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Product Description: A stunning successor to his best selling novel Peace Like a River, Leif Enger’s new work is a rugged and nimble story about an aging train robber on a quest to reconcile the claims of love and judgment on his life, and the failed writer who goes with him.
In 1915 Minnesota, novelist Monte Becket has lost his sense of purpose. His only success long behind him, Monte lives simply with his wife and son. But when he befriends outlaw Glendon Hale, a new world of opportunity and experience presents itself. Glendon has spent years in obscurity, but the guilt he harbors for abandoning his wife, Blue, over two decades ago, has lured him from hiding. As the modern age marches swiftly forward, Glendon aims to travel back to his past--heading to California to seek Blue’s forgiveness. Beguiled and inspired, Monte soon finds himself leaving behind his own family to embark for the unruly West with his fugitive guide. As they desperately flee from the relentless Charles Siringo, an ex-Pinkerton who’s been hunting Glendon for years, Monte falls ever further from his family and the law, to be tempered by a fiery adventure from which he may never get home. Amazon.com: Amazon Significant Seven, April 2008: A gritty western couched in the easy storytelling style of a folk ballad (think 3:10 to Yuma as sung by the Kingston Trio), Leif Enger's highly anticipated second novel (his first was Peace Like a River) tells the story of outlaw Glendon Hale's quest to right his past, as seen through the eyes of his unlikely companion Monte Becket. So Brave, Young, and Handsome begins with Becket, a struggling novelist bewildered by the success of his first book, who has pledged to his wife, son, and publisher to "write one thousand words a day until another book is finished." Four years and six unfinished novels later, Becket sits on the porch of his Minnesota farmhouse about to give up on number seven, when he spies a man standing up in his boat "rowing upstream through the ropy mists of the Cannon River." Eager to set aside his waning tale about handsome ranch hand Dan Roscoe, Becket calls out to the mysterious white-haired boatman and his life changes forever. At turns merry and wistful, romantic and tragic, So Brave, Young, and Handsome is as absorbing as a campfire tale, full of winking outlaws and relentless villains--the sort of story to keep you on the edge of your seat with hope in your heart. --Daphne Durham Customer Reviews: Rating: 
Date: 2008-07-01
Literary Excellence
Beautifully written, with an engaging, if somewhat meandering, storyline. Unlike so many books of this type that start of strong and just sort of end, this ending is one of the better ones I have read recently. A strong read. Rating: 
Date: 2008-07-01
What are they smoking?
What are they smoking at those independent bookstores and households that raved over this? Enger's "Peace Like a River" is a great novel, without qualification. Mysticism aside, it has great characters and a narrative drive, to say nothing of E's wonderful prose, power of observation, and turn of a rural phrase. "So Brave" is well written and decorated here and there with a nutty phrase, but otherwise a limp dishrag of a novel, pocked with absurd coincidences, peopled by half-people, meandering in plot, and generally unnecessary as one of the failed manuscripts of its sappy protagonist. Oddly, it takes a turn for the better in the last ten-twenty pages. A gross disappointment.
Robert Eisner
NYTBR and elsewhere Rating: 
Date: 2008-06-30
This touching second novel was well worth the wait
It's been seven years since Leif Enger triumphed with his first novel, PEACE LIKE A RIVER. If one were to ask why it took so long for him to produce SO BRAVE, YOUNG, AND HANDSOME, one need only crack open the book and begin to experience the life of Monte Becket, the Minnesota writer who is wracking his brain in a failing struggle to pen his second novel.
It is 1915, and Monte has started seven second novels and discarded them all. He feels pressure to succeed, as he has quit his job to become a full-time writer, but at the same time he is getting no such grief from his wife. She believes in him wholeheartedly, even as he begins to think that he should give up and go back to work. It is then that Glendon Hale rows past on the river and lures Monte into a bittersweet tale of redemption, complete with the adventure one might find in an old dime pulp western tale.
Glendon left his wife, Blue, years ago, and the guilt he feels has been tearing him apart. Now, as he gets on in life, he is compelled to seek her out and apologize. The two men set off on the rails, and all is well until a ghost from Glendon's past emerges to turn the quaint trip into a flight from justice. An ex-Pinkerton agent, Charles Siringo --- who himself is now a bestselling author --- latches on to Glendon with the intention of turning him in for a long-ago crime.
The chase ensues, with Charles dogging them south and west, in and out of the lives of an assorted cast of characters, until eventually they go to California and Glendon gets his opportunity to come face to face with his beloved Blue. Monte, who has been changed by all he has seen and heard on this adventure, calls for his wife and son to come west for a time, and a sense of peace and redemption is found.
Enger's second novel was, like Monte's, a difficult birth. For all of the struggle, however, he has set down a beautiful book that is completely heartfelt, honest and true. Because of that, it is impossible for any reader not to believe every moment of this remarkable adventure.
Monte is a likable, albeit somewhat bumbling, narrator with the best of intentions. Charles is so passionate in his desire to capture and turn in Glendon after years of failed attempts that you almost find yourself hoping he gets his man. And the gem hidden within, intertwined with the stories of Glendon, Monte and Charles, is a young man named Hood Roberts, who threatens to steal the show for his own.
SO BRAVE, YOUNG, AND HANDSOME is a true joy of a book. Trying to follow on the success of PEACE LIKE A RIVER was a daunting task, but Enger is certainly capable enough as a storyteller to pen a worthy successor, one that is wholly different and yet, at the same time, incredibly familiar.
Moments of genuine surprise keep you smiling through the trials and tribulations experienced by the heroes of the tale, touched with a bittersweet sense of the days when new acquaintances became old friends on a journey of chivalry and self-discovery in the Old West. Within every passage on every page is a lyrical magic that enchants and yields pure satisfaction right until the conclusion --- and then you lament an end that comes too soon.
--- Reviewed by Stephen Hubbard
Rating: 
Date: 2008-06-29
So brave, young, handsome AND BORING!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If you like inane tales where characters just pop up here and there and blah, blah, blah.....then go ahead, slog through it. Rating:
Date: 2008-06-21
A Fine and Galloping Tale
This book is narrated by one Monte Becket, who sounds like Wallace Stegner, Mark Twain, and Gabby Hayes at different points in this wonderful adventure.
As Monte takes off with the somewhat dubious character, Glendon, Monte rolls into more trouble than he has ever dreamed up in his one-hit wonder of a fiction career.
All manner of swindlers, desperados, sweet ladies, and troublesome, dear animals, not to mention a dogged detective, come their way as Monte and Glendon traverse the US by river, on foot, on horseback, and in broken-down cars.
"The willing suspension of disbelief" is required, but toss your cynical self aside and enjoy.
This is my favorite sentence by the talented Leif Enger: "Death arrived easy as the train; [he] just climbed aboard, like the capable traveler he was." (amended to prevent a spoiler)
It's a terrific book. When was the last time you found sympathy for a snapping turtle? |
