Honor Thy Father

Roripaugh is one of the new post-L'Amour authors of western fiction who hark back to the Max Brand tradition of characters who reflect and feel, not just careen from one action-filled adventure to another. Very much a coming-of-age story of Martin Jr. trying to cope with an emotionally distant father and a brother whose horizons are much broader than cattle and ranching. If you are a youth struggling to find yourself and the two most important men in your life (father and older brother) are not people you find yourself trying to be like, then you have to find your own way, make your own path. Eventually Martin Jr. does. Honor Thy Father has a complex plot but simple characters who are niether stereotypes nor overdrawn and who do not spend an inordinate amount of time questioning themselves, their motives, and their actions. There is enough romantic interest in the form of Leah, daughter of a neighboring rancher, and Mary, the part Arapaho daughter of a nearby retired trapper, to hold the interest of female readers. A lot of youthful males will identify with Martin Jr., whose first sexual experience is not at all what he had imagined. A good read and an author to go to again and again.