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sheldonnylander's review
4.0
I should admit right off that I've never been a big fan of westerns, movies or books. That's not to say that I'm opposed to them or haven't enjoyed them. I've found several western movies enjoyable if a bit derivative. But I've never sought them out, and have really just seen them in passing.
Fistful of Feet is one of those enjoyable westerns but with bizarro overtones. In fact, the bizarro parts are mostly in the details, which would make this an otherwise normal western tale. I'll explain about this part more in a little bit.
The story follows the town of Screwhorse, Nevada at so point after the Civil War. In from the desert wanders a stranger with a burping pistol and a wooden donkey who has a run-in with the local bullies, who work for the town's wealthy citizen, William Lyons, who is friends with the mayor, who both have the town sheriff under their thumb. Did you get all that? Rounding out the cast are a card cheat, the local crazy gunslinger, a group of robbers, the general store manager, a hostile Indian tribe at the gates, and the local madam and her girls, and you have a cast mixed together from all the great western movies. See? A perfectly normal western mashup.
But this is Jordan Krall we're talking about here. My only previous standalone experience from Krall was Beyond the Valley of the Apocalypse Donkeys. So it's not going to be that normal. The interesting thing about this is that, as I mentioned, the bizarro elements are relegated to the details of the novel. For example, there are lots of appearances and references to two-tailed scorpions, in dreams and being used as drugs (that one takes some explaining, but you'll have to read the book). Or the appearance of a starfish creature in one the rooms. But for the most part, this book remains an easily identifiable western.
There are multiple plot threads that intersect to varying degrees. There's the stranger in town causing trouble with the local bullies, the robbers out for revenge, the con man trying to make a big score, and a murder mystery. These aren't all immediately related, and Krall does jump around between various viewpoints easily and quickly, sometimes to the point that it gets a little confusing. It's a pretty big cast for a reasonably short novel, too, which can add to some of the confusion as you switch between viewpoints and ask yourself “Wait, who is this person again?”
Ultimately, Fistful of Feet is an enjoyable western novel, and a worthwhile bizarro read, and while the writing is really solid, it does come up a bit short from being a perfect novel. There can be feelings that things got away from Krall a bit and that it may have been a more ambitious effort than was really needed. Still, Fistul of Feet is definitely worth your time, and comes off as a genuine if twisted tribute to the western genre.
Fistful of Feet by Jordan Krall earns 4 pistol burps out of 5.
Fistful of Feet is one of those enjoyable westerns but with bizarro overtones. In fact, the bizarro parts are mostly in the details, which would make this an otherwise normal western tale. I'll explain about this part more in a little bit.
The story follows the town of Screwhorse, Nevada at so point after the Civil War. In from the desert wanders a stranger with a burping pistol and a wooden donkey who has a run-in with the local bullies, who work for the town's wealthy citizen, William Lyons, who is friends with the mayor, who both have the town sheriff under their thumb. Did you get all that? Rounding out the cast are a card cheat, the local crazy gunslinger, a group of robbers, the general store manager, a hostile Indian tribe at the gates, and the local madam and her girls, and you have a cast mixed together from all the great western movies. See? A perfectly normal western mashup.
But this is Jordan Krall we're talking about here. My only previous standalone experience from Krall was Beyond the Valley of the Apocalypse Donkeys. So it's not going to be that normal. The interesting thing about this is that, as I mentioned, the bizarro elements are relegated to the details of the novel. For example, there are lots of appearances and references to two-tailed scorpions, in dreams and being used as drugs (that one takes some explaining, but you'll have to read the book). Or the appearance of a starfish creature in one the rooms. But for the most part, this book remains an easily identifiable western.
There are multiple plot threads that intersect to varying degrees. There's the stranger in town causing trouble with the local bullies, the robbers out for revenge, the con man trying to make a big score, and a murder mystery. These aren't all immediately related, and Krall does jump around between various viewpoints easily and quickly, sometimes to the point that it gets a little confusing. It's a pretty big cast for a reasonably short novel, too, which can add to some of the confusion as you switch between viewpoints and ask yourself “Wait, who is this person again?”
Ultimately, Fistful of Feet is an enjoyable western novel, and a worthwhile bizarro read, and while the writing is really solid, it does come up a bit short from being a perfect novel. There can be feelings that things got away from Krall a bit and that it may have been a more ambitious effort than was really needed. Still, Fistul of Feet is definitely worth your time, and comes off as a genuine if twisted tribute to the western genre.
Fistful of Feet by Jordan Krall earns 4 pistol burps out of 5.
acknud's review
5.0
Hilarious,weird western. I enjoyed every page. This is a bizarro western set in a town in Nevada. Home to a fetish brothel, a hallucinogenic drink called ass juice, a hero with a wooden donkey any many other characters and features of a strange existence. If you like gunfights, hookers, violence, romance cowboys, Indians and evil mayors then this is a book to check out.
doomfiction's review
5.0
I've been reading bizarro for a long time now, long enough to know that there are basically two categories of authors that write bizarro - those who prefer to write the strangest, weirdest stuff that they can think of and string them together with a thin/weak plot and those who write wonderfully intricate plots with strong characters and bizarro subtleties peppered throughout. Jordan Krall is one of the latter.
FISTFUL OF FEET is by far Krall's best work to date (which says a lot - his books SQUID PULP BLUES, KING SCRATCH and PIECEMEAL JUNE are fantastic). His characters don't just exist in print - they breathe, they live, they bleed, off of the pages.
If you are reading this review, then I am sure you already know what the book is about, so I will save you from reading yet another description of the plot. Just know this, Krall is an author who delivers. He will take you to strange, freakish places - do yourself a favor and take the ride.
