WESTERN BOOKS IN REVIEW

Books are selected for review at the discretion of the editors as a service to authors, scholars, and research institutions; original material receives first priority with reprints occasionally included at the discretion of the editors.  Unless otherwise indicated, all entries are current publications. ISBN included when available.

NONFICTION BOOKS

ALLMENDINGER, BLAKE.  Imagining the African American West.  University of Nebraska Press, cloth, 166 pages, $49.95.  ISBN 0-8032-1067-1.
    The first comprehensive study of African American literature on the early frontier and in the modern urban American West, Imagining the African American West is long past due.  While there are many demographic studies of the Mexican and Indian populations, as well as studies of the rich literary heritage of the Hispanic culture and the oral legends, tales, and histories of the indigenous peoples’ cultures, not to mention the memoirs, diaries, journals, letters, and books of white settlers and military personnel, the African Americans in the West, especially the early West, and their literature has been largely overlooked.  Much of the reason lies in their small population of the West compared to the much more numerous Mexicans and Indians, as well as their lack of literacy and the fact most were too busy earning a living to spend much time writing, even those who were literate.  That doesn’t mean that there is a lack of literature, particularly in the modern urban West.   

   The first work in African American literature to deal extensively with the West is The Life and Adventures of James P. Beckwourth (1856) “However, Beckwourth does not identify himself as a person of color; instead, he attempts to pass as white in his autobiography.”  Allmendinger asks whether “a few literary works by a handful of writers, not all of whom identified as people of color, speak for the thousands of African Americans living in the region prior to the twentieth century?”  Allmendinger doubts it, but the rare few works that are available assume an importance beyond their numbers.  As the emigration of African Americans to the West increased in volume in the twentieth century, so did the volume of literature.  In considering African American literature in the early West, it is important to resist the stereotypical thinking that most were ex-slaves.  They were not.  There were many African Americans who had never been slaves at all, so the population, although small, was extremely diverse in education, experience, standard of living, and profession.  There were homesteaders, miners, businessmen, ranchers, and members of the military.  Racial tolerance toward African Americans in the West was much greater than toward other minorities until very late in the nineteenth century, so much of the early literature didn’t dwell on racial prejudice, although narrated personal histories by ex-slaves had a thing or two to say about it.   

    Allmendinger charts African American literature in the West through the examination of novels, histories, autobiographies, science fiction, mysteries, formula Westerns, melodramas, experimental theater, political essays, rap music, and film.  The book includes bibliographical end notes and an index, as well as photographs and drawings.  Well-written and accessible to the general reader Imagining the African American West is
both an important reference work and an interesting read.

 
BAUGH, ODIN.  John Frank Stevens: American Trailblazer.  Arthur H. Clark Company, cloth, 252 pages, $32.50.  ISBN 0-87062-337-0.
    Builder of railroads throughout the United States, Canada, and Russia, designer and constructor of the Panama Canal, and advisor to railway officials, John Frank Stevens was the finest civil engineer of his time, and one of the best of any time.  Baugh portrays his life from childhood to his death in 1943 at the age of ninety. Among his accomplishments are the Canadian Pacific railroad, the Great Northern Railroad, the Panama Canal, and the repair and operation of Russian railroads.  He also explored Washington State’s Cascade Mountains and discovered what is now called Stevens Pass, as well as the Marias Pass in Montana.  There are many interesting “factoids” to be found.  For example, every employee during the construction of the Panama Canal received free housing allocated at one square foot for every dollar in salary.  Wives were allocated one square foot for every dollar of their husbands’ salary.  The allocation per child is not covered, but it would be interesting to know.  Stevens’ employee responsible for building and allocating the space was known as “Square Foot Smith.”
    The book includes end notes, bibliography, and index, and is a scholarly work that can also be enjoyed by the general reader.

BRAUCHER, SCOTT and BETTE RAMSEY, Editors.  Buck Ramsey’s “Grass” with Essays on His Life and Work, Commemorative Edition and CD.  Texas Tech University
Press, cloth, 200 pages, $29.95.  ISBN 0-89672-569-3.
    Whoever said that epic poems must be about kings and emperors, lords and knights, empires and conquered lands, the nine circles of Hell, or the war between God and Lucifer?  Not that the aforementioned aren’t fitting subjects for timeless epic poems.  One certainly can’t argue with “The Divine Comedy,” “Childe Roland,” or “Paradise Lost” as examples of the best of which gifted poets are capable.  They have enriched our world literary heritage beyond imagining.  But what about icons as subjects?   What about a way of life that has become symbolic of the Old West as a subject?  What about an epic poem written in the common language?  Chaucer did it in “The Canterbury Tales.”  His characters spoke in the language of their social class, whether it was the knight or the Miller.  In keeping with that tradition, what about “Grass,” that long narrative poem about a son of nesters named Billy Deaver who wants to be a cowboy? 

