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Presidio
Set in the 1970s in the vast and arid landscape of the Texas panhandle, this darkly comic and stunningly mature literary debut tells the story of a car thief and his brother who set out to recover some stolen money and inadvertently kidnap a Mennonite girl who has her own reasons for being on the run.
Troy Falconer returns home after years of working as a solitary car thief to help his younger brother, Harlan, search for his wife, who has run away with the little money he had. When they steal a station wagon for the journey, the brothers accidentally kidnap Martha Zacharias, a Mennonite girl asleep in the back of the car. Martha turns out to be a stubborn survivor who refuses to be sent home, so together these unlikely road companions attempt to escape across the Mexican border, pursued by the police and Martha’s vengeful father.
The story is told partly through Troy’s journal, in which he chronicles his encounters with con artists, down-and-outers, and roadside philosophers, people looking for fast money, human connection, or a home long since vanished. The journal details a breakdown that has left Troy unable to function in conventional society; he is reduced to haunting motels, stealing from men roughly his size, living with their possessions in order to have none of his own and all but disappearing into their identities.
With a page-turning plot about a kidnapped child, gorgeously written scenes that probe the soul of the American West, and an austere landscape as real as any character, Presidio packs a powerful punch of anomie, dark humor, pathos, and suspense.
Troy Falconer returns home after years of working as a solitary car thief to help his younger brother, Harlan, search for his wife, who has run away with the little money he had. When they steal a station wagon for the journey, the brothers accidentally kidnap Martha Zacharias, a Mennonite girl asleep in the back of the car. Martha turns out to be a stubborn survivor who refuses to be sent home, so together these unlikely road companions attempt to escape across the Mexican border, pursued by the police and Martha’s vengeful father.
The story is told partly through Troy’s journal, in which he chronicles his encounters with con artists, down-and-outers, and roadside philosophers, people looking for fast money, human connection, or a home long since vanished. The journal details a breakdown that has left Troy unable to function in conventional society; he is reduced to haunting motels, stealing from men roughly his size, living with their possessions in order to have none of his own and all but disappearing into their identities.
With a page-turning plot about a kidnapped child, gorgeously written scenes that probe the soul of the American West, and an austere landscape as real as any character, Presidio packs a powerful punch of anomie, dark humor, pathos, and suspense.
305 pages, Hardcover
First published August 21, 2018
212 people are currently reading
1491 people want to read
About the author
Randy Kennedy
20 books43 followersRandy Kennedy was born in San Antonio, Texas, and raised in Plains, a small farming town in the Texas Panhandle, where his father worked as a telephone lineman and his mother as a teachers’ aide. He was educated at the University of Texas at Austin. He moved to New York City in 1991 and worked for twenty-five years as a staff member and writer for The New York Times, first as a city reporter and for many years covering the art world. A collection of his city columns, Subwayland: Adventures in the World Beneath New York, was published in 2004. For The New York Times and The New York Times Magazine he has written about many of the most prominent artists of the last 50 years, including John Chamberlain, Claes Oldenburg, Bruce Nauman, Vito Acconci, Nan Goldin, Paul McCarthy and Isa Genzken. He is currently director of special projects for the international art gallery Hauser & Wirth. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Janet Krone Kennedy, a clinical psychologist, and their two children.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 129 reviews
September 17, 2018
Lee Child did not steer me wrong. I read his glowing review of Randy Kennedy's first novel in the Times and knew that I had to read that book.
He did not exaggerate. Presidio is a terrific example of Texas noir, with an engaging and somewhat unexpected main character who is a professional car thief.
The novel is set in the Staked Plains and borderlands of West Texas in the early 1970s. Among the best things about the book - among a wide choice of very good things - were the photograph-like descriptions of that arid and spare but beautiful landscape of flat plains rolling into mountains, and country roads where you can see for miles and miles. It's a landscape marked by the occasional nodding pump jack, long before the coming of the wind farms that dot the area today. The 1970s were another country; a country without the internet and cell phones and being constantly connected to the outside world; a country where the border between Texas and Mexico is an amiable line of traffic over a wooden bridge where people come and go more or less at will to work or to buy and sell. It's a country that Cormac McCarthy and Larry McMurtry have traversed successfully in many books. Now, Randy Kennedy adds his name to that list.
Troy Falconer is Kennedy's protagonist. He is a vagabond who has been on the road for many years, earning his way as a thief. Specifically, as a car thief. He steals cars, usually from motel guests, often taking their belongings from the motel room as well. He has perfected his technique over several years and has never been caught. He never keeps any car for long, swapping each one for a different vehicle at his first opportunity.
As we meet Troy, he is returning to the rural West Texas town where he grew up to help his younger brother, Harlan. Harlan's wife had recently absconded with all of the money that he had. Not much to be sure, but he wants it - if not her - back. Troy is there to help him find the wife and get the money.
When they head out on the trail of the wife, Harlan's old truck doesn't get them far and Troy's skills as a car thief are immediately pressed into service. He steals a station wagon at a convenience store and the two men head south. What they don't realize at first is that there is a third person in the station wagon. Ten-year-old Martha Zacharias, a Mennonite girl from Mexico, currently living in Texas with her aunt, whose car it was, was lying down on the back seat of the vehicle when it was stolen. She stays quiet and they don't realize she is there until one night, while the men are sleeping outside, she attempts to drive the station wagon away. When they discover her, she demands that they take her to El Paso where she can meet her father. They compromise on taking her as far as Presidio and buying her a bus ticket to El Paso.
The narrative of their trip south is interspersed with the narrative that introduces Martha's family and background and a remarkable set of notes that Troy has written and leaves in the glove compartments of the vehicles he drives. The notes are styled as "Notes for the police" and they consist of a kind of journal of his explanation of what he has done and how he came to be the person that he is. (The first line of the book is: "Later, in the glove box, the police found a binder of notes.") These notes also include some darkly humorous stories of his time on the road and some of the people he has encountered along the way. It is through the notes that we get to know Troy and Harlan and their now dead father and we learn what happened to their mother.
The propulsion of the plot is the brothers' flight to the border with their accidental kidnap victim, looking over their shoulders all the way, expecting to see the police. The plot moves almost organically and those pages keep turning almost by themselves as everything converges at Presidio for the final denouement.
It's hard to believe this is Kennedy's first novel. It is a very accomplished effort with characters that seem real enough that one could reach out and touch them, a landscape with an aridity that one can taste on the tongue, and a plot filled with a comedy of errors that somehow doesn't seem fanciful at all.
All of which brings to mind a line from Troy's "notes": "Just because a story isn't real doesn't mean it isn't true."
He did not exaggerate. Presidio is a terrific example of Texas noir, with an engaging and somewhat unexpected main character who is a professional car thief.
The novel is set in the Staked Plains and borderlands of West Texas in the early 1970s. Among the best things about the book - among a wide choice of very good things - were the photograph-like descriptions of that arid and spare but beautiful landscape of flat plains rolling into mountains, and country roads where you can see for miles and miles. It's a landscape marked by the occasional nodding pump jack, long before the coming of the wind farms that dot the area today. The 1970s were another country; a country without the internet and cell phones and being constantly connected to the outside world; a country where the border between Texas and Mexico is an amiable line of traffic over a wooden bridge where people come and go more or less at will to work or to buy and sell. It's a country that Cormac McCarthy and Larry McMurtry have traversed successfully in many books. Now, Randy Kennedy adds his name to that list.
