Doc: A Novel [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

Mary Doria Russell (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 3, 2011

The year is 1878, peak of the Texas cattle trade. The place is Dodge City, Kansas, a saloon-filled cow town jammed with liquored-up adolescent cowboys and young Irish hookers. Violence is random and routine, but when the burned body of a mixed-blood boy named Johnnie Sanders is discovered, his death shocks a part-time policeman named Wyatt Earp. And it is a matter of strangely personal importance to Doc Holliday, the frail twenty-six-year-old dentist who has just opened an office at No. 24, Dodge House.
 
Beautifully educated, born to the life of a Southern gentleman, Dr. John Henry Holliday is given an awful choice at the age of twenty-two: die within months in Atlanta or leave everyone and everything he loves in the hope that the dry air and sunshine of the West will restore him to health. Young, scared, lonely, and sick, he arrives on the rawest edge of the Texas frontier just as an economic crash wrecks the dreams of a nation. Soon, with few alternatives open to him, Doc Holliday is gambling professionally; he is also living with Mária Katarina Harony, a high-strung Hungarian whore with dazzling turquoise eyes, who can quote Latin classics right back at him. Kate makes it her business to find Doc the high-stakes poker games that will support them both in high style. It is Kate who insists that the couple travel to Dodge City, because “that’s where the money is.”

And that is where the unlikely friendship of Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp really begins—before Wyatt Earp is the prototype of the square-jawed, fearless lawman; before Doc Holliday is the quintessential frontier gambler; before the gunfight at the O.K. Corral links their names forever in American frontier mythology—when neither man wanted fame or deserved notoriety.

Authentic, moving, and witty, Mary Doria Russell’s fifth novel redefines these two towering figures of the American West and brings to life an extraordinary cast of historical characters, including Holliday’s unforgettable companion, Kate. First and last, however, Doc is John Henry Holliday’s story, written with compassion, humor, and respect by one of our greatest contemporary storytellers. 

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A Letter from Author Mary Doria Russell
For the past three years, when people asked what my next novel is about, I've only had to say four words. “It's about Doc Holliday.” You mention Doc Holliday to guys especially and they just light up. “Oh, man! I love Doc!” they say, and they often mention Val Kilmer's portrayal in the movie Tombstone.

I love that movie, too, but when I write characters, I'm really writing about whom and what they love. The shining silver wire that runs through Doc is John Henry Holliday's love for his mother.

Alice Holliday was 22 when her son was born near Atlanta in the summer of 1851. She was still in mourning for her firstborn, “a sweet little girl who lived just long enough to gaze and smile and laugh, and break her parents' hearts.” I'm sure you can imagine her distress when her second child was born with a cleft palate and cleft lip. Even today, when you know clefts can be repaired, they're a shock.

In 1851, such children commonly died within weeks, but Alice kept her boy alive, waking every hour to feed him with an eyedropper, day and night, for eight long weeks. Think about that exhausted young woman and the baby with the hole in his face. Locking eyes. Struggling to stay awake. Struggling to stay alive...

When the infant was two months old, his uncle Dr. John Stiles Holliday performed a successful surgical repair of the cleft--an achievement kept private to protect the family's reputation. You see, in the 1850s, the Hollidays were Georgia gentry whose large extended family would become the O'Haras, Wilkeses and Hamiltons in Gone With The Wind. (Margaret Mitchell was Doc's cousin, twice removed.) These were people who took “good breeding” seriously, and birth defects were a source of familial shame--for everyone but Alice.

Alice and her son became intensely close. She invented a form of speech therapy to correct his diction. She was a piano teacher who introduced him to the music that would become their great shared passion. She home-schooled him until she was sure his speech wouldn't be ridiculed, then sent him to a local boys academy, where he excelled in every subject. In the midst of our nation's ugliest war, she raised a shy, intelligent child to be a thoughtful, courteous gentleman and a fine young scholar who would earn the degree of Doctor of Dental Surgery before he was 21.

Alice didn't live to see him graduate. She died of tuberculosis when John Henry was 15. The loss was staggering, and when he, too, developed TB, he knew exactly what kind of awful death he faced. Hoping dry air and sunshine would restore his health, he left everyone and everything he loved, and went West. He was only 22 when he left Atlanta in 1873.

