Tears, cheers, and a heart as big as the west
Rating:
5 / 5
When was the last time you read a book about a character who made you want to stand up and cheer? LOUDLY. Annie is that sort of book. The well-documented hilarity in this book is one thing, but the warmth and humanity beneath the wise-cracking surface is what make Annie so special. Read this book.
Humorous supernatural western romance
Rating:
5 / 5
Harriet Klausner By 1881, Annie Pinkerton Boone Newcastle has buried two husbands. Her first spouse accidentally died just after they married when a mule kicked him in the head. On their wedding night, her second spouse, the elderly Jonas, passed away in bed. Her sum of married life is less than twenty-four hours. However, the twenty-two years old widow inherits an oddity. Jonas now "lives" inside Annie's head. He provides her with sermons that he orders she pass on to the world even as he demands his husbandry rights in bed. Annie becomes a renowned psychic, traveling with the unparalell likes of PT Barnum. Her reputation grows as PROPHET ANNIE's predictions start to occur. However, Jonas' ability to forecast the future fails to keep Annie safe from an outlaw gang that abducts her. For over the first 80 percent of PROPHET ANNIE treats the audience to one of the most engaging, brilliant, and unique western novels to come along in years. However, the last forty to fifty pages make an abrupt U-turn from a stupendous satire into a western romance. Honestly, the ending is well written and even interesting in its own right. However, in the context of what occurred before, the final pages leave readers dissatisfied. No one will relish the defanging of the previously precocious outspoken Annie while turning the soul of the book, the perverted Jonas, into a ghostly eunuch. Still, in her third novel, Spur award winner Ellen Recknor proves that she is a talent to be reckoned with, hopefully by returning Jonas inside the body of another individual. Harriet Klausner
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