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  • Published: 30 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9780141962641
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 256

The Last Picture Show




Larry McMurtry's hilarious and touching novel, in Penguin Modern Classics for the very first time

Sam the Lion runs the pool-hall, the picture house and the all-night café. Coach Popper whips his boys with towels and once took a shot at one when he disturbed his hunting. Billy wouldn't know better than to sweep his broom all the way to the town limits if no one stopped him. And teenage friends Sonny and Duane have nothing better to do than drift towards the adult world, with its temptations of sex and confusions of love.

The basis for a classic film, The Last Picture Show is both extremely funny and deeply profound. And, with the eccentrically peopled Thalia, Texas, Larry McMurtry made a small town that feels as real as any you've ever walked around.

Famously filmed by Peter Bogdanovich in 1971 with Jeff Bridges and Cybill Shepherd.

With a new introduction by Mary Karr.

  • Published: 30 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9780141962641
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 256

About the author

Larry McMurtry

Larry McMurty is the son and grandson of cattlemen, and he spent most of his growing years in the ranching country of north-central Texas. He is a graduate of North Texas State in Denton and Rice University in Houston. With publication of his first novel, Horseman, Pass By, he won overwhelming acclaim as one of the most brilliant of America's contemporary novelists. In 1986 he won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction with Lonesome Drove. Several of his novels have been made into films.

Praise for The Last Picture Show

'An alchemist who converts the basest materials into gold'

The New York Times Book Review

'There aren't many writers around who are as much fun as Larry McMurtry'

Boston Globe