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Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral
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Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral
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Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral
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Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral

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About this ebook

Mary Doria Russell, the bestselling, award-winning author of The Sparrow, returns with Epitaph. An American Iliad, this richly detailed and meticulously researched historical novel continues the story she began in Doc, following Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday to Tombstone, Arizona, and to the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

A deeply divided nation. Vicious politics. A shamelessly partisan media. A president loathed by half the populace. Smuggling and gang warfare along the Mexican border. Armed citizens willing to stand their ground and take law into their own hands. . . . 

That was America in 1881.

All those forces came to bear on the afternoon of October 26 when Doc Holliday and the Earp brothers faced off against the Clantons and the McLaurys in Tombstone, Arizona. It should have been a simple misdemeanor arrest. Thirty seconds and thirty bullets later, three officers were wounded and three citizens lay dead in the dirt.

Wyatt Earp was the last man standing, the only one unscathed. The lies began before the smoke cleared, but the gunfight at the O.K. Corral would soon become central to American beliefs about the Old West.

Epitaph tells Wyatt’s real story, unearthing the Homeric tragedy buried under 130 years of mythology, misrepresentation, and sheer indifference to fact. Epic and intimate, this novel gives voice to the real men and women whose lives were changed forever by those fatal thirty seconds in Tombstone. At its heart is the woman behind the myth: Josephine Sarah Marcus, who loved Wyatt Earp for forty-nine years and who carefully chipped away at the truth until she had crafted the heroic legend that would become the epitaph her husband deserved.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperCollins
Release dateMar 3, 2015
ISBN9780062198785
Author

Mary Doria Russell

Mary Doria Russell is the author of five previous books, The Sparrow, Children of God, A Thread of Grace, Dreamers of the Day, and Doc, all critically acclaimed commercial successes. Dr. Russell holds a PhD in biological anthropology. She lives in Lyndhurst, Ohio.

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Rating: 4.261006198742138 out of 5 stars
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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Mary Doria Russell returns to the American West in the late 19th century. The Earp brothers have left Dodge and are now in Tombstone, in the Arizona Territory. Doc Holliday was running a saloon with Kate, and then in a sanatorium for his tuberculosis, and has been trying to raise the money to go back for the full year he's told he needs there. But Wyatt Earp has a tooth he needs pulled, and he doesn't really trust anyone but Doc to do it.So Doc Holliday is in Tombstone, too, with the Earps again. And in Tombstone, the tensions and conflicts are at work that will lead to the famous gunfight at the O.K. Corral, and the aftermath.This is not an easy story to describe briefly, because Russell isn't giving us just the Hollywood myth. She's done the work to recover the real story and the real characters, and the complexity of the social and political forces at work--as well as the aftermath for the survivors of the clash. The result is a rich, detailed, absorbing novel, filled with real characters of depth and complexity. It's a fascinating look at the American West in the 1870s and 1880s, Included in this story are not just the Earps themselves and the Clanton gang, but also the Earp women, one of whom is Josephine Sarah Marcus, who loved Wyatt Earp for nearly fifty years, and worked hard to promote the myth about him and the famous gunfight, rather than a fuller and more complicated version of both the man and the events.It's long, it's deep, it's not always an easy read, but it is worth your time and attention. Recommended.I borrowed this audiobook from my public library.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Except for the last section, dealing with Wyatt Earp's later years, I thoroughly enjoyed Epitaph, the sequel to Doc. This writer has a marvelous way of writing so that you feel you are in the midst of things. The narrative is superior to much historical fiction I've read. The tragic outcomes for most of the participants in the Gunfight at O.K.Corral underscore the violent lives these men led. We also get a glimpse into the lives of their womenfolk and the hardships they had to endure, physically and emotionally. I didn't care for being jolted out of the Old West and into the twilight of Earp's life.shared with the increasingly disturbed Sadie. Perhaps my antipathy for her biased my opinion. Logically, I know the author had to wrap the story up somehow and this ending is appropriate, even if I didn't enjoy it. Overall, a fascinating and worthwhile read that kept me turning pages almost to the end.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Audiobook performed by Hillary HuberFrom the book jacket: A deeply divided nation. Vicious politics. A shamelessly partisan media. A president scorned by half the populace. Smuggling and gang warfare along the Mexican border. Armed citizens willing to stand their ground and take law into their own hands … That was America in 1881. My reactionsIn a sequel to her earlier novel, Doc, Russell explores what REALLY happened at the OK Corral. The events and circumstances leading up to that fateful battle are disturbingly familiar. The gunfight itself lasted a mere 30 seconds, but the ramifications affected the survivors’ lives for the remainder of their days. I love Russell’s writing. She does extensive research and is not content to give us only one side of the issues, or one facet of the characters involved: the three Earp brothers, Wyatt, Morgan, and Virgil, and their steadfast friend Doc Holliday. I particularly liked how she focused on the women who loved these men: Josephine, Alvira (Allie), Mattie, Bessie, Louisa, and Kate. The chief characters in this novel are Josie Marcus and Wyatt Earp, and the last sixty pages, or so, relate Wyatt’s last years and Josie’s efforts to immortalize his role in the history of the American West. I found their story compelling, and it is made richer by Russell’s attention to all the other characters. From the blustering Johnny Behan to the drunken Ike Clanton, every character fairly leaps off the page. Yet, I must confess that what I really wanted was more of Doc. Hillary Huber does a fine job performing the audio version. Her skill as a voice artist is put to the test with the many characters, but she is up to the task.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Thank you, thank you, thank you to Linda and her positive review which prompted me to read this excellent book.

