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Title: The Last of the Plainsmen
Series: ———-
Author: Zane Grey
Rating: 2.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Western
Pages: 237
Format: Digital Edition
| Synopsis: |
Grey “chronicles” a time he supposedly had with a man named Jones, a hunter and trapper who tried to trap the animals he hunted so he could domesticate them, whether they were mountain lions or wild ox. Anything but bears.
| My Thoughts: |
This was very much a Man VS Nature story that happened to take place out West (in the United States) and wasn’t what I think of when I think “Western”. There isn’t a single showdown with pistols, no bare knuckle fights, no Indians trying to scalp anyone, no scheming cardsharps, no damsel in distress, no wily saloon keeper with a hidden shotgun behind the bar. None of that.
This is just a boys adventure story about a man who has a lust for trapping animals and domesticating them. The main story was about Grey and Jones and the group Jones had gathered, trying to catch some mountain lions. During that hunt (which lasted several months if not longer) Jones tells stories about himself hunting other animals. Wild stallions, some sort of Indian ox that they considered sacred, bison, etc. There was a lot of adverse Nature conditions which provides most of the tension of the story.
This was not a “bad” book, but once again, Grey doesn’t give me what I was expecting in a Western and as such, I am done reading him. Maybe next year I’ll try Max Brand? I’d like to keep some Westerns in my reading rotation, but I am not willing to sift through L’Amour’s standalones.
★★☆☆½
Sorry this one didn’t work out for you! Keep trying, if you find a good one I’ll definitely take notice 😄
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Well, this was my last try for Zane. With my reduced reading, I can’t keep an author on tap who has let me down twice.
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Ola, these were favourite books of Col. Sherman Potter 🙂
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Well, good thing Potter is as fictional as this story 🙂
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I can only imagine that these attempts ended in failure anyway. Doesn’t sound like a western I would pick up either.
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That is the thing, most of the hunting expeditions to get animals to domesticate succeeded. Jones (the hunter) realized that a lot of wild life was being destroyed so he was trying to keep the species alive in the only way he knew how.
But for me, a book isn’t a western without all those things I mentioned in the review 🙂
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Ill get to westerns one day when im all “hammered out” i guess…
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Ha! Like that is ever going to happen, those books keep coming out faster than most people can read them all…
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The universe is quite big🙂
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Ah, yes, Westerns. I have avoided them because I used to think of them as cliched … but lately I’ve been coming back to them because it turns out that they have many elements that keep showing up in my own writing. It turns out that gorgeous wilderness landscapes and pioneering survival situations create instant interest and drama.
I think you may need to expand your definition of what constitutes a Western. I haven’t read many, but there is White Fang, which I think counts (isn’t that the one about the sled dog in Alaska?). I have read a Louis L’Amour book that was about somebody sleeping out on a sacred mesa near an old kiva and managing to get into the “Third World” of the Anasazi, which is kind a of a mystical portal fantasy type book but still a Western. The first chapter, which described how you can get turned around in box canyon country and suddenly find yourself in a parallel world, was among the most intriguing I’ve ever read.
Then there are Tony Hillerman’s books, which are actually police procedural novels but they count as Westerns because they take place on the Navajo rez and incorporate Navajo MCs and a lot of culture. There are also books about Anasazi archaeology and Corpse Powder … equally fascinating, but not a gun battle in sight.
I thought my book didn’t have a genre, but finally figured out it was fantasy when I stumbled on to a fantasy web site and discovered that the genre is a lot bigger than High Fantasy. I think maybe the same is true of Westerns.
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Nope, changing my definition of a “western” is out of the question. It’s not my job to change my taste to the authors style but the authors job to write in a style I like.
I don’t think that’s asking too much 😉
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Authors: “We are people too!”
Bookstooge: “No you’re not. Get back to writing!”
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😉
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What a pity it didn’t work out for you! I hope there are better reads coming soon for you.
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Not easy anymore to get that Western fit huh? By the way, have you ever watched Blazing Saddles, the movie that sort inspired The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett?
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Oh man, Blazing Saddles is HILARIOUS!!! That and Space Balls are about the only Mel Brooks movies I’ll watch (most of his stuff was offensive enough to me in one way or another).
I had no idea it inspired Colour of Magic. Where did you pick that tidbit up?
And I do think I’m done with Westerns for the time being. I’m getting really focused on what I read instead of letting myself experiment…
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It was in the preface of my edition of The Colour of Magic I think. 😂 He said something like “I wanted to do what Blazing Saddles did to Western but this time for Fantasy”. Which seems to make a lot of sense to me hahah
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I just keep forgetting how old Blazing Saddles is. I only watched it for the first time 6 or 7 years ago so I tend to think of it in that time frame.
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