Amazon.com: Gringos (9781585670932): Charles Portis: Books
Gringos and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle. Learn more

Buy New

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
or
Amazon Prime Free Trial required. Sign up when you check out. Learn More
Buy Used
Used - Very Good See details
$7.99 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
Kindle Edition
 
   
More Buying Choices
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Gringos
 
 
Start reading Gringos on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Gringos [Paperback]

Charles Portis (Author)
4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)

List Price: $15.95
Price: $10.85 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $5.10 (32%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.
Only 2 left in stock--order soon (more on the way).
Want it delivered Monday, February 27? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. Details

Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Kindle Edition --  
Hardcover --  
Paperback $10.85  

Book Description

May 1, 2000
Following the enormous success of the reissues of Charles Portis's first three novels--The Dog of the South, Norwood, and Masters of Atlantis--comes the reissue of a fourth truly brilliant, wonderfully bizarre novel by one of our great American novelists.

Jimmy Burns is an expatriate American living in Mexico who has an uncommonly astute eye for the absurd little details that comprise your average American. For a time, Jimmy spent his days unearthing pre-Colombian artifacts. Now he makes a living doing small trucking jobs and helping out with the occasional missing person situation--whatever it takes to remain "the very picture of an American idler in Mexico, right down to the grass-green golfing trousers." But when Jimmy's laid-back lifestyle is seriously imposed upon by a ninety-pound stalker called Louise, a sudden wave of "hippies" (led by a murderous ex-con guru) in search of psychic happenings, and a group of archaeologists who are unearthing (illegally) Mayan tombs, his simple South-of-the-Border existence faces a clear and present danger.

Frequently Bought Together

Gringos + Norwood + Masters of Atlantis
Price For All Three: $32.61

Show availability and shipping details

Buy the selected items together
  • In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Norwood $10.91

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Masters of Atlantis $10.85

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details


Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought


Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Portis's 1991 comic novel follows protagonist Jimmy Burns, who has expatriated to Mexico to live a quiet existence. Enter a female stalker, Mayan tomb-robbing archaeologists, UFO hunters, and a group looking for psychic happenings. Good, quirky fun.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"I've always thought Charles Portis had a wonderful talent--original, quirky, exciting. It's an engaging, touching book. -- Larry McMurtry

Charles Portis is perhaps the most original, indescribable sui generis talent overlooked by literary culture in America. -- Ron Rosenbaum, Esquire

Product Details

  • Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  • Paperback: 269 pages
  • Publisher: Overlook TP (May 1, 2000)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1585670936
  • ISBN-13: 978-1585670932
  • Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #61,841 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

 

Customer Reviews

11 Reviews
5 star:
 (7)
4 star:
 (1)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.3 out of 5 stars (11 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Heart of Darkness - But more wry, November 26, 2000
By 
S. McHale (Costa Mesa, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Gringos (Paperback)
Disclaimer: This is my first Portis read, so I have no basis for comparison.

That being said, this is one of the most enjoyable reads I can recall. All the other Amazon reviewers have it right: it is a wonderful menagerie of characters as sized up by the narrator.

What I can add to the list of reviews is the striking parallels to Conrad's Heart of Darkness. You have an odd-job protagonist who, along with is unique travelling companions, goes on a strange journey into the Mexican jungle to search for a missing friend. Along the way, he encounters excesses in human behavior, archeological adventurers, cultists and hippies. At the end of his journey, he finds a self-styled Captain Kurtz-like character: a self-imposed spiritual shaman-cum-criminal. Note that this is not the character that the protagonist is tracking down, but it does lead to an unexpected climax. Of course, the journey really isn't the point to the novel. The point is to capture all the colorful personalities along the way - Portis succeeds marvelously!

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Another rollicking adventure from an American master, February 8, 2000
By 
trh7g@virginia.edu (Charlottesville, VA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Gringos: A Novel (Hardcover)
The one constant in a Charles Portis novel is the tone: dry, deadpan, but never condescending. Often the tone serves as a buffer between the characters and the harsh, arbitrarily violent world around them. In Portis's first novel, _Norwood_, the strategy is largely successful, though in Portis's second and most famous novel, _True Grit_, violence assumes a fundamental place in the narrative.

Portis's latest novel, _Gringos_, about a group of American expatriates in Mexico, may be his most disturbing yet. Although it begins slowly, introducing us to a seemingly random menagerie of locals, dropouts, and hippies, the novel builds to a brutal, unforgettable climax in the remote Mexican jungle.

_Gringos_ is alternately funny and brutal, yet leaves an unexpectedly sweet aftertaste. It's a rollicking, adventurous masterpiece from one of America's finest living novelists.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars A Stumble On The Way To The City Of Dawn, December 29, 2004
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Gringos (Paperback)
I have just completed a frenzy of reading Charles Portis novels, and I had found them all to be very good or very funny or both until I stumbled and almost fell with Gringos. This is one of those books you read and think everyone else understands but you because there really is a lot going on: there are a lot of characters, a wiley protagonist, and Portis got good blurbs on the back jacket. But I didn't get it, not this time. The characters are all classic Portis-wacky and larger than life yet still very real somehow-and the quest is classic Portis too, a journey into the jungle in search of an ancient Mayan codex, UFOs, space aliens, hippie outlaws, and runaway children. I mean, how can you go wrong with a plot like that?

The dialog is not as snappy as other Portis novels, and the characters (so many of them this time that I couldn't keep up) did things for reasons that I wasn't able to follow. I suspect that with a second read, additional details will pop out to make Gringos more intelligible. So if I "get it" with a second reading, I'll dial back in and change my rating.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews









Only search this product's reviews



Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
Christmas again in Yucatan. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
City of Dawn, Beany Girl, Wade Watson, Rudy Kurle, Doc Flandin, Frau Kobold, Mexico City, New Orleans, Soledad Bravo, Big Dan, Bonar College, Mishell Teeter, Professor Camacho Puut, Blue Sheets, Gulf of Molo, Mobile Star, Gamma Bulletin, Posada Fausto, Eli Withering, Father Mateo, The Bishop, Tonya Barge, Checker Marathon, Costa Rica, Foto Naroody
New!
Concordance | Text Stats
Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Search Inside This Book:

Citations (learn more)
This book cites 3 books:

What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?


Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
 
(1)
(1)
(1)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 

Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 

Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions
   



So You'd Like to...



Look for Similar Items by Category


Look for Similar Items by Subject

Search Books by subject:









i.e., each book must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...