Audiobook Sample
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- Title: Untamed
- Author: Max Brand
- Narrator: Richard Kilmer
- Length: 07:31:00
- Version: Abridged
- Release Date: 01/01/2011
- Publisher: LibriVox
- Genre: Fiction & Literature, Western
- ISBN13: SABFAB9780647
There’s something magical about listening to a Western while driving through open country. I remember crossing the Nevada desert at dawn last year, the sky bleeding pink over sagebrush plains, with Richard Kilmer’s gravelly voice bringing Max Brand’s Untamed to life in my rental car. The crunch of tires on gravel became the sound of Black Bart’s paws tracking Jim Silent through canyon country. That’s the power of a great audiobook – it transforms your surroundings into its world.
Untamed is one of those Westerns that sticks to your ribs like campfire stew. Whistlin’ Dan Berry isn’t your typical cowboy hero – he’s something wilder, more elemental. Brand paints him as a force of nature with his uncanny bond to Satan (the stallion, not the devil, though the naming’s no accident) and Black Bart the wolf-dog. Listening to Kilmer narrate Dan’s story, I kept thinking about an old vaquero I met in Sonora who could whisper to mustangs in a way that raised the hair on your arms. Some people just have that ancient understanding with animals, and Kilmer captures that eerie quality perfectly.
The narration elevates Brand’s already vivid prose. Kilmer’s voice has this wonderful texture – like well-worn saddle leather – that makes every description of the frontier landscape tactile. When he voices Dan’s whistling (a character trait that could easily become ridiculous), it sends actual chills down your spine. There’s one scene where Dan calls Black Bart across moonlit mesas that gave me full-body goosebumps during my midnight drive through Utah’s backroads.
What surprised me most was how modern the story feels beneath its Western trappings. This isn’t just a shoot-em-up – it’s a meditation on how violence changes a man, even one as untamed as Dan. Brand asks whether justice and revenge are really different animals, a question that resonated deeply with me after reporting from conflict zones where cycles of vengeance feel as inevitable as desert wind. Kilmer delivers these philosophical undercurrents with subtlety, letting them emerge naturally between gunfights and horseback chases.
Comparing it to other Western classics, Untamed has more in common with Jack London’s wilderness tales than Zane Grey’s romanticized frontier. The animal companions aren’t pets but extensions of Dan’s own untamed soul. Kilmer’s growling portrayal of Black Bart particularly shines – you can practically smell the wolf-dog’s musk through the speakers.
That said, 21st-century listeners might balk at some period-typical simplifications. The female characters are woefully underdeveloped (though Kilmer does his best with the material), and the moral complexity occasionally gives way to melodrama. But these are minor quibbles in what’s otherwise a masterclass in atmospheric storytelling.
For travelers like me, this audiobook makes perfect road trip companionship. There’s an authenticity to Brand’s West that pairs beautifully with actual western landscapes. I’ll never forget listening to the climactic canyon showdown while parked at a lonely Arizona rest stop, watching storm clouds gather over red rock cliffs exactly like those in the story.
Whether you’re a die-hard Western fan or just appreciate tales of raw human (and animal) nature, Untamed delivers. And since it’s free through LibriVox, there’s no reason not to saddle up for this adventure. Just maybe don’t listen alone in the desert after dark – Black Bart’s howls feel a little too real in those circumstances.
With boots dusty from the trail,
Marcus Rivera
