That Old Ace In The Hole

E Annie Proulx

All the exhaustive research that some us saw Ms Proulx spending months doing in that TV documentary is in this book, however fleetingly, so Bob won't like it. Doreen fascinated by and started to mark all the weird names that she uses for the characters, but somehow they do seem real, perhaps culled from telephone directories. Set in the Texas panhandle the book details the everyday lives of the people living and working there, some amazing stories and extraordinary facts. The basic story concerns Bob Dollar, sent from the big city to find potential sites for a feed-lot. Uncharacteristically for this author, it's very funny. Lots of dialogue and the voices of the various characters are very clearly heard. The actual story is a bit incidental to all the research and it wraps up perhaps a bit too quickly in a fairy tale ending. Even so, it's very entertaining and recommended.
Doreen 29/6/03

Gill struggled through this to end, but didn't much enjoy it. She could not empathise with any of the characters: their silly names put her off. She thought that the author might have been sending up the characters. The writing is good quality but the subject matter unattractive. Try it.
Gill 3/8/03

Proulx has immersed herself in the whole culture of the Texas panhandle. A major work, but very boring and only a flimsy story. Lots of research and huge digressions that seem to last for hundreds of pages. Doreen thought it funny but Andrew disagreed. Gill found the characters unsympathetic. Lots of peculiar names - Andrew wondered whether Proulx took these from senders of email spam.
Andrew 19/10/03

By the same author

The frames have gone all funny - click to make it good.