Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (Vintage Classics). Cather is in a class with A.B. Guthrie, Jr. and Bernard DeVoto in her feeling for the expanse and expansiveness of early America. This tale of two French priests carving their church territory out of a resistant New Mexico is an unsurpassed collection of word pictures by one of the greatest American painters-with-language. This isn’t a book about jazz? Good catch. In the credo at the top of the page, see the part about other matters.