    This novel is a testament to what a talented, dedicated, experienced writer can bring to a topic a reader might expect to feel worn or condensed or rehashed . None of that here !

    Instead what happens here is a real treasure for the reader - years of research, multiple perspectives, difficult terrain, conflicting historical and dramatic accounts all coalesced into a page turner.

    If all topics were written up like this people like me would do nothing but read !

    If I could give this writer and this book six stars I would .
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The further adventures of Doc Holliday and the Earps (begun by Russell in her novel, "Doc") leading up to those fateful 30 seconds on Fremont Street in Tombstone, Arizona, in 1881. More grand story-telling, and I have to keep reminding myself that I have never met Doc, or Wyatt, or Josie Marcus...they are so utterly real. My only quibble is that Russell goes on after the shootout to the end of Wyatt Earp's life--he lived until 1929, traveling all over the country, and died in poverty in Los Angeles--giving nearly 200 pages to that period, but making it feel a bit like a biographical summation. Doc was a 5 star read; this one gets 4 1/2.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This brilliant novel starts by asking the reader to look at a clock for 30 seconds and “…imagine one half of a single minute so terrible it will pursue you all your life and far beyond the grave.” The most famous gunfight of the Wild West was fought in an alley near Tombstone’s O.K. Corral and took half a minute.

    This novel is much more than simply retelling a familiar story. It kicks up the layers of dust around Tombstone. The dusty streets and rugged stagecoach rides, the silver mining, the holdups, and the wooden building so easily burned by fire and rebuilt by an involved rich community. Most of the bad guys were not that bad and most of the good guys were not that good. All were caught up in a series of slights, political maneuverings, and vengeance for perceived wrongs, and all had stories to tell and versions of events they believed to be the truth. Epitaph is as much the story of the Earp women, especially Sarah Marcus, as it is Wyatt’s or Doc’s.

    Interestingly, and befitting the debate in our modern times, while gunfight itself boiled down to a personal vendetta, the fuse that lit the dynamite was the legal issue of gun control. By law, guns were not allowed in Tombstone, and Marshal Virgil Earp was attempting to enforce the law on those who refused to disarm, with the help of his deputized brothers and Doc Holliday. This law was also in effect in Dodge City when the Earps were the law there, as well. Additional tinder to this conflagration included the Earps being Yankee Republicans, while most of the population in Southern Arizona was Confederate Democrats. Federal, state/territorial, and local politics played a huge role in the background of the gunfight, too. Federal soldiers had no jurisdiction in certain areas, state marshals had limited jurisdiction, and local sheriffs were also limited in what they could enforce. And none of them were willing to work together unless it benefitted them politically. Even the Cow Boys, a gang of rustlers that rode into Mexico and stole cattle to fatten and sell in Arizona, exploited these limitations.

