num_pages: 240
description: <p>Charles Portis has long been acclaimed as one of America's foremost comic writers. <i>True Grit</i> is his most famous novel--first published in 1968, and the basis for the movie of the same name starring John Wayne. It tells the story of Mattie Ross, who is just fourteen years of age when a coward going by the name of Tom Chaney shoots her father down in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and robs him of his life, his horse, and $150 in cash money. Mattie leaves home to avenge her father's blood. With the one-eyed Rooster Cogburn, the meanest available U.S. Marshal, by her side, Mattie pursues the homicide into Indian Territory.</p><p><i>True Grit</i> is eccentric, cool, straight, and unflinching, like Mattie herself. From a writer of true cult status, this is an American classic through and through. This new edition, with a smart new package and an afterword by acclaimed author Donna Tartt, will bring this masterpiece to an even broader audience.</p>                        <p>Fourteen-year-old Mattie Ross' father was shot and killed. Told through her eyes, <i>True Grit</i> is the story of how she and hard-drinking Marshal Rooster Cogburn set out to find and prosecute his murderer. An epic and a legend.--<i>Washington Post</i></p>
language: en
title: True Grit: A Novel
publisher: Harry N. Abrams