You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.3 AVERAGE
3.3 AVERAGE
challenging
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The narrator did an amazing job portraying the characters and their emotions.
DISCLAIMER: I ONLY read this book because of the 2020 PopSugar Reading Challenge category of "A Western". I do not like the genre as a whole. So when this category came up I picked the author because, as a life long M*A*S*H* the TV show fan, Col. Potter read Zane Grey all the time. So on a trip to a used book store I picked this book up.
So... I did not DISLIKE this book but I can't say I liked it either. Granted, I floated between reading the paperback and listening to the audio, depending on where I was. This book was full of all the tropes we associate with a western novel... ranchers and ranch hands, a single woman running her ranch alone struggling to not be bullied into wedding a town bigwig so he can have her land and fortune, a mysterious one name stranger (riding a blind horse), comes seeking revenge and ends up staying and helping the lady, lady and stranger fall in love and adopt an unwanted orphan child...
But then remembering this book was originally published in 1912... it may have been Zane Grey who helped establish all these tropes.
My biggest issues was actually with the editing of the audiobook. There were no pauses between the end of a chapter and the beginning of the next... heck they didn't wait for the reader to finish pronouncing the final word of the chapter before the next chapter began.
Would I recommend this book... I guess... if you like westerns. But I am not going to try to find book two in this apparent duology, let alone rush out to read anything else in this genre.
So... I did not DISLIKE this book but I can't say I liked it either. Granted, I floated between reading the paperback and listening to the audio, depending on where I was. This book was full of all the tropes we associate with a western novel... ranchers and ranch hands, a single woman running her ranch alone struggling to not be bullied into wedding a town bigwig so he can have her land and fortune, a mysterious one name stranger (riding a blind horse), comes seeking revenge and ends up staying and helping the lady, lady and stranger fall in love and adopt an unwanted orphan child...
But then remembering this book was originally published in 1912... it may have been Zane Grey who helped establish all these tropes.
My biggest issues was actually with the editing of the audiobook. There were no pauses between the end of a chapter and the beginning of the next... heck they didn't wait for the reader to finish pronouncing the final word of the chapter before the next chapter began.
Would I recommend this book... I guess... if you like westerns. But I am not going to try to find book two in this apparent duology, let alone rush out to read anything else in this genre.
Fun in general. Pretty musty, but that's sort of the point in reading Zane Grey in 2022. When it's good it's great, and when it's bad it's pretty abysmal. Repetitive, depending on how you feel about sage and it's being described.
For me, this book was a bit hard to get through. Even though there are definitely some action-heavy moments and it follows the traditional arc of pulp fiction, it relies very heavily descriptions of nature, which, in my opinion, are somewhat difficult to get through. Moreover, many of the characters are very poorly developed / reflect traditional gender roles. Overall, the plot is good, I just personally wasn't a fan of the writing style.
I definitely enjoyed this more at the beginning than the end. By the end, the descriptions of noble and innocent women with fluttering hearts was too much for me. I kept on with it though because I was fascinated by the premise and initial focus on a female protagonist. If only the author had stayed focused on her than shifting the story mostly to the men fawning over her.
Part of my giving this book 5 stars is the fact that I listened to the audio version. I loved the reader, his way with voices, and his very Western rhythms. Fun story, too.
Liked it more than I thought I would since I am not a fan of the Country-Western genre. But I am intrigued by books that are old, and it was interesting to read a book written around the time of the Model T. Who knew that a multi-page description of a horse chase could be so spell-binding?
An excerpt of a review posted on Schaeffer's Ghost:
Riders of the Purple Sage is often listed among the best novels the Western genre has to offer. While Zane Grey’s pulp roots show through, his rich descriptions of the Utah landscape are extremely evocative, and he’s managed to create some fairly compelling characters in Jane, Lassiter, Venters, and the girl he befriends. Grey’s focus on friendship, religion, family, and even marriage (as well as the strength of his female characters) will likely endear him to fans of more romantic authors like Jane Austen and Charlotte Brontë—authors whose fan base tends to skew more to the feminine side. Don’t get me wrong. There is action here (gunfights, chase scenes, etc.), but the focus here is on the indirect way the Mormons exert their power over Jane. They work behind the scenes, so confrontation rarely occurs. Indeed, Grey highlights both the cowardice and the wickedness of this oblique approach by contrasting the conniving Mormon methods with the more direct (and thus somehow less despicable) actions of the local gang of cattle rustlers.Full review available here.