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Frontier trilogy #1
The Englishman's Boy
Winner of the Governor General's Award
Counterpointing the stories of the legendary Western cowboy Shorty McAdoo and Harry Vincent, the ambitious young screenwriter commissioned to retell his story in 1920s Hollywood, this novel reconstructs an epic journey through Montana into the Canadian plains, by a group of men pursuing their stolen horses.
The Englishman's Boy intelligently and creatively depicts an American West where greed and deception are tempered by honor and strength. As Richard Ford has noted, "Vanderhaeghe is simply a wonderful writer. The Englishman's Boy, spanning as it does two countries, two centuries, two views of history—the Canadian Wild West as 'imagined' by Hollywood—is a great accomplishment. Readers, I think, will find this book irresistible."
Counterpointing the stories of the legendary Western cowboy Shorty McAdoo and Harry Vincent, the ambitious young screenwriter commissioned to retell his story in 1920s Hollywood, this novel reconstructs an epic journey through Montana into the Canadian plains, by a group of men pursuing their stolen horses.
The Englishman's Boy intelligently and creatively depicts an American West where greed and deception are tempered by honor and strength. As Richard Ford has noted, "Vanderhaeghe is simply a wonderful writer. The Englishman's Boy, spanning as it does two countries, two centuries, two views of history—the Canadian Wild West as 'imagined' by Hollywood—is a great accomplishment. Readers, I think, will find this book irresistible."
352 pages, Paperback
First published September 14, 1996
109 people are currently reading
2698 people want to read
About the author
Guy Vanderhaeghe
34 books195 followersGuy Clarence Vanderhaeghe, OC, SOM is a Canadian fiction author.
Vanderhaeghe received his Bachelor of Arts degree with great distinction in 1971, High Honours in History in 1972 and Master of Arts in History in 1975, all from the University of Saskatchewan. In 1978 he received his Bachelor of Education with great distinction from the University of Regina. In 1973 he was Research Officer, Institute for Northern Studies, University of Saskatchewan and, from 1974 until 1977, he worked as Archival and Library Assistant at the university. From 1975 to 1977 he was a freelance writer and editor and in 1978 and 1979 taught English and history at Herbert High School in Herbert, Saskatchewan. In 1983 and 1984 he was Writer-in-Residence with the Saskatoon Public Library and in 1985 Writer-in-Residence at the University of Ottawa. He has been a Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Ottawa (1985-86), faculty member of the Writing Program of the Banff Centre for the Arts (1990-91), faculty member in charge of senior fiction students in the SAGE Hills Creative Writing Program (1992). Since 1993 he has served as a visiting professor of English at St. Thomas More College at the University of Saskatchewan.
Vanderhaeghe lives with his wife in Saskatoon.
Vanderhaeghe's first book, Man Descending: selected stories (1982), was winner of a Governor General's Award and the United Kingdom's Faber Prize. A novel, The Englishman's Boy (1996), won him a second Governor General's Award for Fiction and the Saskatchewan Book Award for Fiction and for Best Book of the Year, and it was shortlisted for both the Giller Prize and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
He is perhaps best-known for The Last Crossing (2001), a national bestseller and winner of the Saskatoon Book Award, the Saskatchewan Book Awards for Fiction and for Book of the Year, and the Canadian Booksellers Association Libris Award for Fiction Book of the Year. The novel was selected for the 2004 edition of Canada Reads as the book that should be read by all Canadians.
In 2003, Vanderhaeghe was awarded the Saskatchewan Order of Merit and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.
Vanderhaeghe received his Bachelor of Arts degree with great distinction in 1971, High Honours in History in 1972 and Master of Arts in History in 1975, all from the University of Saskatchewan. In 1978 he received his Bachelor of Education with great distinction from the University of Regina. In 1973 he was Research Officer, Institute for Northern Studies, University of Saskatchewan and, from 1974 until 1977, he worked as Archival and Library Assistant at the university. From 1975 to 1977 he was a freelance writer and editor and in 1978 and 1979 taught English and history at Herbert High School in Herbert, Saskatchewan. In 1983 and 1984 he was Writer-in-Residence with the Saskatoon Public Library and in 1985 Writer-in-Residence at the University of Ottawa. He has been a Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Ottawa (1985-86), faculty member of the Writing Program of the Banff Centre for the Arts (1990-91), faculty member in charge of senior fiction students in the SAGE Hills Creative Writing Program (1992). Since 1993 he has served as a visiting professor of English at St. Thomas More College at the University of Saskatchewan.
Vanderhaeghe lives with his wife in Saskatoon.
Vanderhaeghe's first book, Man Descending: selected stories (1982), was winner of a Governor General's Award and the United Kingdom's Faber Prize. A novel, The Englishman's Boy (1996), won him a second Governor General's Award for Fiction and the Saskatchewan Book Award for Fiction and for Best Book of the Year, and it was shortlisted for both the Giller Prize and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.
He is perhaps best-known for The Last Crossing (2001), a national bestseller and winner of the Saskatoon Book Award, the Saskatchewan Book Awards for Fiction and for Book of the Year, and the Canadian Booksellers Association Libris Award for Fiction Book of the Year. The novel was selected for the 2004 edition of Canada Reads as the book that should be read by all Canadians.
In 2003, Vanderhaeghe was awarded the Saskatchewan Order of Merit and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 221 reviews
December 2, 2022
First-rate Canadian story-telling
When it comes to anti-aboriginal prejudice, no honest, rational person can claim that Canada is without its problems or shameful events in its history. The Cypress Hills Massacre – the slaughter of more than 20 Assiniboine Indians in Saskatchewan by white wolf hunters who had crossed the loosely defined American border on the trail on some stolen horses – is just one of these shameful events, notable in that it generated a national scandal and the creation of the quasi-military force that ultimately evolved into the RCMP.
Shorty McAdoo is The Englishman’s Boy, the servant of an English gentleman, who, after his employer’s death, aimlessly fell in with a nasty group of wolf hunters and horse wranglers. The story of McAdoo’s eventual part in the massacre is unfolded from two different perspectives – first, in third person real-time narration set in 1873 and, second, from a first person perspective as McAdoo reluctantly relates his story as factual support for a silent cowboy movie in 1923 Hollywood.
From a purely historical perspective, The Englishman’s Boy is actually two stories – a horrifying tale of the 19th century Midwest in North America and the development of the silent movie industry in the early 20th century seamlessly melded into a single moving and relentlessly gripping novel. But it is neither pleasant nor easy to swallow. The diversity of topics that a reader is forced to consider is almost dizzying in its scope – xenophobia, anti-aboriginal racism and cultural genocide, anti-Semitism, misogyny, sexual perversion, bullying, the foundations of the American gun culture, the indolence and inane self-centered lifestyles of the wealthy in the USA’s burgeoning capitalist economy, the adulation that is offered to Hollywood stars and more. Snippets of Vanderhaeghe’s brilliant novel will remind readers of a number of popular novels that successfully challenged them on the same topics – Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities, Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, Herman Wouk’s Marjorie Morningstar, F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, for example.
