All My Friends Are Going to Be Strangers (2024)

I always assume we're all about five minutes away from the Apocalypse, what with our current world leaders, locusts in the yard, and whatnot (if you want to know what the last sign of the Apocalypse is, may I reference my Surfacing review?).

So, I wasn't surprised this summer when hail the size of golf balls started pummeling our houses and cars. . . in four different summer storms.

Turns out, many of us needed major bodywork on our vehicles, and almost all of us in many parts of the Front Range of Colorado needed our roofs replaced. So much so, it has taken until NOW to have our particular roof addressed.

We have so many roofers working here in our state, we've used up all of the Coloradans and now they're driving up from states like Texas, to get the jobs done.

In the past 2 weeks we've had men here from Ft. Worth, El Paso and Denton, Texas, banging and pounding on our roof and making our household filled with nerves from all of the noise. And, wouldn't you know it, I was reading Larry McMurtry again, through all of the madness.

What a coincidence!

So, naturally, being the kind of person I am (an annoying perpetual teacher and obsessive reader) when these Texans were all sprawled out in our driveway the other day, eating lunch, I walked up and said. . . “Guys. . . do you know who made me love the state of Texas? Larry McMurtry!!”

My announcement was greeted with blank stares and I do believe one man belched.

I tried again. . . “Larry McMurtry?! You know Larry McMurtry! He's the man who put Texas on the map. Please, tell me you've read him? You're Texans!!”

More blank stares. A head scratch. One man in a 10 gallon hat said, “I heard a him. Ain't never read him, though.”

I'm sure smoke was coming out of my ears as I stomped into my house and started pawing through my piles of books. I make it a habit to have extra copies of Lonesome Dove and The Last Picture Show on hand. I buy them regularly from thrift stores and used bookstores and I hand them out like Halloween candy, whenever a person doesn't know Larry. I wish I could hand out copies of Moving On as well, but I had to sleep with an out-of-print book collector from London, in order to get my rare copy (just kidding, honey!! sort of), and I will never give that one away.

I couldn't believe it. I didn't have any extra copies, just my own precious collection of McMurtry (14 different hardcovers on the shelf at the time of this writing, swoon). I'd be damned if any of those LOSERS were getting one of those. I sat back on my heels in peevish irritation.

What the hell? Texans? Texans don't know Larry McMurtry??

McMurtry has always been my most relatable author, the man who writes closest to my soul. Other than Anne Tyler, I don't know if there's ever been another writer who more accurately communicates my desire to read and write about the two things that mean the most to me in this life: heart and groin.

Larry doesn't write mysteries or intrigue, and I'm not even sure you can accuse all of his stories of achieving a climax or a denouement.

Mr. McMurtry is just one of the finest damn storytellers there ever was.

I could live, perpetually, in his worlds, and, outside of the nearly perfect Lonesome Dove, I could live most contentedly in his Houston series.

The Houston series was written, on and off, during a 20 year period and is comprised of 6 books that do NOT need to be read in order. The most popular contribution in the collection would be Terms of Endearment, a story made famous by the movie, which starred Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger and Jack Nicholson.

Terms of Endearment is so f*cking wonderful. Oh, God, it is. And, Moving On? Don't even get me started.

And, this one, this book #2 of the series, All My Friends Are Going To Be Strangers? Well, I must give it a 4, when compared to the epic Moving On.

But, damn it. . . I could read it forever.

Forever.

The door to ordinary places was the door that I had missed.

Good lord, this is a wandering tale of a naive and rather stupid young man, Danny Deck. It's non-stop grasping at straws--straws being women, women that he f*cks and loses. Over and over again. I think part of this is very much a time piece, and I get that it's suppose to be this spectacle of characters, but the characters are too much of a spectacle. Yes, everyone is lost and broken--you're not unique, Danny. Anyway, the characters read like stereotypes.

Danny has one moment of true action, self-motivated direction instead of aimlessness and it made me laugh. Go all in.

"Where's Geoffrey?" he asked.
"I just threw him off the patio," I said.

