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Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch #2
Resolution
The New York Times—bestselling author’s richly imagined work of historical fiction: a powerful tale of the Old West from the acknowledged master of crime fiction.
I had an eight-gauge shotgun that I’d taken with me when I left Wells Fargo. It didn’t take too long for things to develop. I sat in the tall lookout chair in the back of the saloon with the shotgun in my lap for two peaceful nights. On my third night it was different. I could almost smell trouble beginning to cook.
After the bloody confrontation in Appaloosa, Everett Hitch heads into the afternoon sun and ends up in Resolution, an Old West town so new the dust has yet to settle. It’s the kind of town that doesn’t have much in the way of commerce, except for a handful of saloons and some houses of ill repute. Hitch takes a job as a lookout at Amos Wolfson’s Blackfoot Saloon and quickly establishes his position as protector of the ladies who work the back rooms–as well as a man unafraid to stand up to the enforcer sent down from the O’Malley copper mine.
Though Hitch makes short work of hired gun Koy Wickman, tensions continue to mount, so that even the self-assured Hitch is relieved by the arrival in town of his friend Virgil Cole. When greedy mine owner Eamon O’Malley threatens the loose coalition of local ranchers and starts buying up Resolution’s few businesses, Hitch and Cole find themselves in the middle of a makeshift war between O’Malley’s men and the ranchers. In a place where law and order don’t exist, Hitch and Cole must make their own, guided by their sense of duty, honor, and friendship.
I had an eight-gauge shotgun that I’d taken with me when I left Wells Fargo. It didn’t take too long for things to develop. I sat in the tall lookout chair in the back of the saloon with the shotgun in my lap for two peaceful nights. On my third night it was different. I could almost smell trouble beginning to cook.
After the bloody confrontation in Appaloosa, Everett Hitch heads into the afternoon sun and ends up in Resolution, an Old West town so new the dust has yet to settle. It’s the kind of town that doesn’t have much in the way of commerce, except for a handful of saloons and some houses of ill repute. Hitch takes a job as a lookout at Amos Wolfson’s Blackfoot Saloon and quickly establishes his position as protector of the ladies who work the back rooms–as well as a man unafraid to stand up to the enforcer sent down from the O’Malley copper mine.
Though Hitch makes short work of hired gun Koy Wickman, tensions continue to mount, so that even the self-assured Hitch is relieved by the arrival in town of his friend Virgil Cole. When greedy mine owner Eamon O’Malley threatens the loose coalition of local ranchers and starts buying up Resolution’s few businesses, Hitch and Cole find themselves in the middle of a makeshift war between O’Malley’s men and the ranchers. In a place where law and order don’t exist, Hitch and Cole must make their own, guided by their sense of duty, honor, and friendship.
4 pages, Digital Audio (Unabridged)
First published January 1, 2008
679 people are currently reading
1156 people want to read
About the author
Robert B. Parker
492 books2,304 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database named Robert B. Parker.
Robert Brown Parker was an American writer, primarily of fiction within the mystery/detective genre. His most famous works were the 40 novels written about the fictional private detective Spenser. ABC television network developed the television series Spenser: For Hire based on the character in the mid-1980s; a series of TV movies was also produced based on the character. His works incorporate encyclopedic knowledge of the Boston metropolitan area. The Spenser novels have been cited as reviving and changing the detective genre by critics and bestselling authors including Robert Crais, Harlan Coben, and Dennis Lehane.
Parker also wrote nine novels featuring the fictional character Jesse Stone, a Los Angeles police officer who moves to a small New England town; six novels with the fictional character Sunny Randall, a female private investigator; and four Westerns starring the duo Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch. The first was Appaloosa, made into a film starring Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen.
Robert Brown Parker was an American writer, primarily of fiction within the mystery/detective genre. His most famous works were the 40 novels written about the fictional private detective Spenser. ABC television network developed the television series Spenser: For Hire based on the character in the mid-1980s; a series of TV movies was also produced based on the character. His works incorporate encyclopedic knowledge of the Boston metropolitan area. The Spenser novels have been cited as reviving and changing the detective genre by critics and bestselling authors including Robert Crais, Harlan Coben, and Dennis Lehane.
