A-yep. The Western is dead. 
 Yeah, I'm happy too, because I love stories about the bloody history of the not-so-new world. As much as I love the great Western classics, their time is up. The Western has carried a lot of negative shit in its saddle-bags, shit that needs to be buried with it. The Western began as Historical Fiction, obviously, but it's popularity soon made it a genre all it's own, one especially overloaded with cliches and predictability. It started selling myths as political propaganda, and things got twisted up and confused. The Western and The Duke became symbols of an old, outmoded way of thinking: it was the world-view of fat, old, cigar-chomping, far-right assholes, as far as the younger generation was concerned; and the Western has never really been cool since then, with a few notable exceptions. But the real West is full up with fascinating stories to tell, some compelling history for novelists to dance around as they make shit up. So the death of the Western, making way for new visions of the old West, and rejoining Historical Fiction... it's all good news to me. 
 [Relax, Doc. 'Tombstone' was all manner of bullet-riddled goodness.] 
 Clint Eastwood and David Peoples' 'Unforgiven', and the Coen brother's version of 'True Grit': at once the last of the great Westerns, and the greatest Westerns ever made. Newer entries, like Tarantino's 'Django Unchained' and 'The Hateful Eight' are thrilling attempts at simultaneous homage and deconstruction. 'The Burrowers' and 'Bone Tomahawk' are both gruesome, remarkably similar but entertaining horror films, both set deep into the unsettled frontier, where evolutionary diversions more monster than human hunt white men and Native Americans alike. Western deconstruction, satire, genre mash-up... but the old Western, which was the Myth of the American Frontier, the propaganda, is dead. 
 In books, Louis L'Amour and Zane Grey are very dated. Cormac McCarthy, James Carlos Blake, Ron Hansen, Larry McMurtry, and Charles Frazier are the reigning lords of the hard-eyed American historical novel, but not one them has written a proper 'western'. 'Blood Meridian' can't be called a 'western', any more than 'Wildwood Boys' or 'Desperadoes'. Larry McMurtry comes closest to embracing the tropes of the 'western' genre, but only for the sake of subverting reader expectations. The frontier was not settled by singing cowboys. Native Americans weren't simple savages, but they weren't the noble nature-loving quasi-Buddhists that became the Hollywood cliche in the late-sixties and seventies. The 'New World' was a brutal, vicious battleground, where every random encounter between strangers would very likely end violently. 
 Patrick DeWitt has joined this impressive company with `The Sisters Brothers', a novel that combines the flawlessly crafted prose of fellow Canadian Michael Ondaatje or Charles Frazier, with a darkly comical tale that suggests Charles Portis and James Carlos Blake - particularly his brutal masterpiece `In the Rogue Blood'. Like the latter, DeWitt's book is a story about brothers who are born killers made for a bloody world; like the former, it has a darkly comedic intelligence. 
 As a Canadian myself, I felt bad about NOT feeling bad about the lack of native literary fiber in my pulp-heavy diet. Ondaatje, yes. Atwood, sure. But beyond `Oryx and Crake', I can't remember the last time I read another Canadian novel. Tony Burgess and `Pontypool Changes Everything', I guess, preceded by the loosely connected stories in `The Hellmouths of Bewdley'... 10, 15 years ago. Which means that I'm confessing to being a bad Canadian. Even before Jian Ghomeshi was unmasked as Jack the Ripper, I still fled in terror when `Canada Reads' infected the CBC airwaves with its suitably terrifying frontman (anyone who could create music as undeniably evil as the sonic terrorism of Moxy Fruvous had to house rows of retractable shark teeth behind that smile)... 
 I feel like Dewitt has finally crafted Canlit that doesn't feel like a homework assignment. `The Sisters Brothers' is a cocaine counterpoint to the literary laxatives of `Two Solitudes' and `The Stone Angel'. If the point of using Hugh-fucking-McLennan and Margaret-fucking-Lawrence was to scare kids away from Canlit forever - brilliant. They could also have value as practical demonstrations of Relativity: narrative black holes clearly distorting space-time; when you manage to break free of the oppressive gravitational pull, hours have passed... and you're still on the same page. 
 It's probably true that those wacky kids would hate any book they're forced to read. But the chances of creating an entire generation of anti-Canlit jihadists will be significantly reduced if we take a sledge-hammer to `The Stone Angel' and go with `The Sisters Brothers' instead. Unless teenagers completely suck. I'm willing to consider that possibility. 
 Eli and Charlie Sisters are cold-blooded killers employed by a man known as `The Commodore'. Eli is the narrator of the tale, and he often defers to his brother. Eli has a soft streak that Charlie doesn't seem to possess, showing a sympathy and occasional empathy that is totally inappropriate for a hired gun. Charlie is a very different person - lean and quick and calculating, with a violent temper that often affects his trigger finger... his primary source of income. 
 Okay. Sure. Something like that. 
 The story opens in Oregon City, as the Sisters brothers set out on orders to murder a prospector named Hermann Kermit Warm, whom the Commodore has denounced simply as a thief. Their journey to San Francisco is an eventful one, and Charlie begins to express anger with The Commodore, and dissatisfaction with their arrangement. Upon arriving in the city, they track down a friend of Warm's, who reveals some very interesting details concerning the German prospector's partnership and subsequent falling-out with The Commodore. It involves a method of finding and extracting gold from riverbeds, based on a chemical of Warm's devising. He absconded with his work and secrets when he realized that his partner would certainly kill him once the formula was done. Eli and Charlie now must decide between loyalty to their employer, and a chance to get rich by betraying him. 
 In between, `The Sisters Brothers' is rich to overflowing with fascinating characters and stories. The dynamic between Eli and Charlie provides one of the more memorable fictional relationships I've come across in recent years. This is one of my new favorites, and it feels super patriotic to say that Patrick DeWitt is one of my favorite authors. He's helping to save fiction in Canada, with a story that cleverly avoids being Canadian in any way. We don't need books about elderly women living in Moosefuck Alberta, we just need great stories told with style and passion. If someone says that Canadian Literature doesn't need saving - smite them with a righteous vengeance... or politely take exception... or meekly slink off in the opposite direction. It's all good. 
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