Still, John Grady's obsession over a teenage Mexican prostitute carries no real conviction. And, the convergence of the first two installments of the trilogy within the third has the feeling of an afterthought. The lead character in The Crossing does cross paths with the hero of Pretty Horses, but Billy Parham seems more of a walk-on here. At any rate, it is the fate of highly gifted novelists to be compared not to the lesser novelists around them, but to their own earlier achievements. A dream inside a dream might not be a dream.
True believers look toward what is yet to come.