Troy Falconer is Kennedy's protagonist. He is a vagabond who has been on the road for many years, earning his way as a thief. Specifically, as a car thief. He steals cars, usually from motel guests, often taking their belongings from the motel room as well. He has perfected his technique over several years and has never been caught. He never keeps any car for long, swapping each one for a different vehicle at his first opportunity.
As we meet Troy, he is returning to the rural West Texas town where he grew up to help his younger brother, Harlan. Harlan's wife had recently absconded with all of the money that he had. Not much to be sure, but he wants it - if not her - back. Troy is there to help him find the wife and get the money.
When they head out on the trail of the wife, Harlan's old truck doesn't get them far and Troy's skills as a car thief are immediately pressed into service. He steals a station wagon at a convenience store and the two men head south. What they don't realize at first is that there is a third person in the station wagon. Ten-year-old Martha Zacharias, a Mennonite girl from Mexico, currently living in Texas with her aunt, whose car it was, was lying down on the back seat of the vehicle when it was stolen. She stays quiet and they don't realize she is there until one night, while the men are sleeping outside, she attempts to drive the station wagon away. When they discover her, she demands that they take her to El Paso where she can meet her father. They compromise on taking her as far as Presidio and buying her a bus ticket to El Paso.
The narrative of their trip south is interspersed with the narrative that introduces Martha's family and background and a remarkable set of notes that Troy has written and leaves in the glove compartments of the vehicles he drives. The notes are styled as "Notes for the police" and they consist of a kind of journal of his explanation of what he has done and how he came to be the person that he is. (The first line of the book is: "Later, in the glove box, the police found a binder of notes.") These notes also include some darkly humorous stories of his time on the road and some of the people he has encountered along the way. It is through the notes that we get to know Troy and Harlan and their now dead father and we learn what happened to their mother.
The propulsion of the plot is the brothers' flight to the border with their accidental kidnap victim, looking over their shoulders all the way, expecting to see the police. The plot moves almost organically and those pages keep turning almost by themselves as everything converges at Presidio for the final denouement.
It's hard to believe this is Kennedy's first novel. It is a very accomplished effort with characters that seem real enough that one could reach out and touch them, a landscape with an aridity that one can taste on the tongue, and a plot filled with a comedy of errors that somehow doesn't seem fanciful at all.
All of which brings to mind a line from Troy's "notes": "Just because a story isn't real doesn't mean it isn't true."
September 5, 2022
Una historia que no va a ninguna parte.
Desordenado, confuso y aburrido.
Desordenado, confuso y aburrido.
September 23, 2018
A+ on writing, solid C on story. Picked it up due to its setting (west Texas, where I lived for 5 years back in the 70's) and gushing reviews mentioning the author in the same breath as (gasp!) Cormac McCarthy and James Lee Burke. I don't know about the McCarthy reference, but Randy Kennedy sure can write.
The plot is a sad/funny/weird one: a young guy from some small town outside Lubbock leaves home in the early 70's and makes his 'living' stealing cars, personal items, and identities from fellow travelers around west Texas. That's the part of the state nearly bereft of people (other than the metropolis of Lubbock and some small towns literally in the middle of nowhere) but chock full of cotton fields, cattle, oil pumps, and expansive, flat, wide open spaces. He loses touch with his family, returns home on a whim to find his childhood home owned by someone else, his brother living in a shack out in the sticks, and his father dead and buried.
He and his brother, with whom he has an odd relationship, leave and begin a quest (using stolen vehicles, of course) to track down his brother's ex-wife, who has absconded with his money. He has his own secret reason for wanting to find the woman which he's unable and unwilling to share with his brother. As they travel south and need to change vehicles every so often in order to elude the authorities, they inadvertently kidnap a young Mennonite girl with her own strange backstory who'd been sleeping unnoticed in the rear of a car they swiped at a convenience store. When they finally realize they have a child in the car and they're probably now wanted for kidnapping, they make plans to safely leave her where she can make her way back to her people. She's not interested though. The kid's a real pistol, that's for sure..... The conclusion isn't of the 'feel good' variety but does wrap up a few loose ends. I can see a sort of Coen Brothers moving coming out of it.
The author, who grew up in Plainview, captures the topography, speech patterns, and attitudes perfectly, which is why the Burke reference makes sense. It's a part of the country most folks aren't familiar with but it has its own very real identity that Kennedy does a great job weaving into the story. The main character narrates part of the book (in italics), mostly providing background on himself and his family situation, with the actual story told in the 3rd person. It's a neat approach that progressively reveals the sadness that permeated the brothers’ lives and brought them to their present situation.
Presidio is a promising first novel by a writer who has the chops to produce a lot more. Here's hoping......
The plot is a sad/funny/weird one: a young guy from some small town outside Lubbock leaves home in the early 70's and makes his 'living' stealing cars, personal items, and identities from fellow travelers around west Texas. That's the part of the state nearly bereft of people (other than the metropolis of Lubbock and some small towns literally in the middle of nowhere) but chock full of cotton fields, cattle, oil pumps, and expansive, flat, wide open spaces. He loses touch with his family, returns home on a whim to find his childhood home owned by someone else, his brother living in a shack out in the sticks, and his father dead and buried.
He and his brother, with whom he has an odd relationship, leave and begin a quest (using stolen vehicles, of course) to track down his brother's ex-wife, who has absconded with his money. He has his own secret reason for wanting to find the woman which he's unable and unwilling to share with his brother. As they travel south and need to change vehicles every so often in order to elude the authorities, they inadvertently kidnap a young Mennonite girl with her own strange backstory who'd been sleeping unnoticed in the rear of a car they swiped at a convenience store. When they finally realize they have a child in the car and they're probably now wanted for kidnapping, they make plans to safely leave her where she can make her way back to her people. She's not interested though. The kid's a real pistol, that's for sure..... The conclusion isn't of the 'feel good' variety but does wrap up a few loose ends. I can see a sort of Coen Brothers moving coming out of it.
The author, who grew up in Plainview, captures the topography, speech patterns, and attitudes perfectly, which is why the Burke reference makes sense. It's a part of the country most folks aren't familiar with but it has its own very real identity that Kennedy does a great job weaving into the story. The main character narrates part of the book (in italics), mostly providing background on himself and his family situation, with the actual story told in the 3rd person. It's a neat approach that progressively reveals the sadness that permeated the brothers’ lives and brought them to their present situation.
Presidio is a promising first novel by a writer who has the chops to produce a lot more. Here's hoping......
October 18, 2020
(After writing this review, I've since reread PRESIDIO and enjoyed it far more the second time around. So I upgraded my review, initially posted on Amazon, from four stars to five. It is a rich, textured, authoritative look at a low-level criminal drifter in 1972 Texas with deep, fully dimensional characterizations and a ringingly authentic sense of time and place whose strengths far outpace its fleeting weaknesses. It's the kind of novel that rewards repeated rereadings, revealing subtle and quietly scintillating layers with each new visit.)
I went into Randy Kennedy’s debut novel PRESIDIO with a lot of ambivalence, and emerged with the same, and, well … I didn’t regret the effort it took to get there.
