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Telegraph Days
I've come to think that in times of crisis human beings don't have it in them to be rational. The Yazee gang was riding down upon us, six abreast. We all ran outside and confirmed that fact. The sensible thing would have been to run and hide -- but did we? Not at all.
The narrator of Larry McMurtry's newest book is spunky Nellie Courtright, twenty-two years old and already wrapping every man in the West around her little finger. When she and her teenage brother Jackson are orphaned, she sweet-talks the local sheriff into hiring Jackson as a deputy, while she takes over the vacant job of town telegrapher. When, by pure blind luck, Jackson shoots down the entire Yazee gang, Nellie is quick to capitalize on his new notoriety by selling reviews to reporters. It seems wherever Nellie is, action is sure to happen, from a love affair with Buffalo Bill to a ringside seat at the O.K. Corral gunfight. Told with charm, humor, and an unparalleled zest for life, Nellie's story is the story of how the West was won.
The narrator of Larry McMurtry's newest book is spunky Nellie Courtright, twenty-two years old and already wrapping every man in the West around her little finger. When she and her teenage brother Jackson are orphaned, she sweet-talks the local sheriff into hiring Jackson as a deputy, while she takes over the vacant job of town telegrapher. When, by pure blind luck, Jackson shoots down the entire Yazee gang, Nellie is quick to capitalize on his new notoriety by selling reviews to reporters. It seems wherever Nellie is, action is sure to happen, from a love affair with Buffalo Bill to a ringside seat at the O.K. Corral gunfight. Told with charm, humor, and an unparalleled zest for life, Nellie's story is the story of how the West was won.
289 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 2006
371 people are currently reading
1291 people want to read
About the author
Larry McMurtry
150 books4,066 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 375 reviews
August 3, 2018
I should cut Telegraph Days some slack. This is not a novel that aspires for greatness nor one I wanted to read. I picked it off the library shelf for lack of the Larry McMurtry that I did want to read: Texasville. Published in 2006, this amiable western is the first person account of Marie Antoinette Courtright, commonly known as Nellie, who for a time runs the telegraph office in the town of Rita Blanca in 1876. Rather than tell her story, McMurtry trots in every legend of the era--Buffalo Bill Cody, Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, etc.--for cameos. Forrest Gump didn't have Nellie's knack for the right place at the right time.
The novel opens with twenty-two year old Nellie discovering her father hanging from a noose in the barn. Having been suckered by sales brochures on the allure of ranching, the Courtrights moved from Virginia to No Man's Land, with Nellie's two little brothers, three little sisters, one older sister, one mother and three servants all succumbing to illness along the way. Left with a mule named Percy and a seventeen year old brother named Jackson, the well-organized Nellie heads for Rita Blanca, a backwater town whose residents aren't sure is in Texas or Oklahoma.
Nellie lands her brother a job as deputy sheriff to Teddy Bunsen, the bachelor lawman who has proposed to Nellie six times and she esteems could use help carrying the drunks out of the street. While Jackson lives at the jail, Nellie takes a room in a boarding house run by Mrs. Karoo, a black woman some suppose is a witch. Learning that the telegraph office closed last month when its operator took a Comanche bride and took off, Nellie offers to run it. After beating the snakes and spiders out, her office does robust business, though bringing Nellie terrible news that Wild Bill Hickok, a fond suitor back east, has been shot and killed in Deadwood.
Jackson later asked me why I took it so hard--but then he hadn't really known Billy. When Bill came to visit us at our hotel in St. Louis he came to see me, not Jackson. Once on our riverboat trip he had even held my hand for a while, after a dance; I suppose I was in love with with by the time he let it go. He went no farther that night, but the shy way he looked at me convinced me he might wish to go farther someday. He had promised to come visit us soon in No Man's Land. Most people didn't realize how shortsighted Billy was. He could hardly see across a card table, another thing that touched me. In my lonely times on the Black Mesa Ranch I managed to keep Billy's memory fresh, and I continued to hope that one day he would show up and hold my hand again, and this time, perhaps even on purpose. Our courtship, if that's what it had been, was not lengthy, but in frontier times, with life so chancy, young people had to jump quick if they hoped to have sweethearts, much less wives and husbands.
Fate intervenes when the murderous Yazee gang rides into town with the intent of killing everything in their path. Nellie wanders into the street and Jackson, who has never fired a pistol, calmly draws it at his sister's urging and shoots each of the gang members dead. Beau Wheless, who runs the general store, seizes on the commercial opportunities of the shootout and proposes that Nellie write up "their story" in a booklet he offers to print and split profits with her on. Nellie decides she can pay for printing herself and keep all the profits, and lights out for Dodge City with Jackson in tow.
On the trail, Jackson Courtright demonstrates his fame as a marksman will be short lived when he proves incapable of hitting any game animal with a gun. In Dodge City, Nellie is accosted by the rude and drunken marshal Wyatt Earp, who feels the wrath of Nellie’s tongue, as well his brother Virgil, who issues a marriage proposal to the telegraph operator on her way out of town. She returns to Rita Blanca with copies of her booklet Banditti which sell like hotcakes. With news of the gunfight all over the wire, a gaggle of curious arrive, including two who will change Nellie's life: a devilishly handsome reporter named Zenas Clark, and legendary showman Buffalo Bill Cody.
While Nellie copulates wildly with Zenas in the hayloft of the livery stable, Buffalo Bill arrives on business. Seeking to put together a wild west pageant, Cody proposes recreating Rita Blanca on a grand scale for customers who want to see the Wild West after it disappears. Charismatic and impulsive, Cody hires Nellie to run his business and she relocates to North Platte, Nebraska for four years to do just that. Not content to settle down, she returns briefly to Rita Blanca to serve as mayor, meeting Billy the Kid and General W.T. Sherman before joining Zenas in Tombstone, where she witnesses the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Then I noticed that Zenas and I were hardly the only solid citizens in the street. The photographer, Camilus Fry, whom I had not yet met, was standing there with a black cloth over his arm--I suppose he had been making a picture when he sensed the menace. More than a dozen other citizens were just standing in the street gaping; they had blank, trapped looks on their faces--all of them were mobile, and yet they didn't flee. I had seen that look before, in Rita Blanca, when a cyclone was bearing down on the town--we all knew we ought to run and hide, and do it quick, and yet we didn't move. Fortunately the cyclone just missed us.