            He’d soon begin his fifteenth./ His life was fare until he/ Began to hearken out and/ A far, peculiar kind of calling. 

            Like Chaucer, Ramsey evokes an elegant image using plain prose as the rancher describes Billy’s growing skill as a cowboy: He hears the message on the wind/ And feels the axis at its turnin’./ There are those to the leather born/ Whose hearts beat to the hoof and horn. In the epilogue to his epic, Ramsey closes with the moral of his poem, the reward for living the cowboy way as a “Prince of the Prairie:” When thought is clear, things fall
in place,/ We’ll grasp the mood of Nature’s face,/ We’ll know the texture of real grace.
    Called by many “the Father of Cowboy poetry,” Buck Ramsey says of himself in an essay: “When I was very young, I thought of these cowboys as gods and wanted to walk and talk like them, be like them, and know and live by their ways.”  Buck worked as a cowboy for several years until a green broke horse threw him, putting him in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.  If it had not been for that horse, the world would be a poorer place in a literary sense, for after being paralyzed, Buck started writing poetry. His poetry has touched many hearts and brought forth tears from many who knew neither spur nor saddle, because Buck wrote his poems about the good, the decent, the honest, the heroes without armor, without swords, without wealth, who swear fealty not to a lord, but to the brand.

    The book includes an original essay by Buck, the short story upon which he based “Grass,” and commentaries by fellow musicians, artists, and writers.  A CD is also included of the original recording of Buck reciting “Grass.”  If you have any interest in cowboys, the cowboy way of life, or the Old West, you owe it to yourself to own this commemorative edition.

 

GRISKE, MICHAEL, Editor.  The Diaries of John Hunton: Made to Last, Written
to Last, Sagas of the Western Frontier.  Heritage Books, cloth, 149 pages, $22.95.  ISBN 0-7884-3804-2.
    An abridgement of a six volume set of historical works by Pat Flannery, the author’s grandfather, which center on John Hunton’s diaries.  Hunton was one of the largest government contractors, freight haulers, and cattlemen on the Wyoming frontier.  Hunton made daily entries in his diaries from 1873 until 1888, willing them to Pat Flannery who prepared the documents for publication.  The original six volumes also included narratives by Hunton and others, and his own commentaries that preserve day-to-day life on the frontier.
    The original diary entries are indented and italicized by the editor, and narratives other than those by Pat Flannery are in quotes and indented.  The editor’s own commentaries are in brackets.  A brief biographical sketch of Pat Flannery by his wife is included in the back of the book.  Griske is to be commented for his skillful editorial work that leaves
intact John Hunton’s words and Pat Flannery’s commentaries.  Intrusive editing has diminished many historical works, and I’m glad this editor didn’t fall into that trap.  The book includes some photographs and several articles written by John Hunton for newspapers and magazines.  If you know of my addiction to personal diaries, journals, and memoirs, then you know that I read this book straight through and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

 

JENSEN, RICHARD E., Editor. Voices of the American West, Volume 1: The
Indian Interviews of Eli S. Ricker, 1903–1919 by Eli S. Ricker.  University of Nebraska Press, cloth, 496 pages, $55.00.  ISBN 0-8032-3949-1.
    Nebraska Judge Eli S. Ricker believed that the Old West was becoming distant and romanticized, so in 1913 he began interviewing Indian eyewitnesses to the Wounded Knee massacre, the Little Big Horn battle, the Grattan incident, the Tongue River and Rosebud battles, and the death of Crazy Horse.  Ricker was sympathetic to the Indians’ plight at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century, and his viewpoint was very much that of the Indian.  Again there is no intrusive editorial meddling, for want of a better word, unless the deletion of Judge Ricker’s pickle recipe included in the middle of an interview might be considered meddling.  Jensen enclosed the judge’s parenthetical thoughts in parentheses and bracketed his own commentaries.  He also added or deleted some punctuation to increase the clarity of the sentences.  Jensen writes a long introduction to explain the judge’s interviewing style and his own
editing methodology.  The judge did not live to write his own book, so Jensen compiled these interviews directly from the school tablets the judge used to record the interviews.         The book includes photographs, drawing, maps, tables, and an index.  This is an invaluable resource that adds to the body of historical information about important events as seen from the Indian point of view. 

 

JENSEN, RICHARD E., Editor.  Voices of the American West, Volume 2: The Settler and Soldier Interviews of Eli S. Ricker, 1903–1919, by Eli S. Ricker.  University of Nebraska Press, cloth, 470 pages, $55.00.  ISBN 0-8032-3967-X.
    Using the same editorial methodology as in Volume 1, Jensen compiles Judge Ricker’s interviews with white eyewitnesses–settlers, homesteaders, and veterans–of such events as Wounded Knee, the Little Big Horn battle, Beecher Island, Lightning Creek, the Mormon cow incident, and the Washita massacre.  There are also glimpses of everyday life at different Indian agencies, as well as interviews with workers on the construction of the Union Pacific, participants in white–Indian conflicts, and in cattle drives.  The book includes ten photographs, maps, and index.  As with Volume 1, this is an invaluable addition to our historical knowledge.  If one would prefer to read the interviews in their unedited form, the judge’s writing tablets are available to scholars at the Nebraska State Historical Society.  For most readers’ purposes these published volumes will suffice.

