I picked up a copy of Wilbur Smith's recent "The Triumph of the Sun" while in Australia last week and read it on the long trip home.

That guy can write, and when I met him at two different SCI conventions he came across as a square shooter and a nice guy.

I had read all of his earlier sagas on the Courtneys and Ballentynes and was pleased to see "Triumph" brings a member of each family together in a novel about the siege of Khartoum.

I don't know if anyone has called him Africa's answer to America's James Mitchener yet, but I would like to be the first. Smith's novels are an easy way to learn more about Africa's stormy history.

If you've not read his stuff, I recommend that you do. Although hunting is not a primary focus, his descriptions of hunts for African game are fascinating.

Bill Quimby

I have read several of his books,and he can bring out the Africa with just a few sentences.

Very good writer, I have a few of his books does a dawm fine job.

I read quite a bit of his works during the 70's + early 80's but nothing recently.The book "Triumph" you mention sounds interesting.I'll have to look for it.I think the last book of his I read was the one in the final days of WW1 wherein Sean Courtney's son kills him.I don't recall the name now,Possibly "A Sparrow Falls"?As I've mentioned before,"Shout At The Devil" appeared to me to be a rather thinly veiled reinactment of some of the exploits of P.J.Pretorius.But imitation is the highest form of compliment.

Ooops! I just read this thread again and am holding my head down in shame. I'd like those who caught my misspelling to know I really do know how to spell the name of America's greatest contemporary novelist.

Bill Quimby

I've read a bit of Mitchener's(sp) works in the past + while enthralling pieces of great escapist literature I would respectfully decline to give him the title of 'America's GREATEST contemporary novelist'.He's very good,no doubt,but I would have to opt for Mr. Twain's "Huckleberry Finn" as THE great American novel.No disparegement for Mr. Mitchener intended,only my humble opinion.

Norman Conquest:

Samuel Clemens was a wonderful humorist and author. His characters are timeless and will live forever.

However, most of his works were written in the nineteenth century (he was born just 52 years after our Revolutionary War and died in 1910), which to me disqualifies him as a "contemporary" author.

Even so, I agree that his "Huckleberry Finn" would cause him to be ranked very high (if not at the top) of any list of candidates for Author of THE Great American novel.

Michener (1907-1997), on the other hand, chronicled the history of the world in easy-to-read, entertaining, and well-written works of fiction, and his works were all done within the past 70 years. I doubt that many remember his many characters -- he kills most of them off -- but who can forget his wonderful stories?

Bill Quimby

For those interested in Wilbur Smith's works, Trophy Room Books has 14 different titles of his, some have multiple copies.
https://www.trophyroombooks.com/order_wilbursmith.htm

I've bought several books from Trophy Room and recommend them for their selection, out of print titles, and service. Every book I have bought from them turned out as described and the order & shipment was very fast.

For the sake of discussion I am tossing out my candidates for the title of The Great American Novel. In no particular order, they are:

Gone With The Wind by Margaret Mitchell
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Grapes Of Wrath by John Steinbeck  
Moby-Dick by Herman Melville    
The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper  
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald    
Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe    

Note that I have not included The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway’s most-praised work. I believe TGAN (in addition to being a timeless work) must not only be written by an American author, but it also must have American characters and be set primarily in America.

Also note that I have not listed anything by James A. Michener even though I still consider him our greatest contemporary novelist. In my opinion, his Centennial qualifies on all fronts except for timelessness. His Tales of the South Pacific and Bridges At Toko-Ri will be long remembered, but both are set in other countries.

Your thoughts?

Bill Quimby

Bill,you drive a hard bargain with those stipulations.Several come to mind,but don't fit all the criteria.Forgive me if I veer off a bit,left or right,but you've already picked my first choices.Lets start with William Faulkner-"The Reivers" + "The Sound + The Fury".Joel Chandler Harris-"Uncle Remus".Ken Kesey-"Sometimes a Great Notion".J.D. Salinger-"The Catcher in the Rye".Joseph Heller-"Catch 22".Robert Ruark-"The Old Man + The Boy".O. Henry-"The Ransom Of Red Chief"+ "The Gift Of The Magi".(Short stories as well as the ones by E.A. Poe).Every few years I feel the need to reread "Tarzan Of The Apes",not to be confused with any association here,just a good read.Finally,although not related to TGAN,but abstractly correlated to Michener,The 6 volumes of James Clavell's Asian saga.Sorry about that;I just knew I would wander from the original subject.As I said,that was a hard act to follow.

Norman Conquest: Although I've not read Faulkner's "The Reivers" or Kesey's "Sometimes A Great Notion," I can't find fault in any of the others you've listed, .

America obviusly has its share of homegrown great literature.

Bill Quimby.

Bill, I've been reading Wilbur's books for nearly 30 years. Who else could make you like a eunic! He's just amazing with his captivating descriptions and sense of timing and drama. It was one of the true highlights of my SCI convention moments meeting a man who had given me so many hours of pleasure. Though Peter Capstick was more talkative in that environment.

"It was one of the true highlights of my SCI convention moments meeting a man who had given me so many hours of pleasure."