The Earps, with Doc Holliday on their right flank, continued their advance, despite the fact that they had no accurate notion of where the Cowboys had gone. The Cowboys' mood or rationale I can only guess at. They were somewhere on the other side of the photography shop, perhaps feeling muddled, with no clear notion of what ought to happen next. They may well have all been outlaws--but were they fighting men? The Earps, of course, were fighting men and not much else. If gunplay should begin, it was highly likely that there would be fewer Cowboys when it ended.
"Nellie, bullets are going to fly," Zenas warned. "We ought to get behind that wagon if you won't hide under the desk."
He was dead right, of course, but I was too stubborn, or maybe too curious to consider anything of the sort. I wanted to see the fight, if there was one; and I wanted to be the first one to write it up, as I had written up the Yazee charge in my Banditti book.
What's remarkable about Telegraph Days is Larry McMurtry's ability to paint characters and dialogue and frontier atmosphere. He's in full-on Elmore Leonard mode here, simply permitting the reader to hang out with his characters regardless of anything happening. Even though this novel is western fantasy--with Nellie ultimately moving to Santa Monica to consort with D.W. Griffith and Lillian Gish among other Hollywood royalty--nearly every page features some delightful observation from Nellie. Her resolve, imagination, way with words and insatiable libido are all facets that make her a likable narrator.
It had been a while since I had paid Sheriff Ted Bunsen much attention--my susceptibilities being what they are, I have a way of forgetting one man when a more interesting man comes along; and even in an out-of-the-way place like Rita Blanca, men more interesting than Ted Bunsen did come along. Andy Jessup, Zenas Clark, and Buffalo Bill Cody all put Ted Bunsen well in the shade when it came to being interesting.
On the other hand, I am not the kind of girl who likes to lose boyfriends. Andy, Zenas, and Bill had temporarily hied themselves off to other parts, but good old reliable Ted could be counted on to be sitting in a rope-bottomed chair in the office of the jail, drinking whiskey that might have a fly or two in it. I decided to slip in and give him a kiss or two, so he wouldn't despair. In fact he was pouring whiskey from his jug to his glass when I came striding in in my forthright way: he jumped about a foot when I surprised him.
"Hello, Theodore," I said. "Deputy Courtright has just placed me under arrest--want to help me pick out a cell?"
As well-written as Telegraph Days is, nothing compelling happens. A colorful and well-manicured rose bush gets boring after a minute. His first-person narrative gives McMurtry license to simply let Nellie tell on and on and on. He makes no effort to craft a story around the telegraph office in Rita Blanca, instead letting the reader do the work, using our awareness of frontier legends or historical figures to spice the novel up. I liked the way McMurtry demythologizes legends--Wyatt Earp is not a good guy and Billy the Kid is not a bad guy--with a dash of wit, but the whole business barely warrants a novel. We're simply watching a master craftsman go about his work.
The novel opens with twenty-two year old Nellie discovering her father hanging from a noose in the barn. Having been suckered by sales brochures on the allure of ranching, the Courtrights moved from Virginia to No Man's Land, with Nellie's two little brothers, three little sisters, one older sister, one mother and three servants all succumbing to illness along the way. Left with a mule named Percy and a seventeen year old brother named Jackson, the well-organized Nellie heads for Rita Blanca, a backwater town whose residents aren't sure is in Texas or Oklahoma.
Nellie lands her brother a job as deputy sheriff to Teddy Bunsen, the bachelor lawman who has proposed to Nellie six times and she esteems could use help carrying the drunks out of the street. While Jackson lives at the jail, Nellie takes a room in a boarding house run by Mrs. Karoo, a black woman some suppose is a witch. Learning that the telegraph office closed last month when its operator took a Comanche bride and took off, Nellie offers to run it. After beating the snakes and spiders out, her office does robust business, though bringing Nellie terrible news that Wild Bill Hickok, a fond suitor back east, has been shot and killed in Deadwood.
Jackson later asked me why I took it so hard--but then he hadn't really known Billy. When Bill came to visit us at our hotel in St. Louis he came to see me, not Jackson. Once on our riverboat trip he had even held my hand for a while, after a dance; I suppose I was in love with with by the time he let it go. He went no farther that night, but the shy way he looked at me convinced me he might wish to go farther someday. He had promised to come visit us soon in No Man's Land. Most people didn't realize how shortsighted Billy was. He could hardly see across a card table, another thing that touched me. In my lonely times on the Black Mesa Ranch I managed to keep Billy's memory fresh, and I continued to hope that one day he would show up and hold my hand again, and this time, perhaps even on purpose. Our courtship, if that's what it had been, was not lengthy, but in frontier times, with life so chancy, young people had to jump quick if they hoped to have sweethearts, much less wives and husbands.
Fate intervenes when the murderous Yazee gang rides into town with the intent of killing everything in their path. Nellie wanders into the street and Jackson, who has never fired a pistol, calmly draws it at his sister's urging and shoots each of the gang members dead. Beau Wheless, who runs the general store, seizes on the commercial opportunities of the shootout and proposes that Nellie write up "their story" in a booklet he offers to print and split profits with her on. Nellie decides she can pay for printing herself and keep all the profits, and lights out for Dodge City with Jackson in tow.
