I’m late with this instalment in my Larry McMurtry 2022 Re-reading Project, but I don’t think anyone’s reading along with this bit of it (are you? Everyone seems to be planning to read “Lonesome Dove” at some point in the year) so I should get away with it. No reluctance to read this novel, just a glut of work cutting into my reading time (and it’s not quite the book you read over mealtimes, just in case …). I read the battered US edition you can see in the photo, which I bought on the same day I bought “The Last Picture Show”. I last read it in October 2012, when I was working my way up to reading the fourth and fifth volumes in the series, and handily typed my review from 2000 into that review from my notebooks.
Larry McMurtry – “Texasville”
(09 April 2000)
He had never supposed that people really lived as they ought to live, but he had gone through much of his life at least believing that there was a way they ought to live. And Thalia of all places – a modest small town – ought to be a place where people lived as they ought to live, allowing for a normal margin of human error. Surely, in Thalia, far removed from big-city temptations, people ought to be living on the old model – putting their families and neighbors first, leading more or less orderly, ore of less responsible lives.
But he knew almost everyone in Thalia – indeed, knew more than he wanted to know about most of them – and it was clear from what he knew that the old model had been shattered. The arrival of money had cracked the model; its departure shattered it. Irrationality now flowered as prolifically as broom weeds in a wet year. (pp. 323-324)
We’re 30 years on from the events of “The Last Picture Show” although shockingly the main characters still manage to be slightly younger than I am myself now, reading it! Duane has been married to the somewhat terrifying Karla for over 20 years and they have a range of slightly feral children, from Nellie and her many short marriages, through Dickie, who’s shagging everyone and selling drugs, to the terrible twins, Jack and Julie, who just cause mayhem. There are a couple of grandchildren in the huge house, and a succession of guests who move in and out. Oh, and a dog, Shorty, who makes it through the book, although not loyally. Sonny is still around, owning half the town but quiet and sad and a perpetual bachelor, and Ruth Popper is there, too, happily, running marathons and Duane’s office. A large cast of town characters, cowboys, oil workers and farmers complete the personnel, revolving around Sonny’s shops, the courthouse and the Dairy Queen.
It’s the 1980s and the bust years after the boom, and McMurtry’s central idea, set against the structure of preparations for the town’s centennial event, which allows him to pull in characters and set them against each other, is that everyone’s morals have been knocked loose by either all the money or the threat of bankruptcy. All the women appear to have left their husbands and set up with other men – often Duane’s son, Dickie, as it turns out, and are getting pregnant by men not their husbands. I have to say though that the women have far more agency in this one and are the lead characters, controlling both action and emotions. None more so than when Jacy, Duane’s old love, reappears, fresh from a career in Europe as a film star but also mourning a child. There’s a wonderful scene where they repeat their homecoming queen / football captain moment (which Duane recalls they mocked at the time) on a float in the centennial parade. Jacy’s a mystery and gradually adopts almost the whole town, and it’s only at the end that her real motives come through.
There are funny scenes, the tumbleweed stampede in particular (which I had forgotten again!), the bit where Duane is somehow forced to judge an art show, the visit to the psychiatrist, but also such poignant ones. Sonny’s in some kind of decline neurologically and is found sitting in his old picture show, mostly destroyed, up on the remaining seat, thinking he can see a film against the sky in what I feel is the central scene of the novel.
Long and sprawling, wide and somewhat wild, this was indeed worth a re-read.
JacquiWine
Feb 25, 2022 @ 09:29:35
Another very enticing review of a Larry McMurty novel, Liz! I’m determined to try him at some point this year, that’s a promise for sure.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:07:51
No huge expectations of people, as you know, but it would be nice to see what other people think of him!
LikeLike
MarinaSofia
Feb 25, 2022 @ 13:22:26
I haven’t read anything by him so far, but more and more people I trust are talking about him and rereading him, so I suppose I shall have to at some point. I am such a pushover when it comes to discovering new writers…
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:08:47
I think a few people have revisited his books after his death, I’ve not seen that many reviews though so far myself. Hope you can find one that takes your fancy.
LikeLiked by 1 person
CLM (@ConMartin)
Feb 25, 2022 @ 13:56:01
I’ve never read him either although when he started the book town I was intrigued: https://www.bookedupac.com/
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:09:19
Yes! I always had a hankering to visit his bookshop / town, I hope it will continue on now.