Compelling from first page to last, The Englishman’s Boy is the kind of novel that sticks in your craw and will force you to think about yourself, your country and your history for a long, long time to come. Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
When it comes to anti-aboriginal prejudice, no honest, rational person can claim that Canada is without its problems or shameful events in its history. The Cypress Hills Massacre – the slaughter of more than 20 Assiniboine Indians in Saskatchewan by white wolf hunters who had crossed the loosely defined American border on the trail on some stolen horses – is just one of these shameful events, notable in that it generated a national scandal and the creation of the quasi-military force that ultimately evolved into the RCMP.
Shorty McAdoo is The Englishman’s Boy, the servant of an English gentleman, who, after his employer’s death, aimlessly fell in with a nasty group of wolf hunters and horse wranglers. The story of McAdoo’s eventual part in the massacre is unfolded from two different perspectives – first, in third person real-time narration set in 1873 and, second, from a first person perspective as McAdoo reluctantly relates his story as factual support for a silent cowboy movie in 1923 Hollywood.
From a purely historical perspective, The Englishman’s Boy is actually two stories – a horrifying tale of the 19th century Midwest in North America and the development of the silent movie industry in the early 20th century seamlessly melded into a single moving and relentlessly gripping novel. But it is neither pleasant nor easy to swallow. The diversity of topics that a reader is forced to consider is almost dizzying in its scope – xenophobia, anti-aboriginal racism and cultural genocide, anti-Semitism, misogyny, sexual perversion, bullying, the foundations of the American gun culture, the indolence and inane self-centered lifestyles of the wealthy in the USA’s burgeoning capitalist economy, the adulation that is offered to Hollywood stars and more. Snippets of Vanderhaeghe’s brilliant novel will remind readers of a number of popular novels that successfully challenged them on the same topics – Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities, Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, Herman Wouk’s Marjorie Morningstar, F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, for example.
Compelling from first page to last, The Englishman’s Boy is the kind of novel that sticks in your craw and will force you to think about yourself, your country and your history for a long, long time to come. Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
September 28, 2023
From the first page, you know that you will be reading a book by a truly great writer. Guy Vanderhaege of Saskatoon isn't a household name like Margaret Atwood, but he should be. This gifted storyteller won the Governor-General's medal for this wonderful trip back into the early days of the Wild West, on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border. Published in 1996, this is a dual timeline book -- one story following the vicissitudes of a young boy in 1873 who participates unwillingly in the famous Cypress Hills Massacre (famous only if you are from Saskatchewan, as I am); and the second story taking place fifty years later in 1923 when a Hollywood film producer tries to bring that incident to the big silent screen. Both periods of history are so vividly described that I wondered whether the author had a time machine that took him there. Now I'm going to search out the CBC miniseries, which I have somehow missed viewing.
Update: After reading this a second time I haven't changed my opinion of the writing, but I must admit that the dual timeline was a bit distancing from the massacre story. Either of those stories would have been complete in themselves without the Big Switch. I still love Vanderhaege, though!
Update: After reading this a second time I haven't changed my opinion of the writing, but I must admit that the dual timeline was a bit distancing from the massacre story. Either of those stories would have been complete in themselves without the Big Switch. I still love Vanderhaege, though!
December 31, 2014
Many times you start reading a book and as you get into it, as you get to connect with the dialogue and the characters, becoming more and more interested in the outcome of the story, you end up liking the book. Other times you pick up a book expecting something based on a review or an interesting premise but at some point it starts to drag or become repeditive or predictable and you are disappointed. Occasionally you pick up a book and from the very first page you can tell this book is so far above most of the other books out there. It's written in the way you wish all other books are written. With style, intelligence and a voice that captivates you with passages that are so masterful and perfect that you are in awe of that author's skill and talent. Then you remember what literature is supposed to be. This is one of those books.
The Englishman's Boy is far more than historical fiction. Guy Vanderhaeghe takes you to a place long ago and far away. He lets you experience it.
Well-deserved winner of the Governor General Award.
The Englishman's Boy is far more than historical fiction. Guy Vanderhaeghe takes you to a place long ago and far away. He lets you experience it.
Well-deserved winner of the Governor General Award.
August 6, 2024
The Story Of Shorty McAdoo and Harry Vincent
The Canadian writer Guy Vanderhaeghe's "The Englishman's Boy"(1996) consists of two story lines woven together, mostly effectively. The first story is set in the Hollywood of the 1920s and is narrated in the first person by Harry Vincent, a young wandering man from Canada who finds employment as a writer at a studio. The second story is set in the United States and Canadian west of the 1870's. It is told in a halting narrative in the third person. The story is about a group of wolf trappers who pursue Indians after their horses have been stolen. The pursuit leads to violent, tragic consequences. The key figure in this story and the unifying figure of the novel is "The Englishman's Boy". The young man is in fact American, not English, but he secures work as a servant to a wealthy Englishman who has come to America in search of adventure. One event leads to another, and the young drifter finds himself involved in the posse of the trappers.
Successive chapters of the book alternate between the stories until the threads gradually come together. There is a degree of mirror imaging in the stories as both weave together hard facts and ideals. Both involve a search for mythmaking and national unity in the face of a recalcitrant reality. The search for a national purpose in a diverse, balky country is a continuing theme in American life.
In addition to Harry Vincent, the Hollywood story includes a Hollywood producer, his primary assistant, and a young woman, Rachel Gold, a friend and romantic interest of Harry's. The producer is raw, greedy, and vulgar, but also has a thoughtful, idealistic understanding of film and of America. Among other people, the director is an admirer of the French philosopher, Henri Bergson who taught the importance of intuition over discursive reasoning. The director wants to engage in mythmaking with a Western and asks Harry to track down an old cowboy, Shorty McAdoo, and get what he feels will be an inspiring story. This part of the book shows a Hollywood with its ambitions and flaws as Harry finds and gets to know Shorty McAdoo and his history.
The second story focuses on the posse and of the small group (12 or 13) of men who make it up. The story includes depictions of the West and of its tough characters, trappers, farmers, traders, and Indian tribes and bands. The characterizations and events of this story are sometimes foggy and difficult to follow, probably deliberately so. But the main thread comes through in a brutal fight and its consequences.
