Rating: 
Summary: I'm sorry, i hated it
Review: Let me state right now, i'm a 15 year old that had to read this novel for her summer project for english. I couldn't read more than two pages without falling asleep. The story had some good parts, but Ms. Cather, in my opinion, goes into side stories that don't add anything and in the long run nothing is accomplished but the missionary dying, after making some friends. I thought maybe I am too you to appriciate this book and maybe I'll try to read it later on in life when i dont' have a paper hovering over my head. So I apologize for offending anyone, I just don't recommend it if you're an average teenager
Rating: 
Summary: Sparse, beautiful, engaging, epic.....
Review: If you have ever been to New Mexico, it's easy to see it as stark, barren, devoid of life. But it is only after really savoring the landscape, becoming part of it, do you begin to fully understand. Willa Cather's 'Death Comes for the Archbishop' makes you feel the same way. On the surface it is a lightly written sketch of the missionary journeys of two Catholic priests in territorial New Mexico. But it is that simple life chronicled that brings the desert Sparse? Maybe. Beautiful? Definitely. But it is the very simplicity that draws you in. The two padres spend as much time on the road traveling between the small towns and villages of rugged New Mexico as they do ministering to their flock. Meeting renegade priests, Kit Carson, Indian settlements, criminals and horse thieves, and gold miners. In the end, we feel, with the Bishop as death approached, that we are leaving the past. We wait for the future to take care of itself.
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Summary: Like a Georgia O'Keeffe painting set to prose
Review: Willa Cather's "Death Comes for the Archbishop" is the story of two French American missionary priests, Father Jean Marie Latour and Father Joseph Vaillant, who are assigned by the Roman Catholic church to take command of the parishes of northern New Mexico in the middle of the Nineteenth Century. It is a lawless land of mostly Mexican and Native American inhabitants, recently seized by American occupation. Father Latour takes residence in Santa Fe, later becoming an Archbishop, and Father Vaillant goes to Albuquerque and later up to Colorado to establish a missionary church at Pike's Peak during the gold rush. The two priests build a religious foundation and provide spiritual and material aid for all the parishioners, rich and poor, devout and indifferent, Mexican, Indian, and American. Among the people they meet are the famous frontiersman Kit Carson, who takes charge of a Mexican girl on the run from her abusive, murderous husband, a couple of wealthy benefactors, and two friendly Indian guides, Jacinto and Eusabio, who educate them about tribal customs and superstitions. The priests also find themselves in dispute with two corrupt local priests, the licentious Father Martinez and the miserly Father Lucero. Unlike Sinclair Lewis's contemporary "Elmer Gantry," Cather's novel is about good, honest clergymen, and she keeps her story straightforward and free of cynicism. The solemn, austere existence of the priests is complemented perfectly by the beauty and innocence of the landscape. Cather's vivid, colorful descriptions of the Southwestern deserts, hills, and adobe houses are matchless and mesmerizing; the book is like a Georgia O'Keeffe painting set to prose.
Rating: 
Summary: Great historical novel
Review: Willa Cather's classic cracked this century's top 100 list at number 61. This book is about a French priest, Father Latour and his partner, Father Vaillant. Father Latour is instructed to take over the position of archbishop in the New Mexico territory during the period following the Civil War. This territory had many renegade (and not so godly) priests that had lost touch with Rome and had adopted pagan beliefs. In addition, the area was huge and made it a risky proposition for the priests to visit distant parishes. Together, Father Latour and Father Vaillant discover this new world and run into many challenges as they encounter a variety of characters. Ultimately, Father Latour and his wisdom make a difference in this territory that is lasting, even after his death. This book was similar to Larry McMurtry's, Lonesome Dove, in the fact that each book gives the reader a very close-up view of what the west was like in that period of time. Latour's experiences are chronicled in several novellas, some narrating about miracles. This book was pretty impressive and left me with a greater appreciation for what the missionaries went through when the New Mexico territory was being settled.
Rating: 
Summary: ultimately unsatisfying
Review: Father Jean Marie Latour comes to New Mexico in 1851 to reestablish the Church's control over the Catholic community in America's newly acquired South West. Over the next forty years, he & his cohorts battle the landscape, corruption and indifference to restore the place of the Church in the lives of the local Indians, Mexicans and Americans. This is a spare & simple story, which is both a strength and a weakness. Oddly missing from the tale are God and Jesus Christ. We admire the faith that sustains the priests in their work, but what is it that they have faith in? Why does this faith have the power to maintain them against all hardships? Because these questions remain unasked, let alone unanswered, the book is ultimately unsatisfying. GRADE: C
Rating:
Summary: Death Come for the Archbishop
Review: As a lover of the Southwest, I found it to be a fascinating and soothing depiction of the harsh landscapes and primitive lifestyles of the era. Written without a central plot, in the style of a journal, each story flowed easily into the next. It was a page-turner, but easy to put a bookmark into when it was time to fix dinner, knowing it could easily be resumed without having to refresh my memory regarding a plot. Good spiritual insights. I'll probably read it again the next time I'm sitting on the beach.
