The Quick and the Dead Books

It was definitely a good read. The author did a great job developing the characters.

First off,to the Reader From Toronto above:the answer to your question is YES!Ms.Williams other works are just as wonderful as TQATD.Especially the novel, "Breaking and Entering",which is somewhat similar in feel.And the book of stories,"Taking Care",which is where I first discovered Williams work.And I do agree that this should have won the Pulitzer.But why should we expect those judges to ever think outside the box and use their imaginations-LOOSEN UP already!And I'm in agreement with the prior reviewer that Flannery O'Connor is Williams'obvious antecedent -an excellent model to follow,nuff said.

This is a darkly comedic novel by one of America's premiere writers of fiction. Reviewers have compared her to Flannery O'Connor and that comparison is valid in terms of originality and the ability to cut through the pretense of life and reveal what people do and what they think beneath the surface of convention. But Joy Williams does not have Flannery O'Connor's polished sense of story and structure; however she doesn't need it. She has instead an eagle's eye for detail and an awesome command of language. Her characters are alive with the quickness of life, its strange twists and turns, its Shakespearean absurdity and its banality and wonder. So insightful and so sharply rendered is her prose that it alone carries us along. Into the mouths of babes she puts words of wisdom and out the mouths of her everyday people emerge worldly philosophies.

Thus 8-year-old Emily Bliss Pickless, who likes to pour dirt on her head and to pretend she doesn't know how to read to see if adults will try to mislead her, observes, "You had to act dumb around adults, otherwise there was no point in being around them at all." Assessing her mother's new boyfriend, she concludes, "...mother lacked all discrimination when it came to men." (p. 167) When she has finished re-educating the proprietor of the stuffed animal/trophy museum, we find it shut down with her sign out front, accurately announcing, "CLOSED FOR RECONSIDERATION."

Thus Nurse Daisy, as she washes Freddie Fallow, an elderly 350-pound mountain of an old man (who had to be hoisted into the tub with the aid of block and tackle), muses, "Isn't water a remarkable element? It's exempt from getting wet. It's as exempt from getting wet as God is exempt from the passion of love." (p. 169) Or, "Birth is the cause of death," and "The set trap never tires of waiting." (p. 170) Or even, "Our capacity to do evil has nothing to do with our innocence." (p. 171) Or--most especially--her description of Freddie's impending death as, "the evaporation of your little droplet above the sea..." (p. 172)

This last is an echo of Buddhism that Williams wants to satirize, as she does through the person of the undead Ginger, whose husband Carter has taken a fancy to his gardener, Donald, who espouses trendy Eastern philosophies. She begins, "What's he doing tonight, out hand-pollinating something?" She goes on to say, "Slow white dudes studying Buddhism make me sick," and finishes up with, "I can just hear him. It's only death, Ginger. Everything is fine...Does he say, Thank you, Illusion, every time he manages to overcome some piddling obstacle in his silly life?"

Thus Joy Williams's characters are vehicles for the author's expressions and her starkly original slant on the living and the dead. But what Joy Williams does so well is that she plays fair. The words of quirky wisdom come not necessarily from characters who represent her own views, such as Alice and Emily (although sometimes they do) but they can even come from the most minor of her human creatures. Thus Ottolie "who resembled an iguana" tells Alice from her bed, "I never sleep, you know...Never. Someone sleeps for me. She lives in Nebraska." Ottolie adds, "Aksarben. That's where I get a lot of my people. You have to learn how to delegate tasks." (p. 117)

Some have criticized this novel as "structurally a mess." Not so. Williams has her own organizing mechanisms. Characters flow from one to another; incidents are connected by invisible synchronicities; people appear to further the plot, and then disappear, but they are melded into the psychological and atmospheric structure of the novel. One sees this in the rednecks who seem to appear just to finish off poor Ray of the slanted mouth, but actually they are essential fixtures of the landscape as they smoke dope and shotgun saguaros, observing that "Shooting felt good..." consisting in "the increase of one's power," or that "Paranoia is having all the facts." (p. 152)

Sometimes what is best about Joy Williams is the sheer dazzle of language. Thus the unrelenting Arizona sun is made manifest through metaphor: "The sun shone like oil upon the limousine's hood, which had been waxed to the shine of water." Or the boy Alice sees whose hair was "as white as glare." (pp. 303-304) And sometimes the best thing is her revelation of character with just a phrase or two. Thus we know what Annabel is like because she worries about things like running out of avocado butter or whether she can actually wear beige or not. On page 163 a waiter, who wore "white clinging plastic gloves" comes to life with just these words:

"Have a nice remainder of the rest of your life," the waiter said. "Gotta cough." He turned away.