Needless to say, I didn't enjoy this. I kept hoping that it would have this great reveal moment, but that never happened, for me at least. Maybe I was disillusioned too young, I came out of the crucible, hammered into steel, and wonder at these sorts of stories. Then again, I can see relatives in it. That said, I really like the writing. This was my first McMurtry novel and I think I should have started somewhere else. Perhaps, I'll try Lonesome Dove or Terms of Endearment because the style is good, but I just was not fond of the content. I think I had different expectations from the title.

Old sh*t I've Been Revisiting Part II: The Sequel.

Believe it or not but my tolerance for books about young men who are so desperately swamped by ennui, alienation and genius that they have no choice but to love up all the lovely ladies is extrodinarily low.

No really I kid you not. Yet for some reason this particular case of this dubious breed remains one of my favorite novels.

It's Larry McMurty's genius (yes I did say genius and I'll fight anyone who says different) for drawing character and place. Like Jim Jaramusch and Richard Linklater He has a special knack for capturing character, but more importantly he captures America the real America the one hid behind all the Target's and Bed Bath's and Beyond. The one that has weirdness, beautiful profound weirdness pumping through its veins.

McMurty's contempary books serve as a guide there and his western's a history. Both are equally valuable both are equally great.

You really owe it to yourself to read some of him.

When I heard of McMurtry's passing, I of course needed to revisit his work. McMurtry is the author who introduced me to my love of reading, so it felt appropriate. It's difficult to explain why I appreciate his work so much. There's nothing fancy about his prose, but it feels honest. It's really about the characters he creates and the wonderful dialogue. McMurtry says pretty much the same thing in this novel, "When I got people talking I was okay, but my descriptive prose didn't seem to me to be particularly worth reading." He's selling his prose a little short with that comment, but yes, he will always be remembered for his characters and the famous deadpan humor.

The protagonist in this novel isn't one of my favorites of his, but this novel explores the ineptitude and confusion that young adults often have to grapple with. As one character notes, "Oh, there's such a crudity of sentiment in the young...They've known no heartbreak." McMurtry hits that nail on the head with his Danny character- surely loosely based off of some of his own experiences as a young author. We watch Danny go through that heartbreak for the very first time.

I am not a reliable judge of McMurtry's work- there's too much sentiment there. But I can't help but love even what many would consider one of his minor works. I wouldn't start with this novel if I was new to McMurtry. I'd probably consider 'The Last Picture Show' first. This is a novel that can be understood and appreciated if you are more familiar with McMurtry's thematic tendencies. But it is undoubtedly excellent.

Reasons why I loved this book:
1. The main character is an English major at Rice and there is a lot of lovely, loving description about Houston, its swampiness, its smell. Nothing like seeing your hometown and your home state treated with so much tenderness. I always hear that McMurtry is calling into question the mythology around Texas with his novels but I think he does that more with his flawed characters than he does with the land itself. I want to wade the Rio Grande at night more than anything now.
2. It's hilarious. There's a lot of profanity and sex and it's all very playful. I don't think I'll ever get over how deadpan McMurtry can be over people having sex with animals.
3. The book captures the struggle of writers, but different callings too, to find meaning in their work and in their lives. I laughed throughout the first half of the novel, and I was thoughtful for the second.

So so so so good.

A couple of months ago I went to see Once upon a time in Hollywood. It's been a while since I've watched Tarantino's movies, so I forgot the weird feelings I usually had towards his works. This book reminded me of his movies. It's a slow-paced storyline when you expect nothing, but suddenly characters start to act weird, and you cannot definitely explain why. Every time you want to just ask "why this happened?". This was a weird, strange book.
Don't get me wrong, I liked the book. I love the dept with which Mcmurtry creates his characters, he's one of the best I have ever read. But this is the second time with Mcmurtry the first half of the book is five stars and the second is somehow ruined for me. The one mistake I did with him - I forgot I needed to fall in love with his writing before starting to read his works from the beginning.
However, I reached the book I wanted to read so badly. Terms of Endearment - I feel you will not disappoint me.

Fun and bizarre situations. The dinner scene with the Hollywood producer in the icy cave is my favorite. Swell characters, too, except the narrator, who is whiny and sleeps with -- literally -- EVERY female with whom he comes into contact. I wasn't repulsed. Just bored eventually.

