Rating: 
Summary: Try the Taltos books instead
Review: I got this one in high school. I pledge to really finish it every so often, and I fail every time. It's annoying on several levels: the forced "ooh, a joint named after a Chinese cowboy selling kosher food served with Celtic-y folk music, how totally kooky and original!" vibe that permeates EVERY SINGLE SENTENCE; the annoying in-crowd folk-music references (I don't have anything against folk music, but I don't like books wherein any group of people toss around references that the author is clearly putting in to confound the reader with his superior knowledge of something--"oh, you didn't know that already?"); and frankly the protagonist/narrator was just unpinpointably obnoxious.
We're not even going to talk about the sex scenes.
After this and "The Sun, the Moon, and the Stars" I was ready to throw him to the wolves. I specifically picked up "Jhereg" last night in a bookstore to settle in for some snarking. Imagine my surprise when it swept me away. Damn, he can write! I liked it so much I bought it on the spot. "Cowboy" is a massive waste of time and I'm sorry it was the first of his I picked up. Go for the Taltos books, so far they're great.
Rating: 
Summary: Brust at his best
Review: I love this book! I can't believe it's out of print! I've taken to stockpiling Brust novels; they seem to come and go...The timeshifts--both literal and Faulknerian--keep this book fast and exciting. I love the casual descriptions of how the worlds change farther from Earth, the crack about how Star Trek still exists several centuries later, the really creepy ideas about irrational fear of AIDS, and, of course, the mystery of Who Is Cowboy Feng????? Brust nails the details (just like in the Vlad books, whose timeline is so well worked out that the first books refers to events that aren't explained for years), giving subtle hints about Sugar Bear and Cowboy Feng, so that when he does finally tell us, the resolution is incredibly satisfying, like being shown pieces of a jigsaw puzzle one at a time before finally seeing the whole.
Rating:
Summary: Who are you? What have you done with the REAL Steven Brust?
Review: I picked up this book in a mass of used paperbacks long before I'd read any of Brust's other works. The cover art and cover copy made it look like Spider Robinson's Callahan books or Clarke's "Tales of The White Hart" -- lighthearted tall tales at a bar where reality is not what it seems and the bartender may be from another dimension. Later I got around to reading a Brust novel -- "Jhereg" -- and wound up working through most of his published output in a summer. I was running out of new ones, and I thought "Cowboy Feng" would be a particular treat. Not at all. The wandering spaceport bar is 'powered' in its time travel by the nuclear obliteration of each city it visits, a fact which bothers the flatly-written cast of bar employees some but not nearly enough. There's an AIDS-like infectious disease on every world, though both its symptoms and its origins are never made clear. There's a conspiracy spread through time and space, and its behavior makes sense only if every single conspirator is clinically insane. There's a force opposing the conspiracy, and they don't make a whole lot of sense either. There's a shocker twist ending, and you're very unlikely to care. A few of the between-chapter character studies of musicians are up to Brust's usual standard of prose, but in general this book appears to have been written by someone else with the same name.
Rating:
Summary: one of the best
Review: I was brought to this book through Steven Brust's Taltos series, thinking they were good; how about this? Cowboy Feng impressed me even more, and I began to see that Mr. Brust not only knows how to build suspense and weave a tight plot, but infuse a story with insight into human nature and relationships. It's sci-fi and it's good sci-fi, but it's the emotional rollercoaster that makes it worth the ride. Add to that great descriptive writing, dialogue, and plotting that doesn't show you what's coming, only makes you want to get there (but not in a hurry).
Rating:
Summary: Umm...
Review: I'm 23... I get bored when EVERYONE has the " may care" attitude that allows them to not ask questions about what's going on (and go outside when they know that could mean death). I'm halfway through. I will finish this book, but I don't know why. I was hoping it would be funny... instead it seems to be about a bunch of BORING slackers who obsess about substandard music and food.
Rating:
Summary: Umm...
Review: I'm 23... I get bored when EVERYONE has the " may care" attitude that allows them to not ask questions about what's going on (and go outside when they know that could mean death). I'm halfway through. I will finish this book, but I don't know why. I was hoping it would be funny... instead it seems to be about a bunch of BORING slackers who obsess about substandard music and food.
Rating:
Summary: If you like Callahan's, you'll like Cowboy Feng's
Review: I'm reviewing this to balance the one and two star reviews. This is only my second Brust book, and I enjoyed it a lot. I got it for its cover that reminded me of Robinson's Callahan books. There are similarities. Both have a lot of humor, both are out to save the universe with who finds their way to the bar, both are both "little" and "big" stories. But Brust's is a novel and is able to give more time to character development, not just to the musicians, as one reviewer put it, but everyone who is part of the story. The intermezzos between chapters describing how characters got from here to there were fascinating. Brust also has an interesting plot device. I recommend it, and I'd drink there in a flash. (And hear great Irish music!)
Rating:
Summary: Brust does Spider Robinson?
Review: In "Cowboy Feng's", Stephen Brust tries a variation on his usual fantasy subject areas, twisting towards science fiction, and succeeds admirably. Although this is a stand-alone volume, it brings to mind Spider Robinson's "Callahan's" series. Brust capitalizes on his strength in first-person narration, and keeps the reader guessing through this short volume. A must for fans of Brust, this volume also works well for new-comers. Nicely done.
Rating:
Summary: Brust does Spider Robinson?
Review: In "Cowboy Feng's", Stephen Brust tries a variation on his usual fantasy subject areas, twisting towards science fiction, and succeeds admirably. Although this is a stand-alone volume, it brings to mind Spider Robinson's "Callahan's" series. Brust capitalizes on his strength in first-person narration, and keeps the reader guessing through this short volume. A must for fans of Brust, this volume also works well for new-comers. Nicely done.
Rating:
Summary: Grr
Review: It took every ounce of effort to finish this one. I was stuck on page 115 for about three weeks and finally it was either throw it away or finish. I finished, it was painful in parts, slightly entertaining in others. It was just very hard to read. (And you must endure constant Irish folk music descriptions every few pages that add nothing to the book.) So now that it is finished it is in the recycle bin. I am much relieved.
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