On the trail, Jackson Courtright demonstrates his fame as a marksman will be short lived when he proves incapable of hitting any game animal with a gun. In Dodge City, Nellie is accosted by the rude and drunken marshal Wyatt Earp, who feels the wrath of Nellie’s tongue, as well his brother Virgil, who issues a marriage proposal to the telegraph operator on her way out of town. She returns to Rita Blanca with copies of her booklet Banditti which sell like hotcakes. With news of the gunfight all over the wire, a gaggle of curious arrive, including two who will change Nellie's life: a devilishly handsome reporter named Zenas Clark, and legendary showman Buffalo Bill Cody.
While Nellie copulates wildly with Zenas in the hayloft of the livery stable, Buffalo Bill arrives on business. Seeking to put together a wild west pageant, Cody proposes recreating Rita Blanca on a grand scale for customers who want to see the Wild West after it disappears. Charismatic and impulsive, Cody hires Nellie to run his business and she relocates to North Platte, Nebraska for four years to do just that. Not content to settle down, she returns briefly to Rita Blanca to serve as mayor, meeting Billy the Kid and General W.T. Sherman before joining Zenas in Tombstone, where she witnesses the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
Then I noticed that Zenas and I were hardly the only solid citizens in the street. The photographer, Camilus Fry, whom I had not yet met, was standing there with a black cloth over his arm--I suppose he had been making a picture when he sensed the menace. More than a dozen other citizens were just standing in the street gaping; they had blank, trapped looks on their faces--all of them were mobile, and yet they didn't flee. I had seen that look before, in Rita Blanca, when a cyclone was bearing down on the town--we all knew we ought to run and hide, and do it quick, and yet we didn't move. Fortunately the cyclone just missed us.
The Earps, with Doc Holliday on their right flank, continued their advance, despite the fact that they had no accurate notion of where the Cowboys had gone. The Cowboys' mood or rationale I can only guess at. They were somewhere on the other side of the photography shop, perhaps feeling muddled, with no clear notion of what ought to happen next. They may well have all been outlaws--but were they fighting men? The Earps, of course, were fighting men and not much else. If gunplay should begin, it was highly likely that there would be fewer Cowboys when it ended.
"Nellie, bullets are going to fly," Zenas warned. "We ought to get behind that wagon if you won't hide under the desk."
He was dead right, of course, but I was too stubborn, or maybe too curious to consider anything of the sort. I wanted to see the fight, if there was one; and I wanted to be the first one to write it up, as I had written up the Yazee charge in my Banditti book.
What's remarkable about Telegraph Days is Larry McMurtry's ability to paint characters and dialogue and frontier atmosphere. He's in full-on Elmore Leonard mode here, simply permitting the reader to hang out with his characters regardless of anything happening. Even though this novel is western fantasy--with Nellie ultimately moving to Santa Monica to consort with D.W. Griffith and Lillian Gish among other Hollywood royalty--nearly every page features some delightful observation from Nellie. Her resolve, imagination, way with words and insatiable libido are all facets that make her a likable narrator.
It had been a while since I had paid Sheriff Ted Bunsen much attention--my susceptibilities being what they are, I have a way of forgetting one man when a more interesting man comes along; and even in an out-of-the-way place like Rita Blanca, men more interesting than Ted Bunsen did come along. Andy Jessup, Zenas Clark, and Buffalo Bill Cody all put Ted Bunsen well in the shade when it came to being interesting.
On the other hand, I am not the kind of girl who likes to lose boyfriends. Andy, Zenas, and Bill had temporarily hied themselves off to other parts, but good old reliable Ted could be counted on to be sitting in a rope-bottomed chair in the office of the jail, drinking whiskey that might have a fly or two in it. I decided to slip in and give him a kiss or two, so he wouldn't despair. In fact he was pouring whiskey from his jug to his glass when I came striding in in my forthright way: he jumped about a foot when I surprised him.
"Hello, Theodore," I said. "Deputy Courtright has just placed me under arrest--want to help me pick out a cell?"
As well-written as Telegraph Days is, nothing compelling happens. A colorful and well-manicured rose bush gets boring after a minute. His first-person narrative gives McMurtry license to simply let Nellie tell on and on and on. He makes no effort to craft a story around the telegraph office in Rita Blanca, instead letting the reader do the work, using our awareness of frontier legends or historical figures to spice the novel up. I liked the way McMurtry demythologizes legends--Wyatt Earp is not a good guy and Billy the Kid is not a bad guy--with a dash of wit, but the whole business barely warrants a novel. We're simply watching a master craftsman go about his work.
July 24, 2020
A good narration by Annie Potts and she kept it light. The story started out interesting and humorous. Halfway through I knew way too much about Nellie's predilections toward "copulating" with any dude who could get a "stiffie." Soft porn on the Western Front. With cameos by every legend from Billy the Kid to Buffalo Bill to Wild Bill and even the non-Bills, this fit the bill for the PopSugar challenge, Read a western.
November 27, 2007
Since I listened to this book rather than read it, part of my review has to go to the reader. Annie Potts did an incredible job of making the diverse characters of the old west come alive. Especially our heroine, raised during the Civil War and come of age in the wild west of all our old favorites from Wild Bill to Buffalo Bill and everyone in between. She witnesses all the famous cowboy events of the time and does so with the perspective and demeanor of a Lady. It was so fun I didn't want it to end and as someone raised in Nebraska, i'd say the description of the plains hits a bullseye. What fun!
May 20, 2009
Pound for pound, few writers can compare with Larry McMurtry. The Pulitzer Prize winner has penned several contempary classics--among them, 'Terms of Endearment', 'The Last Picture Show', and the epic 'Lonesome Dove'.
So it's beyond disappointment when a writer as talented as McMurtry spits out a contrived, one-dimensional shell of a novel. And that's being kind to TELEGRAPH DAYS, McMurtry's "alleged" spoof of the cheap dime store novels of the 19th Century. This is a Western dominated by unimagination; by the "adventures" of Nellie Courtright, a young woman who roams the frontier, subsequently rubbing elbows with all of the famous--and infamous--icons: Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill Cody, Jesse James, the Earp brothers, Doc Holliday, General William Sherman, Billy the Kid, to name but a paltry few.