LikeLike
Cathy746books
Feb 25, 2022 @ 14:25:02
I’ve started my read of Lonesome Dove but it’s slow going at the moment – no reflection on the book, more on my attention span!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:09:55
Oh, brilliant! His can be a bit tricky sometimes for the big ones but then suddenly you’re in and dragged along by the characters and events!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Marcie McCauley
Feb 25, 2022 @ 14:47:40
I wish this fit with my reading plans for 2022 as I’m sure he’s worthwhile reading. He reminds me of Richard Russo, in that it can be hard to summarize the power of the story because you really are captivated by the story for almost mysterious reasons…you just fall into it somehow?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:10:40
I’ve had so many challenges I haven’t been able to fit in over the years so I hear you! And yes, I was totally dragged in to Texasville after 50 or so pages and found it hard to put down!
LikeLike
A Life in Books
Feb 25, 2022 @ 15:08:34
I read The Last Picture Show a zillion years ago but have never read Texasville. Now on my list! I’m currently reading a very different take on American small-town life which I’d highly recommend if you’ve not read it: Wendell Berry’s Stand By Me
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:11:23
I hope you get to Texasville, it’s wonderful to revisit the characters, though bittersweet, too. I had a look at Berry’s and they do look enticing. too!
LikeLiked by 1 person
heavenali
Feb 25, 2022 @ 19:26:43
So glad you enjoyed your re-read of this. It certainly does sound long and sprawling.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:11:59
It goes all over the place and has so many characters! The next one is even longer, so I’d better start it in good time!
LikeLike
Christine
Feb 25, 2022 @ 19:29:58
I read Lonesome Dove last year for the first time and absolutely loved it. It’s the only book by McMurtry I’ve read, but I found it so fantastic that I want to read more by him, but I’m not sure if I want to read the Last Picture Show books, or continue on with the Lonesome Dove books. Decisions, decisions!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:12:56
I’d continue with Lonesome Dove, I think. I read them all over the place when I first read them and it took me a while to slot them all together (also characters pop up in books that aren’t “their” books!
LikeLike
Brona's Books
Feb 25, 2022 @ 22:20:37
I love your enthusiasm for your rereading projects. I confess that I had never heard of McMurtry before this, although I see from your pic, that he also wrote Terms of Endearment, which is the only one I know anything about, thanks to the movie.
Thank you for once again widening my reading arena!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Feb 26, 2022 @ 16:13:48
Ah, thank you! I’m sensing I’m an outlier as a British reader of them, even (and where did I find out about them? Not sure it wasn’t in America). But yes, quite a few were turned into films.
LikeLiked by 1 person
wadholloway
Feb 28, 2022 @ 12:41:49
If I can get a McMurtry audiobook from the library I’ll happily listen, but I don’t think our library system – via BorrowBox – has any. I’m thinking of trying Libby soon to see if it has a wider range.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Mar 01, 2022 @ 06:42:13
Thank you for trying! Was he ever a “thing” over there? I feel like he’s fallen out of fashion now even though an author’s death often spikes interest in their books …
LikeLike
wadholloway
Mar 01, 2022 @ 12:53:47
Well he’s not a writer I’ve ever heard of except on your blog. And all his novels I thought were the names of popular movies (that I’d never seen).
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Mar 01, 2022 @ 12:57:34
OK, so his films are better known than his novels, I think that’s quite general. I never know with books from this period of my reading life whether I got into them because of my then American boyfriend and it was a really weird thing for a young British woman to be reading! Same with Jill McCorkle and a few others.
LikeLike
wadholloway
Mar 01, 2022 @ 13:03:22
We all read odd books from time to time. I’ve just added a dozen Viragos to my TBR without having heard of a single one of the authors. I’ve added them to a post I’d already written for Thurs. but I’m afraid I won’t be doing much commenting for a week or so as I have a load north and out into the desert.
(Tonight I’m 600km north of Perth and already about 10 deg hotter. Could do with some Birmingham snow).
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Mar 01, 2022 @ 13:10:36
I’ll look forward to that! No snow here at the moment, it doesn’t snow here much. Cool and damp, though. Bon voyage!
LikeLiked by 1 person
State of the TBR – March 2022 | Adventures in reading, running and working from home
Mar 01, 2022 @ 09:02:24
thecontentreader
Mar 03, 2022 @ 12:00:23
I was not aware that McMurtry had written The Last Picture Show. I think I have to read him at some point.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Liz Dexter
Mar 04, 2022 @ 06:14:17
I do get the feeling his films are so much better-known than his books. I hope you get to try one and report back!
LikeLiked by 1 person
State of the TBR – April 2022 | Adventures in reading, running and working from home
Apr 01, 2022 @ 16:47:07