I was intrigued by Lee Child’s review of it in The New York Times, in which he praised the authenticity of its early 1970s Texas noir and its intriguingly alienated main character, an itinerant motel dweller and car thief who does what he does for survival more than profit. And I was annoyed by the review, which seemed to say that its blurbs from a couple of noted Texas literary heavyweights were reason enough to read the book, which to me strays outside the bounds of a reviewer’s scope. Every once in a while, A-listers come together to lift up an author, having decided on their own that the author’s time had come for promotion into their elite, and in my view the books they chose were usually not the right vehicle for it (i.e., the worthy Steve Hamilton and the less worthy THE SECOND LIFE OF NICK MASON, which read to me like the quickie novelization of a story created to be a screenplay).
Also, PRESIDIO stumbles out of the gate with its split structure: half narrative and half extended epistolary matter. The latter renders the novel so heavy with italics that you may find yourself racing past things you need to know just to get back to a typeface that doesn’t irritate your eyes.
Another alienating early feature is PRESIDIO’s occasionally overreaching prose, which reads like that of an uneducated small-town Texan scamming his way into the Iowa Writers Workshop and seemingly desperate to assert a place among its overweeners: “Sometimes I sit in a hot bath, one leg crossed over the other, thinking about the world at work while I watch the pulse of my heartbeat in the hollow of my ankle.” Ugh.
But, well … there’s something more there. Something that works in spite of the sluggish interiority and the soggy but apparently mandatory meditations on the sparse south Texas landscape. For me, that something is Troy Falconer, the main POV voice of PRESIDIO, a man of equally profound and pointless alienation, a man who lives in cheap motels and steals cheap cars not so much because he’s bad but because he’s good at it, and doesn’t want to do anything else even as he’s dimly aware that at some point he probably should.
Maybe because I’m sort of a solo drifter on the margins myself, lines like this really stuck the landing for me: “My real profession is the careful and highly precarious maintenance of a life almost completely purified of personal property” and “He had an uncommon capacity for two things: lying and enjoying his own company.”
The plot is somewhat beside the point, and it shows in PRESIDIO’s rushed and uninspired ending. But it’s sturdy enough to keep readers on the hook: Troy and his brother Harlan undertake a road trip to find Bettie, a woman of intimate history with both men who stole Harlan’s money. Troy steals one car after another to keep them moving, and one—a station wagon belonging to a mother in a grocery store—turns out, hours after the theft, to contain a young girl half in and half out of the Mennonite world. Troy, who usually operates well below law enforcement radar, is suddenly a major target.
PRESIDIO isn’t as good as its A-lister praise would suggest. It’s a novel that demands more of the reader than, as a debut, it’s earned the right to ask, in my opinion. But if you hook on to what’s good about it, as I managed to, you might be glad that you did. After I read a book, I always ask myself: “Would you read the next book by this author?” And despite my ambivalence, the answer is an unequivocal yes.
I went into Randy Kennedy’s debut novel PRESIDIO with a lot of ambivalence, and emerged with the same, and, well … I didn’t regret the effort it took to get there.
I was intrigued by Lee Child’s review of it in The New York Times, in which he praised the authenticity of its early 1970s Texas noir and its intriguingly alienated main character, an itinerant motel dweller and car thief who does what he does for survival more than profit. And I was annoyed by the review, which seemed to say that its blurbs from a couple of noted Texas literary heavyweights were reason enough to read the book, which to me strays outside the bounds of a reviewer’s scope. Every once in a while, A-listers come together to lift up an author, having decided on their own that the author’s time had come for promotion into their elite, and in my view the books they chose were usually not the right vehicle for it (i.e., the worthy Steve Hamilton and the less worthy THE SECOND LIFE OF NICK MASON, which read to me like the quickie novelization of a story created to be a screenplay).
Also, PRESIDIO stumbles out of the gate with its split structure: half narrative and half extended epistolary matter. The latter renders the novel so heavy with italics that you may find yourself racing past things you need to know just to get back to a typeface that doesn’t irritate your eyes.
Another alienating early feature is PRESIDIO’s occasionally overreaching prose, which reads like that of an uneducated small-town Texan scamming his way into the Iowa Writers Workshop and seemingly desperate to assert a place among its overweeners: “Sometimes I sit in a hot bath, one leg crossed over the other, thinking about the world at work while I watch the pulse of my heartbeat in the hollow of my ankle.” Ugh.
But, well … there’s something more there. Something that works in spite of the sluggish interiority and the soggy but apparently mandatory meditations on the sparse south Texas landscape. For me, that something is Troy Falconer, the main POV voice of PRESIDIO, a man of equally profound and pointless alienation, a man who lives in cheap motels and steals cheap cars not so much because he’s bad but because he’s good at it, and doesn’t want to do anything else even as he’s dimly aware that at some point he probably should.
Maybe because I’m sort of a solo drifter on the margins myself, lines like this really stuck the landing for me: “My real profession is the careful and highly precarious maintenance of a life almost completely purified of personal property” and “He had an uncommon capacity for two things: lying and enjoying his own company.”
The plot is somewhat beside the point, and it shows in PRESIDIO’s rushed and uninspired ending. But it’s sturdy enough to keep readers on the hook: Troy and his brother Harlan undertake a road trip to find Bettie, a woman of intimate history with both men who stole Harlan’s money. Troy steals one car after another to keep them moving, and one—a station wagon belonging to a mother in a grocery store—turns out, hours after the theft, to contain a young girl half in and half out of the Mennonite world. Troy, who usually operates well below law enforcement radar, is suddenly a major target.
PRESIDIO isn’t as good as its A-lister praise would suggest. It’s a novel that demands more of the reader than, as a debut, it’s earned the right to ask, in my opinion. But if you hook on to what’s good about it, as I managed to, you might be glad that you did. After I read a book, I always ask myself: “Would you read the next book by this author?” And despite my ambivalence, the answer is an unequivocal yes.
September 3, 2018
I had high hopes.
Texas border country. Grifters. Mennonites. 1970's. But this book was a bit too meandering for my taste. Good, descriptive writer. Fairly unconventional plot and narrative but I ended up scanning many of the last chapters because so much was not happening.
At it's best, it really captured the era of motels in western Texas - so that was cool however I never really cared for the two brothers, the young girl they inadvertently kidnapped or her stoic father.
Overall, it was a strong average.
Texas border country. Grifters. Mennonites. 1970's. But this book was a bit too meandering for my taste. Good, descriptive writer. Fairly unconventional plot and narrative but I ended up scanning many of the last chapters because so much was not happening.
At it's best, it really captured the era of motels in western Texas - so that was cool however I never really cared for the two brothers, the young girl they inadvertently kidnapped or her stoic father.
Overall, it was a strong average.
June 3, 2018
I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley to read and review.
PRESIDIO by Randy Kennedy is a novel taking place in rural Texas that is centered around three main characters, two brothers Troy and Harlan, and a young Mennonite girl named Martha.
Troy is a life long grifter who started out as a youth boosting cars in an automobile theft ring, and who later goes off on his own traveling the southwest area by stealing cars, money, clothing, and other valuables and quickly exchanging everything along the way by starting over to leave no trace or trail for anyone to follow.
Harlan, Troy’s brother has never left the area he’s lived his entire lifetime, and has lived an uneventful life; that is until he marries a woman who is a grifter known to Troy previously, and she takes everything Harlan has, so Troy decides to return to make a trek with his brother in an attempt to locate her south of the border, and hopefully get back some of what’s been taken.