Setting aside such a titanic suspension of disbelief, this is a book whose author blatantly goes through the motions--this is a book penned for nothing more than a contractual obligation to a publisher. There is no development, no depth, no dire conflict--no feeling. It's a rambling story that never sets a pace and ends with a whimpering yawn. . .that ends with nary an afterthought.
What's most frustrating is the fact had TELEGRAPH DAYS been written by an unknown, it never would have seen the light of day--or it would have been self-published. And that would do even more of a disservice to self-publishing.
So it's beyond disappointment when a writer as talented as McMurtry spits out a contrived, one-dimensional shell of a novel. And that's being kind to TELEGRAPH DAYS, McMurtry's "alleged" spoof of the cheap dime store novels of the 19th Century. This is a Western dominated by unimagination; by the "adventures" of Nellie Courtright, a young woman who roams the frontier, subsequently rubbing elbows with all of the famous--and infamous--icons: Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill Cody, Jesse James, the Earp brothers, Doc Holliday, General William Sherman, Billy the Kid, to name but a paltry few.
Setting aside such a titanic suspension of disbelief, this is a book whose author blatantly goes through the motions--this is a book penned for nothing more than a contractual obligation to a publisher. There is no development, no depth, no dire conflict--no feeling. It's a rambling story that never sets a pace and ends with a whimpering yawn. . .that ends with nary an afterthought.
What's most frustrating is the fact had TELEGRAPH DAYS been written by an unknown, it never would have seen the light of day--or it would have been self-published. And that would do even more of a disservice to self-publishing.
September 19, 2022
Telegraph Days gets mixed reviews, but I liked it a lot. It's a brisk faux-historical romp, and wicked funny. Marie Antoinette Courtwright, an unwitting pioneer at the tail end of the Old West, lands on her feet, and on her back, in a set-piece tour that includes her attempted seduction of Buffalo Bill, him hiring her as his accountant, her slapdown of the Earps, her eyewitness report on the OK Corral dustup, and her making millions, writing dime-novel accounts of her Western adventures.
It's fluff, but *good* fluff, and had enough verisimilitude to send me to Google and Wikipedia, to see if Buffalo Bill really did have someone like Nellie in his life (it appears not, but the other historic details are correct).
McMurtry spent years in futile attempts to demystify the Old West of cowboys and gunfighters. Futile, because everybody loves a good story, and building railroads, churches, schools and hospitals just isn't very dramatic. So the real story of settling and civilizing the West gets buried under exciting legends of cowboys and Indians, gunfighters and lawmen....
McMurtry figured this out, finally, and now he's having fun subverting the silliness. You'll have fun with it, too. Except for the ending, which just kind of tails off. Up to then, it's great.
"...The thing to do with the Wild West was sell it to those who hadn't lived in it, or even to some who had," Nellie tells us in her inimitable voice. "Just sell it all: the hats, the boots, the spurs, the six-guns, the buffalo and elk and antelope, the longhorn cattle and the cowboys who herded them, the gunslingers and the lawmen, the cattle barons and the gamblers, the whores, the railroad men, and the Indians too, of course, if you could find them and persuade them, as Cody had."
Also see the fine review by Erik Spanberg at http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0530/p1...
if you haven't read this one, you should. Nellie Courtwright is a wonder, and this is the most cheerful of McM's late-period Westerns. Not to be missed.
It's fluff, but *good* fluff, and had enough verisimilitude to send me to Google and Wikipedia, to see if Buffalo Bill really did have someone like Nellie in his life (it appears not, but the other historic details are correct).
McMurtry spent years in futile attempts to demystify the Old West of cowboys and gunfighters. Futile, because everybody loves a good story, and building railroads, churches, schools and hospitals just isn't very dramatic. So the real story of settling and civilizing the West gets buried under exciting legends of cowboys and Indians, gunfighters and lawmen....
McMurtry figured this out, finally, and now he's having fun subverting the silliness. You'll have fun with it, too. Except for the ending, which just kind of tails off. Up to then, it's great.
"...The thing to do with the Wild West was sell it to those who hadn't lived in it, or even to some who had," Nellie tells us in her inimitable voice. "Just sell it all: the hats, the boots, the spurs, the six-guns, the buffalo and elk and antelope, the longhorn cattle and the cowboys who herded them, the gunslingers and the lawmen, the cattle barons and the gamblers, the whores, the railroad men, and the Indians too, of course, if you could find them and persuade them, as Cody had."
Also see the fine review by Erik Spanberg at http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0530/p1...
if you haven't read this one, you should. Nellie Courtwright is a wonder, and this is the most cheerful of McM's late-period Westerns. Not to be missed.
January 21, 2011
This was a short novel on audio that I enjoyed listening to at times I couldn't read a "real" book.
It's a nice little picture of the old west through the eyes of Nellie Courtwright, a telegrapher and businesswoman. Along the way in her story, she meets just about all of the old west legends.
It's a little tongue-in-cheek, and a little dab into history at the same time. It has a dose of realism, showing how it wasn't all about blazing gunfights, but did show how those legends could evolve.
What I really found intriguing was her take on the events in Tombstone, including the shootout at the OK Corral. It's quite a contrasting take from the legends that build up Wyatt Earp.
And my favorite moment of the book had to be her interview with Doc Holliday. Priceless.
It's a nice little picture of the old west through the eyes of Nellie Courtwright, a telegrapher and businesswoman. Along the way in her story, she meets just about all of the old west legends.
It's a little tongue-in-cheek, and a little dab into history at the same time. It has a dose of realism, showing how it wasn't all about blazing gunfights, but did show how those legends could evolve.
What I really found intriguing was her take on the events in Tombstone, including the shootout at the OK Corral. It's quite a contrasting take from the legends that build up Wyatt Earp.
