Larry McMurtry pens emotional tale of seeking better life

Years ago, I talked my mother's book club into reading “Lonesome Dove” by Larry McMurtry.

They loved it and with any luck I'll be able to talk them into reading “The Outcasts” by Kathleen Kent, who, judging from her fantastic depictions of 19th century Texas, could have been McMurtry's sister.

“The Outcasts” (Little, Brown & Company, 336 pages, $26), which is out Tuesday, is a Western. But it's also a tale of independence and just how far one person will go - geographically, emotionally - in order to pursue the goal of a better life.

In the first two chapters we are introduced to two very different characters: We have Lucinda, a brassy, intelligent whore fed up with living under a madam; and Nathan, a newly sworn-in Texas state policeman charged with assisting two Texas Rangers bring in a wanted murderer.

Both strike off in pursuit of their goals and while the plot is fast-paced and beautifully constructed, what's more are the internal battles being waged inside each character as they are, ironically, forced to pursue violent, disingenuous actions in order to achieve their moral pursuits.

Kent balances the novel beautifully between Lucinda and Nathan. The chapters alternate between the two and are structured like smaller stories within the larger framework, deepening our attachment while continuing to establish the foundation for the novel as a whole. As a result, when the two storylines combine, it's not showy on the author's part. Rather it hearkens back to a line from one of Nathan's Texas Rangers: “It's hard to imagine, seeing how crowded the sky looks tonight, how far away one star is from another.

Like people, really. We can appear to be standing right next to each other, and yet in our minds, we can be thousands of miles away, lost to the outer reaches. But we're all together in the same black soup, which makes us all related somehow.”

These connections, as Kent points out, can be shocking, disheartening, and also beautiful - just like the West itself.