    Mary Doria Russell extensively researched the events surrounding the gunfight, detailing decades leading up to and following this legendary event. This is a brilliant epilogue for Wyatt Earp and Sarah Marcus.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Epitaph is out of the sci-fi genre I usually read, but when I finished Russell’s The Sparrow it was automatically recommended to me. Russell’s excellent writing style, and my having seen the live re-enactment of the gunfight from the hot metal bleachers in Tombstone, compelled me to give it a try. Wow! She breathes a fascinatingly believable life into the legend. The historical facts and the details of life at that time, in that place, make the necessarily fictional thoughts and feelings of the good guys and the bad guys real as well. For a historical novel, the topic is surprisingly pertinent to the present day turmoil surrounding police involved shootings. Both sides of that issue should take a look at the corrupt politics, the raw emotions of the Democrats and the Republicans of that day, and the complex web of personal events that lead up to the gunfight at the OK Corral.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Well done, Ms. Russell! I read The Sparrow and Children of God some time ago. This is a totally different type of book. Based on fact, a good look into the enigma that was Wyatt Earp.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A sequel to the author's book about Doc Holliday, this novel discusses the politics and people leading up to the gunfight at the OK Corral. I knew nothing except that there would be a famous and tragic gunfight, so it was all new. Honest, simple Wyatt Earp is somewhat tricked by wily, ambitious sheriff Johnny Behan. This is complicated by the attraction between Johnny's girlfriend Josie and Wyatt; they do not act on this for a long time, until after Josie has left Johnny due to his infidelity and abuse. Finally, the Earp brothers, serving as lawmen, confront some known criminals and the gunfight ensues. Later, after the brothers barely survive, some friends of the dead criminals murder Wyatt's beloved little brother, and he leads a rampage of revenge, despite his friends trying to hold him back. The group of friends and Doc rather fall apart over all this tragedy. Eventually, Wyatt tracks down Josie, but he is bitter and no longer tries to be "good"; they stay together for the rest of their lives, however. Although just the last few chapters of the book, the story of how the "real" story came to be publicized is also fascinating. Once again, this author delves deep into historical research and makes the characters real, complicated, and interesting. It was hard to continue the book, though, knowing that it would end badly for everyone.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Whatever it is you think you know about what happened at the O.K. Corral, you're probably wrong. Here's what happened for sure: On October 26, 1881, in Tombstone, Arizona, nine men came together in the street, armed and agitated. Thirty seconds later, five of them walked or ran away. One other was carried. Three lay dead in the dirt. Wyatt Earp was the last man standing, the only one unhurt. The lies began before the smoke cleared, but the gunfight at the O.K. Corral would soon become central to American beliefs about the Old West.

    Epitaph shifts from one character's perspective to the next, from Doc Holliday to Wyatt Earp to less-remembered figures such as Josie Marcus, John Behan, Johnny Ringo, John Clum (the editor of Tombstone's newspaper the Epitaph, who, as mayor, sends Earp and friends on their fateful mission) and Tom McLaury, a shy farmer who, in love with Morgan Earp's wife, finds himself pulled into his brother Frank's plans for revenge against the Earps. As each character's journey moves closer to that October day in Tombstone, their lives are built on decision after decision that lead them to the event that will change them all forever.