And my favorite moment of the book had to be her interview with Doc Holliday. Priceless.
April 25, 2017
About halfway through, this good story with a strong young heroine turned into a kind of western soft porn. I was disappointed. Three stars for the first half.
June 2, 2020
Why did Larry McMurtry write this? The author who wrote the greatest western of all time, Lonesome Dove, has written one of the most worthless books I’ve ever read. The only reason this is getting two stars from me is that the first couple of chapters started out okay. The characters were humorous and interesting in his usual style, but the narrative soon took a nosedive. By the end of the book, I could hardly push myself to finish it. I felt that he was pushing the boundaries to see how dumb of a story he could write and get away with it.
August 4, 2011
Fluff, and not in a particularly good way. I'd call it a slutty 19th century Forrest Gump, but that's an insult to sluts, the 19th century, and Forrest Gump. I only gave this one star because goodreads won't let you rate a book 0 stars.
September 2, 2013
I was surprised, when I read this book, at how truly boring it was, given the good reviews it had received. I am guessing that the reviewers were reminiscing more on the quality of McMurtry's 'Lonesome Dove' than on the quality of the writing in this particular novel.
The book began well enough, and the main character of Nellie started off full of mouth and grit. However, there was no character development, the woman's mouth and spunk became annoying over time and the character remained shallow. There were so many places that McMurtry could have taken this character - but as a man writing from a woman's perspective, McMurtry took her to the place where so many men want a woman to be - having promiscuous sexual dalliances and cleaning up men's messes.
There was no recognizable plot, with the narrative appearing simply to be a forum for McMurtry to "name drop" every cowboy or outlaw hero from that period of the west, from Buffalo Bill to Wild Bill. The author overstretched himself in places simply to include a famous character (e.g. Jesse James or Billy the Kid) whose presence did nothing to further develop or improve upon the story.
About 2/3 through the book it becomes abundantly clear that McMurtry has become as sick of the character of Nellie as the reader has, and he ups the pace, skipping years and even decades with the flourish of a pen where initially the pace of the narrative was measured and slow. Characters who could have had some importance to the story are named once and forgotten, and only those with a name worth dropping are discussed further.
I kept waiting for something to happen. It didn't. The ending did nothing to round off the story. The final chapter simply ended like any other chapter - I turned the page, having no indication from the author that this was the end, and there was simply nothing more. I admit to feeling disappointed that I wasted my time reading toward something epic, as the book had initially seemed to promise - and that something even mildly fascinating never came.
The book began well enough, and the main character of Nellie started off full of mouth and grit. However, there was no character development, the woman's mouth and spunk became annoying over time and the character remained shallow. There were so many places that McMurtry could have taken this character - but as a man writing from a woman's perspective, McMurtry took her to the place where so many men want a woman to be - having promiscuous sexual dalliances and cleaning up men's messes.
There was no recognizable plot, with the narrative appearing simply to be a forum for McMurtry to "name drop" every cowboy or outlaw hero from that period of the west, from Buffalo Bill to Wild Bill. The author overstretched himself in places simply to include a famous character (e.g. Jesse James or Billy the Kid) whose presence did nothing to further develop or improve upon the story.
About 2/3 through the book it becomes abundantly clear that McMurtry has become as sick of the character of Nellie as the reader has, and he ups the pace, skipping years and even decades with the flourish of a pen where initially the pace of the narrative was measured and slow. Characters who could have had some importance to the story are named once and forgotten, and only those with a name worth dropping are discussed further.
I kept waiting for something to happen. It didn't. The ending did nothing to round off the story. The final chapter simply ended like any other chapter - I turned the page, having no indication from the author that this was the end, and there was simply nothing more. I admit to feeling disappointed that I wasted my time reading toward something epic, as the book had initially seemed to promise - and that something even mildly fascinating never came.
June 30, 2011
Sigh. This book was so good in the beginning. I loved the spunky heroine Nellie and the writing was actually funny. I thought it was going to be a fun light-hearted western spoof. But then Nellie started sleeping with every man she met and then left town with Buffalo Bill Cody--although she didn't sleep with him. She tried though. By then the book felt rushed and churned out and just got dumb really fast. It's like McMurtry just wrote this for some fast money from his publisher.
April 5, 2020
Howdy pardner. Reckon y'all wonderin' if this here book was any good. Well, dadgumit if this ain't one of the finest western books I ever listened to. And if you ain't in cahoots with the Earp brothers, you'll probably like it too. Mr. McMurtry has written hisself another rootin' tootin' shoot 'em up. This time with a lady narrator. I know what you're thinkin'. What? A lady narrator? What in tarnation does a lady know about the ol' west? Well, this one, read by Miss Annie Potts, knows quite a bit. She's a telegraph lady who witnessed the gunfight at the OK Corral. She does a lotta kissin' and copulatin' alon' the way with some of the cowboys in her never endin' search for one who can provide her with some regular copulatin'. You know, with one of those guys who never use the letter G at the end of a word. We get to meet or hear about Buffalo Bill Cody, the Earp brothers, Doc Holliday, Billy the Kid, Annie Oakley, Lilian Gish, Katie Elder, Wild Bill Hickock, General William Tecumsah Sherman, and many others.
I think I figured why Mr. McMurtry is such a great writer. I listened carefully and I noticed he doesn't waste his time on any frivolous descriptions. Every sentence he writes adds to the story. Let's face it. Descriptions are for sissies. And there ain't no sissy cowboys.
I think I figured why Mr. McMurtry is such a great writer. I listened carefully and I noticed he doesn't waste his time on any frivolous descriptions. Every sentence he writes adds to the story. Let's face it. Descriptions are for sissies. And there ain't no sissy cowboys.
October 22, 2024
Have yet to discover a bad book by Larry McMurtry (12 and counting).
