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A review by lexyt2
Lay Down My Sword And Shield by James Lee Burke
3.0
I'm giving it three stars because his writing is beautiful.
This is a hard book to explain. It's a story, yes, but it's not tight in the way we are used to stories being tight. It's more a character study and a vivid description of locations and interesting minor characters. You are wherever Hack is, and you see it clearly through his eyes. Not that it isn't interesting, but the plot wasn't what one expects in the way of plots.
It sort of rambles through some of the big events in Hack's life, showing us his background in the war quite vividly and his relationship to people in his life, but in the end, it doesn't really gel into something I could sink my teeth into. Then again, that's a little the way life is, one event after another, some bigger, some smaller, but all moving at a clip.
It is a book originally published in 1971. He uses language we don't use anymore and might even consider offensive, but those are the words they used in the early 70s. They were jarring through no fault of the author. Hack is not a racist and is in fact standing up for decent rights for farm workers, but he is still describing his world through the eyes of someone from that era. There was also a lot of "not trying to look at her breasts" kind of thing, which I almost feel was added just to have something there that involved sex. Very random.
I loved Burke's 'Wayfaring Stranger', and although the writing is just as beautiful, I didn't close the book and say 'wow'.
This is a hard book to explain. It's a story, yes, but it's not tight in the way we are used to stories being tight. It's more a character study and a vivid description of locations and interesting minor characters. You are wherever Hack is, and you see it clearly through his eyes. Not that it isn't interesting, but the plot wasn't what one expects in the way of plots.
It sort of rambles through some of the big events in Hack's life, showing us his background in the war quite vividly and his relationship to people in his life, but in the end, it doesn't really gel into something I could sink my teeth into. Then again, that's a little the way life is, one event after another, some bigger, some smaller, but all moving at a clip.
It is a book originally published in 1971. He uses language we don't use anymore and might even consider offensive, but those are the words they used in the early 70s. They were jarring through no fault of the author. Hack is not a racist and is in fact standing up for decent rights for farm workers, but he is still describing his world through the eyes of someone from that era. There was also a lot of "not trying to look at her breasts" kind of thing, which I almost feel was added just to have something there that involved sex. Very random.
I loved Burke's 'Wayfaring Stranger', and although the writing is just as beautiful, I didn't close the book and say 'wow'.