    Epitaph is a richly detailed story set in the West involving vicious politics, cattle rustling, gang warfare and armed citizens willing to stand their ground and take the law into their own hands. Characters are well-developed and believable. The time period and location are well-researched and historically accurate, and the story is imaginative and compelling. It’s also filled with foul politics and dirty dealing. In addition to exhaustive research the author even signed up for a 58-mile ride along the same trail Wyatt Earp and his company took on their notorious Vendetta Ride not long after the O.K. Corral shootout. She continues the story after the O.K. Corral but she does give you fair warning before proceeding: "If you want a storybook ending, stop — now...But know this as well: If their story ends here, no one would remember them at all."
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Entertaining look back at Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday and the cast of characters who had roles in the famous gun battle. This is not the Wyatt Earp we saw in the 1960s television series. And while the book didn't quite attain the level of "Doc," it was still a very fun read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I don't think I actually knew what happened at the O.K. Corral. Other than my exposure to the Wyatt Earp series on TV when I was a child, I knew nothing about the wild west. Russell paints a clear and easy to read picture of this era and area of US history. Each character is so well developed that we feel we are really there along for the ride as rivalries and loyalties wax and wane.Not only does the author lead the reader up to the fatal shooting, she takes us past the occasion to follow the characters to the end of their lives. A well-developed and thoroughly enjoyable read, even for those who are fans of westerns. This belongs much more to the historical fiction genre and should appeal to a wide range of readers.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Another awesome western by Russell. I love how honestly she writes and how she doesn't sugar up the heroes in the story.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The number one criticism one hears against history books is that they aren’t timely; that they don’t relate to events that are happening today. When it comes to Mary Doria Russell’s latest book, Epitaph, though, nothing could be farther from the truth. Granted, a book about a shootout that happened in a vacant lot in Arizona over 130 years ago hardly seems relevant but when you boil it down to its essentials, a closely-knit biased clan of law enforcement officials gun down innocent members of an underprivileged segment of the population, the story begins to sound very familiar. When three of the Earp brothers and their friend, John ‘Doc’ Holliday, shot and killed three men in the vacant lot adjacent to Fly’s photo studio (later shortened to at the O.K. Corral), they ripped a hole in the fabric of the community every bit as damaging as what happened last year in Ferguson, MO. In both cases everybody had an opinion even though few people actually witnessed the events. In both cases the events touched off further unrest and violence. In both cases, a judicial response was requested the law enforcement officials involved were not indicted. In both cases, law enforcement officials were subsequently ambushed and killed. In both cases, opinions across the country were sharply divided and in both cases, the community suffered. In addition, a key element of Epitaph is the subject of gun control. The Earps were reportedly attempting to disarm the Clantons and Mclaurys, parties who were well known for proclaiming ‘I know my rights!’.I have read several accounts of what happened in Tombstone and watched several shows and movies about it. I even cut my teeth listening to Johnny Cash’s ‘Ballad of Boot Hill’. One would think, with over 50 books and a dozen or more movies covering the subject, that enough has been said about the subject. The truth is that even though Russell’s book is described as a novel, it impresses me with its veracity far more than any of the so-called true accounts written over the years by those with agendas of their own or axes to grind. Although the year isn’t yet over, I feel pretty confident that Mary Doria Russell will have written my favorite book of the year for the second year in a row. Last year I finally succumbed to sound advice from friends and read her first book, The Sparrow. It was magnificent. Russell has now joined the small group of authors whose books I will buy, sight unseen, as soon as it is possible to do so.FYI: On a 5-point scale I assign stars based on my assessment of what the book needs in the way of improvements:•5 Stars – Nothing at all. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.•4 Stars – It could stand for a few tweaks here and there but it’s pretty good as it is.•3 Stars – A solid C grade. Some serious rewriting would be needed in order for this book to be considered great or memorable.•2 Stars – This book needs a lot of work. A good start would be to change the plot, the character development, the writing style and the ending. •1 Star - The only thing that would improve this book is a good bonfire.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Holy cow, Andy! Six hundred pages about a five-minute shoot-out?! Let me tell you, dear reader, these six hundred pages are well-spent. You will read all about the various and different Earp brothers, their various and VERY different women, those who chose to shoot it out with them, their politics, their motives, all mixed up and sometimes admirable, sometimes definitely not. If you are interested in American frontier history, you'll love this novel. I mean LOVE it!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I always love Russell's books, but didn't love this one quite as much as it's predecessor, Doc. Russell's writing style took a big shift about three quarters of the way into the narrative and the last quarter was an odd summation of "what happened to everyone" after the events in Tombstone, instead of carrying on in the same manner as the first part of the book. Nevertheless, the book is well researched and fair and provides something I think is quite new to the tale of Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and their pals: a balanced, nuanced look at what happened and the realities of politics in the "Wild "West."
