After watching "The Missing" last week, I found the book on which it was based at the library--Tom Eidson's The Last Ride, which I read this morning. The writing style is certainly that of a Western, and the story hadn't been changed much for the movie, but I enjoyed it fairly well nonethless. The religion argument between the heroine and her father was a little overdone, and was resolved agreeably but not satisfactorily; the movie's way of dealing with the problem rang truer as well as being subtler. The movie also, surprisingly, gave the characters more depth--despite Eidson's delving into history and motivation, I found it difficult to care much about his characters. But of course it's always difficult to read the book after seeing the movie. In many cases the book falls a bit flat, unfortunately.

I'm too tired and spacey to type accurately much longer, so I'll end by listing some other books I've read in the past week or so (mostly quick easy library reads):
Durable Goods, Elizabeth Berg--the first of three related books, which I accidentally read in backwards order, giving an interesting portrait of childhood and adolescence.
Girl Goddess #9, Francesca Lia Block--very odd little stories with extremely heavy-handed treatment of social issues.
Bloodchild and other stories, Octavia Butler--again, heavy-handed, though much creepier.
Children of the Storm, Elizabeth Peters--the latest Amelia Peabody mystery, which I enjoyed thoroughly as always.
Goat Song, Susan Basquin--an interesting though ultimately depressing tale of the author's adventures in goat farming.
The Whim of the Dragon, Pamela Dean--rereading the third volume in the Secret Country trilogy was enthralling and delightful, though I do wish Dean were contracted to write more mythic fiction rather than more Secret Country books. I'm also in the middle of rereading The Dubious Hills, which I like better but still not as much as her other two books.