Clive Sinclairs True Tales of the Wild West

Another find from the Fiction section of the library - What struck me was the elaboration he uses in the stories. You need to pay attention when you read Clive Sinclairs short stories. for a couple of pages you can drift, he even includes photos, then he'll have you reaching back for an allusion to a character that you nearly missed.

I enjoyed the second story in the book - Calamity Jane turns the tables even more than the first one about Custers last stand and wounded knee. And of course its hard to tell where the autobiography stops and the fictionalising begins. The hint at the start of the story that the Observer/Artist and Subject/Model roles interact takes on a rather surprising turn at the end, and I'm looking forward to more convolutions of character and observer in the next section

so a 5 star find for me - Clive Sinclair - i suppose its a style of literature i like - Annie Proulx, Murakami and David Mitchell all seem in a similar vein



and a quick postscript. Ive kept up the 19th Century reading as well. This evening i made it half way through a Henry James short story published in "the Yellow Book 1894 called "the Death of the Lion". This one is hard work not only because im reading a facsimile edition as a PDF. the language really doesnt say much at all. You have to work out the drama almost as a side issue. The style is so allusional so many references i couldnt understand - i suppose thats what attracts me to it is the attention it needs