 

GREENE, JEROME A.  Fort Randall on the Missouri, 1856–1892.  South Dakota State Historical Society Press, cloth, 264 pages, $28.95 post paid.  ISBN 0-9749195-2-7.
    A detailed study of the establishment and day-to-day operations of Fort Randall by noted historian Jerome Greene, this is a valuable addition to anyone’s library, whether a scholar or general reader.  Fort Randall was the headquarters for troops of “Buffalo Soldiers” as well as others assigned to protect prospectors during the gold rush to the Black Hills.  It also served as Sitting Bull’s prison for two years.  Greene uses letters from the troops to their families back home to chart the reaction to the Civil War, and discusses the soldiers’ families, food, education, religious worship, literary societies, dances, card games, horse races, and visits from the local Indian tribes.  One excerpt that Greene includes about some less respectable entertainment comes from a Sioux City paper.
            “At least two Missouri women were plying their assets among the troops.  Their efforts were noted by a Sioux City paper that termed them ‘White Squaws’ and suggested, according to one historian, ‘that settlement of the country had reached a state of refinement whereby the soldiers no longer were obligated to rely upon native talent for their after-hours recreation.’”
    The post was very important as a supply depot for forts and troops located farther north and west, particularly during the Indian Wars of 1876-77.  It also monitored the continued settlement of the Dakotas and territories farther west.  It was the “consolidation and distribution point for new recruits destined for duty further upriver.  After the discovery of gold in the Black Hills, the fort troops were charged with preventing gold prospectors from reaching the area.  Needless to say that was a futile effort.  When the
government abandoned the attempt to keep prospectors out, the troops were charged with protecting them from the Sioux.  The desertion rate at the fort increased during the gold rush, and less than concerted efforts were made to find the missing troopers.  With the end of the Indian Wars and increased settlement Fort Randall was abandoned in 1892.

    The book includes end notes, bibliography, appendices, photographs and other illustrations, and an index.  Well-written and accessible to both scholars and the general reader, Fort Randall is interesting and informative. This is another coup for Jerome Greene.

 

JONES, ROBERT HUNT.  Guarding the Overland Trails: The Eleventh Ohio
Cavalry in the Civil War.  Arthur H. Clark Company, cloth, 368 pages, $31.50.   ISBN 0-87062-340-0.
    Although the men of the Eleventh Ohio Cavalry had volunteered to fight in the Civil War, they instead found themselves guarding the Platte River and Overland roads from the Missouri River to the west of the Continental Divide.  They re-strung telegraph lines, protected emigrants on the overland trails, fought Indians, built posts along the trails, and froze to death during winter storms.  The troops stayed in the tiny posts in small detachments, which were vulnerable to attack by a larger force of Indians.  The winter and spring of 1864 saw a sharp increase in Indian raids in retaliation for soldiers attacking them without cause.  The soldiers, living where temperatures dropped to twenty, thirty, or forty degrees below zero, were isolated, pressured by their responsibilities and their fear, and undoubtedly had itchy trigger fingers. They were quick to shoot at the least provocation–or no provocation.  The Western frontier was on the knife edge of all-out war.  Then there was Sand Creek, Julesburg, raids on homesteads, ranches, and wagon trains.  Despite it all, the mails got through and so did most of the emigrants.  The Eleventh Ohio had done its job.   

   Guarding the Overland Trails is a fascinating book about men doing their duty despite daunting obstacles.  The book includes end notes, statistics, bibliography, index, six maps, and nineteen illustrations.  It also includes long quotes from enlisted men’s diaries and letters that attest to the living conditions and the danger they faced every day.  Guarding the Overland Trails is well worth buying.

 

KATANSKI, AMELIA V.  Learning to Write “Indian:” The Boarding School Experience and American Indian Literature.  University of Oklahoma Press, cloth, 288 pages, $24.95.  ISBN 0-8061-3719-3.
    Katanski interprets writing about the boarding school experience as literature rather than historical evidence, and finds that even though only English was spoken, the students use their newly taught literacy to define themselves as Indian, thus defeating the government policy of “forced assimilation.”  Katanski’s thesis is interesting and likely valid, but her book is too scholarly to hold a general reader’s attention.  The book includes end notes, bibliography, and index.

NONFICTION OF INTEREST

MILLER, EUGENE A.  Photographer of the Early West: The Story of Arundel
Hull.  Antelope-Press, pap., 144 pages, $14.95.  ISBN 0-9728511-0-0.
    Arundel Hull photographed construction of the Union Pacific Railroad in the late 1860s, as well as any other subject that caught his interest.  There are over seventy photographs in this book, a visual record of the Old West that will delight the reader.

