Rating: 
Summary: Rather Intolerable
Review: I tend to regard myself as an appreciative and patient reader, but there are times I'm simply compelled to share my thoughts on a bad read. This is nothing like the "Shipping News", which I rather enjoyed after a second read. In contrast, "That Old Ace in the Hole" is a beat-around-the-bush tale that digresses from one pointless sub-story to another. There are so many characters in the book that do not establish any permanent connection with the reader -- even Bob Dollar, the protagonist, appears only once every few chapters and mutters a few words, period. In addition, the story is *slow*. You'll need to plough through more than 80 pages before the story starts to pick up. In essence, Bob's a fresh grad working for an evil conglomerate looking to con good ole folks from their land but in between, we get Sherriff So-and-So, the Pioneer Fronk and a slew of idiosyncratic characters -- all happily grating on your frayed nerves. Was Annie trying to paint a rich history of the Texas panhandle? I can only speculate. The sad fact is that all these "noises" are distracting (to say the least) and work against the fluidity of the book. I would've perservered to the end, but with so many other good books out there, leaving this one on the shelf wasn't the hardest thing to do.
Rating:
Summary: Rather Intolerable
Review: I tend to regard myself as an appreciative and patient reader, but there are times I'm simply compelled to share my thoughts on a bad read. This is nothing like the "Shipping News", which I rather enjoyed after a second read. In contrast, "That Old Ace in the Hole" is a beat-around-the-bush tale that digresses from one pointless sub-story to another. There are so many characters in the book that do not establish any permanent connection with the reader -- even Bob Dollar, the protagonist, appears only once every few chapters and mutters a few words, period. In addition, the story is *slow*. You'll need to plough through more than 80 pages before the story starts to pick up. In essence, Bob's a fresh grad working for an evil conglomerate looking to con good ole folks from their land but in between, we get Sherriff So-and-So, the Pioneer Fronk and a slew of idiosyncratic characters -- all happily grating on your frayed nerves. Was Annie trying to paint a rich history of the Texas panhandle? I can only speculate. The sad fact is that all these "noises" are distracting (to say the least) and work against the fluidity of the book. I would've perservered to the end, but with so many other good books out there, leaving this one on the shelf wasn't the hardest thing to do.
Rating: 
Summary: Try audio!
Review: I've greatly enjoyed Proulx's earlier books but was lucky in this case to get the audio version of it. It's not a great book by far, not one of her best, but it has a wonderful sense of place. The audio version is read by Arliss Howard who gets the accents just about right. A book which might have seemed a bit overwritten on the page (the reason for a four-star rating) is great good fun when read aloud by an actor as deft and humorous as Howard. I'd warmly recommend listening to this book.
Rating:
Summary: A disappointing effort from an author who has written better
Review: It's not fair, of course --- a writer has to move on. Annie Proulx cannot be expected to settle permanently into the sad and harshly beautiful Newfoundland coast that served as both setting and character for her masterpiece, THE SHIPPING NEWS. And yet, THAT OLD ACE IN THE HOLE, Proulx's valentine to the quirky stalwarts of the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles, can't help but disappoint in part for falling so far short of her award-winning 1993 novel. The parallels between the two books scream for comparison. Both center on good-hearted but ineffectual men stumbling toward something unpromising in the distance that turns out to be a life. Both books celebrate the dignity and eccentricity of a rural area and the people who inhabit it. In both, place trumps plot by an Oklahoma mile. Unfortunately, the newer novel lacks both the compelling protagonist and the quietly powerful narrative arc of the older book. THAT OLD ACE IN THE HOLE begins as Bob Dollar, a 25-year-old junior college graduate from Denver who is unsure of his career ambitions, takes a job scouting land in the panhandles for Global Pork Rind. Pork farming, we learn early and are constantly reminded, is nasty business --- filling the air for miles with noxious fumes, providing few jobs and forcing the pigs to live out their short lives in a way that offends even people who know how it feels to kill their own supper. Global Pork Rind makes too clear a villain to provide any moral tension. The reader never gets the pleasure of questioning, even for a moment, whose side to take. The story stretches out like a long car ride through the dusty Southwest. Bob, who follows orders from his employer by lying about his affiliation, ingratiates himself to the good people of Woolybucket, Texas. They are a predictably colorful group --- insular and set in their ways, but also admirably tenacious and willing to welcome Bob into their community once he scales their initial suspicions. As always, Proulx displays an uncanny ear for dialect and an eye for local custom. The rhythms and idiosyncrasies of Woolybucket feel real. Bob is a guileless sort, uneasy with the lying and unenthusiastic about his mission. It's no surprise when he fails to score any land for his company. The only real surprise is that he sticks with the job as long as he does. And that's the problem with Bob --- he can't seem to take action. He remains, even at the end, propelled more by happenstance than purpose. Proulx hasn't lost her voice. THAT OLD ACE IN THE HOLE bursts with the eloquent descriptions of the natural world that are her trademark. "It was all flat expanse and wide sky. Two coyotes looking for afterbirths trotted through a pasture to the east, moving through fluid grass, the sun backlighting their fur in such a way that they appeared to have silver linings. Irrigated circles of winter wheat, dotted with stocker calves, grew on land as level as a runway. In other fields, tractors lashed tails of dust." It feels almost petulant to criticize a book that offers images as fresh and apt as this: "In the fallen windmills and collapsed outbuildings he saw the country's fractured past scattered about like pencils on the desk of a draughtsman who has gone to lunch." But language alone, no matter how pleasing it may be, is not enough. Readers slogging through hot, languid Texas days with Bob Dollar are likely to long for a bracing gust of Newfoundland cold. --- Reviewed by Karen Jenkins Holt
Rating: 
Summary: Uuuugh!
