Sweet Promised Land

by Robert Laxalt

Published 1 December 1986
The story of the author's father's return to the Basque Country after living in the United States for almost 50 years.

A Time We Knew

by Robert Laxalt

Published 1 November 1990

The Basque Hotel

by Robert Laxalt

Published 1 December 1989
The time is the 1930s and the setting is a western frontier town of a few thousand people, with one dubious distinction. Carson City, Nevada, is the smallest capital in the United States. Pete's world is circumscribed by Main Street - shops and stores, a pool hall, boarding-house hotels, and a capitol whose main contribution is as a place of liquid shade and precious green grass in blistering summers. By far the most important event of the day is when the steam whistle of the V & T sounds, signaling thee passage of the shortline railway on its journey from Virginia City to Reno, "that impossibly big town of 20,000 people 30 miles away." Pete's immigrant parents run the Basque Hotel, bed and meals, whiskey and wine in Prohibition time for sheepherders and town characters. Pete is indifferent to his heritage except for disquiet about his parents' ignorance of such American traditions as Christmas trees. The heroes that figure in the boy Pete's growing up consist of a motley collection as delightful as the reader will ever meet: Buckshot Dooney, the town drunk who "travels from trouble to trouble"; Hallelujah Bob, who pursues his demons with a shotgun when he has imbibed too much; Irish prospector Mickey McCluskey; Mizoo, the cowboy with a ten-gallon hat; Pansy Gifford, the handyman who always wears a suit with a flower in his lapel; and George Washington Lopez, who swamps out the local whorehouse a block away from the capitol. Pete, too prone to dreams, undergoes his rites of passage - cruelty and kindness, disillusionment, love and terror, pathos and hilarious adventure, and finally, a cautious understanding of his world.

A Cup of Tea in Pamplona

by Robert Laxalt

Published 31 December 1985
In this action filled tale, Laxalt shows the daring and sometimes violent world of the contrabandiers, Basque smugglers in the Pyrenees. Set in the 1960s, the story begins with Nikolas, driven by his family’s financial despair, taking on work from Gregorio, the patrón of a small team of smugglers. Nikolas must smuggle fifty horses over the mountain ridges between France and Spain. If he’s caught, jail and ruin are certain; death is possible. This engrossing novella, told with tight narration and compelling dialogue, shows the grinding poverty and ethnic tensions in Basque lands, fifty years ago.

Child of the Holy Ghost

by Robert Laxalt

Published 1 October 1992
In the second volume of Laxalt's Basque family trilogy, he lifts the veil that conceals the subtle cruelties of those fierce guardians of private scandal, the villagers who will keep from the world what is dear to them.

His book The Basque hotel was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in fiction, and his novella A cup of tea in Pamplona led to his being awarded El Tambor de oro (The Golden Drum), one of Spain's most prestigious literary honours, in 1986. Since 1954, Laxalt has served in a number of positions at the University of Nevada, most recently as the first occupant of the Distinguished Nevada Author Chair..

In a Hundred Graves

by Robert Laxalt

Published 30 April 2016
The Basques of Europe are legendary for the curtain of privacy they have always drawn around their world, shielding it from visitors from the outside. As a result, accounts of the inner workings of Basque village life are almost nonexistent.

In this unique book, author Robert Laxalt has managed to penetrate the deep reserve of Basque village folk. Shepherds, troubadours, merchants, and smugglers, caught up in the panorama of daily life, parade before the reader. They are portrayed against a backdrop of green rugged mountains and stone buildings, typical of the Basque provinces in France and Spain. Laxalt, an American born of Basque parents, unveils the Basque character with warmth, wry humor, and above all, honesty.

The Governor's Mansion

by Robert Laxalt

Published 30 November 1997
In the dramatic third volume of Robert Laxalt’s trilogy, Leon—the eldest son of immigrant parents—becomes the governor of Nevada during the 1960s. An able lawyer in his own right, he is a neophyte when it comes to dealing with the political ploys of the entrenched officeholders who dominate in Nevada. Leon faces the crisis of his budding political career when he is caught between J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI, bent on cleaning out the Mafia, and his own need to protect the autonomy of his native state. An unexpected ally appears when the only man rich enough to solve the governor’s dilemma comes to Nevada—reclusive billionaire Howard Hughes.