Customer Reviews

Keep the Change

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

While Montana is cast as "the last best place" by many of its writers, McGuane seems to see the place as a land of lost hope and illusion. Knee deep in ironies, the story turns in many ways on a faded painting in an abandoned ranch house that Joe, the main character, remembers from boyhood. Grown up now and a painter himself, who doesn't paint anymore, he abandons a Cuban girlfriend in Florida and fetches up after a cross country drive at the old home ranch to spend a season fattening cattle for market while having no faith that much of anything will happen to give his life any direction or purpose.

While most of this story takes place in Montana and most of its characters are nominally Montanans, they seem unmoored not only to the land but to any reason for being there. Those who come from elsewhere tire of it and leave. Those who would leave can't. Only a land-hungry rancher Overstreet seems to have a purpose in life, and it's clearly an empty one - buying up more land.

An old girlfriend figures in the story, and her jealous husband, and there are family members who are able to betray each other, and do. The relations between men and women swing wildly between romance and erotic encounters to bitterness. Greed lurks darkly everywhere. It's a vision not unlike the one in Larry McMurtry's "Texasville." His Duane is a distant cousin of Joe, and it's easy to imagine Jeff Bridges in a movie version of the story - beleaguered and wryly puzzled by what's become of his life. I recommend this novel to anyone ready for an anti-romance about the West, which questions - often humorously and outrageously - most of what the West has stood for in the American imagination.

I picked this up at yard sale for a quarter, so my expectations were pretty low. At first, I thought it was flaky, but after I got into it, it's really quite funny with very sharp dialogue and memorable characters. An interesting view of the modern West, without sentimentality. Joe Starling is a womanizing artist, who can't keep out of trouble with women or his pants zipped so to speak. He returns home to Montana imagining getting back to his roots, but women problems and family problems derrail his plans.

If there is a flaw, it's that Joe is completely unbelievable as a painter -- it just seems like a device to work into the story. He doesn't talk or act like an artist, nor does the beauty of Big Sky country cause him to do as much as break out a pencil to sketch all through the novel. The author might just as well have made him a used car salesman.

But the dialogue is sharp and funny, and his raunchy misadventures with old girlfriend Ellen and live-in lover Astrid have a nice sexy charge to them.

A different kind of novel and one I would probably re-read just to enjoy the quality of the writing.

"Thomas McGuane lives here" I was told last year during a Montana visit. "Who cares?" say I, never having heard of him. Oh, how I wish I had known, wish I had read this wonderful book and taken the time to visit Mr. McGuane and thank him for wonderful vacation reading a year later. Raced through this book; raced back to the bookstore for "Some Horses", embarked on "An Outside Chance" and contemplated sending Mr. McGuana a fan letter! Seldom does a book make me laugh out loud and have to put it down until I recover. This book is delightful and you wonder how anyone can possibly think up a story like this.

I liked the portrayal of family life - it was thoroughly honest, highly realistic, and pulled no punches. The main character is a Westerner but is not senseless to the rest of the world. Rich characters, great scenery and love of the land are highlighted. The author is first rate and it was a pleasure to read.

Another novel dealing with people estranged from family, home and themselves. This novel is heartening in that the characters sometimes find the courage to try to transcend their normal mode of existence. Success is by no means a given, but that makes things all the more compelling and heartening. McGuane's dialogue always delights.

Much of this book is vivid, funny, and even moving. McGuane's 7-page description of Joe's desperate drive from Miami to Montana is terrific -- I haven't read a better summary of a cross-country trip.

But I felt the author went a bit too far in deflating just about everything in the last several chapters. Obviously, that's a valid artistic choice, but I was left shrugging my shoulders -- "Whatever..."

I'm glad that I read Keep the Change, but my initial excitement died away somewhat as the book progressed. I think a similarly deflationary approach was much more successful in the final pages of McGuane's "Panama."