Tuesday 4 September 2018

Book: 'The Rainbow Trail' (1915) by Zane Grey

This is impressive, maybe just as impressive as the first half of the story, which was contained in 'Riders Of The Purple Sage'. 'The Rainbow Trail' (TRT) is a great example of successfully looking at the end of one story, asking 'what if?', and actually producing a good second part. There are few examples of that being done successfully... No, 'Riders' is probably a bit better but simultaneously denser and more difficult, so there are checks and balances in play. All together, it's a grand (unplanned?) two-part story.

TRT is a great Western epic, which spans a year of narrative, or more, and is centred around an ex-preacher called John Shefford. His quest is to discover the fate of the mismatched trio of Lassiter, Jane and little Fay following the events of the first novel, where they were walled into the mini-paradise that was Surprise Valley as an escape from their Mormon pursuers, vengeful at Jane for abandoning her creed. We get more criticism of the Mormons here, such criticism being common for the period, but with more nuance as the youngest generation of that creed perform far more admirably according to the lights of the story.

While 'Riders' was more of a siege story, this is a road novel, with a mock trial and an escape punctuating the two parts of the journey. Shefford is an interesting protagonist to follow in his journey, morphing as he does from a confused ex-preacher through several states. However, the really interesting character is Nas Ta Bega, his Navajo soul brother, who helps and guides him, and who is suffering for the slow demise of his nation. Joe Lake, the allied Mormon, is also a good character to bring in, proving as he does that progress is going to be made. The Shefford story is intertwined with the much shorter (in pages, not time) story of Fay, imperilled in her own little drama, which is in many ways a complement to the whole story. In fact, every other character's story is a complement to Shefford's.

The strengths of TRT are the incredibly wonderful descriptions of the terrains and landscapes of the story, the sparsely written but well defined characterisations, and a great sense of wonder and danger in the wilderness and canyon country.

Very recommended, except for some ant-related peril. Yikes.

O.

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