The Yellow Rose

Hungarian “Western”

This charmingly dark tale takes place in the Hungarian plains and involves a tragic love triangle between two cowboys - a cow herd and a horse wrangler. There is a lot to enjoy about this translated story. The setting is unique and nothing like what I expected Hungary to be like. I went to Wikipedia and learned a great deal about a part of the world I'll never visit. The love triangle is intriguing and mysterious. It portrays the Hungarian cowboy as intensely emotional yet restrained in verbal expression of those feelings. The ending of the story, although never in doubt, is still jarring.

The audiobook is narrated by BJ Harrison who has visited the Hungarian plain. He brings it alive as a character and its emotions overlie the entire narrative. His voicing of the cowboys and their songs is masterful. We understand the emotions of the cowboys through his narration rather than the actual words they speak.

I highly recommend this book.