The stories are threaded together and gradually joined. At times the shifting back and forth proved distracting and also slowed down the pace in the manner of the old saw "meanwhile, back at the ranch" or the cutaway to a commercial at a climactic moment. Still, for the most part this book was riveting and intense.
The book and its characters are torn between ideals and reality and cynicism. The West has long been a symbol of American character and of the quest for freedom as shown for example in Frederick Jackson Turner's famous study, "The Frontier in American History"; and Hollywood has been regarded as the place of dreams and culture for the many people who don't know much about, say, Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" or Hart Crane's "The Bridge" which both involve American mythmaking on a grand scale. Griffith's film, "The Birth of a Nation" with its racism runs through this book, both for its attempt to find a national ideal and for the seriously flawed way the film presented the ideal. The book on the whole shows a hard skepticism. It makes for sad but thoughtful reading in an America that still struggles with questions of its past, its national identity, and its ideals.
Robin Friedman
The Canadian writer Guy Vanderhaeghe's "The Englishman's Boy"(1996) consists of two story lines woven together, mostly effectively. The first story is set in the Hollywood of the 1920s and is narrated in the first person by Harry Vincent, a young wandering man from Canada who finds employment as a writer at a studio. The second story is set in the United States and Canadian west of the 1870's. It is told in a halting narrative in the third person. The story is about a group of wolf trappers who pursue Indians after their horses have been stolen. The pursuit leads to violent, tragic consequences. The key figure in this story and the unifying figure of the novel is "The Englishman's Boy". The young man is in fact American, not English, but he secures work as a servant to a wealthy Englishman who has come to America in search of adventure. One event leads to another, and the young drifter finds himself involved in the posse of the trappers.
Successive chapters of the book alternate between the stories until the threads gradually come together. There is a degree of mirror imaging in the stories as both weave together hard facts and ideals. Both involve a search for mythmaking and national unity in the face of a recalcitrant reality. The search for a national purpose in a diverse, balky country is a continuing theme in American life.
In addition to Harry Vincent, the Hollywood story includes a Hollywood producer, his primary assistant, and a young woman, Rachel Gold, a friend and romantic interest of Harry's. The producer is raw, greedy, and vulgar, but also has a thoughtful, idealistic understanding of film and of America. Among other people, the director is an admirer of the French philosopher, Henri Bergson who taught the importance of intuition over discursive reasoning. The director wants to engage in mythmaking with a Western and asks Harry to track down an old cowboy, Shorty McAdoo, and get what he feels will be an inspiring story. This part of the book shows a Hollywood with its ambitions and flaws as Harry finds and gets to know Shorty McAdoo and his history.
The second story focuses on the posse and of the small group (12 or 13) of men who make it up. The story includes depictions of the West and of its tough characters, trappers, farmers, traders, and Indian tribes and bands. The characterizations and events of this story are sometimes foggy and difficult to follow, probably deliberately so. But the main thread comes through in a brutal fight and its consequences.
The stories are threaded together and gradually joined. At times the shifting back and forth proved distracting and also slowed down the pace in the manner of the old saw "meanwhile, back at the ranch" or the cutaway to a commercial at a climactic moment. Still, for the most part this book was riveting and intense.
The book and its characters are torn between ideals and reality and cynicism. The West has long been a symbol of American character and of the quest for freedom as shown for example in Frederick Jackson Turner's famous study, "The Frontier in American History"; and Hollywood has been regarded as the place of dreams and culture for the many people who don't know much about, say, Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" or Hart Crane's "The Bridge" which both involve American mythmaking on a grand scale. Griffith's film, "The Birth of a Nation" with its racism runs through this book, both for its attempt to find a national ideal and for the seriously flawed way the film presented the ideal. The book on the whole shows a hard skepticism. It makes for sad but thoughtful reading in an America that still struggles with questions of its past, its national identity, and its ideals.
Robin Friedman
February 25, 2012
the englishman's boy is part western, and part early hollywood tale, exploring how we interpret civilization and savagery in our personal thoughts and action, and how that is reflected in the rest of society. it does so by recounting two stories: one of the titular character, drifting through the west, earning his guns, and his horse, becoming a man and a cowboy; and it is also the story of a writer who is looking to record the story of that cowboy, in early hollywood, to fulfill somebody else's dream of film as didactic history: both men learning what he can and cannot stand, when he can and cannot stand up for what he believes is right, and what the trade-offs are.
it's very well-written, with the occasional purple sentence here and there. i found the alternate chapter structure was well-balanced and the pacing was pretty good, though i had issues with foreshadowing regarding the girl toward the end of the book. the characterization is great, and i adore rachel gold -- some of the most poignant moments in the book swirl around her, and she softens what is a very masculine book.
almost what i like best is that this book is written by a canadian but not what i usually come by in canadian literature. sometimes it seems to get your canada arts council grant you have to stuff your book full of canadian themes: totem poles, the immigrant experience, or the vastness of the empty plains, of the country. that's just never resonated with me, and has stultified books i've read in the past. it does take a moment to address what it is to be canadian, however, and i thought this passage rang very true:
"And you're a Canadian, Harry. So why is a Canadian so concerned about teaching Americans how to be American?"
"Because I chose this place... Canada isn't a country at all, it's simply geography. There's no emotion there, not the kind Chance is talking about. There are no Whitmans, no Twains, no Cranes. Half the English Canadians wish they were really English, and the other half wish they were Americans. If you're going to be anything, you have to choose. Even Catholics don't regard Limbo as something permanent. I remember when the ice used to break up on the South Saskatchewan. We'd be woken up in our bed in the middle of the night by a noise like an artillery barrage, you could hear it all over the city, a great crashing and roaring as the ice broke apart and began to move downriver. At first light, everybody would rush out to watch. Hundreds of people gathered on the riverbanks on a cold spring morning, the whole river fracturing, the water smoking up through the cracks, great plates of ice grinding and rubbing against the piles of the bridge with a desperate moan. It always excited me as a kid. I shook with excitement, shook with the ecstasy of movement. We all cheered. What we were cheering nobody knew. But now, here, when I listen to Chance, maybe I understand that my memory is the truest picture of my country, bystanders huddled on a riverbank, cheering as the world sweeps by. In our hearts we preferred the riverbank, preferred to be spectators, preferred to live our little moment of excitement and then forget it. Chance doesn't want Americans to forget to keep moving."
i want to keep moving too. :)
it's very well-written, with the occasional purple sentence here and there. i found the alternate chapter structure was well-balanced and the pacing was pretty good, though i had issues with foreshadowing regarding the girl toward the end of the book. the characterization is great, and i adore rachel gold -- some of the most poignant moments in the book swirl around her, and she softens what is a very masculine book.
almost what i like best is that this book is written by a canadian but not what i usually come by in canadian literature. sometimes it seems to get your canada arts council grant you have to stuff your book full of canadian themes: totem poles, the immigrant experience, or the vastness of the empty plains, of the country. that's just never resonated with me, and has stultified books i've read in the past. it does take a moment to address what it is to be canadian, however, and i thought this passage rang very true:
"And you're a Canadian, Harry. So why is a Canadian so concerned about teaching Americans how to be American?"