Or the two loud women at a nearby table who "had poured sugar on their food so they wouldn't eat anymore."

People yearn for things that cannot be, and that is life. Thus Ginger yearns for Carter to renew their vows of love and for him to join her, but he prefers to conjoin with Donald. And Alice is strangely smitten with the tuxedo-wearing piano player who is (unknown to her, but Annabel sees this clearly) irrevocably gay. But some people do indeed find love or something akin, as the stuffed animal museum owner and his adored Pickless, or Carter with Donald, or Annabel and Paris. Or the "pretty lizard" with J.C.'s missing "Little Wonder."

"The Quick and the Dead" (Second Timothy: 4:1; also The Book of Common Prayer) is a work of art that finds its own structure, that reveals itself to us in its own way. It is a fascinating reading experience, alive and vital, a tour de force of language and character, a darkly comedic romp through the sunshine of our psyches.

Read the review by Matthew S.; I agree completely. I am amazed by all the 5 star reviews, so I must be missing something (like drugs). I got all the way through the book and took myself out for dinner as a treat for accomplishing the task. I give this book 1 star as there is no selection for 0 or, better yet, -1. I found the characters to be out from left field and behaving and thinking in ways far beyond their years. The book was not believable and was boring.

This is one of my favorite novels of all time. It is absolutely flawless - a deranged, bizarre trip into the heart of the desert and the mind's of the characters who populate that arid climate and their own internal, personal, emotionally devastating landscapes. Joy Williams creates a world of heartlessness, beauty, insincerity, twisted motivations, utterly believable and flawed characters, and the most quotable dialogue I've found in any book. This novel was up for the Pulitzer Prize in 2001 but Michael Chabon's "The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" took home the prize. Joy should have won, no question, but if she had to lose to someone I suppose I'm glad it was Mr. Chabon. Anyway, back to Joy - not only does she create a world of dazzling brilliance, she quite effectively mocks our modern culture and comes up with characters that are utterly distinct and memorable and also human - I dare anyone to read this novel and not find at least two characters they can strongly relate to and could mistake for themselves. Joy Williams, simply, is one of the best writers around, and this is one of the best things I've ever read. It's absolutely teeming with originality, genius ideas, and wonderful execution. I wish I'd written it. It's a novel that you don't so much read as experience, it's something that pulls you in with it's hooks and releases you, at the final page utterly changed. It will stick with you. I loaned out my hardback copy almost two years ago to my cousin, who is an English teacher, she's read it several times now and has yet to return it. I had to go out and buy another copy, just because I couldn't handle being without it for so long. When I first discovered this book, I carried it with me nearly everywhere I went, just wanting to keep the characters and the pages close within my reach - it's hard being away from this book, it's become a part of me, almost as vital and important as an organ. This book has a heart of it's own, and you can feel it beating below the surface, you can taste the blood and muscles and sweat when you read. It's simply impossible to describe the passion and art that are contained within these pages. I think everyone could benefit from reading this. It is the great American novel - it touches and comments upon nearly everything in our society that one can think of, it points out what is wrong, it so perfectly describes people and their personalities and actions and it even has elements of the supernatural. Yet for all of Joy William's sarcasm and harsh wit, she loves her characters and does not judge them. Ultimately, we may not be left with answers to every question, but we are left with hope, as delicious as honey from a thorn.

Never read it, but my dad wrote it

This book took me to the depths of boredom. The characters are all to typical and predictable. The story is mundane and without meaning. The author should get out of the bussiness. Although, the book does serve as a fine paperweight.

