TVR Review Because this is Texas - Premium Review
Long Review
Because This Is Texas: An Account of the Sneed–Boyce Feud is a meticulously researched, quietly explosive work of narrative history that reconstructs one of the most notorious “unwritten law” cases in early-twentieth-century Texas. Centered on the 1911–1912 killings of former XIT Ranch manager Albert G. Boyce Sr. and his son Al by rancher and cattleman John Beal Sneed, the book follows the long chain of events that begins as a love triangle and ends as a public referendum on marriage, masculinity, and the sanctity of the home. Drawing on letters, court transcripts, newspaper coverage, and family archives, Clara Sneed—Beal’s great-niece—turns a local legend into a fully realized historical narrative.
The opening prologue situates the story in 1912, a world teetering between Victorian restraint and the coming upheaval of World War I. From there, the first chapter moves back to the turn of the century, tracing the intertwined fortunes of the Sneed, Snyder, and Boyce families as they rise with cattle empires, attend Southwestern University, and settle in booming Amarillo. The core situation emerges when Lenora “Lena” Sneed, married to Beal, rekindles or discovers an overwhelming love for her childhood acquaintance Al Boyce Jr. Their affair, consummated in 1911 and culminating in an elopement that takes them all the way to Winnipeg, sets off a chain of legal, social, and emotional shocks that reverberate through families, churches, courtrooms, and newspapers across Texas and beyond.
The book’s greatest strength lies in how fully it inhabits its principal figures without flattening them into heroes or villains. Lena emerges as a woman of intelligence and emotional intensity, trapped by the constraints of her time and the expectations placed on a wealthy rancher’s wife. Her letters to Al, quoted extensively, are passionate, repetitive, and utterly sincere, revealing both the depth of her love and her willingness to risk reputation, children, and financial security for it. Al appears not as a stock seducer but as a reserved, occasionally brooding man whose own letters are surprisingly open-hearted and vulnerable.
Beal, meanwhile, is drawn as a complicated mixture of aggrieved husband, calculating lawyer, and product of his culture. The narrative shows his oscillation between possessive rage and a self-styled role as guardian of a sick wife “not herself,” whose moral insanity must be contained for the sake of the children. The result is an account that acknowledges the brutality of Beal’s actions—stalking the lovers across borders, having Lena confined to a sanitarium, and ultimately shooting both Boyces—while also explaining how a jury could later see him as the defender of home and honor rather than a murderer.
Stylistically, Sneed writes in lucid, literate prose that balances storytelling with analysis. The book maintains a mostly linear structure—prologue, four chapters, and an epilogue—but frequently zooms out to provide broader context on Texas ranching culture, turn-of-the-century psychiatry (“alienists” and the diagnosis of “moral insanity”), and the gendered expectations of Southern respectability. Quotations from contemporary newspapers, habeas corpus transcripts, and private letters are woven smoothly into the narrative, giving the reader both immediacy and perspective. The tone is measured and thoughtful rather than sensational, even when describing shootings in hotel lobbies and on public streets.
Thematically, the work probes the collision between personal passion and public codes of honor. It examines how the “unwritten law”—the idea that a man is justified in killing his wife’s lover to protect the home—functions not just as courtroom strategy but as a cultural reflex. The book also highlights the ways in which Lena’s body and mind become contested terrain: labeled “insane” or “feeble-minded” when convenient, pathologized for sexual and emotional autonomy, and used as leverage in legal and familial power struggles. In the later chapters and the epilogue, Sneed draws clear lines from this 1910s saga to ongoing debates about gender roles, divorce, and the way communities valorize or excuse violence in the name of protecting family and tradition.
Some readers may find the level of legal and procedural detail demanding. Courtroom strategies, jurisdictional maneuvers between Texas and Canada, and the shifting charges against Al (abduction, larceny, white-slavery accusations) receive significant space. For readers primarily seeking a brisk, plot-driven true-crime read, this can occasionally slow momentum. Others will find that these details are precisely what make the book valuable: they show how law, media, and public sentiment interacted to produce an acquittal that a jury foreman famously justified with the simple phrase, “because this is Texas.”
