Epitaph (a book review post)

When I was a kid, before I discovered dinosaurs (which I did at the age of four), the very first thing I wanted to be was a cowboy. My grandfather had cows on his farm, so I figured that made him a cowboy, and that's what I wanted to be. Imagine my surprise when I got to my American history class in high school and learned that the term "cowboy" became popularized and associated with the west because of a band of rustlers operating in Arizona in the 1880s know as the Cow Boys. Yeah, you heard me; the Cow Boys were the bad guys.

Interestingly enough, it was these same Cow Boys who would create the enduring legacy of Wyatt Earp and, by extension, Doc Holliday. Wyatt Earp, who was possibly the ultimate frontier lawman... right up until he wasn't.

Of course, there are those who would argue that he was never a lawman, just an outlaw posing as one, but, mostly, those are the outlaws who accused him of that. Or men like Johnny Behan, and we know Behan was crooked, so it makes his accusations a little less believable.

At any rate, Epitaph is not really a book about Wyatt Earp. Which is not to say that it's not a book about Wyatt Earp, because it is. Mostly, though, it's about the conditions that lead up the shootout that was not actually at the O.K. Corral and the fallout after it. The enduring legacy it created.

The temptation, here, is to get into the history of it, but that's in the book. To say that Mary Doria Russell is a meticulous researcher is probably an understatement. We'll say instead that I trust her research. And, sure, I'm biased and, sure, this is historical fiction, but I believe the facts are mostly in place and the suppositions logically follow from the facts.

That said, it's Russell's ability to allow the reader to walk along with her characters that is her greatest asset. And that's where her research really shows, I think. She writes as if she knows these people, as if she spent time with them, as witnessed these things herself. It creates a completely believable world.

Basically, I can't recommend this book or Russell more highly. And, although this is a companion piece to Doc, Doc is not required reading; Epitaph is not a sequel.

Whether you think Wyatt Earp walked with the angels or the demons (and it's not unreasonable to suspect either considering that he was never shot; even when his clothes ended up full of bullet holes, he never received a wound), this book is worth reading for the insight on the situation. The incident "at" the O.K. Corral formed a view of the Old West that has never been shaken, one of showdowns and street fights that never really existed. And maybe that's okay, because it's the legends we look up to and aspire to be. Parts of me still want to be a cowboy.

Doc: A Review

I grew up on Westerns. My Saturdays, when there was no one available to play with, were full of them: The Lone Ranger (yes, I will go see the new movie, but I'm already thinking they should have called it Tonto), The Rifleman, The Big Valley, Rawhide, Bonanza. I also watched Gunsmoke, The Wild Wild West, and Alias Smith and Jones (which I loved enough to show my kids not too long ago), but those weren't in the Saturday lineup. None of that translated into reading Westerns, though; I don't really know why.

With that in mind, I was quite excited about Mary Doria Russell writing a Western.
And I wasn't disappointed.

As may be obvious from the title, Doc is about Doc Holliday. Well, obvious as long as you know the book is a Western. After all, what other figure is there from the American West who is called Doc? What you may also think is obvious is that the book deals with the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, perhaps even uses that as its climax, but you would be wrong.

So much of the "history" we know about Doc Holliday is centered around that one gunfight, a gunfight that lasted approximately 30 seconds, but it doesn't tell us anything about Doc. About why he was there. It doesn't tell us anything beyond the persistent legend that says that Doc Holliday was a gambler, gunman, and scoundrel. That he was just shy of a villain. Which was the belief for nearly a century after his death (helped in no small part by the sensationalized stories of Bat Masterson who believed in the story more than the truth).

Doc: A Novel does tell us why he was there without bothering to actually deal with the shootout itself. Heck, it's not even set in Tombstone. Doc tells the story of what was probably the only happy time Holliday had once he moved west to fight his tuberculosis. It deals with how he fell in with the Earps and, specifically, Wyatt, because you can't really tell a story about Doc that doesn't include Wyatt. The interesting thing about that is that it wasn't really Wyatt who was Doc's friend. Not that he wasn't, but it was Morgan Earp that Doc was close to. Once you know that, you can understand everything that happened in Tombstone and, more specifically, what happened after.

At its heart, Doc is a character piece. There is a plot, but it's very soft. The book isn't about the plot, so to speak; it's about the characters. Russell excels at characters, and, I have to say, this book is about as close as you'll get to feeling like you were right there with Wyatt and Doc and all the other Earps. I don't think you necessarily care about what's going to happen in a book like this; you just want to know what's going to happen to the characters. And there's a real difference in those two things.

We hear a lot, these days, about starting in the middle of the action and getting on to the story (the action) and keeping things fast-paced (action) and all of that, but, when I think back about my favorite books, I never remember the action; I remember the characters. It's the characters that captivate me. Sure, books that are full of action can be a lot of fun to read, but, if there's no connection with the characters, then those action (plot) oriented books are (for me) like candy. There's just no substance there, and they don't stay with me. Or, even, interest me much anymore.

If you want to walk the dusty streets of Dodge City with Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp, listen in the conversations they're having, watch Doc do his dentistry during the only time in his life when he was really able to practice it; this is the book for you. If you just want to get to the gunfights and the shootouts, you should go watch Tombstone.

Note: This is probably the best written of Russell's books, which is a considerable accomplishment considering the books she's written, but I think The Sparrow is still my favorite. In fact, I'm sure it is. However, that may all change when the sequel (currently called Epitaph) to Doc comes out; that one will deal with O.K. Corral.