Southern literature tends to be stamped with the obsessions of William Faulkner: doomed and crazy families, legacies of guilt and grudges. The Quick and the Dead maintains that tradition. Wilson chronicles tribal hatred in an Alabama hill-country clan headed by a self-taught itinerant preacher, Robert Treadwell, who speaks in earthy parables and commits self-mutiliation. The book begins and ends with fireball confrontations between the evangelist and his firstborn son, recalled by another son, Luke. The rest, rich in incident, sounds the depths of sexual betrayal and despair. Treadwell calls himself a storyteller, a term that provides a sly, apt link between novelist and revivalist. Each, Wilson suggest, is trying in his way to explain the randon nature of fate. In both the father's febrile sermons and, in the son's cool observations, there is no justice, no fairness. There is, however, the restless energy of a fine writer.

This exciting novel shows the South of the 40's and 50's edging toward secularism. For a short time, Robert Treadwell, a fundamentalist with a violent temper, fuses two Southern traditions -- storytelling and preaching -- into a charismatic ministry among the hill people by telling them contemporary versions of New Testament parables. Before his ministry begins, however, Robert's fanaticism has led to the death of one of his twin sons, and later causes his younger son to be beaten up by bullies, and his oldest son, Will, to retaliate against Robert and then to die. The surviving twin, Luke, narrates parts of the novel. Luke, who can't accept his father's religious mania, nevertheless is haunted by visions of his dead twin, intimations of the "community of the quick and the dead, that those of us alive should could the dead among us, as the dead, I assumed in a spaceless, timeless realm, numbered us among them." Elizabeth, the other narrator, seeks spiritual fulfillment, first through dance and music, then through missionary work as Robert Treadwell's earliest disciple, and fainnly through the flesh with her dead sister's husband, the sensualist Will Treadwell. "The Quick and the Dead" is eloqunet on the anquish of reaching spiritual understanding . . . .

Carol Ames, The New York Times, August 8, 1986

This is a really great, and thoroughly sad book about what happened in Bosnia in the early-mid 90's during the war. It focuses primarily on Sarajevo and it's time under siege by the Serbs. Janine Di Giovanni adds the element of peoples' personal stories and struggles during the war (and after, for some), which helps really bring it a lot closer and puts a face on what people were actually going through, and how the horrors of war affected them. They are also her personal stories as well. She did cover what happened in a few other towns outside of Sarajevo as well, in particular, Mostar, the city of a once beautiful and age-old bridge.
It concentrates almost entirely on the experiences of the Bosnian-Muslim population, since they were the ones under siege in Sarajevo. She does mention a few encounters with Serbs, none positive.
Another element I really am glad she included, was some of the history, as cursory as it was and had to be for such short book, it was enough gain a very basic understanding of what happened and a slightly better idea why.
Finally, she brings in the point that the world stood by so long and watched what was happening, and what human beings, once again, and tragically so, were doing to each other. She makes it so personal, to our benefit, so it's not just news anymore, ordinary people, like you and me, in extrodinary circumstances, and it made me wonder what it would have been like had it been me and family and friends suffering.

The Quick and the Dead by Willa Marsh - I found this book to be and excellant read. Twists and turns abound yet the book is easily understood and gives quick gratification to the reader. If you aren't a reader who likes to spend days sorting out characters but still loves a great diversion from you everyday life now and then, this book is for you. If you do love in depth characters and long twisting plots, you will enjoy this as a break from longer novels yet still be entertained and intrigued. It's a great read. Enjoy!

Oh look -- someone strung together a series of cliches and called it a novel. Randomly citing mainstream opinions of the Viet Nam war, the much-touted personal perspective this author had in Special Forces-style missions, and scenes lifted whole cloth from both "Apocalypse Now" and mainstream romance and detective novels, this book is an unthreatening little read that goes absolutely nowhere. I would recommend this to someone needing to start a fire.

I guess I like cliches. I thought this book was extremely well written. I have a friend that was a LRRP in Vietnam around 1971 and read him parts of the book. He always complains if things are not accurate or real, in books that are about the Vietnam war, and he also liked this book. I didn't notice the inconsistencies the other reviewer wrote about so it didn't bother me. I just loved the way the author wrote. I felt like I was there. He puts so much emotion behind the story. The feelings that he writes about on killing and fear agree with other books I have read and veterans that I have talked to. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in war or Vietnam.

