Rest and Be Thankful [Paperback]

Helen MacInnes (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Fawcett Publications (1949)
• ASIN: B000GHBZGU
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.8 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,780,482 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars You'll swear you can smell the pure air of big sky county., May 15, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Rest and Be Thankful (Mass Market Paperback)

Being a citizen of the west, Rest and Be Thankful lets me revisit the community celebrations and friendly, but schrewed folks that I have known throughout my life. The characters of the book are real, humourous, complex and occasionally surprising. The story is a delicious read. Also, I have listened to the audio of this book. Great companion for traveling, gardening, or repainting a room.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rst and Be Thankful, January 7, 2006

By 

Lois Dodds "loisloisloislois" (Dixon, MO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rest and be Thankful (Hardcover)

"Rest and Be Thankful" is the name given to a green island, sheltering between the forks of Crazy Creek, high in the Wyoming hills. Here, in pioneer days wagon trains coming over the Stoneyway Trail halted before they continued westward.

Two friends, Mrs. Peel and Sarah Bly wandered off the State Highway which they were following to California. Their background was the salons and culture of France, not the wild west. Having found this wonderful place they wanted to share it with their circle of literary hopefuls and authors, which they invited to come.

The charm and humor of this story lies in the varied reactions and interactions of these Easterners as they confront the magnificence of the scenic grandeur they encounter, along with the simple genial frankness of its occupants, the owners and cowboys of Flying Tail Ranch. We are dealing with humorous colliding cultures here.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Probably the most dated MacInnes novel, May 13, 2002

By 

Mike Garrison (Covington, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Rest and be Thankful (Paperback)

Another of her short post-war non-thriller phase. Friends And Lovers is set in the tense pre- WW2 era; Rest And Be Thankful is set in the tense pre- Cold War era.

While politics (of nations and of art) get discussed (and moralized upon), the plot is really a straight romance.

What makes it seem dated, surprisingly enough, is its non-thriller nature. Some of the relationships and most of the dialogue (as well as the setting) didn't ring true to me when I first read the book in the 80s. These days they seem even more divorced from the current world. Almost more like reading Jane Austen.

And the relationship betwen the cowboys and the Indians sometimes seems wonderfully human, while other times seems like something out of a bad Hollywood script.

After this book MacInnes started in with her Cold War thillers and never looked back.