Thin Men of Haddam
Texas Christian University Press
WINNER OF THE JESSE JONES BEST NOVEL AWARD FROM
THE TEXAS INSTITUTE OF LETTERS
WINNER OF THE SOUTHWEST BOOK AWARD FROM
THE BORDER REGIONAL LIBRARY ASSOCIATION
“For excellence and enrichment of the cultural heritage of the Southwest”
Selected for reprint as #15 in The Texas Tradition Series published by Texas Christian University Press.
The Story
Orphaned as a child and reared by an Anglo family, Raphael Mendez lives in a nether world, neither de la raza nor Anglo. Having dropped out of graduate school after a squabble with his fellowship sponsors, he is foreman of the ranch of his childhood. Paired against Mendez in this striking first novel is his cousin, Manuelo - practically illiterate, broke, the father of six starving children, and unable to find work. When Manuelo's desperation pushes him to the other side of the law, Mendez must choose sides.
Praise & Reviews
“This introspective Western orchestrates a variety of conflicts into a composition with a distinctively original texture....C.W. Smith's technique has the impact of Claude Simon...who creates arresting amalgams of past, present, reverie, and locale. Can't do much better than that.”
— New York Times
“Thin Men of Haddam is remarkable in its sure hand in plotting, its management of diverse moods and character, its succinct, quotable lines of wisdom...its story-telling drive, its suspense...deserves to be widely read because of its sure touch and its relevancy...”
— Western American Literature
“Perhaps the most auspicious debut for a Southwest writer since Larry McMurtry's Horseman, Pass By.”
— Fort Worth Star Telegram
“"...a sympathetic and fairly subtle study of the intellectual who straddles the line between revolution and co-option (by virtue of his cleverness) into the ruling class.”
— Kirkus Review
“Surely one of the most gratifying experiences of good reading is its ability to bring us into contact with cultures not our immediate own. C.W. Smith, in this splendid first novel, offers us this kind of reward....Recommended."
— Best Sellers
“A serious, successful novel, rich in regional detail, with a carefully developed story line and believable characters.”
— Library Journal
"Smith beautifully evokes the Southwest. In rich flashbacks and interior monologues, he somehow makes this bleak landscape into a convincing correlative for his characters' gnawing despair."
— Publisher's Weekly
"C.W. Smith offers an already matured talent for writing intense and often beautiful fiction in his fine first novel.... Rich in a poetic language that never goes flat and superb in its evocation of place and...time, Thin Men of Haddam is a novel I much enjoyed."
— Marshall Terry Dallas Morning News
Thin Men of Haddam shows us that good fiction is still being written in the realistic-naturalistic tradition. Critics who announced the death of that tradition will be irked by this book... because a strong and steady pulse of life moves through it..."
— Minnesota Daily
"The writing is sensationally good. I have a feeling Smith could make a treatise on dairy goat management enthralling."
— Sunstone Review