Parker also wrote nine novels featuring the fictional character Jesse Stone, a Los Angeles police officer who moves to a small New England town; six novels with the fictional character Sunny Randall, a female private investigator; and four Westerns starring the duo Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch. The first was Appaloosa, made into a film starring Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 481 reviews
April 22, 2015
Yee Haw!! Spenser, the detective, goes West!
Or so it seems.
In this one, Robert B. Parker unsuccessfully tries to squeeze Spenser’s man code into cowboy britches and a ten gallon hat. This was probably written during Parker’s “fallow” period. Most things that became nauseating with his detective fiction around that time – formulaic plotting, slow plodding story, hackneyed characterizations – bleed into this turn at a western. Every time I read the clipped, macho pro-forma dialogue I thought: Hawk, Spenser, Coalition of Bruisers with Boundaries.
“Ain’t we got unwritten manly rules ‘bout this here killin' thing?”
“Yep.”
If you want a better book featuring these characters pick up Appaloosa, which was made into a decent movie. If you want to read a great western, go get Lonesome Dove.
And thanks for not bringing along the malnourished, Harvard educated, psychiatrist girlfriend character.
Or so it seems.
In this one, Robert B. Parker unsuccessfully tries to squeeze Spenser’s man code into cowboy britches and a ten gallon hat. This was probably written during Parker’s “fallow” period. Most things that became nauseating with his detective fiction around that time – formulaic plotting, slow plodding story, hackneyed characterizations – bleed into this turn at a western. Every time I read the clipped, macho pro-forma dialogue I thought: Hawk, Spenser, Coalition of Bruisers with Boundaries.
“Ain’t we got unwritten manly rules ‘bout this here killin' thing?”
“Yep.”
If you want a better book featuring these characters pick up Appaloosa, which was made into a decent movie. If you want to read a great western, go get Lonesome Dove.
And thanks for not bringing along the malnourished, Harvard educated, psychiatrist girlfriend character.
December 20, 2017
A new version of the good old fashioned western shoot 'em up!
In book two of Robert Parker's Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch series Hitch and Cole have moved on from Appaloosa and wind up as hired hands for an ambitious man looking to gobble up all the land and properties in and around the town of Resolution.
In this world where life is cheap this manly tale of manly men doing manly deeds is violent as all get out. People get shot or at least beaten every few pages. Our so-called heroes' way of fixing any and all problems is to threaten death. It's a little ridiculous and redundant, but hell, it's all in good fun! I suggest just sitting back and enjoying the action, for this is a treat of a romp back to the good ol' days of westerns, where a shotgun or six shooter was all the answer one needed to solve life's difficulties.
In book two of Robert Parker's Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch series Hitch and Cole have moved on from Appaloosa and wind up as hired hands for an ambitious man looking to gobble up all the land and properties in and around the town of Resolution.
In this world where life is cheap this manly tale of manly men doing manly deeds is violent as all get out. People get shot or at least beaten every few pages. Our so-called heroes' way of fixing any and all problems is to threaten death. It's a little ridiculous and redundant, but hell, it's all in good fun! I suggest just sitting back and enjoying the action, for this is a treat of a romp back to the good ol' days of westerns, where a shotgun or six shooter was all the answer one needed to solve life's difficulties.
September 17, 2024
Imperfect characters, they all have issues, but they have their code that they adhere to no matter what is occurring around them. The dialogue is short and to the point, witty and sarcastic, the short chapters make for an easy and quick read. Overall it was a highly entertaining western, the first I’ve read in the series and I’ll definitely be tracking down the others.
February 20, 2018
Resolution (Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch #2). This was an entertaining western but I thought the first one was better. Gonna read 1 more in the series and give it a go.
June 8, 2018
I do love a good western. In this one our dynamic duo have parted company in the beginning. Hitch arrives in the small town of Resolution and is hired to protect the interest of a rich jerk. Soon Hitch is back to keeping the peace and protecting the good guys.
About the time things start to heat up, Cole joins him. Cole is chasing after his lover who left him for a traveling salesman.
Before long the two are battling renegade Shoshones, gunmen and a militant gang. Meanwhile they are protecting homesteaders, abused prostitutes and an abused wife.
All in a days work for our intrepid cowboys.
About the time things start to heat up, Cole joins him. Cole is chasing after his lover who left him for a traveling salesman.