"Because I chose this place... Canada isn't a country at all, it's simply geography. There's no emotion there, not the kind Chance is talking about. There are no Whitmans, no Twains, no Cranes. Half the English Canadians wish they were really English, and the other half wish they were Americans. If you're going to be anything, you have to choose. Even Catholics don't regard Limbo as something permanent. I remember when the ice used to break up on the South Saskatchewan. We'd be woken up in our bed in the middle of the night by a noise like an artillery barrage, you could hear it all over the city, a great crashing and roaring as the ice broke apart and began to move downriver. At first light, everybody would rush out to watch. Hundreds of people gathered on the riverbanks on a cold spring morning, the whole river fracturing, the water smoking up through the cracks, great plates of ice grinding and rubbing against the piles of the bridge with a desperate moan. It always excited me as a kid. I shook with excitement, shook with the ecstasy of movement. We all cheered. What we were cheering nobody knew. But now, here, when I listen to Chance, maybe I understand that my memory is the truest picture of my country, bystanders huddled on a riverbank, cheering as the world sweeps by. In our hearts we preferred the riverbank, preferred to be spectators, preferred to live our little moment of excitement and then forget it. Chance doesn't want Americans to forget to keep moving."
i want to keep moving too. :)
November 26, 2020
Brilliant! I loved the writing, story-lines, characters and dialogues from the two sides of the book was amazing.
I thought the western frontier portion as seen through the eyes of "The Englishman's Boy" was outstanding and how he dealt with all the people he came across, who may not have understood his way of life or he theirs and his friendship with Grace who seemingly took the "boy" under his wings and saved him from the dangers, especially the battle scenes detailed on the journey across the west was well written. It took a few paragraphs of the last chapter to understand it's relevance to the book, but once it mentioned sneaking up and stealing the horses, it all made sense. I live in southern Alberta, and the mention of Fort Whoop-Up & Cypress Hills put some geographical context into this section of the book
The Hollywood portion was very good and it was interesting to see all the Hollywood stars named throughout this part of the book, the back-stabbing that (most likely) went on, the parties, etc. I really enjoyed the back and forth between Harry and McAdoo while Harry tried to get a story from him for a movie & then the wild ending between McAdoo, Wylie & Chance and the romance between Rachel and Harry.
I thought the western frontier portion as seen through the eyes of "The Englishman's Boy" was outstanding and how he dealt with all the people he came across, who may not have understood his way of life or he theirs and his friendship with Grace who seemingly took the "boy" under his wings and saved him from the dangers, especially the battle scenes detailed on the journey across the west was well written. It took a few paragraphs of the last chapter to understand it's relevance to the book, but once it mentioned sneaking up and stealing the horses, it all made sense. I live in southern Alberta, and the mention of Fort Whoop-Up & Cypress Hills put some geographical context into this section of the book
The Hollywood portion was very good and it was interesting to see all the Hollywood stars named throughout this part of the book, the back-stabbing that (most likely) went on, the parties, etc. I really enjoyed the back and forth between Harry and McAdoo while Harry tried to get a story from him for a movie & then the wild ending between McAdoo, Wylie & Chance and the romance between Rachel and Harry.
July 22, 2021
‘The Englishman’s Boy’ by Guy Vanderhaeghe is a historical novel about a real massacre which took place in Canada. American bison hunters who called themselves “wolfers” rode into a camp of Assiniboine Natives near a Cypress Hills trading post. The hunters got drunk first after buying whiskey at the trading post, and then proceeded to accuse the natives of stealing horses. They searched the camp and found no American horses, but that didn’t stop the Americans from deciding to implement the American policy of “the only good Indian is a dead Indian.”
The area was called the Northwest Territories in 1873 when the murder of perhaps thirteen of the natives occurred. The area was located in what later became the province of Saskatchewan, Canada. When news of the murders spread, many Canadians were very angry at Americans. As a result the Northwest Mounted Police was created. Canada asked for extradition of the hunters, but of course their request was refused. The incident is forgotten today.
The author has revived the historical incident in this novel, imagining who the “wolfers” were, creating a character, a boy, who reluctantly joined the hunters, unaware fully of what the “wolfers” intended. The Englishman’s boy had been hired as a valet to a wealthy Englishman. Shortly after arriving in America, his boss died. The boy had had a hard farming life of poverty, and he had run away from his abusive father at age thirteen. He was determined to live a life dependent on no one but himself. However, the only job he could immediately find after the death of his first employer was joining the party of hunters led by an American, Tom Hardwick. Supposedly they were following the tracks of the natives who had actually stolen horses from Hardwick’s hired hands while they slept. They lost the track, but that didn’t stop Hardwick from deciding he knew where they would go - north, somewhere.
In alternating chapters, readers meet Harry Vincent, aspiring screenwriter of Hollywood movies in 1923. He hasn’t attracted attention yet as a writer, but he is close to the action. He is working as an assistant to a Hollywood screenwriter, Rachel Gold. But mostly he writes titles on cards to help movie audiences understand the action happening on the screen. Before this job, he was a journalist for a small town newspaper.
When Harry gets a note inviting him to a mansion for a meeting with the wealthy owner of the movie studio where he is working, Daman Ira Chance, he is thrilled. But he isn’t so thrilled with what Chance wants from him, nor is he so thrilled with Chance himself. First, he realizes Chance is a peculiar man. The job Chance wants him to do is peculiar too. Chance wants him to find an old cowboy by the name of Shorty McAdoo. McAdoo is reputed to be a real Old West cowboy unlike most of the cowboys who hang about waiting to be hired for Hollywood westerns. Chance saw McAdoo in a group of extras hired to be background walk-ons for a western picture which was being made. Struck by his looks, Chance asked around about him and learned McAdoo might indeed be the real thing. There were rumors he had fought Indians for real in his past. Chance wants Harry to find him and interview him about his life. Chance has already tried to contact McAdoo but the ancient cowboy doesn’t want anything to do with Chance’s scheme of making a movie about his life. Harry’s job is to find where McAdoo is living and convince him to talk, after which Harry is to write a script.
Nothing in Harry’s life has prepared Harry for any of this, but he makes an effort, driven by the hope of a promotion and lots more money. But he feels slimed by indications Chance will be writing a Hollywood version of McAdoo’s life, changing the facts to suit Chance’s idea of the American Dream.
