The Which Way Tree
Autor Elizabeth Crooken Limba Engleză Paperback – 15 feb 2024
Observăm încă de la primele pagini cum The Which Way Tree reușește să transforme o poveste clasică de supraviețuire într-o legendă intimă, grație vocii narative a lui Benjamin Shreve. Stilul are ceva din proza lui Kathleen Kent, fără să fie o imitație — acolo unde The Outcasts explorează lăcomia și supraviețuirea în golf, Elizabeth Crook alege să ancoreze narațiunea în puritatea unei misiuni de răzbunare aproape mitice. Benjamin nu este doar un martor, ci un cronicar care, prin scrisori adresate unui judecător, reconstruiește trauma surorii sale, Samantha, și determinarea ei de a vâna pantera care le-a distrus familia. Ne-a atras atenția modul în care autoarea echilibrează tonul sumbru al unei urmăriri de tip „om contra bestie” cu un umor discret și cald, născut din interacțiunile acestui grup improbabil de urmăritori. Deși premisa amintește de asprimea frontierelor din The Night Journal, unde autoarea explora moștenirea generațională a femeilor din sud-vest, The Which Way Tree se simte mai dinamic și mai concentrat pe acțiune. Ritmul este susținut nu doar de pericolul reprezentat de pantera considerată „demon” de localnici, ci și de amenințarea umană sub forma unui soldat confederat sadic care îi urmărește din umbră. Este o proză istorică ce refuză clișeele genului western, preferând să exploreze legăturile de sânge și povara unei promisiuni făcute în fața morții, totul într-un Texas sălbatic, redat cu o precizie geografică și emoțională remarcabilă.
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Specificații
ISBN-13: 9781835010990
ISBN-10: 1835010997
Pagini: 272
Dimensiuni: 129 x 197 x 19 mm
Greutate: 0.19 kg
Editura: Bedford Square Publishers
ISBN-10: 1835010997
Pagini: 272
Dimensiuni: 129 x 197 x 19 mm
Greutate: 0.19 kg
Editura: Bedford Square Publishers
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De ce să citești această carte
Recomandăm acest roman cititorilor care caută o aventură istorică profundă, în care peisajul sălbatic devine un personaj în sine. Veți câștiga o perspectivă emoționantă asupra loialității dintre frați și a modului în care trauma poate fi transformată în curaj. Este o lectură esențială pentru cei care au apreciat The Madstone și doresc să descopere o poveste despre justiție personală, scrisă cu o eleganță rară în literatura de gen contemporană.
Despre autor
Elizabeth Crook este o voce consacrată a literaturii americane contemporane, fiind premiată cu Spur Award și WILLA Literary Award pentru romanul său The Night Journal. Originară din Austin, Texas, Crook și-a dedicat cariera explorării istoriei și mitologiei Sud-Vestului american, publicând frecvent în „Texas Monthly” și „Southwestern Historical Quarterly”. Opera sa, care include și apreciatul Monday, Monday, este recunoscută pentru cercetarea istorică riguroasă și pentru capacitatea de a crea portrete feminine puternice care navighează medii ostile, elemente regăsite din plin în The Which Way Tree.
Descriere
A loyal brother sets out with his tenacious younger sister to avenge her mother's death at the jaws of a mountain lion in 19th-century Texas.
Notă biografică
Elizabeth Crook has published four previous novels, including The Night Journal, which received the Spur Award from Western Writers of America, and Monday, Monday, a Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2014 and winner of the Jesse H. Jones Award from the Texas Institute of Letters. She lives in Austin with her family.