 

PALAZZO, ROBERT P.  Post Offices and Postmasters of Inyo County, California, 1866-1966.  Douglas McDonald, pap., 54 pages, no price given. ISBN 0-932161-06-X.
    Another example of fine regional history of special interest to those in Inyo County and surrounding counties.  During the years cited in the title, Inyo County had a total of 86 post offices, some of which opened and closed in the same year.  Palazzo lists the post office locations, the postmasters, and throws in an interesting factoid occasionally.

 

PRATT, STEPHANIE.  American Indians in British Art, 1799–1840.  University of Oklahoma Press, cloth, 240 pages, $29.95.  ISBN 08061-36578-X.
    The British produced a large volume of art in which American Indians were the focus.  In the early works the Indians were more abstract than real. Later, the paintings portrayed the Indians more realistically, but they were still clearly depicted as “savages.”  The book includes 17 color and 34 black & white illustrations with end notes that place them in historical context, a bibliography and index.

 

SKOVLIN, JON M. and DONNA McDANIEL SKOVLIN.  The Murder of John Hawk: Indians, Stockmen, Vigilantes and the Settling of the Northwest Frontier. Bear Creek Press, pap., 103 pages, $12.95.  ISBN 1-930111-58-4.
    Another Old West true crime book from the Skovlins, this one a study of how the conflicted interaction between Indian, homesteader, and stockman ended in vigilante injustice.  After all, if you can steal Nez Perce land and livestock and it is sanctioned by the government, then it is only a step away to murder without evidence.  The Skovlins illustrate that vigilante justice never occurs in isolation; it either defends or reflects the community at large.  In this instance vigilante justice reflected the injustice of greed and envy.

WEST, LEOTI I.  The Wide Northwest: Historic Narrative of America’s Wonder
Land as Seen by a Pioneer Teacher.  University of Nebraska Press, pap., 277
pages, $18.95.  ISBN 0-8032-9858-7.
    “I want to go west and grow up with the country,” said Leoti West, a twenty-seven-year-old teacher from Iowa.  She got her wish.  She went west to Colfax, Washington, in 1878, and taught for more than fifty years.  The Wide Northwest is a collection of her reminiscences, which first appeared as pioneer sketches in the newspaper.  Need I say that I enjoyed the book immensely.                                               

 

  FICTION BOOKS                                                           
         
BALLARD, TODHUNTER.  Lost Gold: A Western Duo.  Five Star, cloth, 224 pages, $25.95.  ISBN 1-59414-336-6.
    In “Dragon Was a Lady,” Faith Thorndyke inherits a gold mine from her father, but when she arrives in Goat Springs she discovers the newspaper editor has called her father a pirate and that the mine has played out.  Lazarus Howe, attorney, tells her Gorman is lying and a new tunnel has begun.  Howe proposes marriage that Faith, confused and desperate, accepts. What she doesn’t know is that Howe is selling worthless shares to the
miners under her name–doesn’t know it, that is, until the editor reveals the scheme on the newspaper’s front page.  Howe’s actions have woken a sleeping dragon in Faith, and she rouses spitting fire.     In “Lost Gold” a young girl searching for a wagon load of high-grade placer ore hidden by her grandfather in the Superstition Mountains, is duped by a crooked lawyer into hiring Bill Drake and his outlaw gang as guides.  Bill Drake meets with the lawyer and kills him.  Now Faith is alone in the mountains with a murderous outlaw gang and under attack by Apaches.  Todhunter Ballard was known for his hardboiled detective fiction, and these two stories have the same kind of hard-bitten edge.  Both stories are a good evening’s read.

 

BONHAM, FRANK.  High Iron: A Western Trio edited by Bill Pronzini.  Five Star, cloth, 280 pages, $25.95.  ISBN 1-59414-334-X.
    Although these three stories are short novellas, Bonham made every word count to evoke period setting and detail, and well-defined characters.  In “The Sin of Wiley Brogan” Wiley is fed up with breaking horses for a living, and instead takes a job in a stagecoach race to win the mail route. Given the cutthroat nature of the competition, Wiley figures he might be better off being bucked off green-broke horses.  In “Texicans Die Hard” a Texan cowhand inherits an old rancho south of the border he decides to work.  He immediately runs into trouble with the deceased rancher’s sly brother, tax collectors, range saboteurs, border smugglers, and a Mexican-hating daughter of a wounded American trader.  “High Iron” focuses on the men who built the Central Pacific Railroad. 