Like McMurtry, I got a Master's degree in English at Rice - and even though I went there at least 25 years after he did - some of his nostalgia for the place/era definitely rubbed off on me. When I was 23, I remember reading this book, Terms of Endearment and Moving On - all of which share the character of Emma Horton. They've long held a specific, special place in my heart, as the books we love when we are young tend to do.

In this book, Danny Deck (23 ish, graduate student and newly published writer) has both a coming-of-age experience and a picaresque adventure. He marries a beautiful girl called Sally on a whim, and then proceeds to fall in with several other emotionally unavailable women. The structure of this book is his road trip from Houston to San Francisco, his year of misadventures and loneliness in California, and then his trip home again. Danny is charming but totally f*ckless. You want to mother him and slap him (or at least shake him good). He gets progressively more lost as the book progresses, and unfortunately it doesn't end with the sense that he is going to find himself (or anything or anyone else) anytime soon.

McMurtry is great at writing atmosphere, landscape and dialogue. There are some hilarious set-pieces in this novel, although the sexual politics (and the portrayal of women) definitely feel dated. I still enjoyed this book a lot, but the two 18 year olds with me mostly didn't - with the exception of the character of Godwin Lloyd-Jons (English; professor at UT), who they thought was great fun. Btw, I had forgotten how raunchy this novel is! Plenty of sex, drugs and bad language.

Note: My daughter and I listened to this on audiotape on our Epic Road Trip of June 2016. We drove through nearly all of the places described in this novel, including - memorably - the Salinas Valley in the early morning.

I was inspired to go seek out Larry McMurtry’s novel, All My Friends Are Going To Be Strangers after hearing Quentin Tarantino say that he had wanted to become a writer after reading this book. So I wanted to see what it was about the book that inspired him so. It is a bildungsroman, a sort of portrait of the artist as a young man. A young novelist, Danny Decker publishes his first novel which becomes optioned for a movie, not unlike McMurtry himself, who’s first novel Horseman, Pass By was made into the movie Hud. Along the way there is a lot of sex, drugs, and other types of hijinks. I’m guessing Tarantino thought that the lifestyle of a novelist, who is free to roam from Texas to California and back, was not a bad thing to strive for.

It was poignant in some parts and entertaining in others, but generally sort of middlebrow literature in general. I liked this bit about the difference between tragedy and unhappiness:

“I envy the victims of tragedy…They haven’t to feel guilty, or blame themselves for their own waste and the waste of others. War. Starvation. Loved ones dead before their time. The concentration camps. What do I have in common with people who have suffered such things? Nothing.”

Apparently this novel marked a departure from his usual regional literature; I had read one of his earlier books, The Last Picture Show, after seeing the excellent Peter Bogdonovich film.

The ending was a bit manic and left ambiguous but overall it was a 3 star read.

This was my favorite book in college. I recommended it to my daughter and after reading it she said she did not like the way McMurtry portrayed women in it; so after 40 years I decided I should reread it. So far I have to agree with her. His writing is still awesome. I can literally feel the Houston heat in his descriptions, but his does paint his female characters with a bitter brush.

I will do a final review when I finish the book.

8/25/2012 - Finished the book yesterday and yes, it does portray women badly. Only Emma is not hugely screwed up and for those who have read the rest of her story, you know she is pretty messed up, too. I still loved the writing, but the characters seemed dated and damaged.

I read this book a long time ago, but searching under Larry McMurtry I saw the title and was reminded how much I enjoyed it.

It's funny and tender and evokes a Texas I vaguely remember when I was stationed at Fort Hood.

A melancholic book chronicling the misadventures of a young alcoholic author. The book has some very compelling scenes, particularly those taking place in Texas, but ultimately Danny fails to engage the reader as a character. You never really care what happens to him.

Trying to write a review on this is as difficult as getting an assignment from a teacher demanding I write as essay on, why a period is used at the end of a sentence. I don’t know why a period is used to end a sentence, it just works. Like this book, warts and all it just works. I found the story a little strange when I started. It was a little courser about sex than I remember from McMurtry’s other works. Sex is not a forbidden topic for McMurtry, after all, those who have read Lonesome Dove remember the line “a man who won’t cheat for a poke, doesn’t want one bad enough.” However, in All My Friends are Going to Be Strangers, poke, or the like, is replaced with the “F” bomb and other more direct language. This is not a problem, but I just don’t remember it being so prominent in other works I’ve read.

