Written by David Fuller
SUMMARY:
The historical novel, Sundance, was released by Riverhead Books as a 338-page hardcover in 2014. In the late spring of 1913, Harry Alonzo Longbaugh (the Sundance Kid, now in his mid-forties) is quietly released from a Wyoming state penitentiary after a twelve-year prison sentence he willingly chose to endure.
Without his familiar moustache and hiding behind a flimsy alias, Longbaugh has staved off most curiosity seekers while intensely defending his wife’s honor, as necessary. All that has kept him sane surviving prison and perpetual loneliness are his wife’s letters, despite his continued pleas for her to explore a new life without him. At Longbaugh’s behest, she has left the West for a fresh start in New York City.
During his incarceration, the world learned of his violent demise with best friend Robert Leroy Parker (aka Butch Cassidy) in a Bolivian shootout. Long out of touch with modern society, Longbaugh wisely opts to let the world believe this falsehood. All he wants to do now is find his beloved wife: Etta Place, whom he has not heard from in two years.
Forced to kill an ex-sheriff’s vengeful son, Longbaugh finds himself on the run again – from both the law and ghosts from his past. Dodging a posse’s efforts, Longbaugh is told by his estranged sister-in-law that answers most likely await him in New York City. Moving East, the former outlaw finds how New York embodies modern life in a rapidly-changing 20th Century. Inevitably, he is now an often-bewildered relic struggling to catch up.
Clues to Etta’s socially progressive activities bring an ever-savvy Longbaugh into conflict with the New York mob and others associated with his elusive wife. Worse yet, the Kid’s old nemesis, manhunter Charlie Siringo, is doggedly pursuing his world-weary quarry from the remnants of the Western frontier to the shadowy back alleys of New York. All Longbaugh wants is Etta back, but his obsession may cost him everything.
Notes: This title is also available in digital, audiobook, and paperback formats. The cover incorporates an image of Etta Place from her only verified photo – a studio portrait with her fugitive husband taken in New York City, circa 1901. As a matter of trivia, novelist/screenwriter William Goldman (who wrote “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”) once used ‘Harry Longbaugh’ as a pen name.
REVIEW:
Including his own take on the ‘Butch & Sundance’ Bolivian mystery, author David Fuller’s poignant what-if isn’t merely a Western gone East. For historical fiction enthusiasts, the ambitious Sundance succeeds as both a romantic mystery and an action-thriller. Readers must sit tight to learn Etta’s enigmatic fate, but the anticipation proves worth it. Still, Longbaugh’s unrelenting personal quest is counter-balanced by sequences depicting bleak and occasionally violent realism.
Though some events are totally fictitious and others historically-tinged, such scenes creeping upon readers are well-played, no matter how dark their outcome. Case in point: the haunting impact upon Longbaugh’s mind imagining the horrific 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire where Etta may have been best spells out his humanity.
Despite retaining his fearsome fast-draw, Longbaugh’s conscience is similarly felt when he fails to discourage an inept ‘Butch & Sundance’ impersonator duo early on. Such detail reveals a mostly reformed rogue witnessing the ugly fallout of his legend now romanticized in dime novels. One can appreciate Longbaugh’s maturity recognizing why he does not just as easily resume his old crime spree.
Further, Fuller capably devises a revisionist Western where redemption is far harder earned than escaping with the loot from any brazen train heist. Transplanting an aging Sundance Kid (and, by extension, Etta Place) as anachronisms into a complex, pre-World War I metropolis of skyscrapers, motorcars, subways, and turbulent social reforms is a challenge that Fuller impressively lives up to.
Both poignantly written and faithfully researched, Fuller’s Sundance makes it almost easy to visualize Robert Redford reprising perhaps his most iconic role. For instance, a catch-me-if-you-can rooftop exchange between Longbaugh (with a gleam in his eye) and the cool-tempered Siringo is one of several scenes worthy of Redford’s cinematic persona.
Though plot contrivances are a given, Fuller takes some excessive gambles that diminish his novel’s momentum. One is an ultra-convenient reunion that ridiculously comes out of nowhere – twice! Though the first sequence’s banter is wonderfully written, Fuller overplays his storytelling hand, as far as pushing what-if romanticism. He really should have left the tantalizing fate of Sundance’s favorite buddy solely to the audience’s imagination.
Note: Curiously, one thing that Fuller does not divulge is any post-prison re-assessments his enlightened ‘Longbaugh ‘ has made of his ruthless ex-Wild Bunch cronies, like Harvey “Kid Curry” Logan.
Far more critical to the climax is a wartime sub-plot that links too many of that era’s historical events. Unfortunately, Fuller’s war profiteering angle again appears taken from the ‘this only happens in fiction’ playbook. While neither of these plot angles are a dealbreaker, they are other reasons this reviewer’s rating is not even higher.
Ultimately, Sundance delivers high-caliber fiction entertainingly rooted in familiar American history. Clearly, unlike the incorrigible desperado the real Harry Alonzo Longabaugh was, his fictional counterpart risks a far greater endgame. Regardless whether one is an Old West buff or not, Sundance concocts a satisfying and surprisingly powerful read.
ADDITIONAL FEATURES:
The author briefly notes the real Sundance Kid’s historical fate, even though his Bolivian grave still has not been located. Fuller’s acknowledgements section confirms he has slightly altered the spelling of Longabaugh to make ‘Harry Longbaugh’ more his own creation.
BRIAN’S ODD MOON RATING: 8½ Stars
