At Love's Command

At Love’s Command 

By Karen Witemeyer 

Bethany House, 2020. 377 pages. Romance 

Following the massacre of Wounded Knee, cavalry officer Matthew Hanger leaves the military and leads a band of mercenaries who defend the innocent. When one of his men is gravely injured, they seek out the help of Dr. Josephine Burkett. When Josie’s brother is abducted, she asks the Hanger’s Horsemen to save him, but things go wrong and soon it’s Josie who is in danger. Will Matthew be able to save her in time, or will he lose the woman he has fallen for? 

This is one of my all-time favorite Karen Witemeyer books. Josie is a strong, independent, intelligent woman who also is compassionate, understanding, and finds a true partner in Matthew. The Christian elements felt authentic and relevant, without being overbearing. They make each other better people and help one another grow and learn new things. I can’t wait for the other books in this series, and would recommend to anyone who enjoys clean romance, historical fiction, or Christian fiction. 

 TT

The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower #1)

The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower, #1)
By Stephen King
New York: Signet, 2003. 300 pgs. Fantasy.

“The man in Black fled across the Desert, and the Gunslinger followed.” So begins the epic multi-volume Dark Tower series. In this first installment, Roland Deschain, the last Gunslinger, tracks down his adversary, encountering dust-swept and hostile towns, the boy Jake brought from another world, demons, mutants, and a talking raven.

Considered by Stephen King himself to be his magnum opus, The Dark Tower series is full of King’s rich, grandiose prose, and dark atmosphere of the macabre. Fans of Clint Eastwood style old Westerns will appreciate the tall, silent, and brooding Roland, as well as the hard and bleak atmosphere reminiscent of the old West. Get ready to be swept up in a genre-bending saga of epic proportions when you pick up The Gunslinger.

AL

The Springsweet

The Springsweet
By Saundra Mitchell
Boston, 2012. 278 pgs. Young Adult Fiction

Seventeen year old Zora Stewart is more than ready to leave her home in Baltimore after the tragic death of her fiancé, Thomas. So, when Zora's newly widowed aunt needs help on her struggling homestead in the Oklahoma Territory, Zora welcomes the chance to escape into a simple life of hard work. However, things get complicated quickly when Zora discovers her valuable new gift for sensing underground water.

The Springsweet is book two in Saundra Mitchell’s Vespertine series. I didn't read book one, and although I’m sure a few things would have made more sense, I don’t regret starting in the middle of the series; Zora's story stands on its own. This is a fun read, and I especially liked that Mitchell crossed a western setting with supernatural elements. If you've read  Rae Carson's Walk on Earth a Stranger or Michelle Modesto's Revenge and the Wild, you'll enjoy The Springsweet -- particularly if you like stories with a little more romance.

CNC

Copperhead

  

Copperhead Volume 1: A New Sheriff in Town

By Jay Faerber

Image Comics, 2015. 128 pgs. Graphic Novel. Science Fiction

Clara Benson, single mother and tough as nails cop, lands a job as the new sheriff on a dusty back-water hole of a planet in the wake of an interstellar war. Here and there the reader gets tidbits of backstory- mention of artificial humans created to fight battles, aliens bitter about the conquest, a separate peace treaty with the mysterious natives- but the real meat of Copperhead lays in Clara’s constant upheaval of the town’s expectations.

Every character in Copperhead’s cast gets a full personality; without dwelling overlong on exposition, Faerber manages to develop motivations and personalities that leave the reader wanting more. Copperhead leans on common tropes for Westerns (Dukes of Hazard fans will recognize the Boss Hogg breed of kingpin), but the science fiction setting throws them into new and fresh light. The artwork is clear and beautiful, and works well with the script to show the deep emotions of the rough characters. Copperhead has action, mystery, and deep family loyalty woven throughout; it is one of my favorite graphic novels. 

JMS

No Country For Old Men

No Country For Old Men
By Cormac McCarthy
New York: Knoff, 2005. 309 pp. Fiction

While out hunting along the Texas-Mexican border, Llewellyn Moss stumbles upon mysterious crime scene, with a number of men dead or dying and pickup trucks riddled with bullets. After examining the results of this shootout, he discovers a large cache of heroin and a satchel containing millions in cash. He quickly grabs the money and flees the scene. Unbeknownst to him, this will set in motion a relentless and ruthless manhunt, with two men tasked by the competing groups behind the apparent drug deal gone bad to track down the man who stole the money and a county sheriff struggling to keep Moss alive and protect his community.

