The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon

by Tom Spanbauer

Book Overview

Set against the harsh reality of an unforgiving landscape and culture, The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon provides a vision of the Old West unlike anything seen before. The narrator, Shed, is one... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060974974
• ISBN13: 9780060974978
• Release Date: September 1992
• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 0.66 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.3" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Flew under the radar, but it should have been a big seller.

This is one of those books that you pick up and you're just not sure it is your type of book. Don't let the cover art or the blurb on the back scare you off. This is a joyful, fun, uplifting book that shows you that love can come up and catch you when you're not looking. I have passed this book on to several of my friends; some of them I had to push to get them to actually read it and they all loved it. I don't care what your genre of book typically is - pick this up and you won't regret it.

"Without Moves Moves we are nothing"

This may be the most remarkable novel I've ever read. And one of the most original. Oh, there are echoes of other great books, such as "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest" and "Even Cowgirls Get the Blues" (other reviewers have mentioned "Little Big Man") but Tom Spanbauer's vision is unique: his subject is nothing less than the American identity, our dreams of reinvention and assilimilation, our fears and illusions, and the "human-being story" that is unique to each of us. Shed (tribal name Duivichi-un-Dua) begins life as the son as Buffalo Sweets, an Indian prostitute in the employ of Ida Richelieu, purveyor of Ida's Place, in Excellent, Idaho, a backwater in transition from frontier town to Morman community sometime at the beginning of the 20th century. When Billy Blizzard, who has been Ida's lover since he was thirteen, goes crazy, raping Shed and killing his mother, Shed goes to work for Ida as a male prostitute who lives "out-in-the-shed." But when Alma Hatch, ex-Bible salesman and exotic dancer, pays to sleep with Shed, he panics and leaves town in search of his own identity. That's when he meets Dellwood Barker, the Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon. And that's only the beginning of this incredible story, which eventually brings Shed full circle to Excellent, where he, Dellwood, Ida, and Alma form a family ("better than any Morman family" and briefly to include a traveling troop of "authentic Negro" minstrels) that tests them all in ways they could never have imagined. As John Donne said of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales": "here is God's plenty." With "The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon," Spanbauer has earned a special place in American letters. I can think of no book since "Moby Dick" that offers such a vivid mosaic of American life, and no book so profound in its understanding of the human condition. This one goes beyond cult; it's a classic for all time.

Wordcraft at its most lyrical and moving

If I could give this novel 6 stars out of 5--no--*all* the stars in existence, I would. It's hard not to gush over work so perfect, so absolutely involving, so breathtakingly written as this. The wordcraft is exquisite--rich and ripe with the most unusual and stirring of metaphors. It manages that almost impossible balance between philosophy and reality, dream and grit, sex and magic. It's perfect.'Shed' (whose name has other connotations) is on a search for his father. He finds him--and, in the form of his father, also discovers his teacher and his lover. His journey takes him across a landscape of strange beauty, filled with questions about the nature of love, sexuality, violence, cruelty and empathy. The minor characters are incredibly memorable as well--each one so *complete* that you will easily be carried forth into their world(s)--interspersed with irresistable laughter and grief. Shed's father/lover/friend is so exquisitely crafted, and such a strange and wonderful soul, that you will find yourself as much in love with him as Shed is.I cannot say enough good things about this novel. This review feels inadequate. I can only insist that you read it NOW, right NOW, because when you do come across it, you'll be kicking yourself that you didn't pick it up earlier. (Yes, that's what I spent much of my time doing before gathering enough of my wits to write this review.) And even now I'm itching to go back and re-read it.Perhaps the closest comparison is to 'Alice in Wonderland'--for Shed's journey is as delightfully absurd, by turns tragic and hilarious, and as surreal, as Alice's. One might almost say he is a modern, truly liberated version of Alice. But make no mistake. In the apparent absurdity of his journey, he discovers some achingly beautiful truths... each one profound. You will find yourself itching to quote these truths it to your friends--but the pity is, of course, that the entire *book* is quotable--so you'll have to spend hours running around getting them to *read* the thing themselves, as I am doing.

A very human story

If you think this is a book about the turn-of-the-century West, prostitution in frontier Idaho, Mormon settlers or bisexuality, you'd be partly right and partly wrong. Above all else, this struck me as a book about family, both family of choice and family of blood. Spanbauer explores the nature of reality, sexual identity, transgendered issues, bisexual issues, racial issues, "Tantric" sex techniques, the clash of religious and libertine cultures, incest and even sado-masochism, expressing these ideas in terms more familiar to a society of one hundred years ago, not in these modern terms I have just used.The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon spoke to me on multiple levels as I read it and the story and characters have continued to haunt me after finishing the book. While there is plenty of action, this is not primarily an action adventure book. It will be more appealing to those who enjoy stories of spiritual quests than those who enjoy more traditional Westerns.The one caveat I would offer is that this is not a book for the squeamish. In my opinion, Spanbauer deals with his subject matter with grace and taste, however he does not flinch from writing about explicit sex and graphic death. I can't imagine the book without these graphic scenes, though, and wouldn't want this book to be any different than precisely what it is.

Fun to read

I didn't get this book when it was published because -- geez, a WESTERN about a bi Native boy? Then I was completely out of reading material so I reluctantly picked it up. Now I'm sorry I didn't get it before. Talk about your killdeer. Mr.Spanbauer is an excellent writer. He rendered some remarkable dialect flowing from Shed's mind. One of the most fun things about the book was the oddness of Shed's grammar that paralleled the oddness of his world perceptions. With a minimum of punctuation to help, it was sometimes like piecing together a puzzle to figure out what he was saying. And that was always rewarding. I also loved the lambent but respectful way Mr. Spanbauer dealt with Native pantheism. This is a fun and sometimes inspiring book.

Native America as You Never Knew It

One recurring argument about this book is that it misrepresents some or all aspects of Native American history, philosophy, or culture. Quite the opposite: It epitomizes it.I am Cheyenne myself, and perhaps being "raised white" caused me to return and research my roots much more carefully than if I had been raised within my own tribe. Spanbauer's character "Shed" is a much truer depiction of an Indian than is found in most popular fiction. Hillerman's Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee scratch the surface, sometimes delving deeply into the Indian mind, but Shed provides a look at the Indian soul.To Shed, that that is is. His experience is his teacher, and it always tells the truth. The key is to observe his use of the word "killdeer," referring to a bird which will lure a predator away from the bird's nest by pretending to be wounded (an easy kill); when far enough away, the killdeer bird will fly off, leaving the tricked predator lost, confused, and hungry. Shed sees killdeer everywhere--traps, lures, illusions. The greatest illusion of all is to deny what is real, to deny emotions, to deny love--whatever its form.Spanbauer's book is rampantly, wickedly sexual, including myriad instances of male homosexuality. "Not true," say the puritanical readers; "the cowboys weren't [politically incorrect term for "gay" here]." Wrong again, and history is proving it so with many writings about the great open prarie days. Spanbauer writes openly about experience as it is, not as it has been "laundered" in our history books. For those who doubt the concepts in Native America, go look up the term "berdache" and get back to me.Spanbauer's book is as truly Indian and as truly spiritual as the greatly touted (and superlative beyond description) book Seven Arrows, by H. Storm. I recommend this book to anyone who wants a great read, a brilliant narrative, a peek at the spiritual side of Native America, or just a terrific laugh over! the marvelously bawdy story of Ida Richelleu's bright pink whorehouse. Read, and believe your experience.