Before long the two are battling renegade Shoshones, gunmen and a militant gang. Meanwhile they are protecting homesteaders, abused prostitutes and an abused wife.
All in a days work for our intrepid cowboys.
April 19, 2021
I don't enjoy giving one star reviews, but I can't honestly say that I liked or enjoyed Resolution by Robert B. Parker. I was not aware that Resolution is a sequel (the second book in Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch series) when I was reading it, but now that I think of, a number of past events was implied in this book so I should have guessed it. Virgil Cole doesn't appear right away in this one, but he steps on the scene soon enough.
Western genre doesn't particularly appeal to me, but that's not the main issue I had with this book. My main issue is the predictable, slow, uninteresting, and cliched plot. Moreover, the characters aren't well developed and the writing leaves much to be desired. I didn't mind the clipped macho dialogue as such but these dialogues take too much space. The first few dialogues I read were alright, I could imagine the dramatic silences and start to visualize the characters. However, after page and page of the same clipped dialogue sentences, it gets incredibly repetitive not to mention it doesn't add any information. One cannot seriously base one's entire novel on such dialogues and expect it to be anything but boring and cliche, especially when the prose isn't descriptive either. It could work for a short story, even for a few chapter not for the entire novel. The best way I can describe the prose in this novel is non-descriptive and repetitive. Repetition would make for a better title then Resolution. This isn't a terrible novel but it isn't a good either.
I wouldn't particularly mind there aren't any memorable female characters in this novel if there were ANY developed characters. I've read a lot of books without any notable female characters and liked them (for example works of Joseph Conrad, R.A. Heinlein and so on) well enough. As long as there is still something in it for me, it's fine but I didn't find anything for me in this novel, so the fact that there were no strong female characters is just another minus. The only female characters in this novel are prostitutes and a lady who is hopelessly in love with an abusing husband and sorry for the spoiler but she doesn't really fall out of love with him. There is also some mention of Virgil Cole's old love interest Allie but she doesn't actually manifest herself in this one. Maybe Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch were better developed in the first book in the series, but in this one they weren't. The only insight we get to them is through their talk of duty and honour but it was always the same old talk and repetition ruined it. When the same dialogue gets repeated over and over again, it stops making sense.
I'm neither a politically correct reader nor one particularly sensitive to foul language. However, the swear words didn't really add anything to this novel and sounded like empty macho talk. I dislike when writers use foul language without a reason. There were some other things that bugged me, for example the way Indians were described. That phrase about herding Indians into reservation made me a little sick in my stomach. The Indians were only mentioned briefly, but it was unpleasant to read. I know such were the views of that time, but as a writer you can add some perspective.
The plot is pretty basic and if it wasn't painfully slow, it wouldn't be so bad. From the start it is obvious that Everett Hitch is a typical macho western protagonist. This 'gun for hire' character settles in a new town where he shows a soft side to him by saving prostitutes from being raped and not killing people unless he is paid to (or if he wants to save the prostitutes). Nothing much happens until his buddy Virgil Cole arrives and then nothing much happens (except some building tension and saving the above mentioned abused woman) until the final confrontation that is about half a page long (plus a few pages of build up to it). The end. This book didn't teach me anything new and failed to entertained me, so one star ranking it is.
Western genre doesn't particularly appeal to me, but that's not the main issue I had with this book. My main issue is the predictable, slow, uninteresting, and cliched plot. Moreover, the characters aren't well developed and the writing leaves much to be desired. I didn't mind the clipped macho dialogue as such but these dialogues take too much space. The first few dialogues I read were alright, I could imagine the dramatic silences and start to visualize the characters. However, after page and page of the same clipped dialogue sentences, it gets incredibly repetitive not to mention it doesn't add any information. One cannot seriously base one's entire novel on such dialogues and expect it to be anything but boring and cliche, especially when the prose isn't descriptive either. It could work for a short story, even for a few chapter not for the entire novel. The best way I can describe the prose in this novel is non-descriptive and repetitive. Repetition would make for a better title then Resolution. This isn't a terrible novel but it isn't a good either.