As to the writing, as usual it was smooth, pleasant and detailed. The characters where so fully developed that after reading awhile you could pick out everyone in a police lineup. They became so personal that you wanted hug or hit them every few pages, depending on the current happenings in the story. Is this my favorite McMurtry book? No, not even close. But it is an insight into how as life moves forward, and you and your current friends change, friends can become strangers. You can’t go backwards you must move forward, and nothing stays the same.

Solid 3.5 stars, a very nice read, an easy recommendation.

Not many pieces of mainstream fiction out there in which Rice University and, in particular, its library, plays a major role. This was recommended to me by another Rice alum, and I was entertained by the campus perspective at the time. Having said that, this is a very different type of work from, say, Lonesome Dove, which I enjoyed. Overall, a bit heavy on the sex and alcohol themes, but it is what it is. Similarly, for anyone looking for a novel about "the writer's life" by a successful author, don't expect much in the way of inspiration.

This was better than my expectations, the deeper more horizontal I get into McMurtry space the more lost init I am - ain't that how it's supposed to be? The Get is getting better all the time. The dots are colliding as they're connecting bouncing around his catalogue fiction et non-&/mem's = bridge so: Danny Deck a snappy Rice upstart is picaresque-ly vaulted into a writerly perch early and sets off a concatenation of down trending events that swirl against the currents of lost impressions - my numerological gibbering's drowned in muddy border water like Deck's 2nd novel - was the Ouse muddy? Six or eight all through this minor mindfrack novel .. was he athwart me on purpose anticipating .. VW's "Waves" watery imagery, every pore soaked to a modified "Being There" ending. Deck - to be or not?

Finally finished this book. Loved it. Partly because of the Texas locale, but mostly because of the range of characters and emotions and possibilities. I wasn't really hooked on the end which was vague and psychological and seemed like an answer to the however-am-I-going-to-end-this question. I found the characters completely believable even though I haven't met any people like them. Unique. Except maybe for Sally and her parents who were neither interesting nor unique as people.

I reread this book after having finished it about 20 years ago. It has regularly crossed my mind as one the most depressing stories of a star-crossed protagonist I've ever read. Could also be titled, "Every Thing I Do Is Wrong." (like one of my favorite lines by singer Johnny Motard, in the song Alien Autopsy- "You know I don't belong/ And everything I do is wrong")

My favorite McMurtry book. About (surprise surprise) a new up and coming writer, leaving his region of comfort (Texas, of course). Full of McMurtry's wit and charm. (Love the book signing scene, now pretty much a cliche, but, unfortunately true!)

Više o knji*zi na: https://bookishandwilde.wordpress.com...

Ukratko:

Jedna od Tarantinovih omiljenih knjiga koja je bila pravo osveženje zbog jednostavnog stila pisanja kojim se postižu jasnoća i urednost izraza, a radnja se vrti oko mladog pisca Denija Deka i njegovih veza sa četiri žene, dok keruakovski ne nalazi mira i ’beat’-nički živi u San Francisku i van njega, u rodnom Teksasu.

English version:

This novel is one of the favorite books of an undisputable cinema king – Quentin Tarantino. The author of the novel is a renowned writer Larry McMurtry. Unfortunately, Larry McMurtry passed away early this year and that is how this world became less abundant in book worshippers! In All My Friends Are Going To Be Strangers, he wrote about a young man called Danny Deck who enters different types of love relationships with four women. As we follow him ’on the road’ and in San Francisco, the hotbed of Beatniks, we found out how despite coming across as completely innocuous, he actually can and will put up a fight and get into trouble. Danny is a well-rounded character whose character changes from a naive student to a married-but separated-and-lonesome father. I highly recommend it to all readers who have enjoyed ’subconsciously adventure-seeking’ (as strange as it may sound), good-natured and phlegmatic main characters. He just hates being maudlin and refuses to have dignity and pride. He loathes those concepts.