Martha had been living with her father before his incarceration, and her aunt takes her in when she hears of her situation.
Paths cross between the three when along the way Troy steals her aunt’s station wagon unknowingly with Martha asleep in the back, and the two brothers are faced with the impending search and kidnapping charges being added to their already growing list of crimes committed.
Jonas, Martha’s father, has been imprisoned south of the border, so since the brothers were already headed to Mexico in search of Harlan’s wayward wife, they agree to drop Martha off where she’ll be able to travel the rest of the way to where Jonas is supposed to be jailed.
Do the brothers have a chance at safely crossing the border, likely for good this time, and will Martha be reunited with her father before being sent back to her aunt or the former Mennonite community in which she lived previously?
I liked this book as it develops at a slow pace befitting the area where it takes place, and the miles traveled along the way, also to illustrate the idle time Troy has to endure in his chosen path.
Randy Kennedy, the author, mentions “The Last Picture Show” in the closing credits, and Larry McMurtry’s quote on the cover praises the author and the book, so it’s no surprise that it feels somewhat like a 70’s stripped down version of McMurtry’s classic novel, as the pace and the way the characters are presented makes this story work in very much the same way.
4 stars.
PRESIDIO by Randy Kennedy is a novel taking place in rural Texas that is centered around three main characters, two brothers Troy and Harlan, and a young Mennonite girl named Martha.
Troy is a life long grifter who started out as a youth boosting cars in an automobile theft ring, and who later goes off on his own traveling the southwest area by stealing cars, money, clothing, and other valuables and quickly exchanging everything along the way by starting over to leave no trace or trail for anyone to follow.
Harlan, Troy’s brother has never left the area he’s lived his entire lifetime, and has lived an uneventful life; that is until he marries a woman who is a grifter known to Troy previously, and she takes everything Harlan has, so Troy decides to return to make a trek with his brother in an attempt to locate her south of the border, and hopefully get back some of what’s been taken.
Martha had been living with her father before his incarceration, and her aunt takes her in when she hears of her situation.
Paths cross between the three when along the way Troy steals her aunt’s station wagon unknowingly with Martha asleep in the back, and the two brothers are faced with the impending search and kidnapping charges being added to their already growing list of crimes committed.
Jonas, Martha’s father, has been imprisoned south of the border, so since the brothers were already headed to Mexico in search of Harlan’s wayward wife, they agree to drop Martha off where she’ll be able to travel the rest of the way to where Jonas is supposed to be jailed.
Do the brothers have a chance at safely crossing the border, likely for good this time, and will Martha be reunited with her father before being sent back to her aunt or the former Mennonite community in which she lived previously?
I liked this book as it develops at a slow pace befitting the area where it takes place, and the miles traveled along the way, also to illustrate the idle time Troy has to endure in his chosen path.
Randy Kennedy, the author, mentions “The Last Picture Show” in the closing credits, and Larry McMurtry’s quote on the cover praises the author and the book, so it’s no surprise that it feels somewhat like a 70’s stripped down version of McMurtry’s classic novel, as the pace and the way the characters are presented makes this story work in very much the same way.
4 stars.
April 25, 2018
I have always been a sucker for detailed descriptions of minutiae. They're like ice cream on the world-building cake, and oh my goodness Randy Kennedy is serving up double-scoops. Presidio is rich with specific, vivid details that make the Texas panhandle of the 60s and 70s feel like a living thing, and the characters feel like distant relatives. Familiarity through meticulous description. But the prose isn't bossy, and never feels like it's struggling under its own weight. In fact it's snappy as hell, with solid pacing and great tension start to finish. A smooth glide of a read, even as it cycles through several points of view (with no one POV feeling noticeably weaker against the rest, commendable in and of itself). I was eager to get my hands on this arc, and it totally delivered. It'll be an easy recommendation to make come August.
December 19, 2018
There was a lot going on in this novel — (a solid 4.5 stars).
The wide open spaces combined with the claustrophobia of a car trip (an inevitable part of life, driving, if you live in certain parts of the country)... the relationship between two brothers...the woman and young girl who disrupt everything...two fathers struggling to be parents, a Mennonite plot, the bizarre no man’s land of the border...
I never thought I’d be nostalgic for childhood headaches induced by a Zippo lighter and a car full of secondhand smoke. Much less feel homesick for that special TX smell of cattle, oil, and hot weather. Miles of fences and electrical wires. Miles of nothing.
Among the debut novels I’ve read in the last few years, this one delivered on the advance praise. There were some $5 words, but wow, used appropriately. (Spavined, catenaried...). I flagged too many passages to list here, just — the sheer pleasure of the words on the page.
It seems like many of the books I’ve read lately were consciously (and too often, obviously) constructed to Make A Point, but this story....was a well-told story. Any “points” or conclusions to be drawn from the reading of it were left up to me to make. That could be why another reviewer gave this an A+ for writing and a C for story.
I was slightly disappointed by the final chapter, but actually, it was just right. Even in Texas, you can’t drive forever.
The wide open spaces combined with the claustrophobia of a car trip (an inevitable part of life, driving, if you live in certain parts of the country)... the relationship between two brothers...the woman and young girl who disrupt everything...two fathers struggling to be parents, a Mennonite plot, the bizarre no man’s land of the border...
I never thought I’d be nostalgic for childhood headaches induced by a Zippo lighter and a car full of secondhand smoke. Much less feel homesick for that special TX smell of cattle, oil, and hot weather. Miles of fences and electrical wires. Miles of nothing.
Among the debut novels I’ve read in the last few years, this one delivered on the advance praise. There were some $5 words, but wow, used appropriately. (Spavined, catenaried...). I flagged too many passages to list here, just — the sheer pleasure of the words on the page.
It seems like many of the books I’ve read lately were consciously (and too often, obviously) constructed to Make A Point, but this story....was a well-told story. Any “points” or conclusions to be drawn from the reading of it were left up to me to make. That could be why another reviewer gave this an A+ for writing and a C for story.
I was slightly disappointed by the final chapter, but actually, it was just right. Even in Texas, you can’t drive forever.
October 19, 2018
I bought this book based on a review in Texas Monthly which described it as noirish. Accolade endorsements appear on it from Larry McMurtry and Annie Proulx. It’s that type of book.
I take issue with its title. Presidio is the destination but most of the book takes place in West Texas and the Panhandle as well as Chihuahua, Mexico. A better title would have been Llano. Our journey all over the llano is punctuated by letters/journal entries of Troy, a thief who can’t keep still. He has a brother, Harlan, who has never traveled more than ten miles from his home. Two brothers who couldn’t be more different.
So it looks like this book is going to be all about them. Wrong. We meet a Mennonite father and daughter from Chihuahua who have been shunned by their sect and cruelly separated.
So we have the twin themes of two families torn apart and being reunited voluntarily and involuntarily. It’s quite a ride on the back roads of Texas too. So it’s a road trip book with the destination and goals constantly changing due to circumstances. The writing reminded me of Cormac McCarthy as well as Proulx and McMurtry. I didn’t enjoy the ending but was not surprised. You know someone’s luck is going to change but whose?
