The Long, Long Trail

by Max Brand, Frederick Schiller Faust

Book by Brand, Max, Faust, Frederick Schiller

Genres: Westerns, Fiction

251 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

Frederick Schiller Faust (see also Frederick Faust), aka Frank Austin, George Owen Baxter, Walter C. Butler, George Challis, Evin Evan, Evan Evans, Frederick Faust, John Frederick, Frederick Frost, David Manning, Peter Henry Morland, Lee Bolt, Peter Dawson, Martin Dexter, Dennis Lawson, M.B., Hugh Owen, Nicholas Silver

Max Brand, one of America's most popular and prolific novelists and author of such enduring works as Destry Rides Again and the Doctor Kildare stories, died on the Italian front in 1944.

Reviews

[Louis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my first experience with Max Brand. Written early in his career, The Long, Long Trail works as a well-plotted archetypal western. Jess Dreer, the hero, rides alone and chances his freedom to perform a good deed, taking on a hired gun for a lovely young woman. Throw in a lawman who admires the outlaw he seeks to capture and it feels like the stereotypes are in place. Things are not so simple, though; the heroine is not the standard weak, helpless female but a headstrong, independent person in her own right. Why does it get ranked so low then? Brand's dialogue, that's why. This is one of those stories where everyone suffers from extreme diarrhea of the mouth. They talk more than a James Bond villain explaining his plot to control the world. Since this book is nearly 100 years old (published in 1921) and Brand wrote several other well-regarded westerns in his career, I'm going to chalk it up to his not having refined his writing style at that point. If I read another one of his books and it suffers from the same excessive talking, then my bookshelves won't be big enough for any more of him.

[Harron68 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to the audio book free libravox version of the LONG, LONG TRAIL. The plot is worth about 5 stars and the reading is good quality. What knocks down my star rating to "3" is the author's sheer verb-odacious prolixity.
The author, as described in the above brief bio, was incredibly prolific. The writing doesn't spare the horses in adding phrases either, making a sentence's beginning forgotten by its finish. Not an economical writer, as westerns go. Some others, like Zane Grey, write to the style of the era. More modern western authors such as Louis L'Amour, cut to the chase. Brand was astounding in daily writing output and alcohol input. I'd recommend "trail" with the warning the writing style isn't for everyone.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brand shows himself to be the equal of contemporary western writer Zane Grey when it comes to delivering a thrilling yarn. There's nothing here you haven't encountered in the genre before nor is Brand's prose particularly poetic or nuanced. Nonetheless this is a competently written and fairly enjoyable little western.