I wouldn't particularly mind there aren't any memorable female characters in this novel if there were ANY developed characters. I've read a lot of books without any notable female characters and liked them (for example works of Joseph Conrad, R.A. Heinlein and so on) well enough. As long as there is still something in it for me, it's fine but I didn't find anything for me in this novel, so the fact that there were no strong female characters is just another minus. The only female characters in this novel are prostitutes and a lady who is hopelessly in love with an abusing husband and sorry for the spoiler but she doesn't really fall out of love with him. There is also some mention of Virgil Cole's old love interest Allie but she doesn't actually manifest herself in this one. Maybe Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch were better developed in the first book in the series, but in this one they weren't. The only insight we get to them is through their talk of duty and honour but it was always the same old talk and repetition ruined it. When the same dialogue gets repeated over and over again, it stops making sense.
I'm neither a politically correct reader nor one particularly sensitive to foul language. However, the swear words didn't really add anything to this novel and sounded like empty macho talk. I dislike when writers use foul language without a reason. There were some other things that bugged me, for example the way Indians were described. That phrase about herding Indians into reservation made me a little sick in my stomach. The Indians were only mentioned briefly, but it was unpleasant to read. I know such were the views of that time, but as a writer you can add some perspective.
The plot is pretty basic and if it wasn't painfully slow, it wouldn't be so bad. From the start it is obvious that Everett Hitch is a typical macho western protagonist. This 'gun for hire' character settles in a new town where he shows a soft side to him by saving prostitutes from being raped and not killing people unless he is paid to (or if he wants to save the prostitutes). Nothing much happens until his buddy Virgil Cole arrives and then nothing much happens (except some building tension and saving the above mentioned abused woman) until the final confrontation that is about half a page long (plus a few pages of build up to it). The end. This book didn't teach me anything new and failed to entertained me, so one star ranking it is.
October 10, 2025
Our 2 traveling hero’s in the lawless wild west, Everett and Virgil, find themselves caught up in a battle between the town’s saloon owner who wants to own everything in sight, from the other businesses in town to the nearby ranches, copper mines, and timber company. Once again Virgil gets involved with a woman. The 2 men are gun fighters and not knowing the law, they just try to do what is right, even if Virgil acts as judge, jury & executioner. The series must be read in order to fully appreciate it.
August 26, 2016
Robert B Parker well known for his cration of PI Spenser and side kick Hawk and the cool chief of police from Paradise Jesse Stone did also create a couple of characters that lived in the Wild West and could be called gunfighters by the name of Virgil Cole & Everett Hitch.
Hitch has taken a job as an outlook in the local bar of the town/village/settlement by the name of Resolution. There is a disagreement about who is the law in this particular place by the name Resolution. There is no sheriff or any law, hence the job of outlook in the local saloon which is taken by Hitch who is on his own by this time. And after he takes out the gunfighter employed by the local copper mine owner everything changes. The balance of the power seems to shift. When Virgil Cole finally shows his face in Resolution and two other gunfighters hired by the owner of the copper mine trouble will follow soon.
The book is mostly about justice, law and how it works when there is none and the powerful and power-hungry start to think that they are the law and justice. They did not count on the morality of gunfighters the levels of stupid that is combined with some serious overestimation of their own skills.
A lot of talking which is Parkers forte and some sharp action. Not the usual western you might expect and the macho grandstanding is closer to Spenser & chief Stone than what one would expect from gunslingers in a male dominated world.
A nice comfy read that can easily be read in many short moments.
Hitch has taken a job as an outlook in the local bar of the town/village/settlement by the name of Resolution. There is a disagreement about who is the law in this particular place by the name Resolution. There is no sheriff or any law, hence the job of outlook in the local saloon which is taken by Hitch who is on his own by this time. And after he takes out the gunfighter employed by the local copper mine owner everything changes. The balance of the power seems to shift. When Virgil Cole finally shows his face in Resolution and two other gunfighters hired by the owner of the copper mine trouble will follow soon.
The book is mostly about justice, law and how it works when there is none and the powerful and power-hungry start to think that they are the law and justice. They did not count on the morality of gunfighters the levels of stupid that is combined with some serious overestimation of their own skills.
A lot of talking which is Parkers forte and some sharp action. Not the usual western you might expect and the macho grandstanding is closer to Spenser & chief Stone than what one would expect from gunslingers in a male dominated world.
A nice comfy read that can easily be read in many short moments.
December 28, 2016
My son and I listened to this in the car on our way to the grandkids. Parker's sparse prose is perfect for a car trip. The characters are basically Spenser and Hawk in western times. Nice to listen to but I prefer Spenser.