I liked the novel. The writing is literary, and the story is illuminating. The real Wild West was not really very romantic or very nice. While the characters of Chance and Harry are familiar types to me, I had never really thought about the role of actors in creating a false impression of facts through their acting. We all know movie studios emphasize those aspects of a story of in-depth explorations and historical facts into “if it bleeds, it leads” storytelling. But it is the celebrity aura of actors in movies that actually sell the abridged scripts to us! This is a point in the book.
Anyway. The book has many morals about Hollywood storytelling along with others, but it wasn't too distracting, at least to me. It's an interesting story based on historical facts.
Below is a link to a Wikipedia article about the murders:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypress...
The area was called the Northwest Territories in 1873 when the murder of perhaps thirteen of the natives occurred. The area was located in what later became the province of Saskatchewan, Canada. When news of the murders spread, many Canadians were very angry at Americans. As a result the Northwest Mounted Police was created. Canada asked for extradition of the hunters, but of course their request was refused. The incident is forgotten today.
The author has revived the historical incident in this novel, imagining who the “wolfers” were, creating a character, a boy, who reluctantly joined the hunters, unaware fully of what the “wolfers” intended. The Englishman’s boy had been hired as a valet to a wealthy Englishman. Shortly after arriving in America, his boss died. The boy had had a hard farming life of poverty, and he had run away from his abusive father at age thirteen. He was determined to live a life dependent on no one but himself. However, the only job he could immediately find after the death of his first employer was joining the party of hunters led by an American, Tom Hardwick. Supposedly they were following the tracks of the natives who had actually stolen horses from Hardwick’s hired hands while they slept. They lost the track, but that didn’t stop Hardwick from deciding he knew where they would go - north, somewhere.
In alternating chapters, readers meet Harry Vincent, aspiring screenwriter of Hollywood movies in 1923. He hasn’t attracted attention yet as a writer, but he is close to the action. He is working as an assistant to a Hollywood screenwriter, Rachel Gold. But mostly he writes titles on cards to help movie audiences understand the action happening on the screen. Before this job, he was a journalist for a small town newspaper.
When Harry gets a note inviting him to a mansion for a meeting with the wealthy owner of the movie studio where he is working, Daman Ira Chance, he is thrilled. But he isn’t so thrilled with what Chance wants from him, nor is he so thrilled with Chance himself. First, he realizes Chance is a peculiar man. The job Chance wants him to do is peculiar too. Chance wants him to find an old cowboy by the name of Shorty McAdoo. McAdoo is reputed to be a real Old West cowboy unlike most of the cowboys who hang about waiting to be hired for Hollywood westerns. Chance saw McAdoo in a group of extras hired to be background walk-ons for a western picture which was being made. Struck by his looks, Chance asked around about him and learned McAdoo might indeed be the real thing. There were rumors he had fought Indians for real in his past. Chance wants Harry to find him and interview him about his life. Chance has already tried to contact McAdoo but the ancient cowboy doesn’t want anything to do with Chance’s scheme of making a movie about his life. Harry’s job is to find where McAdoo is living and convince him to talk, after which Harry is to write a script.
Nothing in Harry’s life has prepared Harry for any of this, but he makes an effort, driven by the hope of a promotion and lots more money. But he feels slimed by indications Chance will be writing a Hollywood version of McAdoo’s life, changing the facts to suit Chance’s idea of the American Dream.
I liked the novel. The writing is literary, and the story is illuminating. The real Wild West was not really very romantic or very nice. While the characters of Chance and Harry are familiar types to me, I had never really thought about the role of actors in creating a false impression of facts through their acting. We all know movie studios emphasize those aspects of a story of in-depth explorations and historical facts into “if it bleeds, it leads” storytelling. But it is the celebrity aura of actors in movies that actually sell the abridged scripts to us! This is a point in the book.
Anyway. The book has many morals about Hollywood storytelling along with others, but it wasn't too distracting, at least to me. It's an interesting story based on historical facts.
Below is a link to a Wikipedia article about the murders:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypress...
June 1, 2012
We Canadians are a mild lot...so much so that even our Indian massacres are mild affairs with low body counts and a minimum of fuss. This book is centred around the Cypress Hills massacre, a pretty tame affair when compared to the massive episodes of bloodletting that occurred with some regularity south of the border. In the USA it would probably be listed as a skirmish, but I'll bet none of that was any consolation to the unfortunate Assiniboine who were being set upon by (mostly) American hunters. Vanderhaeghe details the torment of a fictional youth who was on the side of the aggressors in that conflict.
This is an engrossing read, if a tad predictable; I knew how the story would end about 2/3 of the way through the book. I definitely have to check out more of this fellow's work.
This is an engrossing read, if a tad predictable; I knew how the story would end about 2/3 of the way through the book. I definitely have to check out more of this fellow's work.
December 7, 2024
How did I wait so long to read Guy Vanderhaegue?!? He is such a uniquely talented author! What a Canadian treasure! I loved this!
March 9, 2025
I’d never heard of Guy Vanderhaeghe and I don’t know how this hardback novel came to be on my shelves. I certainly don’t remember buying it.
One of the great joys about buying books faster than you read them is that you regularly forget what you have bought. Something else catches your eye and the last purchase gets discarded, sometimes for a long time.
That’s why I have a new rule – I can’t buy a new book unless and until I’ve finished one of the unread ones in my collection. This can give my reading a random quality, but it also regularly serves up fantastic treats.
Reading The Englishman’s Boy was one of those. It is a savage, horrifying tale of the old, wild West set against the backdrop of the emerging film industry. An aspiring writer is given assignment: to find and then write up the story of the ancient cowboy Shorty McAdoo.
Vanderhaeghe is a wonderful story teller and his descriptions of the wild border landscape between the US and Canada are vivid and memorable.
This was the first of a trilogy. I’ll be making sure I read the other two shortly.
One of the great joys about buying books faster than you read them is that you regularly forget what you have bought. Something else catches your eye and the last purchase gets discarded, sometimes for a long time.
That’s why I have a new rule – I can’t buy a new book unless and until I’ve finished one of the unread ones in my collection. This can give my reading a random quality, but it also regularly serves up fantastic treats.
Reading The Englishman’s Boy was one of those. It is a savage, horrifying tale of the old, wild West set against the backdrop of the emerging film industry. An aspiring writer is given assignment: to find and then write up the story of the ancient cowboy Shorty McAdoo.
Vanderhaeghe is a wonderful story teller and his descriptions of the wild border landscape between the US and Canada are vivid and memorable.
This was the first of a trilogy. I’ll be making sure I read the other two shortly.
May 31, 2010
Loved the book and the chapter by chapter movement from the Old West to the early days of Hollywood.