Recenzii
"A multilayered tale . . . Benjamin Shreve, the teenage narrator of The Which Way Tree, unspools his tale of Civil War-era Texas in a voice that is utterly convincing, consistent, and believable. Crook never slips out of that voice for a moment. This is no small feat given that the tale involves Benjamin's demented half sister, the infamous massacre of Union-sympathizing German immigrants by local Confederates, and a giant panther. Any first-person voice involving a young Southern boy invites comparisons to Huck Finn. But dialects have complexities and Crook appears to be a master of them. Benjamin's voice swings between the rhythms of the Southern hills and the lofty, elevated tone encountered in Twain and contemporary Westerns . . . His speech can switch from hyperbole to understatement in the same sentence--and it is a wonderfully deadpan understatement . . . The language is arresting . . . The Which Way Tree is a commendable and very readable addition to the tale-spinning tradition and its beautiful use of language."—Paulette Jiles, New York Times Book Review
"A ripping adventure...Benjamin is a boyishly charming chronicler of the crazed hunt...Samantha's unfinished business leads the makeshift hunters through a gauntlet of disasters to the novel's show-stopping finale. 'Vengeance belongs to the Lord,' the preacher chides her, to which she answers, 'Only if he can beat me to it.'"—Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal
"An absorbing coming-of-age novel...Benjamin is akeen observer and reliable narrator...These adventure tales, if told well, areplenty riveting and enduring. The Which Way Tree is told well."—Rod Davis, Texas Observer
"Crook manages in The Which Way Tree the striking feat of not only capturing the voice of a 19th century youth as honestly and compellingly as Mark Twain but also having her Texas Huck recount a Moby Dick-like pursuit across Texas in which the White Whale is a malevolent mountain lion and its Ahab is a girl it mauled while killing her mother."—Austin Chronicle
"Crook's slim,intimate novel illustrates how, at their best, historical westerns provideinsight into human nature tested by the sort of extreme conditions that rarelycrop up in contemporary American settings."—Texas Monthly
"Exuberant . . . Benjamin's voice has echoes of Huckleberry Finn, while his sister's pursuit of the deadly cat recalls True Grit."—Tom Beer, Newsday
"How Crook managed tochannel the voice of a seventeen-year-old boy in 1860s Texas so convincingly Ican't say, but Benjamin is both persuasive and captivating, a fully realizedcharacter that you gladly follow across the Lone Star State. In his youth andlack of education and simple, declarative voice, he calls to mind anotherfigure from nineteenth-century American literature, Huck Finn. Benjamin sharesHuck's keen eye for observing human nature and teasing out some sense of whatit means. His voice is another way in which Crook grips the reader, and may bethe novel's secret weapon . . . Like some of the finest books that came out ofour nation's first century and a quarter, The Which Way Tree leadsus into the wild, where characters must confront both the wildness in natureand the wildness in their own nature. That which is in Sam's heart has theawesome force of a thunderstorm-or a mountain lion-and can no more be tamedthan either of them can. But Elizabeth Crook has at least wrestled hers ontothe page and lets us get close to it, close enough for the hairs on our arms torise. In this remarkable novel, she's given us something wild to wonder at,and to be moved by."—Robert Faires, Austin Chronicle
"This riveting Western has a bit of True Grit feel."—CJ Lotz, Garden & Gun
"The story is intriguing . . . A page-turner."—Mike Yawn, Houston Chronicle
"Samantha is frustrating and, like her brother Benjamin, sometimes I too wanted to strangle her, but I couldn't help but root for her . . . Crook's novel keeps the plot moving fast and the dramatic tension high . . . It's a story that hooked me from the get-go, and when Benjamin finishes his last letter to the judge, I wanted the story to continue . . . Fans of Paulette Jiles's News of the World will be gratified to find another well-told, old-time Texas tale of big adventure and big characters."—Emily Spicer, San Antonio Express News
"The Which Way Tree is adventurous, suspenseful, and charming...you're going to want to read this one."—Elizabeth Entenman, HelloGiggles
"The Which WayTree is unlike anything I've read before...an enthralling adventure, a Texasfairy tale in the truest sense of that term."—Michelle Newby, Lone Star Literary Life
"When I began to read this book its unique voiceappealed to me immediately. Elizabeth Crook has written a beautiful novel withwonderful characters."—Robert Duvall
"Elizabeth Crook has invented a brilliant way ofseeing the old Texas frontier: at very close range, through the eyes of awise-beyond-his-years seventeen-year-old boy and the sister whose defiant questhe joins. The result is a small-scale masterwork, richly detailed andbeautifully rendered."—S. C. Gwynne, New York Times bestselling author of Empire of the Summer Moon