The Doc Holliday of legend is a gambler and gunman who appears out of nowhere in 1881, arriving in Tombstone with a bad reputation and a hooker named Big Nose Kate. But I have written the story of Alice Holliday's son: a scared, sick, lonely boy, born for the life of a minor aristocrat in a world that ceased to exist at the end of the Civil War, trying to stay alive on the rawest edge of the American frontier.

John Henry Holliday didn't have a mother to love him when he was grown, so I have taken him for my own. My fondest hope for Doc is that it will win for him the compassion and respect I think he deserves. Read it, and weep.

Review

Praise for Doc

"Fact and mythmaking converge as Russell creates a Dodge City filled with nuggets of surprising history, a city so alive readers can smell the sawdust and hear the tinkling of saloon pianos...Filled with action and humor yet philosophically rich and deeply moving—a magnificent read." -Kirkus


Praise for Mary Doria Russell
 
“In clean, effortless prose and with captivating flashes of wit, Mary Doria Russell creates memorable characters who navigate the world of exciting ideas and disturbing moral issues without ever losing their humanity or humor.”—The Bookwatch, on The Sparrow
 
“The action moves swiftly, with impressive authority, jostling dialogue, vibrant personalities and meticulous, unexpected historical detail. The intensity and intimacy of Russell’s storytelling, her sharp character writing and fierce sense of humor bring fresh immediacy to this riveting . . . saga.” —Publishers Weekly, on A Thread of Grace
 
“Brilliant . . . powerful . . . Russell is an outstanding natural storyteller whose remarkable wit, erudition, and dramatic skills keep us turning the pages in excitement and anticipation.” —San Francisco Chronicle, on Children of God
 
“Rapturous and relevant . . . a wonderful story that brings to life a period of history that has remarkable parallels to our own.”—Seattle Post-Intelligencer, on Dreamers of the Day

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Random House; First Edition first Printing edition (May 3, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400068045
• ISBN-13: 978-1400068043
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 1.4 x 9.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (127 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,742 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #77 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Mystery > Historical

More About the Author

Mary Doria Russell has been called one of the most versatile writers in contemporary American literature. Her novels are critically acclaimed, commercial successes. They are also studied in literature, theology and history courses in colleges and universities across the United States. Mary's guest lectures have proved popular from New Zealand to Germany as well as in the U.S. and Canada.

Her debut novel, THE SPARROW, is considered a classic of speculative fiction, combining elements of First Contact science fiction and a tense courtroom drama. Its sequel, CHILDREN OF GOD, is a sweeping three-generation family saga. Through the voices of unforgettable characters, these novels raise respectful but challenging fundamental questions about religion and faith. Together, the books have won eight regional, national and international awards. They have also been optioned for Hollywood movies starring Antonio Banderas and Brad Pitt, and they have inspired both a rock opera and a full-scale bel canto opera.

Next, Russell turned to 20th century history. A THREAD OF GRACE is the story of the Jewish underground near Genoa during the Nazi occupation of Italy. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, this thriller "moves swiftly, with impressive authority, jostling dialog, vibrant personalities and meticulous, unexpected historical detail. The intensity and intimacy of Russell's storytelling, her sharp character writing and fierce sense of humor bring fresh immediacy to this riveting WWII saga," according to Publisher's Weekly.

Her fourth novel, DREAMERS OF THE DAY, is both a romance and a disturbingly relevant political novel about the 1921 Cairo Peace Conference, when Winston Churchill, T.E. Lawrence and Gertrude Bell invented the modern Middle East. The Washington Post Book World called it "marvelous and rewarding... a stirring story of personal awakening set against the background of a crucial moment in modern history." Currently in contention for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize, Dreamers of the Day is also being adapted for the stage by Going to Tahiti Productions in New York City.

As a novelist, Mary is known for her exacting research -- no surprise, when you know that she holds a Ph.D. in Biological Anthropology from the University of Michigan. Before leaving Academe to write, Mary taught human gross anatomy at the Case Western Reserve University School of Dentistry. That background that will come in handy for her fifth novel, DOC, a murder mystery set in Dodge City in 1878, when the unlikely but enduring friendship between Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday began, four years before the famous shoot-out at the O.K. Corral.