Lots of good philosophy by the movies Director as to what he wanted to portray in his movie about the Old West, even if that did not really fit into the true Shorty McAdoo storyline. Makes us all wonder how many of even todays movies that are "based on a true story" really are accurate.
I found the book a little slow to start, but it picked up steam as we learned more about the characters and by the end I wished it could have gone on even longer!
Lots of good philosophy by the movies Director as to what he wanted to portray in his movie about the Old West, even if that did not really fit into the true Shorty McAdoo storyline. Makes us all wonder how many of even todays movies that are "based on a true story" really are accurate.
I found the book a little slow to start, but it picked up steam as we learned more about the characters and by the end I wished it could have gone on even longer!
May 27, 2008
I have the CBC to thank for turning me on to this wonderful book. Earlier this year, they aired a jaw-droppingly brilliant adaptation of it as a two-part miniseries. Guy Vanderhaeghe himself adapted it, so I came to the book confident that the story had held up well.
Indeed it had. The story is told in mostly alternating chapters, shifting between the late 1880s (or thereabouts) and the early 1930s (pre-Second World War, at any rate). The past storyline is about a young man, known only as "the Englishman's boy" because of his being a servant for one. After his employer dies, the boy falls in with a gang of wolfers hunting down the Indians who stole their horses. The things he witnesses and is forced to do haunt him even into old age.
The Englishman's boy, now an old man named Shorty McAdoo, is being pursued in the 1930s by Harry Vincent, an up-and-coming scenarist who has been specially employed by a movie mogul to write "the great American picture". Harry's story alternates with Shorty's/the Englishman's boy's story, edging ever closer to the most traumatizing events of Shorty's life.
The story is beautifully written, descriptive without being flowery. Vanderhaeghe's dialogue also rings true, with each character easily identifiable. If you've seen the CBC adaptation, you'll find a different ending, but both endings work for their respective media. However, I must say I preferred the book ending slightly, if only because it made me less sad than the TV ending did.
This book comes highly recommended for those who enjoy Westerns, stories set in Canada, or just generally excellent literary works.
Indeed it had. The story is told in mostly alternating chapters, shifting between the late 1880s (or thereabouts) and the early 1930s (pre-Second World War, at any rate). The past storyline is about a young man, known only as "the Englishman's boy" because of his being a servant for one. After his employer dies, the boy falls in with a gang of wolfers hunting down the Indians who stole their horses. The things he witnesses and is forced to do haunt him even into old age.
The Englishman's boy, now an old man named Shorty McAdoo, is being pursued in the 1930s by Harry Vincent, an up-and-coming scenarist who has been specially employed by a movie mogul to write "the great American picture". Harry's story alternates with Shorty's/the Englishman's boy's story, edging ever closer to the most traumatizing events of Shorty's life.
The story is beautifully written, descriptive without being flowery. Vanderhaeghe's dialogue also rings true, with each character easily identifiable. If you've seen the CBC adaptation, you'll find a different ending, but both endings work for their respective media. However, I must say I preferred the book ending slightly, if only because it made me less sad than the TV ending did.
This book comes highly recommended for those who enjoy Westerns, stories set in Canada, or just generally excellent literary works.
March 20, 2014
Wow, what a horrific part of our Canadian history! Although this book was fiction, I appreciated Vanderhaeghe's efforts to raise awareness of the Cyphress Hills Massacre in 1873 (which I did not know beforehand). The twinning of the 2 stories (the massacre in 1873 and the Hollywood silent movie studio 50 years later) was brilliant and effective. Added to this, I applaud the CBC mini-series also written by Vanderhaeghe. It was great seeing the author in his cameo as the bartender. Both the book and the mini-series should be regarded as Canadian classics to be read and watched for many generations.
March 19, 2016
With alternating chapters that overlap the Wild West frontier with early Hollywood glitz, this novel tries to tell the story of a mysterious old cowboy whose life has the makings of the next great American film--if only he can be found. You'd think this would have been terrific - and I wanted it to be since Guy Vanderhaeghe writes beautifully and creates vivid, sympathetic characters. But I couldn't get into this novel the way I did The Crossing, which also takes place in the Canadian and American wilderness and has two Englishmen sent by their father to find their missing brother, as I recall. This book just seemed over-wrought or overly contrived somehow, especially the grim, melodramatic ending. Maybe if he (the author) had just chosen to tell the tale from the English kid's perspective once he falls in with the wolf hunters going after their stolen horses, it might have been more dynamic.
March 4, 2012
Wow, this was such a great book. Vanderhaeghe is a master of descriptive narrative - you can almost smell and feel the atmosphere, especially in the 'historical' parts of the book concerning the wolfers and the build towards the shocking events at Cypress Hills. at the same time, the parallel story of 1920s Hollywood is believable and atmospheric. I want to read much more by this author - apparently, he teaches creative writing at nightschool in Saskatchewan. Lucky pupils - a master writer. Just read it if you can.
January 20, 2012
I quite liked this book. Its awestern, but its more than that. Its philosophical and smart and eloquent. The story is revealed through two narratives, both are drawn together in a fantastic climax. Excellent story telling!
May 17, 2016
Quite an entertaining and well put together story. The intertwined current versus past and the dual storylines of character development were really good. A highly recommended author from my home country.
October 6, 2008
This novel comes up often during discussion in my classes: Guy has done so many things right.
August 21, 2009
It took until page 65 to be totally drawn in...the writing is wonderful.
January 17, 2021
I had an extremely hard time finishing this book. It took me about 14 days. That’s almost triple the amount it usually takes me to finish a book. I can’t quite put a finger on why I didn’t enjoy it. I should have. It’s historical - I love history. It’s Canadian, and so am I!
Despite loving history, I hadn’t ever heard of the Cypress Hills Massacre until maybe last year and even then, I had really only heard the name. The problem with learning history as a white settler is that you don’t often hear about the white-led violence of settling. Additionally, I grew up in Ontario. The west was always some kind of wild arena in a lot of Ontarians minds . . . until I moved to Alberta.
Moving on: the Cypress Hills Massacre happened in 1873. American and Canadian wolf-hunters were looking for their horses who they assumed were stolen by “Indians” (to use the language of the day). They met a small band of Assiniboine and that’s where the poop hit the fan. Hardwick (who is a character in the novel as well) accuses Little Soldier (also in the book) of stealing them. Little Soldier says they didn’t but there are horses grazing just yonder, so take two of them as a sign of peace and respect (this was in the book - there were three conflicting reports from the actual event). Hardwick was not satisfied (and he and Little Soldier both were drunk), so a massive fight took place. From the ashes of the Massacre came the formation of the North West Mounted Police, mentioned in passing in the book. [This was just an extremely brief sum-up of the events. Take the time to read about it yourself, especially if, like me, you’re a Canadian who didn’t know much or anything about it in the first place!]