Podugačko:

Ovaj roman Larija MekMatrija je pravo osveženje u ove tople letnje dane! Ta svežina potiče od njegovog jednotavnog stila pisanja čime postiže da se rečenice čitaju brzo, tečno i sa zadovoljstvom zbog te nerazmršene i uredne sadržine. Kada pisac tako piše bez obilja deskriptivnih prideva i pretencioznih (ili prepotentnih) reči, onda imate osećaj da lebdite u svetu njegove mašte (ne preterujem!).

Mladi Danny Deck upoznaje devojku Sally u Ostinu, Teksas na jednoj žurci kod profesora Godwina, inače njenog redovnog seksualnog partnera. Kaže u prvoj rečenici: ’’I think I fell in love with Sally while she was eating breakfast’’.
U retrospektivi, tj. nakon čitanja knjige, uviđam da je prva rečenica pravi mamac za sve ljubitelje naivnih i dobrodušnih likova, pre svega muških. Zar nam se tom rečenicom ne otkriva njegova antipodnost sumnjičavom, podozrivom, ciničnom, pesimističnom i zajedljivom muškom junaku. Denija karakteriše istinska dobrota u smislu bezazlenosti i potpuno suprotno nekom ko predstavlja pretnju i opasnost društvu. Ali će nas kasnije razuveriti, jer se neće ustezati da nasilno reaguje.
...

Ostatak uskoro na mom blogu koji će se zvati bookish and wilde!

*shrugs helplessly*

I feel like I need to read McMurtry's other works before I can properly review this since it seems to be reflecting and commenting on some of his well-traveled themes, so this will be somewhat of a cursory analysis.

Half way through the book, I started to feel like I was just in the backseat of McMurtry’s protagonist’s El Chevy, being thrown this way and that around the Southwest; rambling along into different worlds with not a lot of direction from Danny or the book. I think I even started mentally asking Danny “Where are we going now?” And when Danny started to look for his pregnant wife (and general whor*) Sally, I started to ask myself if McMurtry knows where we are going next.

But just like the way Johnny Carson used to guide even his most rowdy interviews in a precise, controlled way, so does McMurtry lead us to where he wants us. With a cast of characters lining up all around Danny, he’s trying to find at least one person he can connect with. He first looks with just his eyes for someone, which leads him to the soulless, heartless, morally devoid Sally.

My hatred of all characters like Sally, women supposedly looking like angels with demon blood running through them, dragged me and the book down. Fortunately, Danny smartens up in San Francisco and leaves her. I, at least, felt the weight lift off of me, but Danny seems hopelessly rudderless.

He finds himself plucked into literary parties and drug-fueled communes, always acutely aware of how out of place he is. And when he goes to L.A., he finally finds one woman, Jill, he feels mentally at home with…but unlike his carnal relationship with Sally, he can’t physically become one with her. Again, he’s rejected from having a world.

Then there’s the bizarre and utterly surreal visit to his uncle's, where, obscenely, a ranch hand keeps screwing everything that has a hole (mostly inanimate objects). The slaughter of the goats was wretchedly gruesome. Too much gore for both Danny and me, so I was happy he left. But reading the afterward in the book (this is where my lack of experience with McMurtry hurts me), the reviewer talks about this episode as McMurtry declaring the death of the Old West.

We know that Danny has written a book much like McMurtry’s “Horseman, Pass By,” which I haven’t read yet, but do know that the movie “Hud,” one my favorites, was based on that novel. The film is about a young man who would’ve been a cowboy in an older era, but in the time he’s living in, he doesn’t have a range to ride on, and it destroys him.

Danny is way too sensitive and odd to be a cowboy, but he, too, doesn’t have a place. At the end of the book, he begins to understand that he is permanently in the hinterland of life. He’ll never be in the center of any community, always an outsider, somewhere between normalcy and insanity (just like every great writer). And at the end of his speedy search for an Eve for his garden, which he does by sleeping with multiple women, multiple times in one night, he realizes that probably no one will ever reside in his world.

You can’t help but wonder what happened to the dear, hapless Danny. I hope he found his peace, and finally drowned that bitch Sally.

Danny Deck works on his first novel, bounces between Houston and San Francisco, suffers a breakdown, and falls in love with at least four different women in the 1960s. Some of the traditional coming of age arcs coupled with McMurtry's total mastery of setting and road trip style characters that flit in and out stream of consciousness style. This was also very funny and an unbelievably fast read.