"It's about vice, bigotry, violence, and living with a terminal disease," Russell says. "And Doc Holliday is going to break your heart."DOC will be published May 3, 2011, by Random House.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

223 of 228 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Moving Novel By Russell, April 3, 2011

By 

Mary Lins (Houston, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Doc: A Novel (Hardcover)

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I'm a huge Mary Doria Russell fan, BUT not so much a fan of "westerns"...so it was with a bit of trepidation that I approached reading and reviewing Russell's latest novel, "Doc", which takes place in Dodge City, Kansas in the late 1870s and with the legendary (and largely mythical) characters of Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, etc. The eventual events in Arizona at the O.K. Corral are alluded to, but not the focus of this novel.

I needn't have worried, it is Russell's wonderful writing and thorough research that makes any subject interesting and accessible. She clearly revels in the research because hers is meticulous; she makes the "wild west" come alive in surprisingly non-stereotypical ways. Clearly she made an effort to separate the myth and legend of Doc Holliday from the truer (and more interesting) tale.

Set primarily in the summer of 1878, the story begins with Doc and his lady-love/prostitute, Kate, who are in Dodge City so that Doc can make enough money gambling to open a legitimate dentistry practice. Descriptions are vivid and fascinating of the riotous activity and carnival atmosphere in a town full of gambling houses and brothels and ignorant but newly rich cowboys. Russell paints a vivid picture of the burgeoning civilization coming to the "wild west" and I found her descriptions of the various denizens of Dodge at the cusp between wildness and civility to be fascinating. She provides the point of view for farmers, cowboys, lawmen, prostitutes and businessmen. Scenes in Doc's dentistry office are illuminating of early dentistry.

A young mixed race man, Johnnie Sanders, friend to both Doc and Wyatt Earp is killed. In an example of early crime forensics, Doc quickly ascertains that Johnnie was murdered and enlists lawman Earp (who feels somewhat guilty about what Johnnie was doing when he died) to help him establish that as fact, without much hope of catching the killer. This is merely a sub-plot, however, because the real meat of the story is in the characters and their relationships to each other and to Dodge City.

The is the fifth novel I've read by Mary Doria Russell, and once again, she made her characters so real to me that several times I found myself near tears with a distinct lump in my throat. I read a LOT and this does not happen to me routinely. She has never failed to move me, and I am always sad to close the last page. To prolong my enjoyment, when I finished the novel I put on a CD of Beethoven's Emperor Concerto and closed my eyes and imagined myself in a dance hall in Dodge City in 1878.

61 of 64 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Astonishingly Riveting and Moving Tale Depicting Different Facets of "Doc" Holliday, April 11, 2011

By 

Tom McGee "Tom" (Springfield, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Doc: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Although "Doc" was my first exposure to Mary Doria Russell, it will not be my last. Her writing flows beautifully. It is vividly descriptive as she sets the scenes, develops believable characters and sensuously draws the reader in.

Much of the story is true, but the book is a historical fiction about the life and times of John Henry Holliday, known in real life for his association with the Earp brothers-- Wyatt, Morgan, Virgil and James. He and the Earps are most famous for their 30-second shootout at the O.K. Corral with the Clanton and McLaury brothers in Tombstone, Arizona at 3 p.m. on October 26, 1881, but that is not the focus of "Doc." In fact, the author credits William Barkley "Bat" Masterson with exaggerating and making up dime store novels for personal gain that resulted in Holliday's reputation as a gunslinger and cold blooded killer.

Doc was born on August 12, 1851 in Griffin Georgia in a wealthy family, graduated from Dental Surgery School in Atlanta and opened up an office with a partner in 1872; however, like his mother John was inflicted with consumption (tuberculosis), was given a poor prognosis and encouraged to move to a more arid climate. He moved to Dallas, Texas, Dodge City, Kansas and later Tombstone, Arizona.

The story is primarily about Doc Holliday's long impending struggle with living his adult life as his debilitating disease slowly destroyed his lungs and finally kill him on November 8, 1887. The story describes a man of many facets--a dentist, a gambler, an accomplished piano player, a horseman, an alcoholic, extremely educated, quick tempered, a loyal friend, a friend of the oppressed, and an amazing human being.