After years of having Cormac McCarthy on my mental TBR list and hearing so many rave reviews, I finally picked up a copy of this book after one of my colleagues said it was one of her all time favorites. I really quite enjoyed this book. It is possibly the most masculine novel I have ever read. While it is set in contemporary Texas, it has the feel of a western, populated with men of few words and much action. Each of the characters are driven to act according to his particular notions of how men are and/or should be. Once set upon a path he doggedly treads it even unto death, with little or no hesitation, circumspection or consideration of self-interest let alone the interests of others. The writing is extraordinarily lean and even Spartan, stripped of even some basic elements of punctuation, reflecting the uncomplicated perspectives of the principal characters. This book is a really page turner and thought provoking examination of the male psyche that nicely avoids being a mere agglomeration of trite alpha male clichés.

CHW

Walk on Earth a Stranger

 

Walk on Earth a Stranger
By Rae Carson
Greenwillow Books, 2015, 436 pages, YA Western

"Lee Westfall has a secret. She can sense the presence of gold in the world around her. Veins deep beneath the earth, pebbles in the river, nuggets dug up from the forest floor. The buzz of gold means warmth and life and home--until everything is ripped away by a man who wants to control her. Left with nothing, Lee disguises herself as a boy and takes to the trail across the country. Gold was discovered in California, and where else could such a magical girl find herself, find safety?"

Without initially realizing I’d done so, this is the second book I’ve picked up this year about a girl who disguises herself as a boy and sets off across the prairie to find a new life in California. While both books have some obvious similarities, they also have some marked differences. Lee Westfall is a bit more successful at passing herself off as a boy. She already knows how to hunt, split wood, and ride a horse. This makes her a bit more capable of fending for herself, but I liked that the book still stressed the fact that Lee needed the help of other people to make her way. I also liked the commentary on the different expectations the time period had for boys and girls.

I enjoyed Under a Painted Sky because it told the story of the trip West through the eyes of diverse characters. The characters in Walk on Earth a Stranger are more typical, but they are a bit more fleshed out as well, and it will be interesting to see how each of these characters fare in the next book in the series. Read both of these books for great western adventure stories with a touch of light romance.

MB

Under a Painted Sky

Under a Painted Sky

by Stacey Lee

G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 374 pages, Young Adult Historical Fiction

"In 1845, Sammy, a Chinese American girl, and Annamae, an African American slave girl, disguise themselves as boys and travel on the Oregon Trail to California from Missouri."

When I think of the Oregon Trail, I think of long lines of covered wagons.  Stacey Lee does a great job of giving a different view of the trip westward.  I loved the diversity of the characters (Chinese American, African American, Mexican, Irish), and I especially loved how she wove the backgrounds of their different cultures into the story.  For example, Sammy is always making assumptions about people’s actions based on the Chinese zodiac.  The fact that Sammy and Annamae are trying to keep their gender a secret while traveling with cowboys added a fun twist to the plot.  The story is fast-paced and full of Wild West adventure, with a little bit of romance thrown in for good measure.

MB

Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral

Epitaph: A Novel of the O.K. Corral

by Mary Doria Russell

HarperCollins, 2015. 581 pgs. Fiction

Tombstone, Arizona. October 26, 1881. 5 cowboys. 4 lawmen. 30 seconds that changed everything. This is the story of the events leading up to those 30 seconds, the gunfight, and its aftermath. In 1881 Tombstone was a burgeoning frontier metropolis with three newspapers, a number of restaurants, two banks, four churches, a school, an opera house, a bowling alley, an ice cream parlor, 110 saloons, 14 gambling establishments, and a bunch of brothels. The mining town was on the rise and it was drawing men with political and financial ambitions.

An earlier chapter in this story--that of Doc & Wyatt becoming friends while in Dodge City is told in Russell's earlier novel, Doc. In Epitaph Russell details the sequence of events that led to the famous gunfight, but what she really does is show the character of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday. Russell reveals them in all their humanity--their values, feelings, desires, as well as their flaws and limitations. Vivid characters and authentic dialog make this a compelling western tale. A familiar story re-told with excellence, insight, and compassion.

SML

Stone Cold

Stone Cold
by C. J. Box
G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2014.  370 pgs. Mystery

     Joe Pickett, the best sort of game warden who has lately dealt as much with the deaths of people as the poaching of animals, finds himself in another sticky wicket as he is on secret assignment from the governor to investigate a wealthy benefactor of the people of  Medicine Wheel County. Wolfgang Templeton is rumored to have been a Wall Street tycoon who got fed up with the business and fled, but not without taking a pile of dough with him. Templeton is also rumored to be a financier of contract hits on some marks richly deserving of death. Joe is not welcomed with open arms when he arrives under cover of an assignment to relocate a flock of pheasants (which would be instantly poached) and to help the resident warden locate places to establish wildlife appreciation centers. Most of the county's population is beholden in some way to Templeton and the last investigator to the county died mysteriously in a motel fire. Joe's life is threatened as well, perhaps by a friend who may have gone to the dark side. A side-story in which Joe's daughter Sheridan is keeping her eye on a loner Goth with a gun obsession at her dorm at the University of Wyoming keeps that tension ratcheted right to the breaking point in another great mystery from the Mountain West.

