Close Range: An Unabridged Collection of Wyoming Stories

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and provocative
Review: No other author lays claim to this domain and no other author could do it justice. Trenchant and unmerciful, there is a continually unexpected sense of finality and perfection to the stories. The absence of a "feminist" tangent appears to have put off other reviewers here at amazon.I found the work strongly sensual and very sexy.

Rating:
Summary: Not endorsed by the Wyoming Tourist Board
Review: Be glad you don't have to live in Proulx's Wyoming. Full of empty, philandering men with shady pasts and desperate women who have a habit of dying of unnatural causes. Every ranch is going under, every rancher is on the edge of going down with it. Proulx is like a rocking chair storyteller on a porch whose tales have to end with death or heartbreak or bleakness because this is what her audience expects of her. Rural legends, I'd call them. Proulx's a bit of a sad sack cynic, but she makes you want to be a part of her world. She calls up man's darker side and you know you could be that bull rider or bar girl with a wildness in the eye and a fatal urge to die...

Rating:
Summary: Vintage Proulx
Review: Not everyone can stomach the stark poetic insights of Ms. Proulx. I read a great deal, and am convinced that her writings rank among the best. Her short stories thoroughly capture the spirit of the human heart. A lot of this is not particularly pretty. She never promises redemption or closure. "Close Range" is superior to "Shipping News" because it is closer to the realities of the human spirit. If you insist on tight, neatly tied up O'Henry type stories, please avoid this book. Otherwise, accept the brilliant lyricism of this song of life.

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Summary: Vomitous stories well crafted.
Review: Annie Proulx is a master wordsmith. Her "Close Range" abounds with a unique talent for quick-sketched technicolor mind paintings. No other author comes close to her compelling style. Yet the yarns she spins in Close Range describe a Wyoming ranch life totally foreign to this '30s ranch-raised vaquero whose memories are breach-loaded with hard-working, straight-shooting, honorable men and women who wouldn't stoop to the four-letter vocabulary so generously woven throughout this book. Except, perhaps, the single truncated four-letter contraction of "manure" which cannot be ignored by ranch hands. The stories range from depressing to disgusting, yet altogether well told.

Rating:
Summary: grisly
Review: I read and loved Shipping News but was not prepared for this book. I read 3 stories, each more grisly and disturbing than the last, and decided to write a review as a warning.

Rating:
Summary: Only in my wildest dreams could I ever write this well.
Review: "Close Range" is an extraordinary collection of stories, written by one of the most talented authors of this century. The book is framed by the two best stories, "The Half-Skinned Steer" and "Brokeback Mountain." The latter was my favorite; my heart literally ached while I read and re-read the sad, sweet tale of two cowboys with a forbidden love for one another. The rest is vintage Proulx with her powerful use of metaphor and an in-your-face style juxtaposed with prose that is so strong and gorgeous that it takes my breath away.

Rating:
Summary: Dark, ugly, should be thrown away at once!
Review: The story (I only would waste my time on the 1st one) is depressing, filled with ugly images and stupid people -- bears no resemblance to any real Wyoming people or attitudes. I have lived here over 60 years and find both the people and the scenery uplifting and positive. She should get a better attitude about life before she vomits her vile thoughts on an unsuspecting reader/listener.

Rating:
Summary: One of today's best short story authors!
Review: Annie Proulx, with her "CLOSE RANGE", proves herself a master at the art of writing short stories. The tales told here are not "novel creations", rather real people who still live in the Old West as their forebearers before them. Trapped by circumstance, family, whatever, Annie's residents of Wyoming give us a hard look at a hard life. Any one of these stories would make a bestseller, standing alone and tens of thousands of extra words. Annie's true gift is to convey a myriad of emotions with a brevity of words, never sacrficing the story's true power.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful. Imagery you can almost taste.
Review: What a marvelous writer. Her use of language to paint a picture, set a scene, describe a character, is terrific. After a single sentence, you KNOW the character being described.

Rating:
Summary: Not even close
Review: This poorly written collection of cartoon-esque stories and characters defies the reader to continue. It is a twisted take on "Western" writing that could only have come from an Eastern greenhorn.