Customer Reviews

The beginning of the end. - By: Scott James (srj9@aber.ac.uk), 25 Aug 2001
I've never had a bad word to say about Ennis & Dillon's Preacher & I'm glad to say that War In The Sun is no exception.

It simply oozes classin every department & builds towards a shattering climax that will test the wits & integrity of all concerned.

Before we get down to brass tacks, Ennis flushes out the details of Herr Starr's blood-soaked rise to power. By balancing Starr's grotesque sexual desire with his obsession for orderin a world caught upin chaos, Ennis has created an individual who is as amusing as he is terrifying.

After giving us a detailed account of Starr's rise to power, Ennis gets down to business & begins to rack up the tension as Jesse; Tulip & Cassidy arrivein Monument Valley for a confrontation with the Saint of Killers.

Meanwhile, the American military, under the command of All-Father Starr, begins to closein from all sides, with the goal of capturing Jesse & using him as the Grail's puppet-messiah.

After the heavy-handed development of the Jesse-Tulip-Cassidy love trianglein Dixie Fried, Ennis takes greater effortin flushing out the relationship between Tulip & Cassidy as Jesse becomes increasingly obsessed with his search for God.

"Obsessed" being the operative word. The theme of obsession is addressedin a number of innovative ways, Starr's obsession to bring order to chaos being the most notable. But this can also be compared to Jesse's unrelenting search for the Lord Almighty, while Cassidy's burning desire for Tulip has all the traits of a lovesick stalker.

Ennis's well-structured narrative details the nuances & extremities of masculine obsession & provides an insight into how three totally different men deal with their own personal darkness.

This is not to say that War In The Sun is for men only: After learning of Cassidy's true feelings, Tulip struggles admirably to conceal the truth from Jesse & remains faithful to him throughout. But unknown to her, fate has something planned for the love-struck couple & the repercussions will be devastating.

Allin all, not a bad little number. Fans of Cassidy may not appreciate the revelations of his duplicitous nature, but then again it adds new depth to a character that wasin danger of becoming a caricature buddy-role.

War In The Sun has the feel of transition about it: In that all the prior storylines have been building up to one singular event after which nothing will be the same again.

As you would expect, War In The Sun ends on a cliffhanger but I get the feeling that the endingin question is subdued & underplayed & perhaps intentionally so. But I always prefer endings to go out on a high.

But minor gripes aside, War In The Sun is perhaps the most important novelin the collection & an essential purchase for fans of the Preacher series.