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Although I cannot speak for the last generation or two, I think that it is still safe to say that most Americans have been, at the very least, exposed to the idea of the mythic "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral." Most probably even think that they understand what happened in Tombstone, Arizona, on that fateful day and believe that it was all a well-planned conflict by the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday to take down a bunch of local bad guys. Well, boys and girls, Mary Doria Russell has written just the book to show you just how wrong you are about why that thirty-second gunfight really happened - and just how tragic the whole affair was for everyone involved.Russell's Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral, which begins approximately two years before October 26, 1881, is a well-researched historical novel that digs deeply into the character and past of the main players in the brief drama. The book explains, though, not just who these dozen or so people were; it delves into why they were in Tombstone in the first place and how their paths crossed many, many times before the afternoon that suddenly left three drunks dead and three lawmen severely wounded. The short-lived violence was so devastating, in fact, that other than the unarmed man who was allowed to run away from the fight, Wyatt Earp was the only man still on his feet when the shooting stopped. So what caused the confrontation? Why were the Earps and Doc Holliday so ready to rush into a fight that could so easily cost them their lives? Did the immediate "crime" (their insistence in wearing their pistols inside Tombstone city limits) of those they being confronted justify such a violent clash? Who fired the first shot and why? Epitaph is both an edifying and entertaining look into the single gunfight that would come to represent the "frontier justice" of the 1880s for decades to come. The whole O.K. Corral myth soon took on a life of its own, in fact, that had very little to do with the reality of the situation. The fight was much more a tragedy than an arrest gone badly with the "good guys" coming out on top. As Russell puts it in her two-page introduction to Epitaph, it changed the lives of the survivors forever because, for the participants:"Whether you live another five minutes or another fifty years, those awful thirty seconds will become a private eclipse of the sun, darkening every moment left to you. You will be cursed with a kind of immortality. Year after year, everything that did and did not happen during those thirty seconds of confusion and noise, smoke and pain, will be analyzed and described and disputed.A century will pass, and decades more. Still, the living will haunt the dead as that half-minute becomes entertainment for hundreds of millions around the world. Long after you die, you will be judged by those who cannot imagine six paces from armed and angry men."Sadly enough, there was nothing particularly heroic about the Earps, Doc Holliday, or anyone who played even a minor role in what happened in Tombstone on October 26, 1881. The Earps were, in reality, little more than a product of their times: a close family trying to make its way in the aftermath of the Civil War. Wyatt was the presumed leader of the pack, and his brothers were perfectly willing to follow his lead when it came to moneymaking schemes that could possibly put the family in the black for good. Their wives (and mistresses) went along for the ride. The Earps ended up in Tombstone simply because, as usual, Wyatt was looking to make a quick buck. And, as a man with no real family of his own, Doc Holliday, ever loyal to the Earp brothers, joined them in Tombstone for no other reason than to fix an aching tooth in Wyatt Earp's mouth. But circumstances (and politics) combined to keep the Earps in Tombstone longer than they had planned to be there. Wyatt, still hoping to cash in on his lawman experience, kept the clan there long enough for the world as they knew it to end in a storm of bullets. As it did.Epitaph is everything that historical fiction should be. It is detailed, it is well written, and it tells the real story behind the myth - and at 577 pages, it is thorough. I highly recommend it both to fans of serious westerns and to those who simply want to know "the rest of the story" about what really happened near the O.K. Corral that day.