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Summary: Number One on my Top 10 list
Review: Willa Cather's works are more reminiscent of paintings than books. They are better described by words such a 'warm', 'vibrant' and 'rich' than by 'suspenseful', 'fascinating' or 'page-turner'. In "Death Comes for the Archbishop" she does to New Mexico with black ink what Georgia O'Keefe needed a whole palette of colors to do. "Death Comes for the Archbishop" is a multidimensional work skillfully woven together. On one hand Cather tells the story of New Mexico in the early days of its occupation by the United States and of the clash of two cultures trying, sometimes unsuccessfully, to get along. On the other hand it is a portrait of a life. It is the story of Father Latour, a French priest sent to Santa Fe by the church to serve as an impartial intermediary between the protestant Anglo government and the Mexican Catholic population. He leaves behind all that is dear to him and dedicates himself to a life of service in a distant outpost far from what he must have considered civilization. While it's true that the book may be 'episodic' or 'anecdotal', few of us recall our own lives as a smooth, day-to-day rendering. What we remember are the high points and low points of our lives, and so it is here. This is, after all, the story of the life, and death, of a man. If you read books just to find out how they end, I'll save you the trouble. He dies. But if you read to experience the world through the heart and eyes of a great author, this book is for you. And once you read it you will find that, for you, Father Latour, hasn't really died. He'll stay with you forever.
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Summary: From a former high school student's perspective
Review: In my AP English class, we were made to read many books. Some I liked, but many I didn't. This was my favorite. A great picture of Southwestern missionary work and the Southwest in general. I at first thought the book would be unenjoyable and bland, but it was great! Definitely the strongest of Willa Cather's that I have read, and well worth the time. Add it to my pile to carry with me at college!
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Summary: Cather's landscape of New Mexico
Review: When I first moved to New Mexico, I was told that two books were prerequisite for anybody new to the state: John Nichol's The Milagro Beanfield War and this book by Willa Cather. I first read Nichol's book and loved it, but procrastination set in and it has taken me almost twenty years to get to Death Comes for the Archbishop. After finishing the novel, I am uncertain as to whether its merits are in line with its reputation. The novel is based (some would say loosely) on the life of Archbishop Lamy and his efforts to increase the authority of the Roman Catholic Church in New Mexico after the Territory was ceded to the United States. As such, Cather paints the picture of a missionary church on the American frontier making in-roads into the native Mexican and Indian populations while increasing the reputation of the new Diocese in Santa Fe. The story telling is straightforward, written in unabashedly simple language with hagiographic tinges. Unfortunately, the characters of the novel are never developed (with the possible exception of Father Vaillant) and remain as either stolid churchmen or stereotyped parishioners. Indeed, the main character of the novel, Bishop Latour, is more similar to the statue of Lamy in front of the Santa Fe Cathedral than to any flesh and blood model. There are passages of profound beauty in the novel, especially when the author is expressing her own feelings about the special and un-definable qualities found in New Mexico. In these instances, the reader gets a vivid picture of the wide spaces, mountains and light that have captivated visitors and residents for centuries. However, I found the book to be episodic to a fault. The action jumps about, chronology is all but dismissed, and the novel never achieves a tightness which characterizes the great works; instead of a great novel, I was reminded of the "picturesque" novels so popular in 18th Century England.
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Summary: A Premier Landscape Novel
Review: Cather's historical novel is as serious and as peaceful as an amber-into-rust-into-rose sunset. The landscape itself has the richest characterization. She has crafted her prose in such a way as to give the land its own vitality and presence. If you like landscape art; if you stop at Scenic Overlooks on the highway; if you ever like to walk in the woods, the hills--just because--read this novel. Archbishop Latour, a Frenchman, has taken on the missionary work of creating a diocese in New Mexico Territory in the 1850's. Throughout his life's ministry, he encounters rogues, blackguards, ragmuffins, scalliwags, and ruthless soldiers, and then some simple saints, some lasting friends, and finally, death. When death finally does come, it brings his own peace, the restitution of justice. Cather writes lugubriously, moving from one anecdotal story to the next. But it is all against the backdrop of the land; when she is finished, the tapestry of the whole appears. Nice.
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