Honestly, my love for Larry McMurtry just continues to grow. Our library genre study is finally on to Literary Fiction, so I thought I would pick up something I was dying to read this month. No surprise, this book was fantastic.

I do feel like I should have picked this up when I was about 19, before my tolerance for artistic and indulgent male protagonists started to wane a little bit. Still totally transcendent literature recommended to anyone.

I generally like this author but certainly never really got into the book. There were some promising moments as the "hero" danny deck drifted in and out of his life and relationships but he was never truly believable. At the end I felt let down. And the author of lonesome dove and Texasville really disappointed me. Save your time and if you're a McMurtry fan, go back to one of his older books

The enjoyment of any book is relative to the readers preferences and life experience. This book is one of my favorites ever because in an odd way it helped make sense of and articulate my experiences shortly after my college graduation in my early 20's.

I loved this book. Grabbed me from the first page. He captures like no one else the internal thinking, crazy thoughts, desires, and sets up scenes and encounters with such truth it blows me away. I don’t know how he does it— it seems so effortless.

I enjoyed the main character's development through out this story. He gets himself into some wild situations and definitely makes some questionable choices.

In honor of McMurtry’s recent passing, I decided to read a novel of his I’d never read before. This picaresque novel follows the shenanigans of young novelist Danny Deck, who lives in Houston and has sold a novel as well as screenplay rights to it for a pile of cash, while weaseling his way into the hearts and pants of several women in his life. When he impetuously marries Sally, a woman he met while sleeping on the floor of a friend’s house after a party, the couple escapes to San Francisco—where their marriage falls apart—and we readers follow Danny from one bad decision to the next, eventually leading him back to Houston.

McMurtry has a gift for turning a phrase, particularly when describing a place he loves. For example, he writes, “Houston was my companion on the walk. She had been my mistress, but after a thousand nights together, just the two of us, we were calling it off. It was a warm, moist, mushy, smelly night, the way her best nights were. The things most people hated about her were the things I loved: her heat, her dampness, her sumpy smells. She wasn’t beautiful, but neither was I.” But this book also finds McMurtry laying down some lazy passages, too, with annoying alliteration like this. “Leon actually has to affect affectations” and “the puppet of remote but very powerful powers.” He does this often throughout the novel and it is very distracting.

Danny is not a likeable character either. He suffers from almost debilitating case of imposter syndrome, even though enormous financial success from his novel falls in his lap time and time again, as simple for him as plucking grapes from a fruit bowl. But once I gave up on the hope that I would eventually like Danny, the novel becomes much more enjoyable and entertaining. If taken as an opportunity to observe a buffoon fail at being a decent human being, then the tale becomes much more fascinating, and even enjoyable in a sad*stic way. There were some very funny scenes and interactions between Danny and his neighbor in San Francisco, Wu, who has spent 19 years writing an unpublishable novel and accompanies Danny to Ping Pong tournaments. Turns out Danny’s wife Sally is insufferable, but Danny is no saint. He passive-aggressively snakes his way into the hearts of Jill and friend Emma, getting into their pants and making quick carnage of their lives.

It’s hard to say if the ending is satisfying or not, but either way, I did enjoy reading this humorous novel about this novelist / underdeveloped young man whose friends (mostly women) become strangers totally by his own selfish undoing.

Overall, I enjoyed this novel from 1972 and would give it 4 stars.

Ik zou het 3.5 ster geven. Heel vermakelijk maar sommige dingen zijn wel een beetje verjaard. Het gaf mij een beetje een on the road gevoel. Een man die zich van hot naar her sleept, geleid door impulsieve kansen en ideeën. Dan is hij hier een maand dan weer 3 maanden daar, dan heeft hij liefdevolle seks met die en dan weer heel ruig met een ander en dat was met al zijn contacten. Bijzondere mensen en verhalen en het overkomt hem allemaal een beetje. Dus vermakelijk maar het zou mij niet mijn hele leve bijblijven.

Like On the Road, but with a young writer incapable of making good decisions and destined to burn every bridge he crosses looking for love where it can’t take root. A terrific fun read.