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Mary Doria Russell is such a good writer that she could imbue a shopping list with character, humor, pathos, and grace. So it is not surprising that she tackles the life of Wyatt Earp with aplomb. This is a much-needed follow-up to her wonderful novel Doc, about Doc Holliday. It focuses more on Wyatt Earp, especially on the complex events leading up to the gunfight at the OK Corral and Wyatt's vengeance afterward. It portrays Wyatt as a very complex, but believable character. Russell has a gift for writing interesting and believable characters, and bringing them to life in just a few sentences - she demonstrates that skill here too.Russell is also good at creating interesting secondary characters. Although this is a story all about the actions of men, the women are some of the most interesting characters in the book, and it is clear how they drive much of the story.Biographical novels are tricky, because normal people's lives don't have the same trajectory that we expect in a novel. Russell manages to give Wyatt an interesting trajectory. The end is a little bit sentimental, but not overly so.I listened to the audiobook, and enjoyed it thoroughly.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A very good follow-up to Doc. This book details the events surrounding the infamous shootout in Tombstone, Arizona, focusing more on the Earps and other people than on Doc Holliday.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Normally, can’t-put-it-down books are thrillers. So I am surprised to say that a novel about the men who were in the gunfight at the O.K. Corral turned out to be unputdownable. This from a person who never liked watching or reading westerns. But I've liked everything else written by Mary Doria Russell, so I read EPITAPH, expecting only that it would be as engaging and as well researched as her other books. Now the trick will be convincing you that EPITAPH is more than a western, that this is literature. I began unconvinced. Then it sucked me in.EPITAPH is a historical novel. All the characters (including Wyatt Earp; his brothers James, Virgil, and Morgan; their friend John (Doc) Holliday; and their “wives”) really existed. And, as Russell says in her “Author's Note,” the main elements of the story are based on real events. All but the last chapters take place in Tombstone, Arizona. The city is full of dirty politics, unethical politicians, and criminal Cow Boys (as this term is spelled in the book) who steal cattle, drink, and stir up trouble. Here is the really true story of how the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday, but particularly Wyatt Earp, try to maintain order there and deal with lawlessness that led to their gunfight at the O.K Corral.If you do not like westerns, here is one you will.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    MDR is very good at historical fiction. She is able to take a lot of research, conflicting accounts, and put it together into a compelling story. I loved [Doc], her first book about these characters, because it turned Doc Holliday in to a real person, instead of a legend. She also brought the tragedy of tuberculosis into a sharp focus, which has enriched any further reading I did about historical figures who had that disease. [Epitaph] is, in my opinion, a good book, but not as good as [Doc]. It doesn’t have as sharp a focus, the perspective shifts and the story changes. Partly that is effective, because one of the things this book does is to show how history and legend can diverge and converge. This book focuses on Wyatt Earp, and he goes from hero to villain and back again; proving that he was human, flawed, and more interesting than if he’d been only the white-hat good guy. However, the shifting perspective, for me, meant that I didn’t care as much about the characters, until the end. I have a soft spot for a book that shows the dilemmas of aging in three dimensions, and, MDR did a great job with that.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a good, if slightly uneven follow-up to Doc, which I loved.The author pulls you into the story of the Earps, the Clantons, and the political backbiting of the times. Her writing gives you a sense that you really know the players, the people who lived in Tombstone, as if you were living there with them, during the boom years.But perhaps strong interest just couldn't be sustained for a novel of this length and scope. I found myself wandering away a little, about 50 pages from the end. Still recommended, especially if the American "Wild West" interests you.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I consider Mary Doria Russell to be one of the finest authors on the scene today. I have had the pleasure of reading 5 of her novels and still consider "The Sparrow" one of the best books I have ever read. "Epitaph" is a stand alone book even though it shares some of the subject material with "Doc". The two do not need to be read together but I would highly recommend both to anyone. Russell does an excellent job of weaving her tale with superb character development and well-paced narrative. Her historical research is impressive. Like many, I honestly thought I knew quite a bit about the "old west" - this book plainly shows I still have a lot to learn. Excellent is not enough but excellent will have to do !
