Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride
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Overview
“Countless books have been written about the infamous outlaw ... this is surely one of the best.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
In this revisionist biography, award-winning historian Michael Wallis re-creates the rich anecdotal saga of Billy the Kid (1859–1881), a young man who became a legend in his time and remains an enigma to this day. In an extraordinary evocation of the legendary Old West, Wallis demonstrates why the Kid has remained one of our most popular folk heroes. Filled with dozens of rare images and period photographs, Billy the Kid separates myth from reality and presents an unforgettable portrait of this brief and violent life.
Synopsis
Award-winning historian Michael Wallis has spent several years re-creating the rich, anecdotal saga of Billy the Kid (1859-1881), a deeply mythologized young man who became a legend in his own time and yet remains an enigma to this day. This new biography separates myth from reality and presents an unforgettable portrait of this brief and violent life.
Publishers Weekly
The boy who would become Billy the Kid (1859-1881) was born Henry McCarty, perhaps in the Irish immigrant wards of New York City. Not much is known about his parents, and it's difficult to trace his whereabouts until his family turned up in Silver City, Colo., in the early 1870s. Both the facts and the legend pick up in 1877, when Henry-already known to some under the alias Kid-shot a man who was bullying him and began a life on the run. Wallis's reconstruction of the Kid's exploits is engrossing. But even more, Wallis (Route 66) shows Billy the Kid as a product of his era, one of profound social dislocation. Billy the Kid was, indeed, only the most legendary of a generation of "desperate men" who knew how to handle a gun. At the same time, a new kind of sensationalist journalism was being created, and reporters were more than happy to contribute to the creation of a myth. Wallis, the host of PBS's new American Roads, writes clean prose, occasionally enlivened by a particularly lovely turn of phrase ("the liquid rustle of cottonwood leaves"). Over the decades, countless books have been written about the infamous outlaw, and this is surely one of the best. 60 illus. (Mar.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
Henry McCarty (1859-81), a.k.a. Billy the Kid, was a frontier gunslinger, a hunted outlaw, and, not least, the dime-store novel creation of Gilded Age journalists. Since his famous demise at the hands of Sheriff Pat Garrett, the Kid has graduated from local legend into national myth, becoming the subject of dozens of novels, poems, and films. Route 66 and Pretty Boy author Michael Wallis has composed a biography that delineates what is real and what is not about America's most beloved badman.Publishers Weekly
The boy who would become Billy the Kid (1859-1881) was born Henry McCarty, perhaps in the Irish immigrant wards of New York City. Not much is known about his parents, and it's difficult to trace his whereabouts until his family turned up in Silver City, Colo., in the early 1870s. Both the facts and the legend pick up in 1877, when Henry-already known to some under the alias Kid-shot a man who was bullying him and began a life on the run. Wallis's reconstruction of the Kid's exploits is engrossing. But even more, Wallis (Route 66) shows Billy the Kid as a product of his era, one of profound social dislocation. Billy the Kid was, indeed, only the most legendary of a generation of "desperate men" who knew how to handle a gun. At the same time, a new kind of sensationalist journalism was being created, and reporters were more than happy to contribute to the creation of a myth. Wallis, the host of PBS's new American Roads, writes clean prose, occasionally enlivened by a particularly lovely turn of phrase ("the liquid rustle of cottonwood leaves"). Over the decades, countless books have been written about the infamous outlaw, and this is surely one of the best. 60 illus. (Mar.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.Library Journal
Historian Wallis (Route 66) turns his attention to Billy McCarty (1859–81), a.k.a. Billy the Kid, carefully separating fact from myth—a difficult task, since the myth has all but obscured the facts. Drawing on archival sources and interviews as well as documents and secondary works, Wallis digs beneath the surface, clearly identifying what is known or probable and presenting the reasonable alternatives for what is conjecture. He emphasizes the politics of the Gilded Age and how it affected the frontier and Billy in particular. This well-written and engaging biography is aimed primarily at general readers interested in the West and provides a clear, concise, and reliable account of Billy; Wallis is careful not to make his story so complicated that it confuses readers. Nevertheless, given the extensive research underlying it, the book can stand alongside Robert Utley's more scholarly Billy the Kid: A Short and Violent Life. Recommended for public and academic libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ11/1/06.]
—Stephen H. Peters, Northern Michigan Univ. Lib., Marquette