The Thicket is set near the turn of the 20th century. For the most part, it is a Western that, without a couple appearances of motorcars, easily could have take place fifty or a hundred years earlier. It is a very well-crafted story that will definitely hold your interest, but it is quite violent. I try not to read books that are too creepy or violent, but this one had a good enough story that I continued reading it after some pretty awful scenes early in the book.
The story starts off in Texas where the main character, Jack, has just watched his parents die from smallpox, and is now going off with his grandfather and younger sister to go live with Jack’s aunt. They never make it to the aunt’s house as Jack’s grandfather is killed on the journey and his sister Lulu is kidnapped by a notorious gang of criminals led by one particularly despicable scumbag by the name of Cut Throat Bill.
Jack manages to enlist the help of two bounty hunters to retrieve Lulu. One, shorty, is a little person and former circus performer. The other is Eustace, a large, muscular African American man who makes his money digging graves and tracking bounties. Eustace travels with a giant wild hog that has befriended him and carries an enormous four gauge shotgun. Jack strikes a deal with Shorty and Eustace to track down his sister in exchange for the deed to his family’s land in Texas.
Cut Throat Bill and his gang do all sorts of despicable deeds as they travel back to their hideout in the Thicket, following a bank robbery that resulted in the murder of a local sheriff.
Despite some pretty horrific depictions of violence, the book does have quite a happy ending with all the villains being dispatched and the majority of the “good guys” living happily ever-after. This book is an absolute page-turner and will soon be released as a movie with Peter Dinklage playing shorty and Juliette Lewis playing Cut Throat Bill. I am guessing the film will have to veer a little from the book’s story since Cut Throat Bill is a mountain of a man in the book, and Juliette Lewis is neither a mountain, nor a man. I am kind of expecting the film to disappoint me because of the odd casting choices, but I will give it a shot anyway, as the book it is based on is excellent.