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Mary Doria Russell has made me like a western. Didn't think it could be done. But I absolutely devoured her two books about Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, their friends, family, and loves during the time of Dodge, Tombstone, and the OK Coral. Russell has a way of bringing to light the hurts, joys, secrets and dreams of her characters that makes them so memorable you don't want their stories to end. I highly recommend all of her work - even this one, and even if you don't like westerns!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I loved this, but boy is it dense and fact- packed. It’s a novel that reads like non-fiction. Or it is non- fiction, with invented dialogue? Here’s how intense this novel is: about 150 or 200 pages into the novel, I started taking notes. I have a full page of handwritten notes, with all the Earps and their lady friends, they seemed to be mostly monogamous, but not the marrying kind. On the other side of the page are the Clantons and the Cow Boys. Then there’s all the other gunfights, stagecoach robbing and murders, that each blamed the other for, that came before the infamous gunfight. Each faction’s occupations and political persuasions, because according to Russell, that’s essential for understanding the lawless, profitable mess that was Tombstone, AZ in 1881. The Cow Boys were rebellious Confederate types, who stole cattle from Mexicans, the border was thirty miles away, and the novel makes clear there was nearly another war fought over it, drank to excess, and were Democrats. The Earps being, mostly, lawmen, represented the interests of the miners, mining companies, and Eastern monied interests, were Republicans. “Doc” Holliday is speaking here to ‘Mrs. Behan,’ aka Sadie Marcus Earp.“’You have terrible taste in men,’ he told her. “I am no prize, and I have friends who treat their livestock better than Mr. Behan treats you… Raise your sights, sugar… Aim low? All you’ll hit are rats, snakes, and rock bottom.’” (9)Toward the end of the novel, the author addresses the reader directly, after Wyatt and Josie have reunited. “If you want a story book ending, stop—now—and remember them in that tender moment. Be content to know that they embarked on a series of adventures throughout the West and they stayed together through thick and thin for forty-five years. But know this as well: If their story ended here, no one would remember them at all.Where a tale begins and where it ends matters. Who tells the story, and why… That makes all the difference.” (521) This my sixth novel I’ve read and loved by Mary Doria Russell. Her books, except for the first two that had some of the same characters, and the last two that have had a lot of the same characters, are in different genres, but she teaches us to love the characters and their struggles, as she does. I am thrilled to have read this. This is a new book that I borrowed from my public library. Finished 4/27/15.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Mary Doria Russell tells the story of the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. If you've read Doc, that may be all that I need to say to entice you to read this book. Once again, Russell paints the picture of the Old West beautifully, transporting us to Tombstone, Arizona in the 1880s. We learn what's happening with Doc Holliday, the Earp brothers, the women who live with them, and the other characters. The tension builds in Tombstone as the gunfight nears. But Russell doesn't leave the story there. She follows the characters after the event, showing the long-term implications of those few minutes of conflict at the O.K Corral. Although tales of the Old West are often peopled by those wearing white hats and those wearing black ones, Russell draws her characters with more complexity. It is because of this that the story rises from the page. A wonderful read!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    “Every Tombstone Needs an Epitaph”“Hell is empty. All the devils are here.”-Doc HollidayOctober 26th, 1881. Tombstone, Arizona. The O.K. Corral. Thirty seconds. Thirty bullets. A mythological moment was born.Everyone knows the story, of the three Earp brothers, teamed up with Doc Holliday, facing down the Clantons and the McLaurys. A bloody opera. An immortal dance.This is a novel, but what Mary Doria Russell has done, is brought this mythical “Old West” episode, back down to earth and has fleshed out this story, giving vibrant life to these legendary characters. They are flawed, taciturn, murderous and courageous. Along with her previous novel, Doc, MDR has crafted two of the best books in the “Western” pantheon, setting the bar, at a daring height. She remains one of my favorite working writers.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Continuing the story began in Doc, Epitaph follows the stories of the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday, as well as Josie Marcus, in the tale of what happened once they reached Tombstone. Focusing mostly on the events leading up to the infamous fight, and giving us Wyatt Earp's story afterward, Mary Doria Russell does a phenomenal job of presenting these characters, sympathetic for all their flaws, and the political maneuverings both in the town and country that impacted the gunfight at the O.K. Corrall and how it was forever immortalized.This was one of those books that I loved so much it's hard to write coherently about why. I had just finished a book in which the writing style did not impress me, and when I first started reading this one and sinking into the assured descriptions, thought "This is how a book should be written." And my opinion never really changed afterwards. A plain foreshadowing - and sometimes outright telling of future events - is strung throughout the book, and even though I really didn't know the details, I found this an effective way of ratcheting up tension whether you were familiar with historical events or not. I can't recommend these books (two - because Doc really should be read first) highly enough.