LW

The Sisters Brothers

The Sisters Brothers
By Patrick DeWitt
Ecco, 2011. 328 pgs. Fiction

Eli and Charlie Sisters are hired guns in the Wild West of the 1850s. Eli has followed his brother Charlie for years, and in ‘The Sisters Brothers’ he tells of what he hopes to be their last big job for their sketchy employer known as the Commodore. What Eli dreams of is to settle down as a shopkeeper and maybe find a woman to marry and start a family. Their assignment is to kill Hermann Kermit and things seem to go terribly wrong at every turn. Their distress provides readers with a violent but entertaining journey from Oregon City to the goldmines of Sacramento.

“The Sisters Brothers” is a tribute to the classic Western. Patrick DeWitt has created an antihero you can’t help but love despite his choice of occupation and flawed moral compass. Guaranteed to be unlike anything else you have read in years, this shoot-’em-up novel of self-discovery and adventure is a riveting, unexpected, and gritty golden nugget just waiting to be mined.

CZ

Resolution

Resolution
By Robert B. Parker
Putman’s Sons, 2008. 292 pgs. Fiction

Everett Hitch, a gun for hire, moves on to a new town, Resolution, and takes a job as bouncer at the Blackfoot Salon. Hitch, who always tries to do what is right, learns that Amos Wolfson, the owner of the Blackfoot Salon, might be on the wrong side of a town conflict. Just when he needs advice from his old friend Virgil Cole, Cole comes into town with a problem of his own.

This second pairing of Hitch and Cole with their sense of duty and honor in a town where there is no law; is just as enjoyable as Appaloosa.

KK

Appaloosa

Appaloosa
By Robert B. Parker
G. P. Putman’s Sons, 2005. 276 pgs. Fiction

Lawmen, Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch, are for hire to clean up the roughest towns. Their friendship spans over a decade of watching each others’ back. They can take on the toughest of men, even Randall Bragg, a man who will not back down. But Virgil’s and Everett’s friendship is tested when Allison French comes to town.

Parker known for his mysteries has no problem switching genres into the Western arena. Fans of Larry McMurtry will be pleased to add this author to their list to read.

KK

West of Cheyenne

West of Cheyenne
By Lee Hoffman
Doubleday, 1969. 190 pgs. Fiction

When Eben Hawkins headed west, he thought he could leave the past behind. Free after several years as a prisoner, he just wanted to be left alone. Hawkins could stand a lot of heat, but when a rancher named Starrett and his bully cowboys tried to burn him out of a homestead where he had every right to be, they were tangling with the wrong man.

This is a great, classic western story about protecting what's yours and standing up for yourself. I enjoyed this book, though I started out disliking the main character. But he went from a hardened and untrusting man to finding himself again - very satisfying.

BHG

The Sky-Liners

The Sky-Liners
By Louis L’Amour
Bantam Books, 1967. 188 pgs. Fiction

Flagan and Galloway Sackett enter the town of Tazewell, Tennessee to pay off their late father's debt, but they get more than they counted on. First, they run into Black Fetchen causing trouble in town and they get the better hand of him, making Fetchen swear vengeance. Second, they run across the Costellos, an old family friend, and promise to escort their granddaughter Judith back to her father in Colorado. Third, Judith is engaged to Fetchen. So what the Sacketts thought would be an easy trip turns into an adventure, but then again, we are talking about the Sacketts.

Fast and enjoyable, as with all the other L’Amour books.

KK

Danger Trail: Knife Thrower's Journey West

Danger Trail: Knife Thrower’s Journey West
By Boyd Richardson
Covenant Communications, 1995. 199 pgs. Western

As a young boy Samuel Harold sees his Mormon parents killed by a mob in Missouri. He escapes the mob and is adopted by the Pawnees who name him Knife Thrower because of his skill with knives. When he returns to live with the white community he becomes known as Brigham Harold because of his allegiance to Brigham Young and the Mormons. Brigham Harold is a peace loving man but he has all the skills he needs to handle any enemy – and he has a few. When a beautiful girl named Erma refuses to marry a drunken settler in the town of Steady and falls in love with the Knife Thrower instead, the two of them find themselves tracked and harassed by ruffians looking to steal their gold and feuding brothers of the rejected suitor.