 

COEL, MARGARET.  Eye of the Wolf.  Berkley Books, cloth, 319 pages, $23.95. ISBN 0-425-20546-0.
    Another outstanding offering in her Father O’Malley series, this one focusing on who killed three Shoshones and left them on the Bates battlefield to mimic the dead bodies of Arapahos killed at the site by Shoshone warriors leading the Bates cavalry in 1874.  Father O’Malley is alerted to the crime by a taped message, and realizes this could break the peace between the Shoshones and Arapahos on the reservation.   Vickie Holden,
an Arapaho attorney and friend of Father O’Malley, is hired by Frankie Montana’s grandmother to defend him for the murder of the three Shoshones.  Vickie and Father O’Malley must find the killer before Montana is convicted and sent to death row.  Coel has been a Spur finalist for best Western novel before, and one can see why.  Her plots are ingenious, the settings real enough to smell the dust in the summer, and feel the sting of sleet in the long, cold winters.  Father O’Malley and Vickie Holden are real people that you might choose to have coffee with in the priest’s shabby, comfortable office, and listen as they discuss how the customs and culture of the Arapahos will help or hinder the murder investigation.

 

DOSS, JAMES D.  Shadow Man.  St. Martin’s Press, cloth, 326 pages, $23.95.  ISBN0-312-34053-2.
    What Tony Hillerman does with the customs and culture of the Navajos in his Joe Leaphorn/Jim Chee mysteries, James D. Doss does with the Southern Utes in his Charlie Moon mysteries except with generous dollops of humor.  Charlie, a special investigator for the Southern Ute Tribal Council when he can’t avoid it, owns an enormous ranch he inherited from a friend, and only wants to work with his cattle and fish in his lake and stay as far away from murder as he can.  Charlie wants to get married, but he has endless
trouble with his girlfriends, most of whom his Aunt Daisy, a tribal healer, doesn’t approve of.  The reader experiences the Southern Ute beliefs through the eyes of Aunt Daisy, a cantankerous old woman who enjoys being cantankerous and is sometimes a little mean.  She casts spells, sees and talks to ghosts, and often visits a pitukupf, a little
creature who lives under the roots of a tree in Spirit Canyon, speaks archaic Ute, and is as cantankerous as Aunt Daisy, but more treacherous.  It is from him and her dreams that Aunt Daisy receives the spiritual knowledge to help Charlie solve his murders.  Not that Charlie wants or needs her help.  Murder is dangerous and Charlie wants his aunt not to
meddle.  In this case, Aunt Daisy sees a shadow man, a ghost, whom she knows is a precursor to murder.  The Charlie Moon mysteries are delightful, the characters, even Aunt Daisy, are loveable, and the murderer’s identity is always a surprise. 

 

FOX, CEDERING and DARRELL LARSON, producers for Word Theater. The Wild West. Audio Book. $9.95, ISBN-13978-0-06-083542-2.
            The best stories capture our imagination and the newly released audio CD, The Wild West, offers three excellent traditional-style Westerns to engage the senses.  These tales span the frontier as well as the development of the Western genre, beginning with a dime novel tale and including two 1950s-era stories from masterful writers.  The performers appearing on the CD offer outstanding work as well.

            Edward Wheeler's dime novel story, "Deadwood Dick:  At the Met," plunges listeners into the events in a Deadwood saloon, complete with card sharps and other rowdies of the day.  Calamity Jane even puts in an appearance.  The story itself is fun, and actress Amy Madigan's grand performance holds you in that rollicking frontier saloon on the edge of your seat.  Her Calamity Jane cackles and commands attention with ease, leaving no doubt that you are indeed in the presence of that enigmatic woman of frontier times.
            Dorothy M. Johnson in "Journey to the Fort" spins a tale of suspense and apprehension.  A woman, captured by the Sioux Indians, is released and rescued by the United States Cavalry, but her journey to safety at a nearby fort is fraught with danger and anxiety.  Actress Sheila Kelley gives a memorably edgy rendering of the woman as she travels physically--and emotionally--back to the life she had known before. 
            The final story, "The Naked Gun," by John Jakes, set in a frontier brothel, focuses on a gunman and a marshal seeking justice.  Their actions forever affect those who live and work at the house of ill repute, an extended family of sorts, including the madam and her girls as well as an arthritic older man and a curious toddler.  Actor Gary Dourdan shows his incredible range, giving the murderous gunman a sound of skin-tingling menace which plays well against his calm, yet sinister, portrayal of the marshal sent to catch the criminal. 
            This first CD by WordTheatre, published by HarperCollins, and performed live at the Met Theatre in Hollywood, is a wonderful introduction to the audio Western.

