I Want To Read: Deadwood

Summer is in full swing, and I think we all know the effect that has on good television: for the most part, it's gone. I unashamedly love TV*, but I appreciate getting a breather from watching a series on a weekly basis. Instead, summer is the time to...turn off the idiot box? Nah. Summer is the time to catch up on DVDs!

And I have had more time than usual to catch up this summer, given that I've been laid up with my broken leg rather than run ragged at summer camp. The best discovery I've made, by far, is Deadwood.

I've almost finished the second season of the HBO series, which ran from 2004 until its abrupt end in 2006. I was immediately enthralled with the Wild West in a way I'd never been before, drawn in by vivid, complicated, yet sympathetic characters** and by the day-to-day realities of a world I was wholly unfamiliar with. It's maybe hard to say, given that I haven't finished watching yet, but right now I'd call Deadwood my second favorite show ever. (It's hard to beat The Wire.)

I'm already looking toward the end of the series and realizing that it's not going to last long enough to suit me. I was excited to find that Pete Dexter's novel Deadwood covers the same period of the town's history. A little research informs me that despite having many of the same characters, there are a fair amount of dissimilarities between the book and the show. All the same, I know I'm going to want to spend a little more time in the town of Deadwood once I'm done watching. Although I have many, many books on my to-read list, I'm hoping I can get a hold of a copy of Deadwood sharpish. Until then, I'm happily devouring Jo Nesbø's The Devil's Star. Bookstore gift cards are the best, no?

*Though I do love books more, naturally.

**I've amused myself by trying to order my top 5 Deadwood characters. It's tough. As of this moment I'd go: 1. Doc Cochran (Brad Dourif) 2. Calamity Jane (Robin Weigart) 3. Sol Star (John Hawkes) 4. Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) 5. Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant). But then what about Charlie Utter (Dayton Callie) and Joanie Stubbs (Kim Dickens)? Or the characters I love to hate, like the slimy E.B. Farnum (William Sanderson) and the sociopathic yet dapper Francis Wolcott (Garret Dillahunt)?