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Title: Betty Zane
Series: Ohio River #1
Author: Zane Grey
Rating: 1.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Western?
Pages: 263
Format: Digital Edition
| Synopsis: |
Betty Zane has come to the frontier to live with her brother and his family. Pretty, head strong and used to getting her way, Betty lives life her way.
A young man comes to the settlement and because he doesn’t immediately bow to Betty’s beauty she “hates” him. Of course, they fall in love with each other but between both of them being young, full of pride and just generally stupid, things don’t go easy.
Then Indians and some damn British Red Coats attack the fort. The brave men and women and children hold them off and win a great victory.
Betty Zane and her fella done get hitched and produce a heap ‘o chillens.
| My Thoughts: |
Well, after I was done with the Sacketts, I figured Zane Grey was next. This is NOT an auspicious start, that is for sure.
This isn’t what I’d think of as a Western, but more of Frontier Fiction. There are no cowboys, no West, it’s all East of the Mississippi river and it is sappy as a Janette Oke book. I was NOT expecting that.
I also wasn’t expecting deeply insightful characters either but almost everyone portrayed came across as a cardboard cutout slapped with a coat of brightly colored paint. I felt like I was watching clowns at a circus.
The story telling itself was tedious. First Zane would do a chapter of “history” where he just spells everything out. Then we’d jump into the story where he would then tell that exact same history but using the characters and making a story of it. He bleeding spoils his own thing and pretty much just puffs up his word count. Needless to say, I was not impressed.
I have an omnibus edition of Grey’s works and I’ll be skipping the next Ohio River book. Of course, without an actual index I’ll have to flip through 200’ish pages to do that. This is why you shouldn’t buy $2 omnibus books on Amazon.
★☆☆☆½
The book I’m currently reading has pretty flat characters so far too. I think it may end up being an unpopular opinion on a pretty famous sci-fi book unless something changes soon. I don’t blame you for skipping the rest of this series after that review.
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I don’t mind some cardboard but not 100% recycled cardboard 🙂
A good idea for a story covers a lot of cardboard too…
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Betty Zane is fairly famous for her actions during the American Revolution.
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Yeah, this was half historical, half fiction. It didn’t work for me…
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I was a huge L’Amour fan when I was a teen, and I still enjoy some of his every once in a while.
Zane Grey, though, always bored me to death. I think I only ever finished one of his books.
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Well, that is good to know. I’ll have to keep that in mind for my future reads.
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I wonder why the author decided to do his story telling that way. Telling the same thing twice with essentially no difference except adding in the characters? That’s weird.
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It is weird. Makes me wonder if it’ll happen in his other books.
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You are planning on trying more by this author, then? I’ll be curious to see what you find.
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Yep, I’ve got an omnibus that I paid good money for, so I’m going to get my 200 cents worth 😀
Of course, we’ll see what actually happens…
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Good luck!
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I’ve only read one Zane Grey short story that I recall, and it didn’t impress me, though I wouldn’t say it was *bad.* But then, reading L’Amour might have spoiled this blogger just a teeny, tiny bit. 🙂 Some of Grey’s novels are on my ‘to read’ list, so this does not sound promising. Maybe I will get to those novels soon and see what I think of them, lowering the book count a little in the process! XD
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I am really hoping his style changes in his other books. I want westerns in my book diet.
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They’re good for the soul, that’s for sure. Hmm, have you tried any of Peter Dawson’s Westerns? I read some of his short stories recently, and they were almost as good as L’Amour’s.
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I have not even heard of Dawson. If Grey bombs out for me I’ll probably have a look-see…
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Well.. At least I got a good laugh outta readin’ “a heap ‘o chillens”! 😛
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Yeah, that was pretty much the most enjoyable part of the whole experience (writing that I mean).
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That just doesn’t sound good. And doesn’t look good! (She looks like she has no clothes on while riding, and that could not have been comfy! :)) But… you only paid for it two bucks, so it seems more like a waste of time than money – and then you took you time back with this wonderfully scathing review, so I’d say you’re in black all the way 😀
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This was definitely a bad start for me and Zane Grey. I’m desperately hoping his other books are better.
The cover was definitely a lot more lurid than anything in the book. Very misleading. The cover I have in my Calibre library is much more representative.
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I loved this cover, which made me curious to go and check out the book description. But ugh, cardboard cutout characters? No way, characters first for me always.
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Considering how character driven you are in your reading, you definitely want to stay away from this. I didn’t write this in the review, but even Lamour’s characters had more depth
I couldn’t believe it myself…
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I really hate having to try and flip through books I don’t want to read on these omnibus editions. It’s one of my pet hates about ebooks!
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Yeah, cheapo ebook editions cost the reader more in time sadly. Blah 😦
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