I take issue with its title. Presidio is the destination but most of the book takes place in West Texas and the Panhandle as well as Chihuahua, Mexico. A better title would have been Llano. Our journey all over the llano is punctuated by letters/journal entries of Troy, a thief who can’t keep still. He has a brother, Harlan, who has never traveled more than ten miles from his home. Two brothers who couldn’t be more different.
So it looks like this book is going to be all about them. Wrong. We meet a Mennonite father and daughter from Chihuahua who have been shunned by their sect and cruelly separated.
So we have the twin themes of two families torn apart and being reunited voluntarily and involuntarily. It’s quite a ride on the back roads of Texas too. So it’s a road trip book with the destination and goals constantly changing due to circumstances. The writing reminded me of Cormac McCarthy as well as Proulx and McMurtry. I didn’t enjoy the ending but was not surprised. You know someone’s luck is going to change but whose?
August 15, 2019
This writer has got the goods. I was all-in. What a fascinating main character. This story is not for everyone and there were a few rough-around-the-edges aspects (e.g., detailed description of fast action slowed things down to the point of confusion and loss of meaning), but with a little honing of his craft, this author has the potential to be a literary force. I liked this far too much to not give it 5 stars!
December 28, 2018
I thought that I could finish this book because it is relatively short, but it was so meandering, boring and pointless that I gave up at the halfway point. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
October 20, 2018
Couldn't get past chapter 2. Got bored with motels.
Update, and apologies. I felt that I had done this novel a disservice, and so I went back to where I had stopped, and have now finished what was an enjoyable read. I could harp on about some areas I thought could have been tightened up, a story that wanders (too much for me), but the main character is fascinating, and the writing is powerful in places. 3.something STARS.
Update, and apologies. I felt that I had done this novel a disservice, and so I went back to where I had stopped, and have now finished what was an enjoyable read. I could harp on about some areas I thought could have been tightened up, a story that wanders (too much for me), but the main character is fascinating, and the writing is powerful in places. 3.something STARS.
September 16, 2018
I’m tempted to rate it higher simply because it’s set in - and so beautifully describes - the Texas Panhandle where I grew up. If I’m honest, I’m a little jealous of Kennedy’s ability to create a mental picture of the landscape. It’s uncanny.
I think it’s a very good story, and I loved it. I felt the ending didn’t live up to the start of the story; but still, worth the time to read. A beautifully told story, about people most of society ignores.
I think it’s a very good story, and I loved it. I felt the ending didn’t live up to the start of the story; but still, worth the time to read. A beautifully told story, about people most of society ignores.
September 30, 2019
As you can see, I'm not sure how to categorize this book. There is some crime involved. Hell, Troy makes his living, so to speak, by stealing cars and robbing motel rooms. His brother, Harlan, is one of those people of whom we say, "If it weren't for bad luck, he'd have no luck at all." He is as honest as Troy is not. The father was a n'er do well, who more or less left his sons on their own after their mother died. Dad is now dead, himself, and the boys are men. But the story isn't really a mystery, beyond wondering how it will turn out. Still, ok, mystery. It is beautifully written, hence the mainstream-lit-etc. category. A lot of the novel is Troy's journal. In fact, it opens with "a folder of notes" the cops find in the glove-box of one of the many cars Troy has stolen. It begins "Notes for the police (Or anybody else who finds this and wants to read it)." Personally, I was sucked in by the first paragraph. So, character novel. But maybe it's a contemporary Western (a category I do not have in my GoodReads). No cowboys. No horses. But surely there is more to the west than that.
As you know from the blurb, Troy goes home for the first time in years to try to help Harlan recoup some money from his wife, who robbed him and took off. Naturally, Troy had had some dealings with the wife before she found Harlan, so he figures he can find her. In the course of events, the brothers, as in Troy, with Harlan along for the ride, more or less against his will, steal a car. After having it for quite some time, they come to learn that a young Mennonite girl has been hiding in the back seat since before they got into it. Troy wants to just leave her where they are, in middle of nowhere, Texas. Harlan says they can't just leave a little girl out there all alone. None of this matters, because the girl tells them that if they leave her, she'll tell all to the police; she knows their names. And thus begin a caper across Texas, some of New Mexico, with Old Mexico as the destination.
Troy has few redeeming characteristics beyond being really, really good at what he does. He does not want to haul a young girl around, because the consequences if caught are way out beyond anything he's had to deal with. Ever. Harlan means well, but is caught up in things beyond his experience. He is also stubborn. He isn't especially appealing as a character, but he is good person. Martha, the girl, is stubborn beyond belief! She's had a hard life, but has a goal. And she is happy to use these two in order to achieve that goal. And then there is Texas, possibly the most significant character in the novel. This is not urban Texas. This is not pretty, romantic Texas. But you feel it in your bones. Kennedy is good, that way. Very good.
So. Read it. Enjoy it. And figure out your own categories.
As you know from the blurb, Troy goes home for the first time in years to try to help Harlan recoup some money from his wife, who robbed him and took off. Naturally, Troy had had some dealings with the wife before she found Harlan, so he figures he can find her. In the course of events, the brothers, as in Troy, with Harlan along for the ride, more or less against his will, steal a car. After having it for quite some time, they come to learn that a young Mennonite girl has been hiding in the back seat since before they got into it. Troy wants to just leave her where they are, in middle of nowhere, Texas. Harlan says they can't just leave a little girl out there all alone. None of this matters, because the girl tells them that if they leave her, she'll tell all to the police; she knows their names. And thus begin a caper across Texas, some of New Mexico, with Old Mexico as the destination.
Troy has few redeeming characteristics beyond being really, really good at what he does. He does not want to haul a young girl around, because the consequences if caught are way out beyond anything he's had to deal with. Ever. Harlan means well, but is caught up in things beyond his experience. He is also stubborn. He isn't especially appealing as a character, but he is good person. Martha, the girl, is stubborn beyond belief! She's had a hard life, but has a goal. And she is happy to use these two in order to achieve that goal. And then there is Texas, possibly the most significant character in the novel. This is not urban Texas. This is not pretty, romantic Texas. But you feel it in your bones. Kennedy is good, that way. Very good.
So. Read it. Enjoy it. And figure out your own categories.
October 10, 2018
Thanks to the publisher for sending me a review copy!
The synopsis of this book doesn't do it justice. It's sold as the story of two brothers on the run who accidentally kidnap a young girl... and while that's true, it's not the WHOLE story. No, this novel is so much more than that, so I decided to write my own synopsis:
Troy lives outside society. He stakes out seedy motels on the interstate in search of a man about his size, learns his patterns, and then robs him blind of everything but family pictures and wedding rings. Then, he inhabits their possessions - clothes, books, car - until they start to feel a little too much like his, and then he starts over again, keeping only a makeshift journal written on cheap motel memo pads. He wants the identity, not just the fast cash.
His brother Harlan, on the other hand, clings to their past and kept their childhood home preserved practically as a museum. Troy comes back to their hometown when Harlan's mail order bride goes missing with all of Harlan's savings - and in the course of their pursuit they steal a car and unwittingly kidnap young Martha, a Mennonite girl with her own troubles to contend with. Dark, atmospheric, ambling, deeply introspective, with the rich setting of 1970s west Texas - this is a story for someone who knows what it's like to feel on the outside.