In terms of a Western story, which the 1873 narrative was, it didn’t grab me as much as a Larry McMurtry book might have. There is something about Canadian fiction literature that in my reading experience affects every book. It’s this presence of gloom. I especially note this in authors from the Maritimes. It’s almost as if there’s an overwhelming sense of existentialism for one, or more characters in all Canadian lit (that I’ve read thus far). I know that in the anthology of short stories I’ve written, people have mentioned noticing the same thing there. Is it ingrained in Canadian authors?
Harry Vincent’s narrative - in which he is hired by a man to tell the story of Shorty McAdoo (and ultimately the events of the 1873 massacre) isn’t really all that different. Despite taking place in Hollywood in the 20s with all the glamour of film writing and filmmaking, it was so oppressive. Was that the point of it all? Perhaps by the end as Harry struggles to get Shorty to talk about any of it.
I wonder if I had read this book having more knowledge of the actual history, I could have enjoyed it more. To give credit where it’s due, I feel like Canadian-based historical fiction is hard to find. So what do you recommend?
Despite loving history, I hadn’t ever heard of the Cypress Hills Massacre until maybe last year and even then, I had really only heard the name. The problem with learning history as a white settler is that you don’t often hear about the white-led violence of settling. Additionally, I grew up in Ontario. The west was always some kind of wild arena in a lot of Ontarians minds . . . until I moved to Alberta.
Moving on: the Cypress Hills Massacre happened in 1873. American and Canadian wolf-hunters were looking for their horses who they assumed were stolen by “Indians” (to use the language of the day). They met a small band of Assiniboine and that’s where the poop hit the fan. Hardwick (who is a character in the novel as well) accuses Little Soldier (also in the book) of stealing them. Little Soldier says they didn’t but there are horses grazing just yonder, so take two of them as a sign of peace and respect (this was in the book - there were three conflicting reports from the actual event). Hardwick was not satisfied (and he and Little Soldier both were drunk), so a massive fight took place. From the ashes of the Massacre came the formation of the North West Mounted Police, mentioned in passing in the book. [This was just an extremely brief sum-up of the events. Take the time to read about it yourself, especially if, like me, you’re a Canadian who didn’t know much or anything about it in the first place!]
In terms of a Western story, which the 1873 narrative was, it didn’t grab me as much as a Larry McMurtry book might have. There is something about Canadian fiction literature that in my reading experience affects every book. It’s this presence of gloom. I especially note this in authors from the Maritimes. It’s almost as if there’s an overwhelming sense of existentialism for one, or more characters in all Canadian lit (that I’ve read thus far). I know that in the anthology of short stories I’ve written, people have mentioned noticing the same thing there. Is it ingrained in Canadian authors?
Harry Vincent’s narrative - in which he is hired by a man to tell the story of Shorty McAdoo (and ultimately the events of the 1873 massacre) isn’t really all that different. Despite taking place in Hollywood in the 20s with all the glamour of film writing and filmmaking, it was so oppressive. Was that the point of it all? Perhaps by the end as Harry struggles to get Shorty to talk about any of it.
I wonder if I had read this book having more knowledge of the actual history, I could have enjoyed it more. To give credit where it’s due, I feel like Canadian-based historical fiction is hard to find. So what do you recommend?
March 26, 2021
What’s the best English-Canadian novel of all time? Admittedly, when speaking of Canadian novels, all time isn’t a very long time, less than 250 years. {BTW, I’m not including French-Canadian novels. I don’t know them well enough.}
The History of Emily Montague (1769) is usually considered the first Canadian novel. Although there were dozens of novels published in the 19th century, CanLit didn’t really get off the ground until the 20th century. But I digress. This isn’t a history lesson.
The best English-Canadian novel is … drumroll please … The Englishman’s Boy, by Guy Vanderhaeghe, published in 1996.
I can hear dissent. I don’t mind. When it comes to books, I’m opinionated. As for the dissent, I’ll address some of it. “What about Nobel-prize winner Alice Munro?” Well, Munro wrote one book published as a novel, which is actually a collection of inter-linked short stories, albeit an excellent collection. “What about an Atwood or Lawrence novel?” Worthy of consideration, but I vote for The Englishman’s Boy. “What about novels by Hugh McClelland, Michael Ondaatje, Rudy Wiebe, Lisa Moore, or Miriam Toews?” Again, all worthy, but give me The Englishman’s Boy.
Here’s why. In a nutshell, The Englishman’s Boy delivers the best combination of prose and plot. A literary double play. The writing is masterful. Vanderhaeghe’s painterly descriptions and perfect sentences are somehow direct and poetic at the same time. The storyline is just as masterful. You get a captivating page-turner that spans generations. I won’t elaborate on the plot. Suffice to say that it pulls you in and doesn’t let you go.
I’m not the only person who thinks Vanderhaeghe is a master. He’s won three Governor-General’s Awards for Fiction (one was for The Englishman’s Boy). His prose has been lauded by many. For example, Rick Salutin extolled its virtues in the ‘Globe and Mail,’ claiming that Vanderhaeghe’s sentences were works of art (I’m paraphrasing Salutin). The Englishman’s Boy was turned into a mini-series (which was almost as good as the novel). That is a tribute to the plot, and is a rare thing in itself – see: Movies vs. Books.
When I want to read a Canadian classic that delivers both excellent prose and plotting, I open the The Englishman’s Boy.
The History of Emily Montague (1769) is usually considered the first Canadian novel. Although there were dozens of novels published in the 19th century, CanLit didn’t really get off the ground until the 20th century. But I digress. This isn’t a history lesson.
The best English-Canadian novel is … drumroll please … The Englishman’s Boy, by Guy Vanderhaeghe, published in 1996.
I can hear dissent. I don’t mind. When it comes to books, I’m opinionated. As for the dissent, I’ll address some of it. “What about Nobel-prize winner Alice Munro?” Well, Munro wrote one book published as a novel, which is actually a collection of inter-linked short stories, albeit an excellent collection. “What about an Atwood or Lawrence novel?” Worthy of consideration, but I vote for The Englishman’s Boy. “What about novels by Hugh McClelland, Michael Ondaatje, Rudy Wiebe, Lisa Moore, or Miriam Toews?” Again, all worthy, but give me The Englishman’s Boy.
Here’s why. In a nutshell, The Englishman’s Boy delivers the best combination of prose and plot. A literary double play. The writing is masterful. Vanderhaeghe’s painterly descriptions and perfect sentences are somehow direct and poetic at the same time. The storyline is just as masterful. You get a captivating page-turner that spans generations. I won’t elaborate on the plot. Suffice to say that it pulls you in and doesn’t let you go.
