Rueful Regret Audiobook by Steve Vernon
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Title: Rueful Regret
Author: Steve Vernon
Narrator: Charles Craig
Format: Unabridged
Length: 3 hrs
Language: English
Release date: 10-31-17
Publisher: Stark Raven Press
Genres: Fiction, Westerns
Publisher's Summary:
This is a story that sounds like a cross between Lonesome Dove and Twin Peaks.
Meet Bass Clayton, a bounty killer turned professional drunkard. Silver Grimes is the man who inadvertently turned Bass Clayton into a drunk; after Bass accidentally shot Silver's arm off with an eight gauge shotgun. Sally Jezebel has a secret that she is keeping from both of them.
Their lives are going to turn when Newt Gallagher comes riding into Willy Jake's bar on top of Pritcher Targate's prize sow.
What you have got to ask yourself is just how far one man will go for revenge?
Members Reviews:
Peyote goodness
I think I've found a new sub-genre I really enjoy. Or maybe it's just the way Steve does the telling. Or probably both. I do know one thing, Steve Vernon excels at these kinds of stories. "Long Horn, Big Shaggy" was my introduction to this special breed or storytelling, and truthfully, I hadn't actually looked for any others. The movie "Blueberry" comes to mind.
After this, I think I'll go a lookin'.
Bass Clayton (great name by the way) is a whiskey drinkin', quiet thinkin' bad ass of a bounty hunter who, on one fateful job, manages to put a charge of shot into his target...and soon wishes he could take it all back. Silver Grimes is, actually I still haven't figured it out exactly *what* he is, (that could be the cold medicine talking), but he shows up two years after having his arm blown off by Bass. Think Silver would be none too pleased? Well, he ain't. But he's not so eager for revenge as we might think. He's about... deeper things. And the opening chapters to mid-point had me thinking that any moment, Silver was going to start in with a whoopin' about Bass's head and shoulders.
Only he didn't. Which, I gotta admit, perplexed me. Until the second half of the story.
The second half has, in typical Vernon fashion, scenes horrifying to visualize, and there was one instance in particular, just the sheer simplicity of it, which made me cringe. The imagery isn't for the faint of heart. There are nightmares on paper here, the kind where you can hear the worms gnawing away at the edges, but you still refuse to drop the book.
Rueful Regret is storytelling just after sunset, when the light's just gone from the sky, and those first flames of a fire pit take life. This pony moseys along at a deadwood pace, but there's an undercurrent of darkness here, of things not quite played out, of debts not yet paid, things best left undone and of consequences juuust about to happen. I liked it very much. As with "Long Horn Big Shaggy" there are head shaking lines of pure gold and brow-cocking similes that, once again, made me just sit back and wonder where the hell Steve comes up with it all.
If it's from a well, it's probably one of those dusty stone jobs with a bucket hanging over the depths, somewhere in a desert where the wind never blows.
I for one, hope it's plenty deep.
Excellent Western
An excellent novella. The best of the recent Steve Vernon stories that I've read. Hilarious but also moving in parts. Unlike in other Vernon stories that I have read, the final third remains strong. I've previously found that he's strayed into mindless action sequences in his final act, at least in Tatterdemon and Long Horn Big Shaggy.
Lots of typos and errors that should have been caught during proof reading.