9780440217282
Brules share button
Harry Combs
Format Mass Market Paperback
Dimensions 4.20 (w) x 6.90 (h) x 1.90 (d)
Pages 695
Publisher Random House Publishing Group
Publication Date March 1995
ISBN 9780440217282
Book ISBN 10 0440217288
About Book
Not so many years ago, rumor had it that the grizzled mountain man living by himself in a cabin on Lone Cone Peak in southwestern Colorado was an outlaw to stay clear of. A true survivor of the woolliest days of America's great move westward, he was a man with chilling memories and few regrets, a legend folks whispered about for years - a hard, hurting cowboy. His name was Brules. Cat Brules began life as a wild, full-of-the-devil young plainsman. He rode carefree and hell-bent on his favorite horse across Kansas, where he met a girl and fell in love. He drove a mule team deep into buffalo country with a starry-eyed scheme to strike it rich, and he had the deadly misfortune to lose his best friend to the Comanches. And from that point on Brules became a man in search of justice and his own soul...a man whose life would embrace the whole short, passionate history of the Old West. Bringing to life this grand, sweeping novel is a feat of sheer storytelling genius. The tale unfolds as Brules tells it to a young man who dared to approach the gritty outlaw's lonely cabin and was rewarded with the story of Cat Brules's life...of his one brief, passionate love with Wild Rose, a Shoshone woman; of his unshakable friendship with a silver-spurred Mexican named Pedro; and of his one-man war against those who robbed him of his girl, his friend, and his heart. Written by Harry Combs, the charismatic eighty-year-old aviator and outdoorsman, Brules began as a story Combs told to his grandchildren and grew into this sprawling, impeccably researched historical novel about freedom and our nation's past. It is a work so grand in scope and scale, so filled with brutality and violence, heroism and tenderness, it will take your breath away. Brules is written in fire and blood; it is tougher than Lonesome Dove, richer than Jack London, and better than any of them.

Rich with historical detail, Brules tells the story of a man whose life embraces the whole short turbulent history of the West. He sought revenge in a one-man war against the Comanche nation, fell in love with a Shoshone woman, and rode hell-bent toward the tragedy that would make him an outlaw or a hero.

Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

In 1916, civil engineering student Steven Cartwright plays hooky from his father's fall cattle drive to visit Cat Brules, a mysterious Colorado mountain man rumored to be a thief and a murderer. The friendship between the boy and this relic of the rapidly disappearing frontier provides a frame for this fluid first novel, as Brules tells Steven the story of his life over a series of nights around the campfire. After a drive down the Chisholm Trail in 1867, Brules killed his trail boss in a fight over a Hays City, Kans., prostitute named Michelle. Fleeing town, the pair were captured by Comanches; Brules escaped, but Michelle was tortured and killed, setting her lover on a one-man vendetta against the Indians. Brules gradually overcomes his hatred, eventually marrying a Native American. The author, an aviation pioneer who wrote a nonfiction study of the Wright Brothers, Kill Devil Hill , clearly knows and loves the land and history of the American West. References to numerous actual people and events (Butch Cassidy, General Crook, the Fetterman massacre) add verisimilitude to his story. Although overly long and tending to drag in spots, this expansive novel will remind some readers of Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove . ( July )

Library Journal

The wide-open spaces of Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico during the years following the Civil War form the backdrop of this Western novel of bonanza proportions. In a highly colloquial voice, Cat Brules narrates a rich reminiscence of the Old West as he hunts buffalo and stalks Comanche Indians in revenge for their murder of his loved ones, constantly testing his considerable shooting skills. Combs, the author of an award-winning study of the Wright brothers ( Kill Devil Hill , Houghton, LJ 12/15/79. o.p.), does a nice job of detailing the guns, wildlife, and Indian customs of the period. A paucity of dialog and a few too many repetitive Comanche episodes slightly mar the fun, but most readers of Westerns will still find the journey well worth the ride.-- Keddy Ann Outlaw, Harris Cty. P.L., Houston

Wes Lukowsky

Before World War I, when 11-year-old Steven Cartwright was riding near his father's Colorado ranch, he encountered an old man living alone on Lone Cone Peak. Though the two barely exchanged a glance, the boy was fascinated and went out of his way to cross paths with the man again. A tentative relationship formed and came to fruition years later when the boy returned home on summer break from college. Through one long, lonesome mountain night, Cat Brules bared his soul to Steven, recounting his long, eventful life as a cow puncher, Indian fighter, gunman, and lover, from an 1867 cattle drive to Hays, Kansas, to the death of his beloved Shoshone wife, Wild Rose, in 1891 at the cabin where he still lives. This entertaining--if lengthy--saga of the Old West is enlivened by Brules' gallows humor and his stoic acceptance of life's vagaries. What sets the novel apart from the usual fare is its wide-ranging scope and the fact that first-time novelist Combs, an aviation pioneer and author of an award-winning study of the Wright brothers, is past 80. Yes, you can expect plenty of marketing hoopla designed to turn Combs into a cowboy version of Helen Hooven Santmyer, the octogenarian author of "". 20. 20. 20And Ladies of the Club"," the surprise best-seller of 1984. Like "Ladies", "Brules" began life as a small-press title (Lyford Books, 1992), only to be picked up later by a major trade house. Marketing campaigns and Combs' age aside, the novel stands on its own quite well. Brules is a memorable character--sometimes admirable, sometimes not, but imbued with a sense of humanity that can only be gained through a lifetime of experience.