And Not to Yield : A Novel of the Life and Times of Wild Bill Hickok [Bargain Price] [Hardcover]

Randy Lee Eickhoff (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2004

Born James Butler Hickok, Wild Bill Hickok made his reputation as a gunslinger extraordinaire, and his legend has titillated journalists, novelists, and historians ever since. Here is the story---crafted by a master novelist---of this complex hero whose exploits have become part of the lore of the American frontier.

Nurtured by devout, staunchly Abolitionist parents, young Hickok quickly leaves their hardscrabble farm to homestead in Kansas. A true romantic and a Renaissance man, nourished by Greek and Arthurian legends, he effortlessly succeeds as a rancher, gambler, Union soldier, Indian fighter, lawman, baseball umpire, merchant, actor, marksman nonpareil---and lusty lover of whores, debutantes, and Libbie Custer.

But Hickok's many talents could not bring him peace. Guided and plagued by phantoms from his past, blessed and cursed with supernatural gifts, Hickok, like his hero Ulysses, must fulfill his destiny through his travels. From bleak upstate New York to the rugged Badlands, from New York City's Broadway to the Rockies, from the Mississippi riverboats to the Great Salt Flats, here is the compelling Odyssey of an American icon, told in Randy Lee Eickhoff's unforgettable voice.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The Fourth Horseman is an ambitious, daring, notable work by a veteran novelist ... splendid." --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Randy Lee Eickhoff holds several graduate degrees, including a Ph.D. in Classics. He lives in El Paso, Texas where he works on translations in several languages, poetry, plays, and novels of which two have been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. His translation of Ireland's national epic is now a text in not only schools in the United States, but countries overseas as well. His nonfiction work on the Tigua Indians, Exiled, won the Southwest History Award. He has been inducted into the Paso Del Norte Writers Hall of Fame, the local chapter of the Texas Institute of Arts and Letters. He spends his time in El Paso, Ireland, and Italy, lecturing on Dante and The Ulster Cycle.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• ISBN-10: 0312869258
• ASIN: B000F6Z7Y8
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 1.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,814,219 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Surprisingly poor, September 9, 2005

By 

S. Michener "western lover" (new york unfortunately) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: And Not to Yield: A Novel of the Life and Times of Wild Bill Hickok (Mass Market Paperback)

This book moves at a snail's pace. As "a novel of the life and times of Wild Bill Hickok" it does nothing to draw the reader in, and care about the characters. When the extensive dream sequence appears in the middle of the book, I was left wondering what King Arthur and the knights of the round table had to do with Wild Bill. Did I miss something? I suppose this is some inferior use of metaphor, but there had been no effort to set it up, and therefore it lacked relevance.
Like the other review here I can't understand how this was a winner of the Western Heritage Award for Best Western Novel. I will stick with Spur award winners from now on. For readers who are looking for true western literature with metaphor and imagery, check out Win Blevins "Stone Song." That was a Spur award winner, and one of the best western themed books I've ever read.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars So-so retelling of a western legend, July 31, 2005

By 

Mr. E (My House) - See all my reviews

This review is from: And Not to Yield: A Novel of the Life and Times of Wild Bill Hickok (Hardcover)

While reading "And Not To Yield" I was constantly reminded of better novels, such as Thomas Berger's "Little Big Man". Eickhoff sets out to accomplish many of the things Berger did in his tale of the life of a wild west hero, but the narrative is always just a little flatter and tamer and the events just a little less exciting than those of Little Big Man. I realize Berger was writing a fictional account, but surely the life of Wild Bill Hickock could have produced a more gripping biographical novel. This is just a dry recounting of Hickock's career with some dreams and visions of mythological characters thrown in, in an attempt to provide Hickock with motivation.

And perhaps I'm nitpicking here, but Eickhoff's choice of words in at least one instance was very poorly researched and jarringly anachronistic: In chapter 29, on page 190, we learn this about Hickock's early enemy in the Rock Creek incident: "McCanles had a number of "wannabes" hanging around him at the time..." 'Wannabes' is a word first used among fans of the singer Madonna in the mid 1980s to describe those who dressed and acted like her. 'Wannabes' does NOT belong in the vocabulary of a gunfighter of the 1860s and 1870s. I'm really kind of shocked that Eickhoff and his editors included this word. Sycophants, henchmen, cronies, sidekicks, emulators... Any of these would have been better than 'wannabes'.

I don't really understand how this novel won the 2005 Western Heritage Award for Best Western Novel, but I guess western stories are few and far between today and the judges had little to work with.