SOURCE: "Across Texas by Non Sequitor," in New York Times, October 22, 1989, p. 8.

In the following review, Kingsolver, a novelist and author of The Bean Trees, states that despite a weak ending, Some Can Whistle is engaging and entertaining.

A novel about a novelist is a narcissistic contraption at best—and, at worst, false advertising. If the truth must be known, we novelists are a pale, unglamourous lot, cowering behind our dictionaries. Few of us have wacky maids and the knack for stumbling on corpses; even fewer of us are rich. But Larry McMurtry can write about anything he wants, and most everything that breathes and is literate will beg for more. Mr. McMurtry's prose stands up and kicks fence posts. His cowboys are articulate, his petty criminals have grand potential, and in his latest book, Some Can Whistle, even a rich novelist is as complex as Hamlet, and...