You can thank Gray Thornton and me for bringing Smith to his first SCI convention. I forget the year, but it was when he introduced his "River God." Gray (he was SCI's membership director then) and I had "discovered" his Courtney and Ballentyne series and agreed Smith would be a good addition to the convention.

I contacted St. Martin's Press and arranged for Smith to sign books in our Publications Division booth There must have been 50 to 75 people in line whenever he was signing. He seemed to love talking with people.

You may be interested in knowing that St. Martin's paid for Smith's airfare, room and meals while SCI provided banquet tickets and a pass to the exhibit hall, and then got a percentage of the sales of the books that year.

I doubt that such was the case when Smith returned in 2003 and spoke at the Life Members' breakfast. I don't know why, but I was surprised to see that he spoke as well as he writes ... he was entertaining and knowledgeable and spoke without notes. I wish I'd had more time to talk with him then, but he always was surrounded by crowds.

Capstick loved talking with people, too, and contributed a lot to the SCI conventions.

Bill Quimby

I am a fan of Wilbur Smith, and have (and have read) all of his books. He signed a few for me at the 2003 SCI convention Bill Quimby mentions. I enjoyed his earlier work the best, most especially the Ballantine and Courtney novels. I was not all that keen on Triumph of the Sun or Blue Horizons. When it comes to southern Africa even in a fictional form he is the best.

America obviusly has its share of homegrown great literature.

Bill Quimby.[/QUOTE]

Those who come to mind this evening after reading the TGAN mentions may not be classic in the sense of some of those listed, but they are worth a mention. Ernest K. Gann, The High And The Mighty, Fate Is The Hunter; James Jones, Go To The Widowmaker, From Here To Eternity; Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove; Herman Wouk, War and Remembrance; Tom Clancy, The Hunt For Red October.....

"Those who come to mind this evening after reading the TGAN mentions may not be classic in the sense of some of those listed, but they are worth a mention. Ernest K. Gann, The High And The Mighty, Fate Is The Hunter; James Jones, Go To The Widowmaker, From Here To Eternity; Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove; Herman Wouk, War and Remembrance; Tom Clancy, The Hunt For Red October....."

All good choices, I'm sure, although I've not read all of them. Perhaps what we need is a Top 50 TGAN list. Note the great range in subjects in all these titles. As I've said, America has produced many authors of great literature in our brief history.

Bill

My wife is the reader in the family, but on long road trips, since it has gotten all most impossible to find anything but talk radio call in shows, we rent or buy Audio Books.

Some of the best we have gotten a hold of were "River God" and the "Seventh Scroll", the sequal to "River God" and we have listened to all but I think one of his books about the Courtney's.

My other favorite author at this time is Tony Hillerman and his Navajo Detective series about joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee. We especially like those when we are going up to western Colorado on a late season cow elk hunt, as we leave our hoiuse and spend the night in Albuquerque or Gallup, and then drive up what used to be 666 thru the Navajo Nation to Shiprock and then to Cortez, Colo.

I really enjoy the way Mr. Smith writes about the early days of white settlement in Africa.

Tony Hillerman has a lot of fans, but I'm afraid I am not one of them. He's a good storyteller and he writes about my corner of the world, but his style seems sophomoric to me.

Besides, I've never forgiven him for stealing the "Thieves of Time" headline I wrote many years ago for a series of newspaper articles I did about commercial looting of archaelogical sites in four western states.

Bill Quimby

Wilbur has his moments but is often hard to take seriously. Coetze can be good but beware of "The master from St Peterburg" which is rubbish. André Brink is very readable. Jock of the Bushveld is a must!

None of these are really on hunting (except WS at times) but a lot of general "Africania".

Bill my father gave me a book of him at 12 since then i never missed one all in my family including my wife and my father are fans on Wilbur Smith-Juan

Well, hate to be a dog in a manger, but I dislike Wilbur Smith's books. I think the sexual violence in them is gratuitous and uneccesary.

I borrowed "A Time to Die" once and if it was my book I would have torn it down the spine right after the elephant kills the main character and thrown the rest away. Up until then, fantastic, after, well that's a few hours of my life that I'll never get back.

"I borrowed "A Time to Die" once and if it was my book I would have torn it down the spine right after the elephant kills the main character and thrown the rest away."

An acquaintance of mine was killed by an elephant in Zimbabwe some years ago. Witnesses described the attack almost exactly as Smith described.

Bill Quimby

Yes, I enjoy Wilbur, espescially his earlier efforts. May I suggest John Graves' Goodbye to a River or two books by Cormac McCarthy: Blood Meridian and Suttree.....Dave

Read Smith everywhere I could find him. King of the potboilers and some good information on Africa.

I gotta go with billinthewild...Ernie Gann's "Fate is the Hunter" is the classic work on American aviation, as good as St. Exupery's stuff. Gann is rarely read by those outside of the aviation field, but he was a superior writer. Gann's writings can be credited, I believe, in leading many a young man, including me, to seek an aviation career.

BTW, I have to agree with the poster that said Michener is less than America's greatest comtemporary novelist.

Much of Michener's research was done for him by his staff. He'd then glean the cream, create fictional characters to fit the circumstances, and crank out a book. Not to say that I haven't enjoyed reading him over the years. The Covenent was one of the better books about South Africa up through the time it was written.