            --Guest Review by Lori Van Pelt

GUERIN, GENE.  Cottonwood Saints.  University of New Mexico Press, pap., 344 pages, $19.95.  ISBN 0-8263-3724-4.
    Set in remote northern New Mexico, and based on a 40-page journal written by the author’s mother before Alzheimer’s stole away her memory, Cottonwood Saints is replete with the culture of Mexican-America.  Margarita Galvan is born in her father’s lumber camp, but is raised from infancy at her grandparents’ hacienda at Moro, New Mexico, because her grandmother, Dona Prisca, believed she did not belong in the masculine environment of the a lumber camp.  Instead, she was raised like a princess by Nasha, her Pueblo Indian nursemaid, and by her grandmother.  Independent and self-reliant, confident of her place in the world of cottonwood saints, Margarita survives both diphtheria and the influenza epidemic of 1918.  But her life as a princess ends abruptly when her grandmother finds the remains of Nasha’s illegitimate newborn infant in the attic.  Dona Prisca beats Nasha with a log, and badly injured, the Indian woman crawls away and disappears. This begins a period of great change for Margarita who eventually returns to the lumber camp.  
    Guerin’s characters are horribly, tragically real, so real the reader cannot only read about Margarita, but suffers along with her, flinching as she meets life’s unfairness and the selfishness of other family members.  It is a tragic story, but Margarita survives.  Cottonwood Saints is a compelling read, one that lingers in the mind after you turn the last page.

 

KELTON, ELMER.  Brush Country: Two Texas Novels.  Forge, cloth, 384 pages, $24.95.  ISBN 0-765-31019-8.
    Two reprints of Kelton’s early novels reveal stories that show little of a young writer trying to find his voice, his style, his creative juice.  These two early works compare favorably with his latest work and show that he was a born storyteller.  They are more traditional Westerns than his later historical novels, but all the signs are there of a gifted writer exercising his skills.  In Llano River (1966) Dunee, a drifting cowboy, hires on with cattle baron John Titus to find and stop whoever has been rustling his cattle.  Dunee rides into an outlaw town, a catalyst for murder, revenge, and vigilante justice.

    In Barbed Wire (1957) cowboy Doug Monahan makes a living building barbed wire fences now that he has lost his own ranch.  On his latest job he has a run-in with an old style cattle baron who doesn’t like fences.  Doug is burned out and one of his friends killed, a wrong decision for the cattle baron, because Doug comes after him.

   Both books are exciting, filled with action, but stylistically head and shoulders above any traditional Western you would care to mention.

 

KIMBALL, ALLAN C.  Calamity Creek.  Sun Country publications, pap., 153 pages, $12.95.  ISBN 0-9649407-5-2.
    A humorous romp that will have you laughing out loud as you follow Dutch Dave, a hapless saloon owner out to rescue his establishment’s only whore from Johnny Ringo. Dutch Dave is accompanied by Ethan Allan Twobears, a retired army scout who only wants to drink himself into oblivion, Brother Karl Adolph Weichkopf, an itinerant preacher who carries his own church in his wagon, and a band of renegade Comanches.  Dutch Dave’s question: What possessed Johnny Ringo to kidnap a whore who’s not even very young anymore?  And what did those Comanches really want when they caught up to Johnny Ringo. 
    I promise you, if you’re a lover of traditional Westerns, you’ll love this one.

 

LEWIS, C. JACK.  Massacre Mountain.  Avalon, cloth, 183 pages, $21.95. ISBN 0-8034-9731-8.
    Steve Bard escapes a band of Indians on his way to Fort Wingate, where a job as a contract scout awaited him.  Bard is curious about the Indians.  They wear no identifying headbands or feathers and are not painted for war. Besides, this was Navajo country, and the Navajos are peaceful people.  He discovers a burned out cabin and corpses at a mining claim, apparently an attack by the same Indians that attacked him.  When he gets to the fort it is full of civilians sheltering from the Indians.  Everyone is convinced
the Navajos are on the war path.  He meets Frank and Jesse James disguised as settlers on their way to California, and a hotheaded young woman who runs a card game for a living.  He also meets an arrogant rancher who refuses to loan his cowboys to the fort to help with defense.  Bard is still puzzled at the Navajos acting out of character by attacking white men, and he doesn’t understand the lack of identifying feathers.  But it doesn’t matter.  He is ordered to find them and he will.

    As an Avalon Western, it is safe to read to youngsters because there is no profanity and the blood is off-screen.  Violence is at a minimum.  Still, it is a well-written Western with good plot twists.

LYON, SUZANNE.  A Heart for Any Fate.  Five Star, cloth, 293 pages, $25.95. ISBN 1-59414-329-3.
    From Virginia civilization to Kentucky frontier and finally to settlement in Missouri, young Hannah Cole follows her husband and lives in a one room log cabin, learns to grow crops, give birth with only her brother-in-law to help, and survive Indian raids.  At her wedding in Virginia, Hannah’s cousin gives her a journal to record her thoughts.  She does so, writing down the major events in her life, her feelings about her family, and her
secret love.  When she dies, her slave, Lucy, secretes the journal in Hannah’s coffin, so the pioneer woman’s secrets remain secret.

    A story of struggle and also of success, with likeable characters and a fine sense of place.   It is a story that leaves you with the feeling that Hannah’s life was one worth living.  A solid historical novel.