The synopsis of this book doesn't do it justice. It's sold as the story of two brothers on the run who accidentally kidnap a young girl... and while that's true, it's not the WHOLE story. No, this novel is so much more than that, so I decided to write my own synopsis:
Troy lives outside society. He stakes out seedy motels on the interstate in search of a man about his size, learns his patterns, and then robs him blind of everything but family pictures and wedding rings. Then, he inhabits their possessions - clothes, books, car - until they start to feel a little too much like his, and then he starts over again, keeping only a makeshift journal written on cheap motel memo pads. He wants the identity, not just the fast cash.
His brother Harlan, on the other hand, clings to their past and kept their childhood home preserved practically as a museum. Troy comes back to their hometown when Harlan's mail order bride goes missing with all of Harlan's savings - and in the course of their pursuit they steal a car and unwittingly kidnap young Martha, a Mennonite girl with her own troubles to contend with. Dark, atmospheric, ambling, deeply introspective, with the rich setting of 1970s west Texas - this is a story for someone who knows what it's like to feel on the outside.
December 19, 2018
Ambientato nel Texas degli anni ’70, tra il Panhandle, El Paso e (appunto) Preisidio, al confine tra New Mexico e Messico. Si parla di ladri di macchine, truffatori, reverendi in crisi di vocazione che si riciclano come camionisti, bambine mennonite rapite per sbaglio, vecchie storie che si mescolano con le origini dell’America di oggi. Una prosa cristallina, solida, veloce veicola una storia che però procede con lentezza e mostra qualche calo di tensione, ma nel complesso è un libro più che riuscito.
September 16, 2018
Randy Kennedy's debut novel Presidio (2018) follows the trials and tribulations of Troy Falconer, a modern West Texas cowboy who has left the cows behind for occasional work on oil rigs and full-time work as a thief. Troy enjoys nothing more than using other people's things—anything stolen is a pleasure: stolen cars, stolen money, stolen clothes. His goal in life is to own nothing, but to have everything. He works the Texas motels, where traveling salesmen have perp-worthy things for Troy to borrow.
This is not a book for those who want endings. While there are events to experience and people to meet, this is not a book about the destination—it's all about the journey. What you'll experience is outstanding writing—it is simultaneously deadpan and comedic, reportorial while it drips with a deep feeling of nostalgia and loss. The book is a candidate for the Great American Novel, with echoes of Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, the disconnectedness of the Joads in Grapes of Wrath, and more than a little bit of the road trips in Thelma and Louise.
The story is told in long chapters with two voices: the first is Troy's backstory told in his "notes to the police," long italicized monologues on how he got to the here and now. The second voice is a hovering narrator's view of current events as Troy navigates the West Teas roads. The characters live hardscrabble lives on the edges of a successful America: they are dead-ended at birth by parents who had little to offer; they have an education so minimal that there is nothing to build on; they have the morals to match their situation yet somehow seem to be good folks. None are likable, none are thrivers, but they all are survivors just putting one foot in front of the other.
It's the early 1970s and Troy Falconer is a thirtyish wanderer without a destination, a man who doesn't even leave a shadow behind. He's not truly a bad man, he just has a strong instinct to survive with a hope for something better. As he says,
Troy's last sighting of Bill Ray was years ago, when Dad took his two sons fishing and the trio brought home a carp. Bill Ray put it in the bathtub, where
On the way Troy stops by the cemetery to visit Ruby and Bill Ray; there he finds a strange headstone for the still-living Harlan. When he eventually sees Harlan he learns that the headstone was bought in a two-for-one deal when Bill Ray died. As Harlan says,
Aron, Martha's father, had been excommunicated by his Mennonite colony in Mexico because he put modern rubber tires on his tractor. Shunned by his wife's family, he abducted Martha from her mother and several siblings and went to Mexico where they lived in a trailer with two of Aron's workmates. One of the workmates molests Martha and Aron beats him badly. Aron goes to a Mexican prison land Martha is sent to live with her aunt in Texas. But now Martha has been abducted yet again, this time inadvertently, and she is heading back to Mexico with the Falconer boys. Their destination is the border station at Presidio, Texas.
In Presidio the story ends quickly at he border station. Kennedy never hints at the book's destination, which might leave some readers feeling cheated but was, to me, perfectly consistent with the book's tenor: none of the characters seems to have a clue about their destination. This is a story that will stay with me for a while.
Four and ½ stars.
This is not a book for those who want endings. While there are events to experience and people to meet, this is not a book about the destination—it's all about the journey. What you'll experience is outstanding writing—it is simultaneously deadpan and comedic, reportorial while it drips with a deep feeling of nostalgia and loss. The book is a candidate for the Great American Novel, with echoes of Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, the disconnectedness of the Joads in Grapes of Wrath, and more than a little bit of the road trips in Thelma and Louise.
The story is told in long chapters with two voices: the first is Troy's backstory told in his "notes to the police," long italicized monologues on how he got to the here and now. The second voice is a hovering narrator's view of current events as Troy navigates the West Teas roads. The characters live hardscrabble lives on the edges of a successful America: they are dead-ended at birth by parents who had little to offer; they have an education so minimal that there is nothing to build on; they have the morals to match their situation yet somehow seem to be good folks. None are likable, none are thrivers, but they all are survivors just putting one foot in front of the other.
It's the early 1970s and Troy Falconer is a thirtyish wanderer without a destination, a man who doesn't even leave a shadow behind. He's not truly a bad man, he just has a strong instinct to survive with a hope for something better. As he says,
If my sin is anything it's being too much of an American—a throwback to the pioneers who settled this great country, always headed somewhere to claim something with little more than a horse and the ragged clothes on their backs; or before them, back to the Comanche who made no permanent home in this part of the country and considered most of what he had only temporarily his.Troy's mother, Ruby, died when he was very young in a family tragedy we'll learn about late in the book. His father, Bill Ray Falconer, raised their sons, Troy and Harlan, in the noble traditions of the male Falconers: he taught them to whistle, spit, snap their fingers, and whittle, as well as to drive, to shoot, and other manly arts.
Troy's last sighting of Bill Ray was years ago, when Dad took his two sons fishing and the trio brought home a carp. Bill Ray put it in the bathtub, where
[I]t swam around briefly but then seemed to accept its fate and floated motionless, staring down the length of the tub, as if waiting for an appointment. When the boys woke the next morning the carp was gone, along with Billy Ray.Troy is now headed home, to the house that Harlan inherited from Bill Ray and which, he'll find, has been taken for back taxes. His trip home is not motivated by a need to reconnect. Harlan has told him that Harlan's wife Bettie—a con artist who had first been in Troy's bed—has stolen $25,000 left to Harlan by Bill Ray. Troy figures half of it is his, so he is on the way to join Harlan in tracking Bettie down.
On the way Troy stops by the cemetery to visit Ruby and Bill Ray; there he finds a strange headstone for the still-living Harlan. When he eventually sees Harlan he learns that the headstone was bought in a two-for-one deal when Bill Ray died. As Harlan says,
Only thing of value I have left and I have to be dead to use it. There must be a country song in there somewhere.Troy steals a sedate station wagon and he and Harlan head to Mexico. Little do they know that asleep in the back of the station wagon is Martha, an eleven year old Mennonite girl who had been living with her aunt (the car's owner) after being returned from Mexico where Martha had been taken by her father. Martha is the spunkiest and most likable character in the book; she brooks no opposition.
