Thursday, February 7, 2019

A Town Named Hate by John Prebble


Martha Boyd sat in a corner during the town meeting. Now and then she looked across the room to Jason, and once he smiled to her reassuringly, and the smile was a bridge between them across the smoke and the heat and the hate in the room.
A stunner!
A story of a small town with forgotten promise, a long-dead tragedy and a mistake to latch vengeful hopes on.
Insight to burn, atmosphere that seethes, and a plot that boils start to finish.
Masterful!
at
Labels: ,

2 comments:

  1. Andrew McBrideFebruary 11, 2019 at 5:59 AM

    Prebble may have re-cycled (or re-worked) this as THE LONG HATE in his short story collection SPANISH STIRRUP. That also contains MY GREAT AUNT APPEARING DAY, which was made into the 1950s movie WHITE FEATHER. He also wrote a great novel, THE BUFFALO SOLDIERS. IMHO you won't find a better written western!

    ReplyDelete
  2. hatmakercombatsportsFebruary 11, 2019 at 8:12 AM

    Thank you for the info--I've been tracking down Prebble's work since encountering this story. Even his Scottish Highlands work is well worth a look.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

The Best of TV Westerns: The Critics' Choice : "Hopalong Cassidy" to "Have Gun, Will Travel," "Maverick," to "Bonanza" by John Javna

We continue on a theme. This currently hard to obtain volume may be slim but there is much to appreciate. You will find many of th...

  • Top Five from a Modern Master
    S. Craig Zahler, author of the excellent, albeit intense novels A Congregation of Jackals and Wraiths of the Broken Land , and writer-d...
  • Rawhide Kid #1
    “Always remember, Tommy--a gun is neither good nor bad! It depends on who is wearing it! In the hands of the Rawhide Kid, it is somethin...
  • A Conversation with James Reasoner
    If you don't know James Reasoner, you're in for a treat, if you do know him and his work, well, it's still mighty enlighteni...