November 28, 2008
Parker is just repeating himself in his mysteries and westerns by rehashing the same tired macho characters who live by the gunman's code that anyone who has read anything he's done in the last 20 years knows by heart. Even worse, the ending of Apaloosa was the first halfway original thing he'd done in years, and he reverses it in this book to get everything back to his usual baseline. Whatever happened to the guy who wrote the first dozen or so Spenser novels? Oh, and he really needs to drop the repeated story about a flawed woman that a character loves.
June 6, 2014
I'm enjoying this series. Here we build on the way the last book ended (also of course building on the events in the last book).
Everett having ridden out of Appaloosa after taking a certain precipitous action on behalf of his friend Virgil opens the book by taking a job in a saloon as a "lookout" (read bouncer...except bouncers here can end up having to shoot a troublemaker).
From there things begin to spin. Of course Virgil does show up...violence ensues as do moral quandaries.
(Yes in case you think I missed it because i didn't mention it in my last review I get the double meaning in the title[s]).
Anyway, excellent read. The dialogue is terse and direct (as befits a western). Some of our characters are of course talkers, but our heroes are mostly men of few words. I don't mind the way that works and I'm enjoying these.
I only regret that Mr. Parker is gone and there are only 6.
Recommended, enjoy.
Everett having ridden out of Appaloosa after taking a certain precipitous action on behalf of his friend Virgil opens the book by taking a job in a saloon as a "lookout" (read bouncer...except bouncers here can end up having to shoot a troublemaker).
From there things begin to spin. Of course Virgil does show up...violence ensues as do moral quandaries.
(Yes in case you think I missed it because i didn't mention it in my last review I get the double meaning in the title[s]).
Anyway, excellent read. The dialogue is terse and direct (as befits a western). Some of our characters are of course talkers, but our heroes are mostly men of few words. I don't mind the way that works and I'm enjoying these.
I only regret that Mr. Parker is gone and there are only 6.
Recommended, enjoy.
June 29, 2018
No fluff. Lots of "He said" and "I said". Some f*** words. Some bad guys and some not so bad guys. The end.
Great story.
Doesn't take long to read but I put it down and didn't back to it for awhile.
Great story.
Doesn't take long to read but I put it down and didn't back to it for awhile.
September 11, 2016
Dissapointing! I loved the first book in this series, Appaloosa. This book, number 2 in the series, was not as good. The plot was a bit boring, and the dialogue wasn't as interesting. It almost seemed like a first draft of the book. I abandoned it at the half-way mark, so maybe the second half was better. I wasn't interested enough to stick around and find out.
October 14, 2016
A solid western. Rehashed somewhat from Appaloosa but still entertaining.
November 25, 2022
Lots of shooting, killing, swearing. Everything a duster book should be.
May 5, 2021
I love Robert Parker's Spenser novels.
He has the leanest, meanest writing style you could ever wish for, and it is perfectly suited to the PI genre.
So I was pleasantly surprised to find this western in a charity shop.
Parker's dialogue and moral code is perfectly displayed in this small but very fun story, where men are men and smell like horses.
He has the leanest, meanest writing style you could ever wish for, and it is perfectly suited to the PI genre.
So I was pleasantly surprised to find this western in a charity shop.
Parker's dialogue and moral code is perfectly displayed in this small but very fun story, where men are men and smell like horses.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 9, 2011
If only Goodreads had negative stars. One star just seems so generous for this piece of garbage. I started listening to this book looking for an easy fun novel after plodding through the biography, Washington - A Life. I really enjoy a Louis L'Amour from time to time, so I thought I'd give it a shot. Huge mistake. I didn't make it very far. This book is bad. The characters are so stereotypical it is comical. The conversation is just painful. Parker fills pages with "yep", "guess so", "I suppose", etc. etc. And he ends almost every sentence with "he said". Try listening to an audiobook where the reader says "he said" every 4 seconds. Trying to listen to this on audiobook was mindnumbing. And then to top it off, after about 2 very short chapters the language just turned foul. Very unnecessarily foul. I had to stop and delete. This one is an absolute waste of time. It will pain your mind and polute your spirit - stay away.
February 6, 2013
Solid, good pace and well written western. 10 of 10 stars for this master novelist.