Aron, Martha's father, had been excommunicated by his Mennonite colony in Mexico because he put modern rubber tires on his tractor. Shunned by his wife's family, he abducted Martha from her mother and several siblings and went to Mexico where they lived in a trailer with two of Aron's workmates. One of the workmates molests Martha and Aron beats him badly. Aron goes to a Mexican prison land Martha is sent to live with her aunt in Texas. But now Martha has been abducted yet again, this time inadvertently, and she is heading back to Mexico with the Falconer boys. Their destination is the border station at Presidio, Texas.
In Presidio the story ends quickly at he border station. Kennedy never hints at the book's destination, which might leave some readers feeling cheated but was, to me, perfectly consistent with the book's tenor: none of the characters seems to have a clue about their destination. This is a story that will stay with me for a while.
Four and ½ stars.
September 21, 2018
Lyrical writing about harsh lives in a harsh part of Texas, from the Panhandle to the Rio Grande, this tale of two brothers in the 70s, estranged by guilt and crime, go on a pointless search for the femme fatale that messed with them both. Along the way the car thief of the two picks a station wagon with a surprise hidden passenger, an eleven year old nearly mute Mennonite girl caught between her own Hobson's choice between horrible relatives. Taut, funny, deeply sad, this one's a keeper.
April 23, 2019
Extremely well written.
June 1, 2023
There is such a thing as trying too hard and 'Presidio' might be an example. It's an odd, slightly rambling tale that tries earnestly to evoke a time and place, far West Texas in the early 1970s. Dry, empty, flat. Sparse might be a good word and so is the story itself but the writing is anything sparse, with long, and often painful descriptions of place or mundane actions. There are some good ones--the ubiquitous pumjacks as described as prehistoric creatures. The story itself I could take or leave, not very riveting and sort of pointless. The best thing about 'Presidio' was that I learned something about the 'Russian' (actually German) Mennonite communities (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mennoni... of northern Mexico), principally around state of Chihuahua and the City of Cuauhtémoc. Was barely aware they existed and while the book does not deal with them in much detail it did prompt me to read some about them for which I thank the author. 2.5 stars rounded down.
February 27, 2019
Languid and evocative. Not every moment worked but when it did, it felt like I was out in the middle of West Texas at some dusty motel in the middle of nowhere.
April 25, 2024
Troy Falconer regressa à sua cidade Natal, em plena década de 70.
O seu regresso deve-se à ajuda que o mesmo quer prestar ao irmão, Harlan, que, recentemente, viu a sua mulher fugir com todo o seu dinheiro, que não era muito. Troy, nos últimos anos, levava e ganhava a vida a roubar todo o tipo de carros, num exercício bem rotineiro.
Iniciam, assim, a busca pelo paradeiro da fugitiva. Pelo caminho, os carros vão sendo assaltados e trocados recorrentemente para que sejam imunes ao rasto. Todavia, é num assalto que, sem darem por isso, fogem num carro com a jovem Martha no seu interior.
Dirigem-se para a fronteira mexicana, onde Martha se vai revelando através da sua teimosia e da sua convicção em fazer parte daquela busca ou fuga ou o que seja. A improbabilidade da situação oferece contornos apelativos enquanto a polícia e o pai de Martha estão no encalce do trio.
Os pontos fulcrais da narrativa são bem talhados e definidos. Um thriller slowburn, que é entregue num ritmo muito paciente.
A descrição tanto pode funcionar como uma qualidade, como como um defeito. A oferta do detalhe é uma tendência presente nesta obra.
O seu regresso deve-se à ajuda que o mesmo quer prestar ao irmão, Harlan, que, recentemente, viu a sua mulher fugir com todo o seu dinheiro, que não era muito. Troy, nos últimos anos, levava e ganhava a vida a roubar todo o tipo de carros, num exercício bem rotineiro.
Iniciam, assim, a busca pelo paradeiro da fugitiva. Pelo caminho, os carros vão sendo assaltados e trocados recorrentemente para que sejam imunes ao rasto. Todavia, é num assalto que, sem darem por isso, fogem num carro com a jovem Martha no seu interior.
Dirigem-se para a fronteira mexicana, onde Martha se vai revelando através da sua teimosia e da sua convicção em fazer parte daquela busca ou fuga ou o que seja. A improbabilidade da situação oferece contornos apelativos enquanto a polícia e o pai de Martha estão no encalce do trio.
Os pontos fulcrais da narrativa são bem talhados e definidos. Um thriller slowburn, que é entregue num ritmo muito paciente.
A descrição tanto pode funcionar como uma qualidade, como como um defeito. A oferta do detalhe é uma tendência presente nesta obra.
March 25, 2019
The only mistake I made in reading this was not reading in larger chunks, as I found myself having to occasionally go back and re-read. Very entertaining & well-written!
March 31, 2019
I grew up Plainview in the 70's and 80's (one of the comments erroneously claims the author is from there, but it's actually Plains - a small town southwest of Lubbock; Plainview - mentioned on p.3 - is north of Lubbock). Plainview sits dead-center in the Texas Panhandle and I can tell you, for this native West Texan, that Presidio hits all the right notes for living on the Llano Estacado.* Indeed, the biggest strength of this novel is the power of description Kennedy possesses for his former home. I felt magically transported back to the High Plains as I read his work.
As a passionate Cormac McCarthy fan (Note my name; All Hail, 'Blood Meridian'!), I'm always skeptical of critics and reviewers who invoke CM when promoting an author's work. It never measures up. That's why there's McCarthy and then everyone else. With that said, I can see why Kennedy's novel is attached to CM. Like McCarthy, Kennedy is strong in bringing the reader in situ, with detailed and poetic descriptions of 1970's West Texas. Also, like CM's Texas noir No Country for Old Men, Presidio shares some stylistic similarities.
For a first novel, I think Presidio is a wonder. It has well-paced writing, an engaging story, and tension in the all the right places. I'll let the readers be the judge as to whether the ending is a fitting conclusion to the story line.
For me, as not only a lover of West Texas but of literature as well, I want to give kudos to Randy Kennedy for his first novel. I would definitely pick up his next work with the kind of quality he proffers to us in Presidio.
*The first criticism (somewhat humorous to me) is of the character, Johanna. Kennedy writes,"Johanna drove to El Paso by herself before sunup on Saturday morning, smoking the whole way." At this point Johanna is the wife a Southern Baptist pastor. As someone who grew up in the SBC of West Texas and has known literally hundreds of pastors over the last 20-plus years there, right or wrong, seeing the pastor's wife smoking a Marlboro in her new station wagon as she zips down the highway would've been downright scandalous and likely a fireable offense in small, puritanical, West Texas Baptist churches. Had this happened in real life back in the day, Johanna's husband would've had the deacons calling him on the phone first thing in the morning. My sense is that Baptist pastors' wives were either less given to the "sin of smoking" or much better at hiding it than Johanna. ;)
The second is that Aron's behavior at the conclusion (no spoilers) feels somewhat out of nowhere if not bizarre based on his character development.
