The Boar [Hardcover]

Joe R. Lansdale (Author), Alex McVey (Author)

Book Description

It's the Great Depression in East Texas, and a fifteen year-old boy has to face down a wild boar that threatens his family. But if his Dad, a tough carnie wrestler, can't stop the beast, what hope does a kid who wants to be a writer have?

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Best known for his celebrated mysteries featuring Hap Collins and Leonard Pine (The Two-Bear Mambo, Bad Chili), Lansdale wrote this shopworn coming-of-age tale in 1983 when he was still sunk in obscurity. His introduction explains that he set out to produce a YA novel like those by Gary Paulsen and Robert Cormier because, to his mind, their work was "closer to literary novels than those written for adults." Set in 1933 during the early Depression, with whispers of Mark Twain and an echo of Faulkner's The Bear, this yarn recounts the bravado of 15-year-old East Texas farm boy Richard Dale, who battles with "old Satan," a wild boar of mythic proportions. After his father goes off to earn money as a carnival wrestler, Richard must protect his pregnant mother and younger brother. When the monstrous boar kills the family's dogs and bursts through the farmhouse door, his mother goes into early labor, and the boy resolutely hitches up the wagon to take her and his younger brother to a doctor in the nearest town. Returning home undaunted to face the unearthly creature, Richard enlists the aid of his best friend, Abraham, an African American boy who dreams of returning to his African heritage as a great warrior. While Lansdale's sentimental attachment to his early work is understandable, it gives little indication of the gift for telling disturbing and outrageously funny tales that would later bring him acclaim. This "deluxe'" edition contains illustrations not seen by PW.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 121 pages
• Publisher: Night Shade Books (July 19, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1597800163
• ISBN-13: 978-1597800167
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,422,716 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over thirty novels and numerous short stories. His work has appeared in national anthologies, magazines, and collections, as well as numerous foreign publications. He has written for comics, television, film, newspapers, and Internet sites. His work has been collected in eighteen short-story collections, and he has edited or co-edited over a dozen anthologies. He has received the Edgar Award, eight Bram Stoker Awards, the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Grinzani Cavour Prize for Literature, the Herodotus Historical Fiction Award, the Inkpot Award for Contributions to Science Fiction and Fantasy, and many others. His novella Bubba Hotep was adapted to film by Don Coscarelli, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. His story "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road" was adapted to film for Showtime's "Masters of Horror." He is currently co-producing several films, among them The Bottoms, based on his Edgar Award-winning novel, with Bill Paxton and Brad Wyman, and The Drive-In, with Greg Nicotero. He is Writer In Residence at Stephen F. Austin State University, and is the founder of the martial arts system Shen Chuan: Martial Science and its affiliate, Shen Chuan Family System. He is a member of both the United States and International Martial Arts Halls of Fame. He lives in Nacogdoches, Texas with his wife, dog, and two cats.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great early Lansdale!, March 29, 2000

By 

Lisa A. Decesare "The Librarian" (Cambridge, MA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Boar (Subterranean Press Short Novel) (Hardcover)

This was a fabulous book! Lansdale is a great writer for many reasons one of which is his ability to write in so many different genres. Lansdale wrote The Boar very early in his career. In the introduction Lansdale discusses the genesis of the story and the journey to get it published. This alone was very interesting.

The story itself is a well-written period piece. It takes place in Texas during the depression. It is the story of a 15 year old boy and an almost mythical wild boar that threatens his family.

4.0 out of 5 stars JRL fans should give this early title a shot... very entertaining, January 25, 2012

By 

Craig Childs (Cordova, TN United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Boar (Kindle Edition)

This book has gotten short thrift among Lansdale fans because it is labeled a "Young Adult" novel. There is nothing "young" about this story, except it features a teenage protagonist, and JRL tones down the language and violence a bit. But if this had been published in a short story collection, it would fit nicely next to other similarly-themed novellas like "Mad Dog Summer" and "White Mule, Spotted Pig".

A lot of JRL's best work deals with coming-of-age themes. Sometimes these themes are dressed up in a horror novel (The Drive-In 1 & 2), or southern gothic (Steppin' Out, Summer '68), or racially-charged 1930's crime novels (A Thin Dark Line, The Bottoms). The Boar ranks up there. The tone is homespun and folksy, the characters are colorful and slightly bizarre, and the man-vs-beast story is plausible and exciting without jumping the shark.

For years, this has been a hard book to find (at least, for a reasonable price), but now that JRL has made it available as an e-book, I hope it finally finds the audience it deserves.

(And let me just say, I'd love to see some of his other backlog titles--like Texas Night Riders and For a Few Stories More --come out as e-books, too.)

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Coming of Age Story, December 12, 2011

By 

Joe Keenan (Norwood, Pa.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Boar (Hardcover)

Publisher Weekly said it best, "Best known for his celebrated mysteries featuring Hap Collins and Leonard Pine (The Two-Bear Mambo, Bad Chili), Lansdale wrote this shopworn coming-of-age tale in 1983 when he was still sunk in obscurity. His introduction explains that he set out to produce a YA novel like those by Gary Paulsen and Robert Cormier because, to his mind, their work was "closer to literary novels than those written for adults." Set in 1933 during the early Depression, with whispers of Mark Twain and an echo of Faulkner's The Bear, this yarn recounts the bravado of 15-year-old East Texas farm boy Richard Dale, who battles with "old Satan," a wild boar of mythic proportions. After his father goes off to earn money as a carnival wrestler, Richard must protect his pregnant mother and younger brother. When the monstrous boar kills the family's dogs and bursts through the farmhouse door, his mother goes into early labor, and the boy resolutely hitches up the wagon to take her and his younger brother to a doctor in the nearest town. Returning home undaunted to face the unearthly creature, Richard enlists the aid of his best friend, Abraham, an African American boy who dreams of returning to his African heritage as a great warrior. While Lansdale's sentimental attachment to his early work is understandable, it gives little indication of the gift for telling disturbing and outrageously funny tales that would later bring him acclaim."

This is yet another work that should be more widely known. This is the type of book a young boy or girl (or even an adult) would find appealing. If you are interested in developing a love of reading in your child I'd recommend this book. It's all here, hard times, struggles, wondering if you're man enough (at 15 years) to step up and fill your fathers shoes... With his fathers absence the hunting of a legendary wild boar falls to Richard, will he kill the boar or the boar kill him? This theme harkens back to ancient Irish and Gallic mythology, Lansdale very ably updates this theme to modern times. Lansdale is a very talented writer, however, be wary of his other writing, for example, Dead in the West (the worlds only zombie western), as it has very adult themes. This book however, should be read by one and all!