July 9, 2015
Audiobook: Excellent western following Appaloosa in the Hitch/Cole series. I especially love the cadence of Parker’s writing that is very similar to his Jesse Stone series, one of my Stone’s favorites. Hitch, who resembles Stone in many ways, has arrived at the town of Resolution where he takes the job of ‘lookout’ in a saloon/whorehouse. He establishes his credentials very soon by killing the local gunfighter and then, to his employer’s consternation begins defending the local whores from brutes, several of whom are “important” people.
It gets complicated when the saloon’s owner, who also owns the general store, begins to close out on some homesteaders whose debts have become intolerable. He wants their land. And then the local mine owner hires two gunslingers and *he* wants the saloon.
Hitch and Cole are not your average gunslingers. Hitch a graduate of West Point and Cole occasionally talks about John Locke. “The law is a contract between government and the people, so when we was the law in Appaloosa were we the government or the people?” asks Cole of Hitch. Good question. The issue arises once again in Resolution.
Perfectly read by Titus Welliver.
It gets complicated when the saloon’s owner, who also owns the general store, begins to close out on some homesteaders whose debts have become intolerable. He wants their land. And then the local mine owner hires two gunslingers and *he* wants the saloon.
Hitch and Cole are not your average gunslingers. Hitch a graduate of West Point and Cole occasionally talks about John Locke. “The law is a contract between government and the people, so when we was the law in Appaloosa were we the government or the people?” asks Cole of Hitch. Good question. The issue arises once again in Resolution.
Perfectly read by Titus Welliver.
April 3, 2010
Unlike most middle books in a trilogy, which are usually the weakest of the whole, this book -- the middle book in the Virgil Cole/Everett Hitch trilogy -- is the strongest of Parker's western trilogy, all three of which are so enjoyable that I read each in a single sitting.
I didn't actually know that Robert B. Parker had written a sequel to Appaloosa until my father told me he read this book, and mentioned how much he liked Virgil Cole's character, which made me realize it must be related to Appaloosa in some way.
I didn't actually know that Robert B. Parker had written a sequel to Appaloosa until my father told me he read this book, and mentioned how much he liked Virgil Cole's character, which made me realize it must be related to Appaloosa in some way.
October 1, 2019
I deducted a star for the sheer number of “I said, he said” that really stuck out when listening to it on audio.
February 21, 2023
I'm tempted to stop reading this series, but my completionist nature probably won't permit it. I only have two left and my library has both on audio so they probably won't cost me more than 5 hours since I can listen at double speed and not miss a thing. Not much really happens in this edition. It's cliched, predictable, without very good writing, and not really worth the time. Fortunately, the repetitive, testosterone-rich, dialogue-intensive narrative makes it easy to choke your way through. The characters are very thin; Cole and Hitch are a long way from Hawk and Spenser, their modern analogs from Parker's first series, but the secondary and tertiary characters come across like dirty rainwater. In addition to the western clichés (I was expecting someone to get headed off at the pass throughout), the setting is kind of vague. References are made to mountains, plains and a proximity to Wichita that might put it on the eastern slope of the Rockies in Colorado, but it rains far too much for that to be the case (even allowing for the precipitation as change literary license since not much really changes). I know the Spenser series eventually got tired and Jesse Stone was a good attempt for Parker to branch out. I've yet to read any of the Sunny Randall series and I shudder at the thought of what he did with a female lead. This one, however, seems to be the worst of the bunch. There clearly wasn't much (any) research and was likely written straight from the memory of 1950s movies and television. It's disappointing and I kind of wish I hadn't started.
January 8, 2023
Eh. It was a typical Western. The characters were desperately trying to be so Western that they ended up psychically knowing what other characters meant from meaningful looks and and barely communicating with more than one word at a time. And sometimes when reading books I get irritated by long conversations where you cant tell who is speaking because it goes for so long without saying who is saying what. But after this book I won't complain about that anymore, because reading he said, I said, she said after every line is a bit worse. :) I've read a lot of Westerns and I've never read one with this much cursing. It doesn't feel like it goes with the time period, but that's probably because western movies and books are usually written with more conservative audiences in mind. I guess I'm just used to them being cleaner.