September 2, 2013
Dang, there's such a melancholy wit in the language of the west and it's so pure in all of Larry McMurtry's novels. It's not just within the local vernacular but also in the stories that the people of the great plains find interesting enough to relate to folks who dutifully listen. I chose this book to read over the weekend because I was to spend that time very near the place where most of this book takes place and I wanted to, along with the accompanying visuals of the plains, match the cadence and delivery of what I was readin' to what I was hearin' from th' folks around me. It worked to further the immersion of the rhythms of this terrific book and make it live for me. I did the same thing when I visited Paris and read 'La Reine Margot' by A. Dumas and also when I went to Key West and read that 'Joe Merchant' novel by Jimmy Buffett. I recommend this, it always helps the book. Try Hemingway in Havana, it'll floor ya'.
I've read many of McMurtry's novels over the years because the language of these characters, spoken and narrative, is what I grew up hearing from my parents who were raised in the early part of the 20th century in far rural south east Colorado, near Kansas and the Oklahoma panhandle. McMurtry has such an incredible knack for nailing that distinct verbal style and the way people think from that part of the country, that even when I was actually reading those books it seemed like listening to an audiobook in my head, read by any one of the cowboys and horse trainers that I grew up around. The plays of Sam Shepard are just like this too.
Finishing a Larry McMurtry novel, you feel like what I would imagine an omnipotent presence feels when looking upon us funny little humans- as if in a huge terrarium. You watch them, you learn all about them, you see their triumphs and failures with equal amusement and in the end you really care about them and thats where the great tone of humanity in his books come from. What they do in the book is not always true to history but so true to human motivations and folly that you'd believe it if you didn't know otherwise. The truth shoots straight from common motivations of the spirit that we all possess in 'Telegraph Days', from the courageous Nellie to her callow brother Jackson. McMurtry always sees that we relate to every character in some way along the line and humanizes the legendary figures of the tall tales of the west so well that even Buffalo Bill, the Earps and Clantons, and Billy the Kid just feel as little and lost as everyone else. It's only the setting maybe that makes them feel smaller, like one looking into a class enclosure at their behavior.
it's not all fluff, I don't mean to give that impression, there are a few moments of deadly seriousness, one of such vivid horror that I was completely stunned and found myself nearly in tears and oddly, the event was about animals and not people!
'Telegraph Days' is a wonderful read and it just flies by. It's not 'Lonesome Dove', but it shares the same quirkiness of character and melancholy wit that 'Dove does and is quite unpredictable.
I love the characters in this book.
I've read many of McMurtry's novels over the years because the language of these characters, spoken and narrative, is what I grew up hearing from my parents who were raised in the early part of the 20th century in far rural south east Colorado, near Kansas and the Oklahoma panhandle. McMurtry has such an incredible knack for nailing that distinct verbal style and the way people think from that part of the country, that even when I was actually reading those books it seemed like listening to an audiobook in my head, read by any one of the cowboys and horse trainers that I grew up around. The plays of Sam Shepard are just like this too.
Finishing a Larry McMurtry novel, you feel like what I would imagine an omnipotent presence feels when looking upon us funny little humans- as if in a huge terrarium. You watch them, you learn all about them, you see their triumphs and failures with equal amusement and in the end you really care about them and thats where the great tone of humanity in his books come from. What they do in the book is not always true to history but so true to human motivations and folly that you'd believe it if you didn't know otherwise. The truth shoots straight from common motivations of the spirit that we all possess in 'Telegraph Days', from the courageous Nellie to her callow brother Jackson. McMurtry always sees that we relate to every character in some way along the line and humanizes the legendary figures of the tall tales of the west so well that even Buffalo Bill, the Earps and Clantons, and Billy the Kid just feel as little and lost as everyone else. It's only the setting maybe that makes them feel smaller, like one looking into a class enclosure at their behavior.
it's not all fluff, I don't mean to give that impression, there are a few moments of deadly seriousness, one of such vivid horror that I was completely stunned and found myself nearly in tears and oddly, the event was about animals and not people!
'Telegraph Days' is a wonderful read and it just flies by. It's not 'Lonesome Dove', but it shares the same quirkiness of character and melancholy wit that 'Dove does and is quite unpredictable.
I love the characters in this book.
May 23, 2016
Read any of the other 1-star reviews to see what the many problems are with this book. No need to repeat them here, since all the reviews say basically the same thing. Nellie Courtright is basically the Forrest Gump of the Old West -- if Forrest was intelligent, a woman, and a complete slut.
Packed with way too many characters -- "look, there's General Sherman for two pages serving no purpose whatsoever!" -- there is surprisingly little real plot past the first couple of chapters, when a potentially strong story about a young boy who accidentally becomes a heroic gunfighter is suddenly abandoned to follow the increasingly boring story of his vain and ever-horny sister...What started as an interesting and amusing tale ended as a huge disappointment.
Packed with way too many characters -- "look, there's General Sherman for two pages serving no purpose whatsoever!" -- there is surprisingly little real plot past the first couple of chapters, when a potentially strong story about a young boy who accidentally becomes a heroic gunfighter is suddenly abandoned to follow the increasingly boring story of his vain and ever-horny sister...What started as an interesting and amusing tale ended as a huge disappointment.
December 1, 2025
" Would make an interesting movie. Another great book by Mcmurtry."
October 12, 2021
Dramatically and thematically thin but breezy and amusing. Feels like it was tossed off for giggles, but if you enjoy McMurtry and the history of the American West you might not mind. I was torn between three and four stars. 3.5 would be about right. Maybe 3.475.
April 1, 2025
4.75 This is a delightful western. Would have been a 5 but Lonesome Dove sets the mark. Great storytelling, strong female lead with Augustus McCrae vibes, historical characters from the West show up, whimsical, great narrator.
September 2, 2013
I was surprised, when I read this book, at how truly boring it was, given the good reviews it had received. I am guessing that the reviewers were reminiscing more on the quality of McMurtry's 'Lonesome Dove' than on the quality of the writing in this particular novel.