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    You know those silly questionnaires that ask, if you could meet anyone alive or dead who would you choose? I think I would choose Doc Holiday, he was such a complicated person, the many different sides to his personality, his diverse talents. I find him fascinating and loved Russell's novel, Doc. This book was much more extensive, and Doc only plays a small part, yet the parts that contained him and Josie, who would eventually become Wyatt Earps wife were among my favorites.The atmosphere in this story was spot on, while reading I felt like I was in Tombstone. The dirt in the streets, the wooden houses, the gun fights, the gambling, prostitution, drinking and stage coach robberies. All the Warps and their women are prominently featured. The political maneuvering, even way back then there was criminal activity and differences between the Republicans and Democrats. Go figure. A lawless time, as Tombstone tries to grow and become a safe town. The relationship and loyalty between Doc and the Earps. Of course it ends in the gun fight at the OK Corral, and the rest as they say is history.Yet it doesn't end there, not in this novel as the author goes on to show how Josie fights for a heroic vision of her husband, the sanitized version that will go down in history.A book, so incredibly well written, that will appeal to history readers as well as those who love Westerns.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    EPITAPH: A NOVEL OF THE O.K. CORRAL is the third Mary Doria Russell book I've read. The first was DOC, all about Doc Holliday's early life and how he met the Earps. Then I read DREAMERS OF THE DAY, an historical novel framed by the 1921 Cairo Peace Conference. EPITAPH returns us once again to the Earp brothers and the American West of the early 1880s, this time not Dodge City, but Tombstone and the O.K. Corral, and we all know what happened there. Or we thought we did if we grew up in the 50s and 60s and watched all those dumb Wyatt Earp TV shows starring Hugh O'Brien, and then a lot of movies about the O.K. Corral. (Actually I've only seen one of them, the Henry Fonda one, MY DARLING CLEMENTINE.) But after reading DOC and its encyclopedic look at Holliday's early life and the world he lived in, I have come to respect Russell's slant on things. She researches and researches and then researches some more, and then turns all that research into some of the most eminently readable and intelligent novels I've ever encountered. And EPITAPH, her latest, is no exception. While the subtitle indicates it's about the O.K. Corral showdown, readers will quickly discover that the shootout itself - which Russell tells us first thing lasted probably no more than half a minute tops - is merely the axis upon which a much larger story turns, and it is, like DOC, a roller-coaster of a page-turner which, not incidentally, also gives you a fascinating look at the politics of the 1880s and how that gunfight fit into the larger scheme of things.We learn, for eample, that the Tombstone story played out during the short, tragic presidency of James Garfield, a professor of Greek and Latin at tiny Hiram College in Ohio, and a reluctant candidate who gave his party "warning that he would do nothing to gain the office ... He'd kept his word too, traveling no farther than his own front porch during the campaign." When Garfield died from wounds inflicted by an assassin, his VP, Chester Arthur, proved to be a weak, ineffectual and fearful successor. And this is only a small part of the historical frame Russell provides for her saga of the Earps and Holliday. The border tensions between the Arizona Territory and Mexico, fueled by cattle thieves and outlaws, also figure into the story, as do the devious and crooked politics of the times. Wyatt Earp and his brothers, all lawmen, fall victim to these politics, and the resulting actions are reminiscent of the recent racial tensions and grand jury investigations of police officers in Missouri and New York. In this respect, the larger story of the O.K. Corral becomes relevant and timely, even though it happened over a hundred and thirty years ago.So yes, Russell knows her history and uses it to her best advantage. But she is also incredibly skilled at bringing these real historical figures to life. And not just the Earps and their women, but also the other lawmen and townspeople. Even the villains become real - the two McLaury brothers (one a gentle farmer, the other a blowhard troublemaker), the Clantons (the brutal, abusive patriarch; the fearful, damaged older son, Ike; and the wild younger son, Billy), and the notorious psychopath, Johnny Ringo; as well as a large cast of minor characters both good and bad. But after Wyatt and Doc, perhaps the most fascinating figure here is the woman who came to love Wyatt and stayed with him for over forty years, Josie "Sadie" Marcus.Hey, I could go on and on about this book, but I'd better not. It's a pretty damn good one though. If I had any problem at all with the book it would be that the first couple hundred pages (it runs nearly 600 pages), which, while filled with interesting historical stuff, may have lumbered just a bit. In fact the best part of the book comes after the gunfight - the political fallout and betrayals, when the police officers - the Earps and Holliday - are painted as vicious killers and are arrested and tried. Sound familiar? Well, I told ya. And then there are the later years of Wyatt Earp, years of wandering from place to place, trying to escape his storied past. EPITAPH is one helluva good read. I suspect it may be the most complete and accurate look at the famous gunfight, the events that precipitated it, and the aftermath ever written. And it's also a great 'docu-novel' of the life of Wyatt Earp. Probably the best book of that sort I've read since Darryl Ponicsan's TOM MIX DIED FOR YOUR SINS. It's always a difficult and touchy task to fictionalize the life of a real historical personage. Ponicsan did it well with the colorful Tom Mix. And now so has Mary Doria Russell with Wyatt Earp. I recommend this book highly.