November 28, 2024
More adventures of Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch in the Old West, with Parker’s lean, muscular prose on display again. Greatly enjoyed the expansion of the characters of Cato and Rose, and hope they show up in the next few books in the series.
February 16, 2020
What a cute book. Fun to read and dialog was priceless. Not liking to shoot a man while he is drunk is a wonderful character trait.
August 12, 2020
Another superb western by RBP. The partnership between Hitch and Cole is bulletproof. Simple yet rich dialogue drives each chapter, sometimes refraining into moments of silence that mean more than words. A gritty and ever evolving story of changing alliances and honor among gunmen make this a perfect sequel to ‘Appaloosa’.
December 12, 2014
I'm enjoying this series. Here we build on the way the last book ended (also of course building on the events in the last book).
Everett having ridden out of Appaloosa after taking a certain precipitous action on behalf of his friend Virgil opens the book by taking a job in a saloon as a "lookout" (read bouncer...except bouncers here can end up having to shoot a troublemaker).
From there things begin to spin. Of course Virgil does show up...violence ensues as do moral quandaries.
(Yes in case you think I missed it because i didn't mention it in my last review I get the double meaning in the title[s]).
Anyway, excellent read. The dialogue is terse and direct (as befits a western). Some of our characters are of course talkers, but our heroes are mostly men of few words. I don't mind the way that works and I'm enjoying these.
I only regret that Mr. Parker is gone and there are only 6.
Recommended, enjoy.
Everett having ridden out of Appaloosa after taking a certain precipitous action on behalf of his friend Virgil opens the book by taking a job in a saloon as a "lookout" (read bouncer...except bouncers here can end up having to shoot a troublemaker).
From there things begin to spin. Of course Virgil does show up...violence ensues as do moral quandaries.
(Yes in case you think I missed it because i didn't mention it in my last review I get the double meaning in the title[s]).
Anyway, excellent read. The dialogue is terse and direct (as befits a western). Some of our characters are of course talkers, but our heroes are mostly men of few words. I don't mind the way that works and I'm enjoying these.
I only regret that Mr. Parker is gone and there are only 6.
Recommended, enjoy.
June 19, 2008
The sequel to Appaloosa finds Everett Hitch working in a saloon for a man named Wolfson, who is called in various places a SOB, so he is well named. After Hitch cleans up the town, Wolfson a petty dictator found in many a Western novel, finds himself in a war for control with both a mine owner and some homestteaders. On the arrival of Virgil Cole, the action heats up a little.
In hard cover the book has barely enough words on a page to spend more than a day reading it. The laconic dialogue and talk of the gunman reading philosphy and political theory is text book western lore. Parker adds in small common curse words and has more talk of prositutes and women in his story than in the typical LaMour book.
I found the endless dialogue fun to read but the book itself was underwhelming.
In hard cover the book has barely enough words on a page to spend more than a day reading it. The laconic dialogue and talk of the gunman reading philosphy and political theory is text book western lore. Parker adds in small common curse words and has more talk of prositutes and women in his story than in the typical LaMour book.
I found the endless dialogue fun to read but the book itself was underwhelming.
July 15, 2011
I liked this better than his Spencer books! Too bad there's only 3 in this series. Being an Arizona native I tried for years to get into Western novels. I tried Louis L'Amour, didn't care for it. Figured Zane Grey had that Arizona connection, didn't do it for me. I even tried Tony Hillerman for something more contemporary, just didn't seem to click for me. But Resolution was a blast. Shallow? Predictable? Male, macho, misogynist? Maybe, sorta, sometimes, but you know what? I loved it. Tight, direct, just enough humor, plenty of action, characters that are introspective and reflective but not neurotic and who care about each other and looking out for the little-guy.
The perfect summer escape for any grown up who used to be a little kid who wanted to grow up to be a cowboy.
The perfect summer escape for any grown up who used to be a little kid who wanted to grow up to be a cowboy.
March 16, 2016
This isn't a book I read; it is a book I 'listened." I'm doing more of that as I spend more time driving across Snoqualmie Pass to Yakima from the west side. I enjoy Robert B. Parker's Spenser series, and this is the first Western I have read by him, and he won't replace Louis L'Amour, because even his good women use bad language, but I thoroughly enjoyed the listen. I'll see now if I can get the first one, Apaloosa, now that I know there was a first one.
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