Available:*
Library | Call Number | Status |
---|---|---|
Searching... Salem Main Library | CD L'Amour | Searching... Unknown |
Bound With These Titles
On Order
Summary
Summary
Joe Harbin hadn't killed a man for a fortune in gold just to sit in prison and let Rodelo collect it. But when he and his men break out and head for the stash, they end up with a pair of unwelcome partners: Rodelo and a beautiful woman with a hidden past. To get fifty thousand dollars in gold across fifty miles of desert, the desperate band quickly learns how much they need each other---and how deep their greed and suspicion can run. At the end of the journey lie the waters of Baja and a new life in Mexico, but first they have to survive the savage heat, bounty-hunting Yaqui Indians, and the shifting, treacherous nature of both the desert sands and their own conflicting loyalties.
Author Notes
Born in Jamestown, North Dakota on March 22, 1908, Louis L'Amour's adventurous life could have been the subject of one of his novels. Striking out on his own in 1923, at age 15, L'Amour began a peripatetic existence, taking whatever jobs were available, from skinning dead cattle to being a sailor. L'Amour knew early in life that he wanted to be a writer, and the experiences of those years serve as background for some of his later fiction. During the 1930s he published short stories and poetry; his career was interrupted by army service in World War II. After the war, L'Amour began writing for western pulp magazines and wrote several books in the Hopalong Cassidy series using the pseudonym Tex Burns.
His first novel, Westward the Tide (1950), serves as an example of L'Amour's frontier fiction, for it is an action-packed adventure story containing the themes and motifs that he uses throughout his career. His fascination with history and his belief in the inevitability of manifest destiny are clear. Also present and typical of L'Amour's work are the strong, capable, beautiful heroine who is immediately attracted to the equally capable hero; a clear moral split between good and evil; reflections on the Native Americans, whose land and ways of life are being disrupted; and a happy ending. Although his work is somewhat less violent than that of other western writers, L'Amour's novels all contain their fair share of action, usually in the form of gunfights or fistfights.
L'Amour's major contribution to the western genre is his attempt to create, in 40 or more books, the stories of three families whose histories intertwine as the generations advance across the American frontier. The novels of the Irish Chantry, English Sackett, and French Talon families are L'Amour's most ambitious project, and sadly were left unfinished at his death. Although L'Amour did not complete all of the novels, enough of the series exists to demonstrate his vision.
L'Amour's strongest attribute is his ability to tell a compelling story; readers do not mind if the story is similar to one they have read before, for in the telling, L'Amour adds enough small twists of plot and detail to make it worth the reader's while. L'Amour fans also enjoy the bits of information he includes about everything from wilderness survival skills to finding the right person to marry. These lessons give readers the sense that they are getting their money's worth, that there is more to a L'Amour novel than sheer escapism. With over 200 million copies of his books in print worldwide, L'Amour must be counted as one of the most influential writers of westerns in this century. He died from lung cancer on June 10, 1988.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (1)
Library Journal Review
Prolific writer L'Amour published this brief tale in 1966, and it was adapted into a film later that same year. In it, the wrongly imprisoned Kid Rodelo joins three other outlaws recently escaped from Yuma prison. They carry with them a fortune in gold but too little water to face the dreaded Camino Del Diablo desert route. Their flight to freedom is dogged by bloodthirsty Yaki Indians and complicated by the addition of a guarded yet refined young woman. Western fans will not be disappointed. Narrator Edoardo Ballerini's gruff delivery accentuates the action. VERDICT Recommended to fans of traditional Westerns, and, at just four hours, this is also an easy point of entry for those curious about L'Amour's work.-Mark John Swails, Johnson Cty. Community Coll., Overland Park, KS (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.