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Monday, August 31, 2009

Books Onward to Indifference!

Posted by Paul Constant on Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 3:07 PM

Slog tipper Matthew writes:

Are you familiar with the late 1970s mass market infatuation with historical pulp-ee stories? From the White Indian to John Jakes - there was a whole company outfitted to take advantage of the Bicentennial in 1976? Those books today make up the bulk of the non-romance fiction found at most Thrift Centers.

Matthew is talking about books by Donald Clayton Porter (sample titles: Apache, Spirit Knife, and Creek Thunder), and Dana Fuller Ross. Ross is the pseudonym for several authors who wrote pretty standard Oregon-Trail-style novels. They all followed pretty basic plots: Some stock characters find danger (Damned Native Americans! Troublesome pumas!) and romance in their journey west, but eventually everything ends well. Here were some titles by Ross: Nebraska!, Texas!, Illinois!, Washington!, and Montana! Here are books that appeared in the Wagons West Frontier Trilogy: Westward!, Expedition, and Outpost! I had read one or two of these books—when you spend your youth hitting up 25-cent bargain bins at used bookstores, you become familiar with a wide variety of shitty fiction—and remember them as so bland that they were instantly forgettable.

Well, Matthew noticed, in his local Idaho bookstore, that Pinnacle is reissuing the Ross titles this fall and packaging them to go in the historical romance section of bookstores. They aren't available on the Kindle yet, but just you wait. This ensures that a whole new generation of readers will stumble into mediocrity and then forget all about the experience. At least books by Louis Lamour and Zane Grey (the major two western novelists who remain in print, despite the decimation of their once-popular genre) were so frequently awful that they had a sort of cheap-movie charm to them. These Ross books turn to mist as you read them.

All of which goes to say absolutely nothing except that literary immortality comes way too fucking easily. Thanks to Matthew for the stroll down memory lane.

Comments (17) RSS

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Those are nearly as bad as Anthony Bordain's trip to my hometown on Without Reservations last week: I could only watch 20 minutes before I wanted to scream at how fucking wrong his portrayal of life there is like.

If you want the written version: feel free to read these horrid novels.

Posted by Cato the Younger Younger on August 31, 2009 at 3:13 PM

I remember those. There was also a series very similar to those aimed at preteen/teenage girls called Sunfire. They were set in all different time periods (the most ocntemporary I can remember is the 1920's women's suffrage movement), but the vast majority were frontier-type settings.

Looking back they were formulaic nonsense, but boy did I love them when I was in junior high.

Posted by Sheryl on August 31, 2009 at 3:21 PM

Out of curiosity, what's your hometown, Cato?

Posted by jw36 on August 31, 2009 at 3:21 PM

I learned more about American history from John Jakes' books than from any classes I attended.

Posted by El Cabong on August 31, 2009 at 3:29 PM

I remember these. . . "Seven Alone" (not "Little House" callibre for sure) for putative adults. Book covers reaching similar heights of ugliness and dullness possible only between 1978 and 1994. I'm not sure I ever saw one of these new, but they flooded Goodwills for years.

Posted by Stace

on August 31, 2009 at 3:37 PM

My grandmother tried to make me cover up the cover of John Jake's The Bastard...the title gave her conniptions.

Posted by michael strangeways

on August 31, 2009 at 3:50 PM

@2: Ah, the Sunfire books. You'd obsessively look for the one with your name on it and then read it in hopes that it would be amazing, but it never was. At least Sweet Valley High had rich bitches and bastards and surfing, all Sunfire had was equally shitty writing and the most boring protagonists in existence.

Posted by Jessica on August 31, 2009 at 4:01 PM

Paul, are you telling us that the romance section of the bookstore is about to become inundated with a series of mediocre, cookie-cutter books with paper-thin plots and cardboard characters?

The genre is ruined! RUINED!

Posted by Wicked Virgin

on August 31, 2009 at 4:01 PM

@7 - See, I hated Sweet Valley High. I think you were either a Sunfire/Girls of Canby Hall person or a Sweet Valley High person. Never the twain shall meet. I wonder if it is because, for all intents and purposes, I grew up in in a city that bridged the east coast and the midwest (Pittsburgh). Some people there are decidedly east coast, but most are pretty midwestern.

The only author/series all the girls in my class (and a few boys) agreed on was Lois Duncan. I must have read Stranger with My Face about 50 times in 7th and 8th grade. And, in looking it up to make sure I had the author right, I discovered Lifetime just made a movie based on the book:

http://www.mylifetime.com/on-tv/movies/s…

Are film makers really that desperate?

Posted by Sheryl on August 31, 2009 at 4:43 PM

You're right. My mom had all the Ross books, and I spent a summer reading them, but I can't remember anyone in them or anything that happened.

Posted by mint chocolate chip on August 31, 2009 at 5:20 PM

I loved all the Sunfire and Dana Fuller Ross books, and Canby Hall and Sweet Valley. And I actually do remember some of the stories from the Dana Fuller Ross books, probably because I read them all multiple times.

Posted by lucy990 on August 31, 2009 at 5:26 PM

Haha my mom has a bunch of these too.

Cato, I thought that was the weakest No Reservations yet. Focusing on just Livingston was very odd. I didn't get what was so appealing or profound about the cranky old writer (most writers are far more interesting on paper than in person) and he just came across as another drunk curmudgeon. The fly fishing segment was plain embarassing and so set up. I imagine too that you have quite a different story to tell about small town Montana.

Posted by laterite on August 31, 2009 at 5:49 PM

Some of the best historical romances right now are full of terrifically explicit sex scenes, well-supported with plots, strong characters, etc. etc. Not the bodice-rippers of my mom's generation. I can't imagine how these insipid "Western novels" are going to fit on the bookshelves alongside all the lovely depictions of oral sex, multiple lovers, etc.

Posted by Sarah in Olympia on August 31, 2009 at 11:08 PM

@ 13: The name "Sarah in Olympia" sounds to me like the perfect title for one of those "best historical romances", "full of explicit...", "etc. etc." Just sayin'. Best wishes.

Posted by Timmytee on September 1, 2009 at 7:44 AM

Why is Benicio Del Toro on the cover?

Posted by starsandgarters on September 1, 2009 at 9:07 AM

OMG - I loved both Sunfire and Canby Hall! Sadly, I had every single last one of the Sunfire books - and I think they still are in my parents' garage. I went on to get an MA in History, go figure.

Posted by ovrobinson on September 1, 2009 at 11:06 AM