To The Last Man: A Story of the Pleasant Valley War (Mass Market Paperback)

by Zane Grey (Author)
Key Phrases: queried jean, round heah, old rancher, Ellen Jorth, Gaston Isbel, Grass Valley (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
This is a rousing, old-fashioned tale loosely based on the true story of a little-known chapter of Western history: the deadly feud of the Tonto Basin in Arizona or the Pleasant Valley War. When Jean Isbel answers his father's summons home, he makes a huge mistake for a cattleman's son-he falls for a sheepherder's daughter, Ellen Jorth. Her father is expanding his sheepherding operation, and the stock are grazing down the surrounding range. What begins as the age-old rivalry between cattlemen and sheepherders erupts into a violent war between cattlemen and rustlers masquerading as sheep men, and the two lovers are caught in the middle. Indeed, the violence seems to pause only long enough for the womenfolk to bury their dead before the hogs eat them. While the language is a bit dated, Jim Gough's masterful narration of this exciting story will hold listeners spellbound. Since good Westerns are rather scarce on the ground these days, Blackstone Audio is performing a special service by making this old classic available to a new generation. Highly recommended for all libraries.
Barbara Perkins, Irving P.L., TX
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Product Description

To the Last Man is the story of Arizona's Pleasant Valley War, one of the most legendary conflicts of the Old West.  A venomous feud between cattle ranchers, the Isbels, and sheepherders, the Jorths, plunges both families into a deadly cycle of vengeance.  Yet, even as their families spiral into annihilation, Ellen Jorth and Jean Isabel struggle to keep their fateful romance alive.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Forge Books; 1 edition (December 2, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765363062
• ISBN-13: 978-0765363060
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,711,133 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Based on a true blood feud, you can see where it happened, February 15, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: To the Last Man (Mass Market Paperback)

Of all of Zane Grey's books, this one rates in my personal top three favorites. The story itself is outstanding. Lots of suspense and gunplay, with a hopeless romance injected to keep your mind engaged. This story is especially good as it is loosely based on an true blood feud which happened in Pleasant Valley, a town in the Tonto Basin area of Arizona. Therefore, you can visit the site, see where Zane set his novel, and know that while Grey's may have been a fictional account, a feud DID happen, right where you are standing. The town is now called Young, by the way, to get rid of the stigma associated with the Pleasant Valley War. During a cross country trip, I took the time to drive out to Young just so I could see for myself where it all happened. I recommend every Zan Grey fan take the time to do so. I also read the account of the actual feud (available at the Tonto Basin Historical Center), and several key elements in Grey's novel are true. There was only one active participant who survived the feud, and the bit about the battle pausing so the ladies could bury their dead husbands to keep hogs from eating the corpses actually happened.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Book--Bad Version, July 18, 2008

By	JIm from Michigan - See all my reviews

The Kindle version of this novel is almost unreadable due to missing punctuation and run-together sentences. It seems to have been scanned, run through the OCR software, and published without benefit of proofreading and editing. It's a shame, really. It's a rousing story but I'm having a hard time slogging through it due to the poor quality of the text.