FISTFUL OF FEET is by far Krall's best work to date (which says a lot - his books SQUID PULP BLUES, KING SCRATCH and PIECEMEAL JUNE are fantastic). His characters don't just exist in print - they breathe, they live, they bleed, off of the pages.
If you are reading this review, then I am sure you already know what the book is about, so I will save you from reading yet another description of the plot. Just know this, Krall is an author who delivers. He will take you to strange, freakish places - do yourself a favor and take the ride.
xterminal's review
4.0
Jordan Krall, Fistful of Feet (Eraserhead Press, 2009)
I finished this book quite a while ago (16 April 2011; it's 7 July as I write this). I've been trying to come up with something to say about it other than “OMGYOUMUSTREADTHIS”, because while that's the case, it doesn't quite give you an overview of the book's strengths and weaknesses, does it? I want to give it the attention it deserves, but every time I start trying to come up with a “this book is like...” gig, I end up tripping over my feet. And then I end up coming back to Alejandro Jodorowsky, but Fistful of Feet is absolutely nothing like El Topo plotwise. (The movie it kind of is like plotwise is hilariously bad, and I refuse to mention its name here, mostly because as soon as I was finished writing the review for it I blocked it from my mind, and thus no longer remember it.)
Plot: In the small frontier town of Screwhorse, Nevada, pretty much anything can be had for a price. Problem is, sometimes that price is a little higher than you might want to pay. This problem is exacerbated when Calamaro, a gunslinger form the dusky wilds of New Jersey, walks into town pulling his wooden donkey. Very few people in town like Calamaro when they first meet him. (Snap judgments can be a bad thing, kiddies.) But eventually he finds himself with a small core of friends. More enemies, though, including a few wannabe card sharps he embarrasses on his first night in town who work for the Big Boss Man(TM). So of course we have a showdown between the mysterious gunslinger and the town power brewing. How much more western can you get than that?
But telling you about the plot of this book doesn't tell you about all the wonderful little side bits and details that make it so great. The hallucinogenic blue starfish still haunts my dreams three months later. He may be my favorite character in a book I've read so far this year. In fact, he may deserve a book all his own. [elbows Krall] And come on, a wooden donkey. You have to love that. And the secret in the boss' basement (which is actually revealed on the back cover, but not explicitly, so I won't spoil it for you here). The OTHER posse of mysterious gunslingers converging on the town for an entirely different reason. And then there's the climax, which takes all the best blood-flying bits of a Sam Peckinpah film and makes them weird. And, come on, TENTACLE COWS.
Not to say the book doesn't have its weaknesses, and they're the same ones I usually write about when I start talking bizarro. The characterization could've been stepped up some, especially with the minor characters; too many of them smell a little too much like symbols or archetypes rather than thinking human beings (or thinking tentacle cows). Most of the major characters, however, are well-drawn. Krall turned in a book that's about twice as long as most bizarro novels I've read to date, and he used the extra space wisely. Still, make no mistake, this is plot-based fiction for the most part, and what usually gets sacrificed in the service of plot-based fiction in characterization. As long as you're ready for it, or don't care about it, you shouldn't have a worry in the world.
The short answer: OMGYOUMUSTREADTHIS. *** ½
I finished this book quite a while ago (16 April 2011; it's 7 July as I write this). I've been trying to come up with something to say about it other than “OMGYOUMUSTREADTHIS”, because while that's the case, it doesn't quite give you an overview of the book's strengths and weaknesses, does it? I want to give it the attention it deserves, but every time I start trying to come up with a “this book is like...” gig, I end up tripping over my feet. And then I end up coming back to Alejandro Jodorowsky, but Fistful of Feet is absolutely nothing like El Topo plotwise. (The movie it kind of is like plotwise is hilariously bad, and I refuse to mention its name here, mostly because as soon as I was finished writing the review for it I blocked it from my mind, and thus no longer remember it.)
Plot: In the small frontier town of Screwhorse, Nevada, pretty much anything can be had for a price. Problem is, sometimes that price is a little higher than you might want to pay. This problem is exacerbated when Calamaro, a gunslinger form the dusky wilds of New Jersey, walks into town pulling his wooden donkey. Very few people in town like Calamaro when they first meet him. (Snap judgments can be a bad thing, kiddies.) But eventually he finds himself with a small core of friends. More enemies, though, including a few wannabe card sharps he embarrasses on his first night in town who work for the Big Boss Man(TM). So of course we have a showdown between the mysterious gunslinger and the town power brewing. How much more western can you get than that?
But telling you about the plot of this book doesn't tell you about all the wonderful little side bits and details that make it so great. The hallucinogenic blue starfish still haunts my dreams three months later. He may be my favorite character in a book I've read so far this year. In fact, he may deserve a book all his own. [elbows Krall] And come on, a wooden donkey. You have to love that. And the secret in the boss' basement (which is actually revealed on the back cover, but not explicitly, so I won't spoil it for you here). The OTHER posse of mysterious gunslingers converging on the town for an entirely different reason. And then there's the climax, which takes all the best blood-flying bits of a Sam Peckinpah film and makes them weird. And, come on, TENTACLE COWS.
Not to say the book doesn't have its weaknesses, and they're the same ones I usually write about when I start talking bizarro. The characterization could've been stepped up some, especially with the minor characters; too many of them smell a little too much like symbols or archetypes rather than thinking human beings (or thinking tentacle cows). Most of the major characters, however, are well-drawn. Krall turned in a book that's about twice as long as most bizarro novels I've read to date, and he used the extra space wisely. Still, make no mistake, this is plot-based fiction for the most part, and what usually gets sacrificed in the service of plot-based fiction in characterization. As long as you're ready for it, or don't care about it, you shouldn't have a worry in the world.
The short answer: OMGYOUMUSTREADTHIS. *** ½
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