Alternating chapters from the viewpoints of Erma and Brigham Harold move this western adventure forward. In Manti, Utah, they make a home but, in classic western style, there will be no peace for the two of them until after a showdown with their enemies. SH

All the Pretty Horses

ALL THE PRETTY HORSES
Cormac McCarthy
Vintage Books, 1993. 301 p. Fiction

If you've got a horse and a pistol it's all you need for adolescent adventure. In this western coming-of-age novel, sixteen-year-old John Grady Cole has both. Enlisting his cousin, the two boys leave the familiarity of their Texas ranch under the quietude of night and head south across the Mexican border to test their skills as cavalleiros. The boys are coarse and their language reflects this, but they live by a code of ethics the western cowboy has long been known for; a code that will be tried again and again as their journey progresses. And in the end they will find that living on their own, on the harsh edges of their known civilization, will force them into manhood almost before they are ready.

It’s a beautiful tale of heartbreaking survival. McCarthy’s writing has a stark, haunting quality--mirroring the Texas/Mexican landscape and you’ll come away with a melancholy that’s hard to shed.

Winner of the National Book Award for Fiction and other prestigious honors, this is the 1st in McCarthy’s Border Trilogy and one to add to the ‘New Classics’ list. With Frank Muller as narrator of the audio version, his superb rendering completes the experience.

DAP

Drums Of Change

DRUMS OF CHANGE
Janette Oke
Bethany House. 1996. 235 p. Romance

Taking place in Canada during the late 1800’s, Drums of Change by Janette Oke, is the coming of age story of Running Fawn. Running Fawn desperately clings to the “traditional” ways of her people wishing things never to change. But the white settlers are arriving, the buffalo are disappearing as well as the Blackfoot’s way of life and then horrible sickness decimates their small band. To make matters worse, a white missionary comes to live with the band and wants to teach them a new religion (Christianity). “Haven’t their Gods provided for them in past generations?” asks Running Fawn. Running Fawn, along with Silver Fox, the chief’s son, are picked to go to the mission school in Calgary to learn the white man’s ways. Silver Fox wants to learn so he can someday lead his people wisely. Running Fawn does not enjoy the experience. She is constantly in inner turmoil with the new and old ways, leaving her feeling she doesn’t fully belong to either. While the story- line is not particularly riveting, it does make one ponder about the hardships, tragedies and multitude of adjustments the Native Americans had to endure. This is a squeaky clean easy to read book that women interested in the west and Native American life, may enjoy. It is #12 in the “Women of the West Series.” I listened to the unabridged 7.5 hour Recorded Books version with an excellent reading by Barbara Caruso.

mpb

Brokeback Mountain

Brokeback Mountain
By Annie Proulx
Scribner, 1997, 55 pgs. Fiction

A compelling tale (more a short story than novel) of unconventional love. Two cowboys raised to be tough and unemotional face an overwhelming attraction to each other. Because their situation does not allow them to be together, they each marry and attempt to live conventional lives but are unable to break their connection to one another. There is some graphic language and sexual content but it is not gratuitous and is not the focus of the story. The heartbreaking and abrupt conclusion evokes compassion and sadness for anyone caught in their situation.

Shane

Shane
By Jack Schaefer
Houghton Mifflin, 1954. 214 pgs. Western


When a mysterious man rides onto his father’s farm, young Bob Starrett feels a strange combination of fear and admiration. Joe Starrett invites the traveler, who introduces himself simply as Shane, to stay on for a while as hired help on the small farm. Shane stays and becomes involved in the valley’s land war which eventually becomes deadly.

This is a seminal western novel. Complete with a mysterious and lonely hero, a lawless wild west setting, and don’t forget a little gunplay. I can’t say this was my favorite book ever, the author does seem to ramble on a bit, but it was quick and entertaining.

CZ

Breathe

BREATHE: A NOVEL OF COLORADO
Lisa T. Bergren
David C. Cook, 2009. 400 p. Fiction

Consumption has taken the lives of nearly all the St. Clair family. Racked with the disease, Odessa barely manages to keep breathing on the train ride from Philadelphia to Colorado Springs. It’s 1883 and her last two remaining siblings, Dominic & Moira, are transporting their sister to this wild frontier town--which boasts a sanatorium famous for its success with consumptive patients. The future is uncertain, but the frontier seems to proffer new life for more than just Odessa. Saloon fighting, a new opera house and a handsome rancher are more than enough to consume the time and talents of all three St. Clair children. But several mysterious deaths surrounding the town's mining industry ensure the family will have to stick together in order to survive.

With a basis in historical fact, the 1st in the Homeward Bound trilogy offers adventure, mystery, and the promise of love within the framework of a gentle, Christian ideology.

DAP