The book began well enough, and the main character of Nellie started off full of mouth and grit. However, there was no character development, the woman's mouth and spunk became annoying over time and the character remained shallow. There were so many places that McMurtry could have taken this character - but as a man writing from a woman's perspective, McMurtry took her to the place where so many men want a woman to be - having promiscuous sexual dalliances and cleaning up men's messes.
There was no recognizable plot, with the narrative appearing simply to be a forum for McMurtry to "name drop" every cowboy or outlaw hero from that period of the west, from Buffalo Bill to Wild Bill. The author overstretched himself in places simply to include a famous character (e.g. Jesse James or Billy the Kid) whose presence did nothing to further develop or improve upon the story.
About 2/3 through the book it becomes abundantly clear that McMurtry has become as sick of the character of Nellie as the reader has, and he ups the pace, skipping years and even decades with the flourish of a pen where initially the pace of the narrative was measured and slow. Characters who could have had some importance to the story are named once and forgotten, and only those with a name worth dropping are discussed further.
I kept waiting for something to happen. It didn't. The ending did nothing to round off the story. The final chapter simply ended like any other chapter - I turned the page, having no indication from the author that this was the end, and there was simply nothing more. I admit to feeling disappointed that I wasted my time reading toward something epic, as the book had initially seemed to promise - and that something even mildly fascinating never came.
The book began well enough, and the main character of Nellie started off full of mouth and grit. However, there was no character development, the woman's mouth and spunk became annoying over time and the character remained shallow. There were so many places that McMurtry could have taken this character - but as a man writing from a woman's perspective, McMurtry took her to the place where so many men want a woman to be - having promiscuous sexual dalliances and cleaning up men's messes.
There was no recognizable plot, with the narrative appearing simply to be a forum for McMurtry to "name drop" every cowboy or outlaw hero from that period of the west, from Buffalo Bill to Wild Bill. The author overstretched himself in places simply to include a famous character (e.g. Jesse James or Billy the Kid) whose presence did nothing to further develop or improve upon the story.
About 2/3 through the book it becomes abundantly clear that McMurtry has become as sick of the character of Nellie as the reader has, and he ups the pace, skipping years and even decades with the flourish of a pen where initially the pace of the narrative was measured and slow. Characters who could have had some importance to the story are named once and forgotten, and only those with a name worth dropping are discussed further.
I kept waiting for something to happen. It didn't. The ending did nothing to round off the story. The final chapter simply ended like any other chapter - I turned the page, having no indication from the author that this was the end, and there was simply nothing more. I admit to feeling disappointed that I wasted my time reading toward something epic, as the book had initially seemed to promise - and that something even mildly fascinating never came.
July 16, 2013
A quick, entertaining read of the Wild West as only McMurtry can tell it. The heroine is a little like Forrest Gump and just happens to be witness to all the old characters and events that have come to be memorialized about those days in the late 1800s. I admitted to even getting a little emotional as her story wraps up and the characters die or fade away. Not the Lonesome Dove it was touted to be on the inside cover, but still very worthwhile.
August 24, 2013
We listened to Annie Potts read this novel, and her voice brought Nellie Courtright to life in such a way that we started talking to each other with a twang. McMurty peppers this novel with the legends we boomers grew up thinking were heroes, but the real heroes were people like Nellie and her little brother, Jackson. A great introduction to "the old west" and McMurtry's love and respect for the people who settled there.
December 1, 2013
A spunky woman goes around the American West, meets all the famous people of the time, enjoys "vigorous copulation" with most of the men,and participates in the marketing of her era.
Problem is, she's two-dimensional, impervious, and improbable. So her journey from event to event doesn't do anything to change her, and it begins to feel like a clever catalog of who was who in the Wild West, with an unconvincing lesson at the end, a bunch of witty dialogue and tons of unsexy sex.
Problem is, she's two-dimensional, impervious, and improbable. So her journey from event to event doesn't do anything to change her, and it begins to feel like a clever catalog of who was who in the Wild West, with an unconvincing lesson at the end, a bunch of witty dialogue and tons of unsexy sex.
September 20, 2015
Not one of McMurtry's best written books, but still enjoyable. Written from the point of view of a woman who becomes a telegraph operator in the waning days of the wild west. Reminds me a little of Thomas Berger's 'Little Big Man' in that this fictional character meets several historic figures of the time. I really like the story line, and how McMurtry ended the story. Overall an entertaining read.
September 10, 2007
One of McMurtry's most entertaining books, if smaller in scale than the "Lonesome Dove" series. The heroine is a gutsy telegraph operator whose job puts her in contact with Buffalo Bill and other western legends.I don't know if the prolific McMurtry plans any sequels, but as a light-hearted look at Western myth-making, this makes a wonderful companion to "Buffalo Girls".
September 9, 2021
Well, Nellie Courtright is a firecracker. A copulating telegraph operator who tells the story of her life and liaisons with the likes of western icons such Wild Bill Cody, Billy the Kid and Doc Holliday. Gun fights galore. More copulation. A come down after Lonesome Dove.
Read
September 10, 2023Telegraph Days is a ripping good yarn about Nellie Courtright, one of the fearless women who helped settle the West. Lighter and funnier than most McMurtry westerns, Telegraph Days features pretty much every Old West trope and character you can think of, all filtered through Nellie’s no-nonsense-but-extremely-willing way of going about things.
September 20, 2009
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
SO MANY MEN, SO LITTLE TIME, September 1, 2008
By Bookworm (St. George Utah) - See all my reviews
Larry McMurtrys Telegraph Days give us a glimpse of the old west from a woman's perspective. The woman in question is a 22 year old Virginia native, Nellis Courtright who with her 17 year old brother, Jackson, resides in the town of Rio Blanca, a nothing little place located in an area known as "no mans land". The towns tenuous claim to fame comes from a gunfight in which Jackson, through sheer luck, kills six members of the infamous Yazee Gang.
