Peace like a River is one of the clubs all time favorites and many of the members enjoyed "So Brave, Young and Handsome". The characters were well developed. You knew them by the time the book was finished. Many were surprised that they enjoyed a book that smacked of being a western.

Leif Enger is a great author, no doubt... but this book pales in comparison to "Peace Like a River." On it's own, its a good story of a middle aged man in career crisis who latches onto a man with excitement and mystery. In comparison, it lacked the spiritual weight of his other book, which was disappointing.

If a book doesn’t grab you by page 50, you shouldn’t feel bad for abandoning it. But SO BRAVE, YOUNG, AND HANDSOME should grab you right away with Leif Enger's typical writing style. However, I found that this book doesn’t live up to its promise.

Monte Becket is an author. He has written a bestseller, and everyone is anticipating what comes next. But he doesn’t have it in him, whatever “it” is. So he leaves his ever loving wife and child to join his neighbor, Glendon Hale, who is headed for Mexico. Glendon wants to apologize to the wife he left there many years before, and Monte wants to find "it."

What follows are chapter upon chapter upon chapter of unlikely events. This is how Monte gets from here to there, and the heck with his wife and child, who want him home. He ends up in California, where Glendon‘s wife has remarried and settled with her new husband. (It doesn’t spoil the story to tell you that.)

The book bored me to tears. I did not care about any one character. The whole thing is just plain silly. It felt like reading a comic book.