Don't Skip Out on Me

from ThePortPorts

One thing you always take away from a Willy Vlautin novel: It'd be easier for people - beleaguered by fate and interfered with by emotions - to do the right thing, if only someone could make clear to them what the right thing is. Rules and truth are poor guidance, prone as they are to contradicti...

from KatyBee

Willy Vlautin breaks my heart. This is a plain spoken novel set in Nevada about Horace, a 21-year old young man of Paiute-Irish heritage. His mother essentially gave up raising him so he stayed with his grandmother until she died and then stayed with a caring sheep rancher and his wife. Horace is...

from banjo123

Vlautin is an American novelist of the West; the working-class; and rural/small town US. He is in the tradition of Steinbeck and Dos Passos. His novel "Lean On Pete" was made into a movie recently. This is his most recent novel, and it is not his best. It's about a young half Paiute and half Iris...

from Hagelstein

Indian/Irish Horace Hooper was abandoned by his parents as a baby and raised by his smoking and drinking grandmother. When she was dying he was taken in the by the Reeses, an older couple who ran a sheep ranch. Horace wants to be a boxer. A Mexican boxer. He adopts the name Hector Hidalgo, tries ...

from rmarcin

This is a heartbreaking story of a young man, Horace, who works for Mr. and Mrs. Reese who are ranchers. However, Horace dreams of being a championship boxer. The Reeses beg him to stay but he wants to pursue his dream. Western themed novels, and boxing isn't my thing, but this story draws you i...