OVERHOLSER, WAYNE D.  Twin Rocks: A Western Duo.  Five Star, cloth, 207 pages.  ISBN 1-59414-169-X.
    Two of Overholser’s short novels are published together for the first time.  In “Trouble at Gold Plume,” Jim Harrigan is tracking his brother-in-law, whom he blames for the accident that killed his sister.  He runs across a lady rancher being intimidated by a baddie from the local town of Gold Plume, the same baddie that Jim is sure is hiding his brother-in-law.  In the title story, “Twin Rocks,” Morgan Dill’s father’s will complicates his life, since the ranch will be controlled by his sister until Dill reaches twenty-five.  But Dill’s brother-in-law hates him and has no intention of letting the Rafter D revert to Dill.  A save the ranch plot is spruced up with the use of the property complication, and Overholser’s skills at characterization lend believability.

 

RANDISI, ROBERT J.  Trapp’s Mountain.  Leisure Books, pap., 262 pages, $5.99.  ISBN 0-8439-5340-3.

    John Henry Trapp is finally free after twenty-five years in prison for avenging his wife’s death, and ready to return to his rugged mountain.  However, there are some who don’t think Trapp had paid his debt to society yet.  They want him six feet underground, horizontal in a pine box, with a wooden cross over his head.  Trapp doesn’t agree with that point of view toward his future.  Not at all.  And he doesn’t figure to fall in with their plans, either.  He may not be the youngest man, but he may be the meanest.  And he can still hit a whiskey bottle at 100 feet.  No, sir, planting him on Boot Hill won’t be as easy as some folks figure.  If they come after him, he’s ready.
    Robert Randisi always did write a ring-tailed, action-packed Western, with a whiff of gunsmoke arising from it.  Trapp’s Mountain is another good example of what I’m talking about: action, gunsmoke, rescuing damsels in distress, facing down his accusers with a big iron in his hand.  Read it, you’ll see.

 

RODERUS, FRANK.  The Wrangler.  Berkley Books, pap, 199 pages, $5.99.  ISBN 0-425-20189-9.
    John Chandler hires on with widow Catherine Wolbrough’s Ladder brand. Catherine plans to sell the cattle and ranch, so she can return East with her sons.  But another ranch cowhand, Eddie Mannet, plans to propose to the widow, thus taking control of her ranch and all her other property. If she doesn’t sell, then he’ll use other efforts.  He’s reasonably good-looking and charming when he wants to be, so he figures Catherine will
fall into his hand like an overripe plum.  John Chandler watches Eddie Mannet’s maneuvering toward gaining Catherine and her land, and tells himself that it is none of his business, that he had enough of lost causes in the War.  Then Eddie stepped over the line and tried to force Catherine into marriage, and John Chandler discovered he hadn’t lost his taste for lost causes and fighting for strangers.
    A traditional Western with Roderus’ usual knowledge of human psychology that he skillfully uses to create a believable, complex viewpoint character who adds a depth to a novel.

SCOTT, LESLIE.  The Texas Ranger: A Western Duo.  Five Star, cloth, 196 pages, $24.95.  ISBN 1-59414-163-0.
    Two traditional Westerns featuring two different Texas Rangers, well crafted characters against authentic backgrounds and situations, The Texas Ranger is satisfying reading.  In the first story, “Drums of Doom,” Texas Ranger Walt Slade works  undercover to solve several cattle rustling raids and arson.  Just as he rides up to a house, he sees the rustlers leaving the place in flames and the owner burning inside.  In the distance he hears Indian war drums and knows he has more to contend with than rustlers.
    In “Lone Star Peril” two ranchers, one Texan and the other Mexican, at war after a third party ambushes both and kills a Texas Ranger, are the concern of Jim Hatfield, called in to stop the range war and capture his fellow Ranger’s killer.  Both stories are full of action to the last page, meant for a quiet evening and a cold beer.

 

SHERMAN, JORY.  The Vigilante.  Berkley Books, pap., 215 pages, $5.99.  ISBN 0-425-20628-9.
    Wiley Pope and Fritz Canby are sons of two of the town’s wealthiest families, spoiled, uncaring, and violent.  But they had never committed murder before–not until they tortured a couple who owned Del’s Roadside Store until they revealed the location of their strongbox.  Angry that the couple had thwarted him until he had to torture them, or maybe just because he discovered how much he enjoyed beating a man, Wiley pistol
whipped the man and his wife to death.

    Lew Zane, the couple’s son, felt his grief overwhelmed by anger when the sheriff refused to take the word of an eyewitness that Pope and Canby were the murderers, and proposed to do nothing, not even question the two young men.  Worse, the sheriff warned Lew to leave it alone.  Lew Zane had no intention of letting his parents’ murderers go free.  He didn’t care how much money the fathers had; he didn’t care about the law; he wanted justice, and he intended to get it.
    Once again Sherman turns out a traditional Western with the smell of gunpowder and sound of hoof beats.  A fine read for your leisure time.

