaining. It had me laughing out loud on several occasions and even crying a few tears a time or two.
It was a quirky story about love between flawed people. (Some very flawed.) It was also about love between people and the objects they desired to own and/or collect. This story may give some people some insight into some of the people in their own life or that they've know and it may help them to understand why some people collect some things.
All in all I would recommend it to anyone who likes a good, entertaining read.
October 10, 2020
Larry McMurty has a long history of writing books with great emotional depth (Terms of Endearment) unflinching honesty about growing up in small-town Texas (The Last Picture Show) and epic and sometimes cynical storytelling about the old west (Lonesome Dove). If this is what you are looking for in Cadillac Jack, boy did you pick up the wrong book. Cadillac Jack is pure satire. It is the story of a retired rodeo cowboy turned antique scout who travels the county in a pearl gray Cadillac buying and selling everything from one of a kind hubcaps off Rudolph Valentino's car to Billy the Kid's book while charming a bevy of women. All the action is set against the background of the Clinton-Bush era Washington. Every character you meet is a caricature, unbelievably quirky and eccentric. The book gives the impression that McMurty, notoriously curmudgeonly, decided "I'll show you that I have a sense of humor too!" Like much satire, it is very place and time-specific so may best suit readers with a clear memory of the late 90's.
August 30, 2019
Pont egy régiségvásáron, vagy inkább kacatvásáron találtam ezt a könyvet, szerencsére a borító annyira bizarr volt, hogy nem hagyhattam ott. Persze azért a történet sem tűnt épp rossznak, és nem is csalódtam benne. Tipikus amerikai regény, ráadásul pont egy olyan réteget mutat be, ami elég távoli, nem csak időben, de életszínvonal terén sem épp az általam megszokott. Főszereplőnk története inkább tragédia, mert a sok-sok nő, lóvé, és a mozgalmas élet ellenére sem épp a legéletvidámabb fickó, de nem csak az ő életét járja át az életuntság, hanem a regény többi szereplőéjét is. Mindezt nem lehangolóan elénk tárva, hanem humorral és kiválóan megírt női karakterekkel színesítve olvashatjuk Cadillac Jack történetét, ami kellő érdeklődéssel beszippant egy újabb amerikai rémálomba, ahol tárgyak és nők, nők és kapzsiság, na meg a félvállról vett sok-sok dollár csak kellékei egy mélyebb, de mégis tök laza, szórakoztató regénynek.
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