" 'PreacherDob said, Vengeance belongs to the Lord, Samantha. She said, Only if he canbeat me to it.' This told me everything I needed to know about Samantha Shreve,a character who knocked my socks off from her first appearance on the page.This book is the stuff of legends, tales told for a hundred years around Texascampfires. Written in a form that is historically accurate and yet feelspainstakingly intimate, The Which Way Tree is unlike anything I'veread before."—Attica Locke, author of Bluebird, Bluebird
"The WhichWay Tree is one part Track of the Cat, one part True Grit,and one part Tom Sawyer, a ruthless pedigree for a novel thatdisplays human nature in its most beautiful form--a marvel."—Craig Johnson, New York Times bestselling author of The Western Star, a Walt Longmire mystery
"InThe Which Way Tree, Elizabeth Crook has conjured a powerful, sly, andoften charming tale delivered in the winning voice of Benjamin. This novel is afast-paced story resonating with rich characters and mythic elements that cometo us as folklore that mustn't be doubted."—Daniel Woodrell, author of Winter's Bone and The Maid's Version
"ElizabethCrook has created a book of marvels. Its comedy is steeped in the hardscrabbletragedies of a wilder old America. You will even catch an echo of Twain's witin the picaresque narration."—Luis Alberto Urrea, author of the national bestseller The Hummingbird's Daughter
"Notsince True Grit have I read a novel this charming, exciting, suspenseful,and pitch-perfect. The Which Way Tree is winning from first page to last."—Ron Hansen, author of The Kid and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
"Recalls CormacMcCarthy's horseback meandering and keen eye for terrain and flora in TheCrossing. There are also obvious echoes of True Grit, though Sam iseven more fiercely single-minded than Mattie . . . An entertaining picture ofharsh, stark life in the Old West."—Kirkus Reviews
"Poignant and plainspoken...Crook crafts Benjamin's narratoin beautifully, finding a winning balance between naivete and wisdom, thoughtfulness and grit."—Publishers Weekly
"This is a story of unremitting deprivation allayed by unexpected kindness, with a dangerous chase motivated by love and suffused with humanity."—Michele Leber, Booklist
"A ripping adventure...Benjamin is a boyishly charming chronicler of the crazed hunt...Samantha's unfinished business leads the makeshift hunters through a gauntlet of disasters to the novel's show-stopping finale. 'Vengeance belongs to the Lord,' the preacher chides her, to which she answers, 'Only if he can beat me to it.'"—Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal
"An absorbing coming-of-age novel...Benjamin is akeen observer and reliable narrator...These adventure tales, if told well, areplenty riveting and enduring. The Which Way Tree is told well."—Rod Davis, Texas Observer
"Crook manages in The Which Way Tree the striking feat of not only capturing the voice of a 19th century youth as honestly and compellingly as Mark Twain but also having her Texas Huck recount a Moby Dick-like pursuit across Texas in which the White Whale is a malevolent mountain lion and its Ahab is a girl it mauled while killing her mother."—Austin Chronicle
"In the tradition of Charles Portis's classic True Grit, Elizabeth Crook's heart-pounding adventure, The Which Way Tree, features a tough-as-nails orphan in pursuit of frontier justice...you'll follow Sam to the ends of the earth."
—Natalie Beach, O Magazine"Crook's slim,intimate novel illustrates how, at their best, historical westerns provideinsight into human nature tested by the sort of extreme conditions that rarelycrop up in contemporary American settings."—Texas Monthly
"Exuberant . . . Benjamin's voice has echoes of Huckleberry Finn, while his sister's pursuit of the deadly cat recalls True Grit."—Tom Beer, Newsday
"How Crook managed tochannel the voice of a seventeen-year-old boy in 1860s Texas so convincingly Ican't say, but Benjamin is both persuasive and captivating, a fully realizedcharacter that you gladly follow across the Lone Star State. In his youth andlack of education and simple, declarative voice, he calls to mind anotherfigure from nineteenth-century American literature, Huck Finn. Benjamin sharesHuck's keen eye for observing human nature and teasing out some sense of whatit means. His voice is another way in which Crook grips the reader, and may bethe novel's secret weapon . . . Like some of the finest books that came out ofour nation's first century and a quarter, The Which Way Tree leadsus into the wild, where characters must confront both the wildness in natureand the wildness in their own nature. That which is in Sam's heart has theawesome force of a thunderstorm-or a mountain lion-and can no more be tamedthan either of them can. But Elizabeth Crook has at least wrestled hers ontothe page and lets us get close to it, close enough for the hairs on our arms torise. In this remarkable novel, she's given us something wild to wonder at,and to be moved by."—Robert Faires, Austin Chronicle