As a passionate Cormac McCarthy fan (Note my name; All Hail, 'Blood Meridian'!), I'm always skeptical of critics and reviewers who invoke CM when promoting an author's work. It never measures up. That's why there's McCarthy and then everyone else. With that said, I can see why Kennedy's novel is attached to CM. Like McCarthy, Kennedy is strong in bringing the reader in situ, with detailed and poetic descriptions of 1970's West Texas. Also, like CM's Texas noir No Country for Old Men, Presidio shares some stylistic similarities.
For a first novel, I think Presidio is a wonder. It has well-paced writing, an engaging story, and tension in the all the right places. I'll let the readers be the judge as to whether the ending is a fitting conclusion to the story line.
For me, as not only a lover of West Texas but of literature as well, I want to give kudos to Randy Kennedy for his first novel. I would definitely pick up his next work with the kind of quality he proffers to us in Presidio.
*The first criticism (somewhat humorous to me) is of the character, Johanna. Kennedy writes,"Johanna drove to El Paso by herself before sunup on Saturday morning, smoking the whole way." At this point Johanna is the wife a Southern Baptist pastor. As someone who grew up in the SBC of West Texas and has known literally hundreds of pastors over the last 20-plus years there, right or wrong, seeing the pastor's wife smoking a Marlboro in her new station wagon as she zips down the highway would've been downright scandalous and likely a fireable offense in small, puritanical, West Texas Baptist churches. Had this happened in real life back in the day, Johanna's husband would've had the deacons calling him on the phone first thing in the morning. My sense is that Baptist pastors' wives were either less given to the "sin of smoking" or much better at hiding it than Johanna. ;)
The second is that Aron's behavior at the conclusion (no spoilers) feels somewhat out of nowhere if not bizarre based on his character development.
March 16, 2020
Presidio by Randy Kennedy.
Review by Galen Weitkamp.
As the novel begins police find a folder of notes in the glove box of a presumably stolen car. The first page begins, “Notes for the police: (Or anybody else who finds this and wants to read it). My name is Troy Alan Falconer.“
Troy is a car thief. But he is more and less than that. His notes indicate that he steals neither for profit nor sustenance; rather he chose this lifestyle in pursuit of a kind of freedom and solitude. The narrative shifts back and forth between Troy’s glove compartment diary and the present day, first focusing on the thoughts and activities of Troy, then Troy’s brother Harlan and finally on Martha Zacharias, a ten year old Mennonite girl with whom the two brothers find themselves accidentally partnered. The three of them are now desperately making their way to the town of Presidio on the Rio Grande leaving a string a stolen vehicles in their wake.
Presidio is a story about parents, childhood guilt, happenstance, choice and the cruel realities we sometimes create for ourselves and others; at least that’s my take on it. It is certainly a lonely, thought provoking analysis of the relationship between two brothers, a father and two sons and another father with his young, self-reliant daughter. Stark and clear, Presidio is well worth the read.
Review by Galen Weitkamp.
As the novel begins police find a folder of notes in the glove box of a presumably stolen car. The first page begins, “Notes for the police: (Or anybody else who finds this and wants to read it). My name is Troy Alan Falconer.“
Troy is a car thief. But he is more and less than that. His notes indicate that he steals neither for profit nor sustenance; rather he chose this lifestyle in pursuit of a kind of freedom and solitude. The narrative shifts back and forth between Troy’s glove compartment diary and the present day, first focusing on the thoughts and activities of Troy, then Troy’s brother Harlan and finally on Martha Zacharias, a ten year old Mennonite girl with whom the two brothers find themselves accidentally partnered. The three of them are now desperately making their way to the town of Presidio on the Rio Grande leaving a string a stolen vehicles in their wake.
Presidio is a story about parents, childhood guilt, happenstance, choice and the cruel realities we sometimes create for ourselves and others; at least that’s my take on it. It is certainly a lonely, thought provoking analysis of the relationship between two brothers, a father and two sons and another father with his young, self-reliant daughter. Stark and clear, Presidio is well worth the read.
July 11, 2018
“Presidio” by Randy Kennedy, published by Touchstone Books.
Category – Fiction/Literature Publication Date – August 21, 2018.
Troy Alan Falconer is and always has been a car thief. He wants no possessions and lives day to day by stealing cars. He haunts motels and outside of his brothers has no friends.
Although he hasn’t seen his brother for years he hooks up with him and they both, in a stolen car, head out looking for his brother’s wife who has left him and has taken what little money he had.
It is only after some time on the road that they discover a young Mennonite girl in the back seat covered by a blanket.
They make an effort to get rid of her but she insists that they take her to her father who is in prison. Unable to get rid of her they cross the Texas Panhandle and head for Mexico.
They spend their time hiding out, pursued by the police, trying to convince the girl to go home, and stealing more cars.
I found this novel to be uneven and difficult to follow as the scenes keep shifting as do the characters. I did like the writing but the story left a lot to be desired, especially the ending.
Category – Fiction/Literature Publication Date – August 21, 2018.
Troy Alan Falconer is and always has been a car thief. He wants no possessions and lives day to day by stealing cars. He haunts motels and outside of his brothers has no friends.
Although he hasn’t seen his brother for years he hooks up with him and they both, in a stolen car, head out looking for his brother’s wife who has left him and has taken what little money he had.
It is only after some time on the road that they discover a young Mennonite girl in the back seat covered by a blanket.
They make an effort to get rid of her but she insists that they take her to her father who is in prison. Unable to get rid of her they cross the Texas Panhandle and head for Mexico.
They spend their time hiding out, pursued by the police, trying to convince the girl to go home, and stealing more cars.
I found this novel to be uneven and difficult to follow as the scenes keep shifting as do the characters. I did like the writing but the story left a lot to be desired, especially the ending.
August 21, 2019
I’m giving this book three stars not for the story line but for the fact that it took place in the early 70’s and the author kept the narrative in tune with this time period. And geographically I learned some about the old country of New Mexico and Texas two places I have never been before which was some what interesting. But overall, the storyline was dull extremely slow moving. I didn’t find it an enjoyable read until the Mennonite girl is found in the back seat and her story line was more interesting. There wasn’t any form of climax to the plot until the very end and sadly it was finished before readers could actually get to enjoy it. It’s written with some knowledge of the area and not surprised the author is from one of the locations visited by the characters. But overall it wasn’t riveting nor did I enjoy the ending and I live to read books till their very end and this one was disappointing to say the least
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December 17, 2018One of those eerie stories in the noir tradition about lost men and women outside society, exiles by temperament and by circumstance. To read about them is both terrifying and exhilarating. A part of me cringes at the unearned good fortune, the sheer random good luck that separates me from them, that allows me to sit inside the walled community of “passably decent” society and peer out fearfully at the feral life they lead. Another part of me finds alluring the stubborn way they survive without the rules and structures I depend on. Could I do that? Would I be strong enough, agile enough? No way. I just read about it.
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May 29, 2020
For me, this book was a hot mess. It meandered all over the place, and jumped around from viewpoint to viewpoint. I kept waiting for something significant to happen, and it never did until the last chapter. And I'm still not sure how all of those characters ended up where they were.
A hard pass for me as far as investigating any other books by this author.
A hard pass for me as far as investigating any other books by this author.
July 11, 2020
I really enjoyed the book. It is really well written and has really interesting characters doing things I would never do. It is a road trip, noir, border fiction, Texana, and more, all rolled up into one. I guess the NY art world pays the bills, but I hope he keeps writing about his home state.
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