Lonesome Dove is one of my all-time favorites (I've read the book cover-to-cover probably three or four times and then various parts of it many more times), and I really liked Comanche Moon when I read it back in junior high. I've never gotten around to reading Dead Man's Walk, but that's on my list of things to do sooner rather than later. I read Streets of Laredo once, right after I read Lonesome Dove for the first time, and I came away disappointed and depressed.
Newt's death was disappointing, but it made sense in the context of the story (way too young to be running an outfit in Montana and way too inexperienced to ride the Hell B*tch). The way it was handled (just a quick mention) fit well with Call's emotionless personality. The rest of the book just kind of sucked, I guess that's the best way to put it. I hated that Call ended up crippled and depending on Pea and Miss Lorena. I was most aggravated by Joey Garza killing Judge Roy Bean. I'm one who appreciates historical fiction being woven into real history, and McMurtry did a good job of that for most of the time, but then he just decided to throw all that out the window with the inexplicable decision to have a fictional outlaw murder a real-life lawman (who was never murdered in real life).
Another something I'd like to mention to all you fellow Lonesome Dove aficionados: I've always been bothered by the change in location of the events that took place in Comanche Moon. Comanche Moon took place in Austin, for the most part, but Lonesome Dove discussed all the back story from Comanche Moon (Clara, Maggie, etc.) as if all those events occurred in Lonesome Dove. It would be understandable if Comanche Moon was written before Lonesome Dove, and when McMurtry wrote Lonesome Dove, he decided that things needed to be moved down to the border, but that's not the case. Lonesome Dove was the first book written and Comanche Moon was the last, so it comes across as if McMurtry just felt like changing the setting for all the pre-Hat Creek events and he just flat didn't care about continuity between books. As big of a screwball as he is, that honestly wouldn't surprise me. Am I the only one that has been bothered by this for years?
[This message has been edited by WestTxAg06 (edited 12/29/2007 11:30p).]