John's long on-again off-again relationship with former wealthy educated aristocrat, turned alcoholic prostitute and Doc's gambling promoter known as Kate Harony is an integral part of this fascinating and moving tale.

I was absolutely enthralled with this author's writing style and ability to paint a riveting adventure. Enjoy!

54 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A hard, determined, complicated man, April 4, 2011

By 

TChris (Tzer Island) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Doc: A Novel (Hardcover)

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Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp are firmly established in the pantheon of Wild West legends, along with Jesse James and Billy the Kid. So many books have been written about them, fiction and nonfiction, that it may seem odd to find another novel based on one of these gunslingers. It must be their legendary status that draws the attention of writers. Widespread familiarity with the legend becomes the writer's base, and the chance to reinvent or reinterpret an icon has an undeniable appeal. In Doc, Russell embraces the challenge of making the familiar seem new with surprising success.

Behind every legend there's a person, and it is the person, not the gunfighter, that Mary Doria Russell imagines in her story of Doc Holliday's time in Dodge City. Russell underplays the novel's armed confrontations while taking note of how legends build, how tall tales grow: an incident involving six cowboys evolves in the telling until Holliday faces down two dozen. Ultimately Russell deconstructs the legend, deemphasizing Holliday's skills as a gunfighter/gambler while painting a detailed picture of a loquacious, consumptive dentist who seems always a step away from death. The plot, such as it is, involves the apparent murder of an entirely fictitious character, a friend of Holliday and Wyatt Earp, but the mystery of his death is merely a vehicle to drive a deeper story. It isn't the familiar story of the O.K. Corral and Wyatt Earp's confrontation with the Clantons; the novel makes reference to those events in a concluding chapter, but the story effectively ends in Dodge City, before the Earp brothers and Holliday make their way to Tombstone.

Russell begins with an eyeblink view of John Holliday's Civil War childhood and his brief but violent stay in Texas (where he killed a man and was shot by another). By the time Holliday decides to rebuild his tubercular life in Dodge City, he's taken up with Kate, a princess turned prostitute who entrances him with erudition that matches his own. Kate is a significant figure in Holliday's life and in the novel. Kate's affinity for Holliday is based in part on his ability to win large sums of money at the card tables, in part on his intelligence and education, and in part on her inability to understand him. Unlike the other men in her considerable experience, who "were as obvious and as easily dealt with as a phallus," the complex dentist becomes her most memorable lover. To Kate's dismay, it is Doc Holliday's dentistry, not his gambling, that fills him with pride and purpose. Russell portrays Holliday as a compassionate if ill-tempered man who treats the fictitious characters "China Joe" and John Horse Sanders with respect regardless of their race, who understands the difficult lives that drove women to work in bordellos. Russell's Holliday is a man isolated by his intelligence and southern manners as much as his illness and quick temper.

Russell's Dodge City is a lawless land of unchecked freedom, fueled by the seasonal influx of money brought by Texans driving cattle: "They were giddy with liberty, these boys, free to do anything they could think of and pay for: unwatched by stern elders, unseen by sweethearts back home, unjudged by God, who had surely forsaken this small, bright hellhole in the immense, inhuman darkness that was west Kansas." Russell populates Dodge City with fully realized characters, emphasizing the routine and drama of their daily lives rather than the excitement and rough justice of frontier life. Speaking to Morgan Earp about literature, Holliday argues that Raskolnikoff and Oliver Twist's Fagin are interesting characters because they are a mixture of good and bad. Russell's characters are interesting for the same reasons. She creates a Wyatt Earp who is filled with insecurities instilled by an abusive father. The experiences and motives that drive her politicians and villains illuminate their lives.

I can't speak to the novel's historical accuracy, although I can note that Russell, in an afterward, calls attention to a few minor changes she made in the historical record. She also lists the novel's characters, italicizing the few who are entirely fictitious. Frankly, I don't think it matters; writers of fiction are licensed to change the past for the sake of the story. Still, so far as I can tell, Rusell's novel is as true to the past as it is to the artist's purpose: to tell truths even when they are fictional. Doc is a wise and stirring and truthful novel about a hard, determined, complicated man. It easily merits five stars.