"This riveting Western has a bit of True Grit feel."—CJ Lotz, Garden & Gun
"The story is intriguing . . . A page-turner."—Mike Yawn, Houston Chronicle
"Samantha is frustrating and, like her brother Benjamin, sometimes I too wanted to strangle her, but I couldn't help but root for her . . . Crook's novel keeps the plot moving fast and the dramatic tension high . . . It's a story that hooked me from the get-go, and when Benjamin finishes his last letter to the judge, I wanted the story to continue . . . Fans of Paulette Jiles's News of the World will be gratified to find another well-told, old-time Texas tale of big adventure and big characters."—Emily Spicer, San Antonio Express News
"The Which Way Tree is adventurous, suspenseful, and charming...you're going to want to read this one."—Elizabeth Entenman, HelloGiggles
"The Which WayTree is unlike anything I've read before...an enthralling adventure, a Texasfairy tale in the truest sense of that term."—Michelle Newby, Lone Star Literary Life
"When I began to read this book its unique voiceappealed to me immediately. Elizabeth Crook has written a beautiful novel withwonderful characters."—Robert Duvall
"Elizabeth Crook has invented a brilliant way ofseeing the old Texas frontier: at very close range, through the eyes of awise-beyond-his-years seventeen-year-old boy and the sister whose defiant questhe joins. The result is a small-scale masterwork, richly detailed andbeautifully rendered."—S. C. Gwynne, New York Times bestselling author of Empire of the Summer Moon
" 'PreacherDob said, Vengeance belongs to the Lord, Samantha. She said, Only if he canbeat me to it.' This told me everything I needed to know about Samantha Shreve,a character who knocked my socks off from her first appearance on the page.This book is the stuff of legends, tales told for a hundred years around Texascampfires. Written in a form that is historically accurate and yet feelspainstakingly intimate, The Which Way Tree is unlike anything I'veread before."—Attica Locke, author of Bluebird, Bluebird
"The WhichWay Tree is one part Track of the Cat, one part True Grit,and one part Tom Sawyer, a ruthless pedigree for a novel thatdisplays human nature in its most beautiful form--a marvel."—Craig Johnson, New York Times bestselling author of The Western Star, a Walt Longmire mystery
"InThe Which Way Tree, Elizabeth Crook has conjured a powerful, sly, andoften charming tale delivered in the winning voice of Benjamin. This novel is afast-paced story resonating with rich characters and mythic elements that cometo us as folklore that mustn't be doubted."—Daniel Woodrell, author of Winter's Bone and The Maid's Version
"ElizabethCrook has created a book of marvels. Its comedy is steeped in the hardscrabbletragedies of a wilder old America. You will even catch an echo of Twain's witin the picaresque narration."—Luis Alberto Urrea, author of the national bestseller The Hummingbird's Daughter
"Notsince True Grit have I read a novel this charming, exciting, suspenseful,and pitch-perfect. The Which Way Tree is winning from first page to last."—Ron Hansen, author of The Kid and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
"Recalls CormacMcCarthy's horseback meandering and keen eye for terrain and flora in TheCrossing. There are also obvious echoes of True Grit, though Sam iseven more fiercely single-minded than Mattie . . . An entertaining picture ofharsh, stark life in the Old West."—Kirkus Reviews
"Poignant and plainspoken...Crook crafts Benjamin's narratoin beautifully, finding a winning balance between naivete and wisdom, thoughtfulness and grit."—Publishers Weekly
"This is a story of unremitting deprivation allayed by unexpected kindness, with a dangerous chase motivated by love and suffused with humanity."—Michele Leber, Booklist
While hunting near his Texas home at the end of the Civil War, Benjamin Shreve witnesses a Confederate soldier,
Clarence Hanlin, picking the pockets of eight hanged men. The 17-year-old orphan is called to court to testify about what he saw. In letters to the judge, Benjamin tells the epic tale of the panther that killed his stepmother and disfigured his stepsister, Samantha. Clarence plays a bizarre role in the tale, helping and hindering Samantha's Ahab-like quest for
vengeance against the panther. Benjamin, frank and quick-witted, tells a story that is absorbing and satisfying. He
doesn't dwell on his hardships but focuses on Samantha's single-minded pursuit of the panther and the cold-blooded
soldier who ended up in the middle of it all. VERDICT: Spur-Award-winning Crook's (The Night Journal; Monday, Monday) fifth novel will be a must-read for fans of Joe Lansdale's Western adventures and Patrick deWitt's The Sisters Brothers. Readers new to the Western genre will be hooked if they start with this compelling novel.
—Emily Hamstra, Library Journal