Death in the Time of Pancho Villa

By Sandra Marshall

BOOK DESCRIPTION

The in-laws are aghast when Rose Westmoreland boards a train alone, bound for the far edge of the country in search of her missing husband. Unthinkable for a lady in 1911. Now she's in El Paso, a city holding its breath, anticipating a spectacle. A decisive battle of the Mexican Revolution is about to erupt right across the Rio Grande. Rose's husband, Leonard, sent there by his employer, Stoneman Petroleum, apparently first went native, then disappeared, leaving behind a fiery mistress and rumors he was sent to offer the rebels money in exchange for favorable drilling rights.

Alone in this liminal place, Rose is befriended by two women, a retired thespian and a young Mexican expatriate, who suggest coping methods that would throw the folks back in Shaker Heights into a tizzy. A reporter recruits Rose, who is a talented amateur photographer, to immortalize the Mexican leaders: a sardonic, strawberry soda-sipping Pancho Villa and visionary Francisco Madero, who communes with the shades of Napoleon and Beníto Juárez.

Rose is caught up in the intrigue of the Revolution, the unfamiliar culture of the borderlands, and the deadly competition between international oil companies. When the only person to offer real information about Leonard is killed by what is, perhaps, a stray bullet, she finds her own life in danger. Her determination to uncover the truth reveals hidden secrets, calling into question everything she thought she knew about her life back home, and threatens the well-being of everyone she holds dear.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sandra Marshall was named a finalist in the original softcover fiction category of the Willa Literary Awards, presented by Women Writing the West for her novel. She has also co-authored “Historic Architectural Styles, Las Cruces, N.M.: Celebrating 150 Years,” and holds degrees in anthropology and public history and had an extended career as an archaeologist and architectural historian, primarily in the American Southwest.

She shares a lifelong interest in photography with the novel’s main character.

MY OPINION

The title caught my attention first. How could it not, when I’m so invested in learning about the Mexican Revolution and in writing fiction. I’ve read the book now twice. It was even more enjoyable the second time, perhaps because I had just finished reading Timothy G. Turner’s memoir, Bullets, Bottles, and Gardenias. He’s one of the book’s main characters.

The story takes place in El Paso, Texas, when the Mexican Revolution is about to erupt on the city’s doorstep. This is the “first” revolution, when war was still a romantic notion for both Mexicans and Americans, not the violent civil war Mexico had to slog through before peace was restored and a stable government installed.

Fast-paced and plausible, the novel is filled with quirky, memorable characters. Rose is not a heroine to sit back and wring her hands. She places herself in the thick of things. Her housemates, Marty and Louisa, are unique in every way and raise Rose’s eyebrows on more than one occasion. Pancho Villa and many other historical figures alive on the novel’s pages. The author may have given Villa a bigger role in the book than he actually played. I can’t decide. The memoirs and histories I’ve read give me conflicting impressions. Aside from that, I believe the story stays true to the facts as they happened.

Another thing that makes Death in the Time of Pancho especially noteworthy is the role of photographers in the plot. The Mexican Revolution was when photographers started taking action photos to satisfy the hunger people had to see what was actually happening. Before then, the photographs in newspapers were staged set pieces.

Since the cover states this is “A Rose in Old El Paso Mystery,” I assumed there would be more books in the series. Unfortunately, there have not been thus far. I would have enjoyed reading more about Rose and her exploits.