Texas Lily

Weighed down by plot gimmicks and contrived soap-opera theatrics, this tale of Gilded Age New Mexico runs a poor second to Fackler's outstanding 1995 shoot-'em-up, Billy the Kid. Vowing revenge against the villain who ordered the assassination of her political activist father, resourceful 15-year-old Lily Cassidy enters into a marriage of convenience with 50-year-old cattle baron Emmett Moss, the most powerful man in the territory. He wants to breed her for a son, she wants him to kill the man responsible for her father's murder; but when Lily keeps her part of the deal, Emmett welshes. While his duplicity and brutish sexual attentions are earning him Lily's enmity, Emmett's niece has a steamy affair with a randy young gunfighter, and she too produces a son. Family jealousy and shame drive Emmett to kill Claire's illegitimate baby--though (as only Lily knows) there's been a cradle swap, and Emmet's crime is patricide. This isn't the last act of violence to touch Lily's life: a posse led by her husband shoots up her only true (unrequited) love, a handsome, young, gay gunfighter. And on it goes for 20 years of pain, murder, revenge, lust, hatred, disappointment, sadness, insanity and suicide. In this ponderous, ambitiously bleak,family saga, everyone's a loser. (July)