I’m not the only person who thinks Vanderhaeghe is a master. He’s won three Governor-General’s Awards for Fiction (one was for The Englishman’s Boy). His prose has been lauded by many. For example, Rick Salutin extolled its virtues in the ‘Globe and Mail,’ claiming that Vanderhaeghe’s sentences were works of art (I’m paraphrasing Salutin). The Englishman’s Boy was turned into a mini-series (which was almost as good as the novel). That is a tribute to the plot, and is a rare thing in itself – see: Movies vs. Books.
When I want to read a Canadian classic that delivers both excellent prose and plotting, I open the The Englishman’s Boy.
July 26, 2025
Read 80% of it in one day, which always merits a 5-star rating from me.
Kept reading for the reveal and to see how the film story would end. Can't say either was a huge surprise, but the beautiful writing, and the weird 1920s storyline, and the interesting characters were worth it.
I loved Shorty in both timelines, and all the side characters, and the weird film producer. The 1920s storyline almost seems a bit overdone, except you read about weird millionaires like that all the time, from Howard Hughes to Kanye West.
I'm glad the poetic writing was broken up with a lot of dialogue, but it was beautiful:
"Once he cast his eyes up to the forest roof and there was the moon, bouncing along in step with him, jarring and bobbing its lunatic face at him through the treetops."
...If occasionally overwritten. Like, if I can't grasp the image right away (as with the above example), and the syntax is unusual, then my eyes want to skim (as with the below example):
"Crossing rolling countryside in late afternoon, the line of march scattered and ragged as it crawls up ridges and descends into declivities which cup unpalatable water with a white petticoat hem of alkali deposit peeking from under a dirty skirt of mud."
I look forward to reading The Last Crossing.
Kept reading for the reveal and to see how the film story would end. Can't say either was a huge surprise, but the beautiful writing, and the weird 1920s storyline, and the interesting characters were worth it.
I loved Shorty in both timelines, and all the side characters, and the weird film producer. The 1920s storyline almost seems a bit overdone, except you read about weird millionaires like that all the time, from Howard Hughes to Kanye West.
I'm glad the poetic writing was broken up with a lot of dialogue, but it was beautiful:
"Once he cast his eyes up to the forest roof and there was the moon, bouncing along in step with him, jarring and bobbing its lunatic face at him through the treetops."
...If occasionally overwritten. Like, if I can't grasp the image right away (as with the above example), and the syntax is unusual, then my eyes want to skim (as with the below example):
"Crossing rolling countryside in late afternoon, the line of march scattered and ragged as it crawls up ridges and descends into declivities which cup unpalatable water with a white petticoat hem of alkali deposit peeking from under a dirty skirt of mud."
I look forward to reading The Last Crossing.
Read
September 1, 2018An intriguing narrative about two powerful settings: the Wild West and the sometimes wilder early Hollywood. Much of the narrative focuses on the exposing and conveying of historical truth in contexts that prefer sanitized fictions. Yet it’s a novel 🙂
September 19, 2021
A story set in my backyard and told very well. Lots of interesting themes. Some of the dialogue felt rote but overall a great read.
June 21, 2019
Loved this book! Compelling and full of gritty but vulnerable characters.
June 21, 2024
So good. But damn is it ever bleak
December 29, 2024
Great story teller!
June 6, 2015
I really like this book. It has a very interesting storyline. In fact, Englishman's Boy includes three storylines that are all intertwined. Firstly, there are two Assiniboine Indians stealing some horses from white men in 1873.
Secondly, there is the young Englishman´s Boy whose real name is never given and who joins the white men whose horses were stolen in their chase of the Indians all the way up to Canada. (+ includes a retelling of the Cypress Hills massacre in 1873)
Thirdly, there is an old Western actor in Hollywood called Shorty McAdoo. He is contacted by Harry Vincent in 1923 who works for a movie company owned by Damon Ira Chance. The second and the third storyline are told simulataneously. Chance is determined to make an epic movie about the American West and he wants Harry bring him McAdoo's biography so that he can make a movie out of it. However, everything turns out to be much more difficult and complex than it seems on first sight.
In the end, Englishman´s Boy discusses not only the topics of history and identity which are fairly popular among contemporary Canadian authors, but also the legitimacy of Hollywood in the 1920s and beyond. It relates Canadian identity to American identity and how the latter is portrayed in the movie industry. There are many layers to the storyline and they are easy to explore so that you get a good overall picture of the problems that are addressed and dealt with in this fabulous novel. I give it a good 4 out of 5 stars!
Secondly, there is the young Englishman´s Boy whose real name is never given and who joins the white men whose horses were stolen in their chase of the Indians all the way up to Canada. (+ includes a retelling of the Cypress Hills massacre in 1873)
Thirdly, there is an old Western actor in Hollywood called Shorty McAdoo. He is contacted by Harry Vincent in 1923 who works for a movie company owned by Damon Ira Chance. The second and the third storyline are told simulataneously. Chance is determined to make an epic movie about the American West and he wants Harry bring him McAdoo's biography so that he can make a movie out of it. However, everything turns out to be much more difficult and complex than it seems on first sight.
In the end, Englishman´s Boy discusses not only the topics of history and identity which are fairly popular among contemporary Canadian authors, but also the legitimacy of Hollywood in the 1920s and beyond. It relates Canadian identity to American identity and how the latter is portrayed in the movie industry. There are many layers to the storyline and they are easy to explore so that you get a good overall picture of the problems that are addressed and dealt with in this fabulous novel. I give it a good 4 out of 5 stars!
March 4, 2017
If Westerns are your thing, this is a phenomenally written Western and while I only give it 3 stars, it's because Westerns are not my thing. I find the intricate detail of life in the wide open space to be rather tiring and I read this for a book club so in my mind I was duty-bound to finish it. The book fluctuates between 1920s Hollywood and the real old West of about 30-40 years prior. While I was slightly more interested in the Hollywood era, I really never warmed to the characters. As I mentioned in my first paragraph though, the writing itself is excellent, the quality of the book is great. I just couldn't honestly give it more than 3 stars because I personally didn't enjoy it. I guess others would have no trouble with 4 or 5 stars.
July 20, 2011
I cannot explain why I even finished reading this book. An epic novel, large in scope and rather long. A story about old cowboys and Indians, plus a concurrent story about a researcher/writer who seeks out a famous old cowboy to interview him about his life, in order to produce an epic movie. Lots of details about Old Hollywood, too many for me since I have not much of an interest in movies or the movie business. I plodded through this novel b/c it had won the GG a few years back, but for the life of me, I cannot see any redeeming qualities to recommend this book.
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