Dead Man's Walk

By: Larry McMurtry

Narrated by: Will Patton

In Streets of Laredo, McMurtry brought the story ahead, giving us Call in his old age. Now, in Dead Man's Walk, he takes us back to the days when Gus and Call were young Texas Rangers, first experiencing the wild frontier that will form their characters. We also meet Clara Forsythe, the unforgettable young woman whose effect on Gus McCrae is immediate and unshakable. Danger, sacrifice, comradeship, and love give them the strength and courage to survive against the almost insurmountable odds of the frontier.

In Dead Man's Walk, Gus and Call are not yet 20, young men coming of age in the days when Texas was still an independent republic. Enlisting as Texas Rangers under a land pirate who wants to seize Santa Fe from the Mexicans, Gus and Call experience their first great adventure in the barren great plains landscape, in which arbitrary violence is the rule -- whether from nature, or from the Indians whose territory they must cross in order to reach New Mexico.

From the Indians defending their land with unrelenting savagery, to the Texans attempting to seize and "civilize" it, and the Mexicans threatened by both, the reckless men of the untamed frontier make this at once a riveting adventure story and a powerful work of literature.

©2000 Larry McMurtry (P)2000 Simon & Schuster

A Little Gruesome

The plot is not complicated, and not all that different from many other western adventure novels, but the adventures themselves are quite amazing. There is a lot of gruesomeness in this book. It makes me sad to think of the inhumane things we humans are sometimes willing to perpetrate against our fellow humans.

I'm sitting the fence right now as to whether I will read the other two books in this series (Lonsome Dove being the fourth book and the only other one I have read). McMurtry is a very good writer and from that standpoint I do want to finish the series. But the gruesomeness is a little overwhelming, and from that standpoint I don't want to finish it. I came to care about the characters in this story, and that made it all the harder to "witness" as it were, the evil that is so easily committed against so many good men and women. But either way, I have to take a break from the heaviness of this book and next read something a little lighter.

The narrator, Will Patton, is absolutely fabulous. Ok, his French suffered a little bit, but the only French character was in the book for just a short time, and we all got over it. Every other characterization was top notch.

Great book - great reader

Loved the book and Will Patton's characterizations

great story

Loved loved loved it!!!!!!!! I would listen to Larry's books any time. very good stories

amazing!

i absolutely loved it had it finished in only a few days! ready to read the rest of the series.

A timeless western

the narrator was great and the writing superb, an amazing western even in 2021.

Dead Man’s Walk

Great book, well read! Great story!

“I’d never trust any man that didn’t want a poke bad enough to lie for one!”
~Augustus McCray

another McMurthy classic

Good development of characters. Smart & funny dialogues. Enjoyable read. even my dog was listening carefully..

Very enjoyable listen in the series!

Great book, and the narration was SPECTACULAR with the exception of his French accent. YIKES. The ending was less than fulfilling but I have felt that way about just about all of the Lonesome Dove books.

Fabulous!

All time great by one the greatest authors of all time. The narration was exemplary. I wish he'd read more of the series.

Good but not great

The story drags a little, but serves as a good introduction to McMurty's characters, Gus and Call, and what will ultimately be a series of fierce Indian antagonists.