I don't know what C.Blanc, R.O. Despain, and Alan C.
Catlin think they are doing with their reviews of
Eickhoff's work, But their reviews remind me of
someone who is a wannabe reviewer and doesn't have the
intellectual capacity to be one. Unfortunately,
comments like these idiots are unwarranted. THE QUICK
AND THE DEAD is a wonderful read and, from others with
whom I have shared the work, seamless and flawless.
Several other reviews have praised Eickhoff for his
accuracy and truthfulness as a storyteller. Blanc,
Despain, and Catlin appear to be looking for works to
denigrate through their stupidity

Somewhere in this derivative but, vivid novel, is a great movie. Too bad that movie has already been made by someone else. Whole scenes are lifted from The Director's Cut of Apocalypse Now! He even resorts to using dialogue directly from his source. Am I the only one who noticed this? Catman

Cassidy's treatment on gunfighting is an excellent primer and an important historical text on pistolcraft. This book is the overall combined effort and experience of many combative and pistol experts of the time like Fairbairn, Sykes, Applegate, Askins, Cooper and Jordan; a lot of perspectives are detailed in this book.

Today there is lot of disputes over "point shooting", the topic can get as hot as what the best pistol round is; 9mm or 45 caliber. With that I am not recommending point shooting over other methods, but it always wise to be aware and familiar with other techniques in your bag of tricks as a professional gunfighter.

This book is divided into two distinct sections. The first section is the longer of the two and deals with pistolcraft; techniques of fire and close quarters shooting. Also covered throughout this section is information about pistol traditions, combat methods and various personalities of the time. In the seconded section titled "practice" the author offers courses of fire in combat shooting.

Overall I found this book to be an important historical text worth to be studied by today's modern gunfighters.

This is not good Mitchell - instead, it is more reminiscent of Dorothy Sayers and Umberto Eco on a literary binge with crime only peripherally involved.

The plot concerns the murders of five women in the New Forest - murders committed by one of three people. The murderer's identity is revealed a quarter through the book, so there is no surprise. (Note: in one of Mitchell's best books of the 1970s, Fault in the Structure, the killer's identity is known from the beginning). On the girls' bodies are notes written by the killer - notes to do with various religious heretics who were put to death for their beliefs. (This is where Eco and Sayers come in - Eco, however, is interested in knowledge for its own sake rather than as a way of showing-off as it is with Sayers.)

The book is a fairly sub-standard 'cosy', very different from Mitchell's normal work - and not really worth the bother. The plot is dull, the detection is dull, the murderer is obvious (and dull), and even Mrs. Bradley is dull. Tired Mitchell. Thankfully, her imagination picked up with her next book, Dance to Your Daddy (1969).

The artist's rendition of the actors are fine, but almost all of the humor that made the movie watchable and interesting are drained down to nothing. A lot of it has to do with film and timing, which isn't present in a graphic novel.

I bought this largely for the "deleted" scenes. I knew there were some scenes involving Mary the checkout girl and others in comic form, and I was hoping they would be in this volue. No, what's here is pretty much what you saw in the movie with some of the scenes shortened. They problematically weed out some of those moments that made the movie a great mix of smart and dumb humor. Ed's "prediction" speech from the bar is gone, as his is "got wood" shirt. Pete's deconstruction of Shaun's life that leads to a lot of his attempts is gone. The two walks to the store are essentially gone (including the second one's excellent descent into ignorance no matter what). A lot of the background gags (news stations showing men in biohazard suits while Shaun looks away, for instance, or people coughing on the bus) have been overlooked, though a few new ones are in place and the timing on a lot of the jokes probably wouldn't make sense to you if you haven't seen the movie already. All in all it keeps the big story well and intact, cuts out a lot of the "drawn out" sections of the movie, and offers a few new little visuals (zombie neighbor waving sort of things, single panel additions, unless my mind is warped and I am overlooking the deleted scenes that are put back in) but really doesn't equal the completeness of the original movie. The only real plus, here, are the extras. The covers and the "pin ups" included at the back are quite well done and warrant an extra star from me on their own (hence the 4 stars instead of 3).

Well when I first got this book, I was expecting information on how to use Ghost hunters as enemies in an adventure. While the info is there, most of the book (95% of it) is devoted to playing a ghost hunter. Not a bad idea if most of the organisations weren't incredibly boring. There is a few gems here and there. The Benandanti, for example, are great in any adventure. But bright spots aside this book was a letdown. Your better of with Mediums: Speakers with the Dead. Overall a much better book.