Nellie is a self-sufficient, unique and assertive women who captializes on her brothers feat by writing a pamphlet describing the event and selling it for 25 cents a copy. This is the beginning of an adventure that takes the reader from the dusty streets of the Oklahoma panhandle in the mid 1870's to the early days of Hollywood.
Nellie is an amorous gal but lacks a discriminating eye when it comes to the opposite sex. She finds herself attracted to any number of gents, some of whom are legends of the untamed old west. McMurtry manages to deftly weave actual historical figures like George Custer, Bill Hickock, Billy the Kid, Virgil Earp, Buffalo Bill Cody, and Jesse James into the various threads of Nellies life as she pursues fame and fortune in various careers ranging from telegraph operator to secretary/manager for Buffalo Bills Nebraska holdings to storyteller/author and finally to Hollywood screenwriter.
Larry McMurtry obviously loves the character and flavor of the old west and is able to realistically convey it's sights, sounds and smells. He seems to be particularly fascinated by its women. In this book, as in Buffalo Girls, his female characters are rarely run of the mill. Instead he chooses to portray them as "a hardy breed of survivors - - strong, organized, in control and rarely repentent. This latest heroine, Nellie Courtright, a "ladylike" pipe smoker could easily be the poster child for a group called "The Society of Willful Western Women".
SO MANY MEN, SO LITTLE TIME, September 1, 2008
By Bookworm (St. George Utah) - See all my reviews
Larry McMurtrys Telegraph Days give us a glimpse of the old west from a woman's perspective. The woman in question is a 22 year old Virginia native, Nellis Courtright who with her 17 year old brother, Jackson, resides in the town of Rio Blanca, a nothing little place located in an area known as "no mans land". The towns tenuous claim to fame comes from a gunfight in which Jackson, through sheer luck, kills six members of the infamous Yazee Gang.
Nellie is a self-sufficient, unique and assertive women who captializes on her brothers feat by writing a pamphlet describing the event and selling it for 25 cents a copy. This is the beginning of an adventure that takes the reader from the dusty streets of the Oklahoma panhandle in the mid 1870's to the early days of Hollywood.
Nellie is an amorous gal but lacks a discriminating eye when it comes to the opposite sex. She finds herself attracted to any number of gents, some of whom are legends of the untamed old west. McMurtry manages to deftly weave actual historical figures like George Custer, Bill Hickock, Billy the Kid, Virgil Earp, Buffalo Bill Cody, and Jesse James into the various threads of Nellies life as she pursues fame and fortune in various careers ranging from telegraph operator to secretary/manager for Buffalo Bills Nebraska holdings to storyteller/author and finally to Hollywood screenwriter.
Larry McMurtry obviously loves the character and flavor of the old west and is able to realistically convey it's sights, sounds and smells. He seems to be particularly fascinated by its women. In this book, as in Buffalo Girls, his female characters are rarely run of the mill. Instead he chooses to portray them as "a hardy breed of survivors - - strong, organized, in control and rarely repentent. This latest heroine, Nellie Courtright, a "ladylike" pipe smoker could easily be the poster child for a group called "The Society of Willful Western Women".
April 23, 2008
In "Telegraph Days," Larry McMurtry combines something of a tall tale with a revisionist Western, producing a quick, enjoyable read in the process. The tall-tale aspect of the novel comes from the narrator, Nellie Courtright, crossing paths with almost every signficiant real-life Western figure -- Doc Holliday, Billy the Kid, Buffalo Bill Cody, Jesse James, Wild Bill Hickock, and Wyatt Earp and his brothers among them -- as well as being an eyewitness to the shootout at the OK Corral.
The book's revisionism comes in making Nellie a sexually liberated, business-minded, thoroughly independent woman at a time when few women were allowed to be such. In fact, it's hard to imagine a woman as sexually liberated as Nellie being accepted even today.
"Telegraph Days" is by no means deep -- I doubt I'd get anything more from the book by reading it a second time -- but it is a fun yarn. Its main failing, and it's not a major one, is an over-reliance on Nellie's encounters with historical figures. Many of the characters McMurtry creates from whole cloth, especially Nellie herself, are far more interesting than the real-life cowboys she meets.
The book's revisionism comes in making Nellie a sexually liberated, business-minded, thoroughly independent woman at a time when few women were allowed to be such. In fact, it's hard to imagine a woman as sexually liberated as Nellie being accepted even today.
"Telegraph Days" is by no means deep -- I doubt I'd get anything more from the book by reading it a second time -- but it is a fun yarn. Its main failing, and it's not a major one, is an over-reliance on Nellie's encounters with historical figures. Many of the characters McMurtry creates from whole cloth, especially Nellie herself, are far more interesting than the real-life cowboys she meets.
February 17, 2024
Absolutely wonderful! I listened to the audio version (narrated by Annie Potts) on a recent road trip with my husband. I have always been a Larry McMurtry fan, and this book is no exception. Both my husband and I were entertained and listened from start to finish without missing a beat. Highly recommend!
March 12, 2014
Well, this is kind of weird. I guess it's supposed to be a comic-ish tale of life in the Old West via the narrator Nellie Courtright, but it seems weird. Like, it starts the day after her father 'suicided himself,' and she kind of doesn't give a shit about it, but does give a shit about making out with every dude she meets. Which would be funny if it were meant to be a dry commentary on what a heartless person she is. And maybe it's supposed to be, but I guess it just kind of feels more empty to me. And the she knows everyone like The Earps and Buffalo Bill and blah blah is just kind of stupid and weird and like I said, empty. Which is weird, cuz obviously Larry McMurtry has been part of incredibly great stuff like Lonesome Dove and Brokeback Mountain. But I haven't read his books before, just seen the adaptations, so maybe I like his stuff adapted and the direct version is empty. I have no idea. Anyhow, I just kind of decided that I don't hate it I just don't give a shit, so I'm putting it down. I think this makes me a pariah in certain circles, but there you go.
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