Scan barcode
A review by davybaby
Gallows Thief by Bernard Cornwell
1.0
On a train ride from Chicago to West Glacier, Montana, I finished the book I'd been reading, and sought a replacement. I'd heard of Bernard Cornwell as one of the best historical fiction authors around, so when I saw Gallows Thief on a very sad Take-a-Book-Leave-a-Book shelf at a whistle stop, I thought I'd give it a go.
The book follows the absurdly-named Rider Sandman, a recently impoverished former officer and cricketer who now has to (gasp!) find a job. He takes a commission as an investigator for the British government to verify the guilt or prove the innocence of a young man condemned to death (despite the fact that he has no real skills in this line of work, and it took a thinly veiled mcgufffin to get him involved in it). In the course of his investigation, he meets clichés who say and do cliché things, and suffers harrowing plot points and an inevitable, unsurprising final twist.
But that's not all you get! Your conceptions of traditional manliness and superiority over those jerks in the past will be reinforced. You'll be reminded that all ugly people are wicked, and gay people are weak. You'll get your necessary quota of manly violence and stumbling romantic dialogue, as well as some clumsy and half-hearted Christian Values.
If this isn't enough to make you wet your pants with anticipation, all this can be yours for the low low price of FREE! All you have to do is pick it up from the Williston, North Dakota train station, where I threw it forcefully as soon as the train stopped.
The book follows the absurdly-named Rider Sandman, a recently impoverished former officer and cricketer who now has to (gasp!) find a job. He takes a commission as an investigator for the British government to verify the guilt or prove the innocence of a young man condemned to death (despite the fact that he has no real skills in this line of work, and it took a thinly veiled mcgufffin to get him involved in it). In the course of his investigation, he meets clichés who say and do cliché things, and suffers harrowing plot points and an inevitable, unsurprising final twist.
But that's not all you get! Your conceptions of traditional manliness and superiority over those jerks in the past will be reinforced. You'll be reminded that all ugly people are wicked, and gay people are weak. You'll get your necessary quota of manly violence and stumbling romantic dialogue, as well as some clumsy and half-hearted Christian Values.
If this isn't enough to make you wet your pants with anticipation, all this can be yours for the low low price of FREE! All you have to do is pick it up from the Williston, North Dakota train station, where I threw it forcefully as soon as the train stopped.