Because This Is Texas will resonate most strongly with readers interested in Texas history, legal history, and serious narrative nonfiction about crime and social norms. It offers a richly contextualized, unsentimental look at how a community chose sides in a feud that was never quite a feud, and how the myth of the protective husband was weaponized in courtrooms and newspapers. For those who want more than a lurid retelling—for those who want to understand how such a story could happen and what it meant to the people who lived through it—this book delivers a compelling, deeply researched account.
Short Review
Because This Is Texas: An Account of the Sneed–Boyce Feud traces a sensational early-1900s Texas love triangle—Lena Sneed, her husband Beal, and her lover Al Boyce Jr.—from whispered gossip to national headlines and landmark trials. Using family letters, court records, and contemporary journalism, Clara Sneed reconstructs the lovers’ elopement to Canada, Lena’s forced confinement in a sanitarium, and the public murders of both Boyce men by Beal, then shows how a Texas jury framed those killings as an act of home protection rather than crime. The prose is clear and historically rich, balancing vivid scenes with careful explanation of legal strategies and cultural attitudes toward marriage, divorce, and the “unwritten law.”
Rather than cast simple heroes and villains, the book presents its central figures in all their contradictions: Lena as passionate and transgressive yet vulnerable to institutional power; Al as reserved rancher turned ardent lover; Beal as both controlling husband and emblem of a culture that equated masculine honor with lethal force. Some readers may find the dense legal and procedural sections slower than the more narrative passages, and the focus is unapologetically regional and historical rather than broadly commercial. Still, for readers of narrative history and serious true crime, this is a thoughtful, engaging account that illuminates how one Texas story came to stand for an entire set of values about home, honor, and justice.
One-Sentence Review
A richly researched, quietly riveting account of the Sneed–Boyce affair, Because This Is Texas turns a notorious Texas shooting case into a nuanced study of love, honor, and the “unwritten law.”
Book Rating
📘📘📘📘 – Strongly Recommended: A well-crafted, deeply contextualized narrative history that will satisfy readers of serious true crime and Texas history, even if its dense legal detail and regional focus give it a somewhat niche appeal.
Pull Quotes (1–2)
- “Because This Is Texas transforms a notorious love triangle and double killing into a nuanced exploration of how passion, honor, and the ‘unwritten law’ shaped early-twentieth-century Texas.”
- “More than a local scandal, the Sneed–Boyce saga becomes in this account a vivid study of how communities excuse or celebrate violence in the name of protecting home and family.”
Content Notes
• Language: Mild to moderate; period-appropriate dialogue and newspaper quotations, occasional strong phrasing but no pervasive profanity.
• Violence: Moderate; on-page descriptions of two shootings and threats of violence, plus repeated discussion of possible lynching or execution, but little graphic physical detail.
• Sexual Content: Non-graphic; adultery and an intense extramarital love affair, implied sexual relationship, references to pregnancy and miscarriage, but no explicit sexual scenes.
• Drugs/Alcohol: Moderate; frequent social and problematic alcohol use in early-1900s Texas ranching culture, mentions of heavy drinking.
• Sensitive Topics: Confinement in a mental institution, contested claims of insanity, miscarriage, strong gendered double standards, threats to children’s custody, and themes of vigilantism and extrajudicial justice.
ReadSafe Rating
• Rating: PG-13
• Labels: V, SC, DA, ST
• Explanation: The book contains multiple on-page killings, persistent threats of violence, and frank discussion of an extramarital affair and miscarriage, though none of these are described in graphic physical detail. Alcohol use is common and sometimes excessive, reflecting the period’s ranching and saloon culture. Sensitive topics include forced institutionalization for “moral insanity,” intense public shaming, and the normalization of lethal “honor” violence. Overall, the content is mature but appropriate for most teens and adults comfortable with serious historical true crime.