THURLO, AIMEE and DAVID.  White Thunder.  Forge, cloth, 252 pages, $23.95. ISBN 0-765-31174-7.
    Just as Navajo Special Investigator for the Tribal Police, Ella Clah, promises herself she will spend more time with her six-year-old daughter, FBI area supervisor Simmons demands she investigate the disappearance of FBI Agent Thomas.  Agent Thomas was filling in for the usual agent assigned to oversee the Navajo Reservation, and was unfamiliar with Navajo customs, so he interrupted a Sing, a religious ceremony sacred to the traditional Navajo.  Any Navajo at the Sing was automatically a suspect.  Fortunately
Ella’s brother, a traditionalist, was not at the Sing, so she goes to ask his help in identifying those who were.  While at her brother’s, someone shot at her, but who or why she didn’t know unless it was a Navajo who was at the Sing.  But attempting to murder a police officer who is investigating a federal case is serious business.  Besides, killing her wouldn’t stop the FBI.  Then she receives a call from Thomas, obviously
injured and imprisoned underground somewhere, but unable to identify his location.  If Thomas is still alive, then why is someone trying to kill her?  It makes no sense.
    The Thurlos have written another Western mystery featuring Ella Clah that might be their best yet.  Their descriptions of Navajo customs and religious beliefs, the portrayal of the uneasy relationship between the traditionalists, such as Ella’s brother and her mother, and those Navajos who have mostly discarded the old ways, show understanding of and respect for Navajo customs.  Like the other volumes in this series, White Thunder sings with authenticity of setting, of character, of culture.  If you have never read one of the Ella Clah series, I recommend you do.

THOMAS, SHARON L.  New Beginnings.  Five Star, cloth, 251 pages, $26.95. ISBN 1-59414-373-0.
    In 1847, as Marjory Turner and her family began their journey on the Oregon Trail to a new life, she begins a journal given to her by her father, recording her feelings and experiences, fears and joys in the unfamiliar surroundings of the covered wagon.  Midway through the journey Marjory’s father is killed when the wagon accidentally rolls over him.  It is then she realizes how far she and her mother had grown apart.  Her mother hadn’t wanted to go to Oregon, and resented Marjory’s enthusiasm for the
trip and the closeness with her father.  “All I could think was that she’d never understood Papa.  And I knew now that she would never understand me.”

    The wagon master assigned young Walter Wilkins as their driver, and he taught Marjory how to drive.  She loved it, but she had little time for pleasant thoughts as her mother announced they would be turning back at Fort Bridger. However, when they find Fort Bridger deserted, they have no choice but to go on even though Marjory’s mother is more ill than ever setting up further challenges for Marjory. This is a marvelous story backed by solid research that creates a realistic journey on the Oregon Trail, New Beginnings is an absorbing, compelling story.  Kudos to Ms. Thomas.

FICTION BOOKS OF INTEREST

KRAFT, BRIDGET.  Fields of Gold.  Five Star, cloth, 278 pages, $26.95. ISBN 1-59414-362-5.
    Another fine historical novel centered around Kellen O’Roarke’s desire for revenge against a man who swindled his father, and Guin Talbot’s determination to refuse Kellen’s offer to buy a strip of land to build a railroad spur to his new resort.  Their disagreement doesn’t stop a loving relationship from developing between them.  Likeable characters and a good, solid story makes this a pleasurable read.

 

JONES, STEPHEN GRAHAM.  Bleed into Me: A Book of Stories.  University of Nebraska, cloth, 150 pages, $22.00.  ISBN 0-8032-2605-5.
    A collection of short stories that feature Indian characters allows Jones to examine how modern day American Indians cope with the white world.  He delves into lingering stereotypes, mistrust, and violence, evoking sometimes brief, but poignant even hurtful images.  From the man who uses a ripe watermelon to draw flies away from a poached deer, to the son who bleeds into his father carrying him home, these are unforgettable and
powerful stories.  A must read for any lover of short stories.

SALISH and KOOTENAI TRIBES.  Beaver Steals Fire: A Salish Coyote Story.
University of Nebraska Press, cloth, 64 pages, $14.95.  ISBN 0-8032-4323-5.
    A children’s story about how Coyote plans with the other animals how Beaver will steal the fire from Curlew, keeper of the sky world.  All fire is in the sky world with none for the creatures on earth until Coyote changes the way of things.  A wonderful story to read to your children, but according to the Salish, it can only be read when snow is on the ground.

SAVAGE, JR., LES.  Doniphan’s Thousand.  Five Star, cloth, 295 pages, $25.95.  ISBN 1-59414-155-X.
    Colonel Alexander Doniphan, an inexperienced battlefield commander, commands the 1st Missouri Volunteers in the Mexican American War.  The 1^st Missouri is one of the brigades charged with capturing Santa Fe.  As always, Savage focuses on the individuals, rather than on battle scenes, and creates realistic characters, each burdened with psychological flaws.  Doniphan’s Thousand is compelling historical fiction.