|
|
Agee, Jonis ListingsIf you cannot find what you want on this page, then please use our search feature to search all our listings. Click on Title to view full description
|
|
|
1 |
WEIGHT OF DREAMS
Agee, Jonis
1999 52447 At seventeen, Ty Bonte's life revolves around the seasons and the work to be done on his father's Nebraska Sandhills ranch. Long abandoned by his mother for the comforts of town life, Ty learns from his father that violence is as much a part of being a man as hard work. When he and his drinking buddy Harney Rivers, beat up two young Indians from the nearby Rosebud Reservation and leave them to die, Ty flees from home and the arrest warrant that has been issued for their crime. Ty settles in Kansas, making a quiet but good living as a horse trader. Reinventing himself as his own kind of man, he tries to forget his past - the sudden death of his brother, the rejection by his mother, the drunken beatings by his father, and the night he and Harney drove onto the Rosebud Reservation. He takes in Dakota Carlyle, a woman who seems to find solace in horses but rarely in people and who has her own past. But before Ty and Dakota have a chance to make a life for themselves, Harney Rivers suddenly reappears and commits an act of shattering brutality that forces Ty to return to Nebraska. His quest for retribution, resolution, and redemption culminates in a furious and mesmerzing courtroom battle between the two men. Publishers Weekly Though Agee's fourth novel is oddly book-ended between two courtroom scenes, its strength is in what lies between-- its depiction of the landscape of the Nebraska Sand Hills country, the unforgiving weather, the gritty demands of ranching andthe relationships forged between people and the animals they care for. In 1975, teenage Ty Bonte's family has been ravaged by the accidental death of his little brother. Ty is brutalized by his drunken father and unloved by his pious mother. Moreover, he keeps bad company; his villainous chum, Harney Rivers, is a small town rich boy whose cruel exploits continually go unpunished. One night, Ty and Harney beat two drunken Indian men and leave them for dead; the men survive only because Ty goes back to save them, before fleeing the state. This event is reconstructed in flashback; most of the book takes place 22 years later, when Ty is a horse trader, living modestly in Kansas. Harney, now a prosperous banker in their old Nebraska town, reenters his old buddy's life, killing Ty's beloved horse and stealing the rest of his stable, savagely beating Ty, and threatening Dakota, the woman with whom Ty has established a promising though uncertain relationship. Ty and Dakota return to Ty's family ranch, where his father is dying of emphysema and his mother is still priggish and cold. The families of the brutalized Indians seek justice, if not revenge, and Ty stands to lose everything: his woman, his ranch, his freedom. This tale of a sympathetic but busted-up man is compelling, but here the narrative suddenly diffuses, weighted down with too many characters who engage in endless machinations either to save Ty or to hurt him. Agee (Strange Angels) is best in engaging the drama of the rugged countryside. In tying up the plot, her direction scatters and each ambitious subplot grows broad and thin, diminishing the central struggle. Returning to the themes of her 1993 Strange Angels-with a detour through the badlands of Russell Banks-Agee offers a rambling saga that includes an abuse-riddled Nebraska family, a hideous crime, a slow path to redemption, and the love of a good woman. Our first sight of hellion Ty Bonte is in court, where he's being fined for another wild night gone wrong. Ty is troubled but basically good: he just has a lot of monkeys on his back. His father works him like a slave on their Sandhills ranch; his mother, having moved back to town long ago and found religion, treats him like a stranger; he still blames himself for his younger brother's death in a tractor accident; and then there's Harney Rivers, the banker's son and Ty's ever-ready partner in transgression. Harney is beyond wild, and the extent of his savagery soon surfaces when he a Viking Adult 0-670-88233-X / 9780670882335
Hardcover New Condition New York
Price:
15.65 USD
|
|
Add to Shopping Cart Now (Easily removed if you change your mind!) |
|
|
|