Review: My husband & I read books aloud to each other, & have been "working" on this novel since the beginning of the year. We are about 30 pages from the end, & just can't seem to gather the strength to want to finish it. Unlike The Shipping News & The Accordian Tales (which we absolutely loved), Ace in the Hole is filled with shallow, unlikeable characters (with silly names), rediculous side stories (a CD of songs performed by passing wind???), the obligatory, predictable incest, & painfully predictable plot twists - which adds up to the most boring 384 pages ever put into print. We are obviously resentful of this waste of our time. If you're dying to read this thing, buy it used or go to the library.
Rating: 
Summary: Just like the real thing
Review: My step mom is from the panhandle in Texas, and I grew up travelling across that God-forsaken country from Southern California and back again; experiencing grit-filled wind storms, freak snow, termites that brought the house down, pigeon shoots off the back of a tractor hoe, cotton bale jumping, learning how to drive on some ol' Texan back road into and out of ditches, Elvis Xmas songs, the best damned biscuits and gravy you EVER had, and more relatives with names like Proulx invented for this novel than you'd care to believe.
This book brought it all back to me, fresh and oil stained to its' very roots. The characters are wonderfully kooky (and thus in my mind's eye, very realistic- you just can't make people up like the ones who live in Texas!), and the story unfolds as only a true Proulx does: it meanders and crosses over story line to story line, until at the very end, you are happy to leave these folks to their fictional lives, knowing they'll be just fine, ma'am...
Thanks again for some more fine reading, and for capturing so well the true Panhandle sprit. I look forward to whatever comes next!
Rating:
Summary: Who knew?!
Review: No modern writer is better than Annie Proulx at describing brutal environments and tragic characters. Who knew she could also present a wry, rollicking work of humor that keeps the chuckles coming from beginning to end? With this joyously fun novel Proulx widens the range of her talents and gives readers even more reason to eagerly await her next offering.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant Modern Literature
Review: Once again, Annie has managed to capture a picture of a region. Her descriptiveness is so complete and detailed, yet not in the least boring, that one is drawn back to the book until it is finished. Annie shows real life on the Texas and Oklahoma panhandle, not just the scenery or a few characters, but the entire panarama and the true feelings, emotions and perceptions of those who spent generations in the panhandle. Annie also does something that few authors do as well as she does. She writes wonderful dialogue. But not just plain old dialogue, but dialogue in dialect. To do this with authenticism is very difficult, but Annie does it like it is just another note on the refrigerator. Annie shows a true brilliance for modern day fictional literature and no one who has a love for the genre should go without reading this book, as well as her others.
Rating:
Summary: an enjoyable read
Review: Pleasant reading, includes lots of interesting characters, and the book drifts along enjoyably. The plot is not as interesting as the people you meet in this book.
Rating:
Summary: happy ending
Review: proulx writes of believable people, events, and quandries. after reading "open range" with some sad stories of life hitting hard i was happy to pick up the beautiful prose in a happy story. the ending leaves me wishing it was non-fiction and that i could pick up something that would enable me to move to the texas panhandle (and i don't like texas). although this novel does remain true to showing that people aren't perfect, it definately leaves me with a positive feeling about people rather than some of her previous more sorrowful works.
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