PAINTED HORSES

A mid-1950s oater that wants to come over all cowboy and sensitive at the same time.

Catherine Lemay, the heroine of Brooks’ debut, is a young archaeologist who’s seen the aftermath of war poking around in the rubble of London. John H—she thinks it could stand for “horses,” but “hell raiser” is a reasonable candidate—rides the Western fence line, following the mustangs. He’s known war up close, a member of the last American horse cavalry unit to see combat, fighting the Germans in Italy. It stands to reason that, Montana being a small state and all, they’ll meet and become intertwined like two wind-blasted strands of barbed wire. When Mr. H funs, he funs, but when he and Catherine get serious, well….There’s plenty to be serious about apart from sad reflections on the war, for a dam is coming to the coulee in which the mustangs run, and both Catherine and John H have to make a stand: Do they serve progress, or do they fight for what’s real about the West? Brooks does a good job of plotting, following parallel stories that speak to that large question through characters who are more than just symbols—though they’re that, too. There’s some fine writing here, especially when it comes to horses and the material culture that surrounds them, and when it comes to Western landscapes, too, for Brooks knows that in good Western writing, the land is always a character. There’s also some overwriting, along the lines of “[s]he wanted Audrey Williams to keep talking, wanted to know her story too, the fragments and pieces and the buried mysteries, wanted the whole vicarious treasure of it.” A little of that goes a long way, especially when Brooks places himself inside Catherine’s head—and, from time to time, elsewhere in her body.

It’s a sight better than The Bridges of Madison County, but it’s a kindred project: Boy meets girl under open sky, boy kisses girl, girl emotes, and then it’s a whole new shooting match.