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ROOTIN’ TOOTIN’ READIN’Westerns from Rodman Public Library |
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Doc Holliday's Gone / by Jane Candia Coleman This is the story of Mary Katherine Horony who was born into wealth but reduced by circumstances to prostitution. The author describes Kate's 10-year love affair with Doc Holliday, whose lungs gave out before his taste for cards and whiskey. She also details the time in Tombstone when Doc stood with the Earp brothers against the Clantons and others in a shootout that probably never should have happened. Gabriel's Story / by David Anthony Durham Set in the 1870s, the novel tells the tale of Gabriel Lynch, an African American youth who settles with his family in the plains of Kansas. Dissatisfied with the drudgery of homesteading and growing increasingly disconnected from his family, Gabriel forsakes the farm for a life of higher adventure. Thus begins a forbidding trek into a terrain of austere beauty, a journey begun in hope, but soon laced with danger and propelled by a cast of brutal characters. Leaping Man Hill / by Carol Emshwiller This novel is set in the ranch country of post-WWI California. When Mary Catherine comes to the farm that Charlotte is barely keeping afloat with the help of her shy younger brother Fay, in order to home-school the youngest boy, Abel, a tree-climbing imp who has never spoken, she's little more than a skittish girl herself. This is Mary Catherine’s first taste of freedom, and with a tricky combination of harsh discipline and a generous heart, she tackles the challenge that Abel represents. White Desert /by Loren D. Estleman When the murderous duo of Lorenzo Bliss and Charlie Whitelaw-wanted for various crimes in the States - torch a Canadian hamlet and massacre its citizens, maverick U.S. Marshal Page Murdock decides to dispense some frontier justice. The Survival of Juan Oro / by Max Brand This story tells of Juan Oro, who, raised by Yaquis and captured by the forces of Don Jose Fontana, is apprenticed to outlaw Matias Bordi after promising to murder Bordi once he has learned the ways of a killer. But Juan's feelings for Bordi are such that he cannot keep his promise. Long Road Turning / by Irene Bennett Brown Meg Brennon is the alias that Cassidy Malloy has adopted to keep her abusive husband from finding her. It's 1873, and she has set herself up as an itinerant saleswoman in eastern Kansas when her wagon is stolen by an old woman, Grandma Spicy; a teenage girl, Lucy Ann Voss; and her younger brother, Lad. Meg decides to join forces with this ragtag group. Lincoln's Ransom : a western story / by Tim Champlin This story is based on real life. In 1876, a gang of counterfeiters led by one James Kinealy stole Abe Lincoln's remains from a Springfield, Illinois, mausoleum, hoping to trade the dead president for cash and a live engraver doing time in Joliet. One of Kinealy's fellow grave robbers is Sterling Packard, a secret-service agent planted to foil the audacious plot. Packard's trap fails, and a bizarre adventure ensues. |
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The Return of Little Big Man / by Thomas Berger Jack Crabb, now well past his 100th year and supposedly the only white man to survive Custer's Last Stand, returns to tell of his acquaintance with characters such as George Custer and Wild Bill Hickok, as well as his shuttling between the worlds of whites and Indians.
Fool's Gold / by Stephen Bly In 1905, the Skinners are traveling to California when they decide to pass through Goldfield, NV, the last gold-rush boomtown to spring up. Circumstances end up keeping them in Goldfield. Bly provides a rip-roaring Western in the tradition of Louis L'Amour, filled with humorous characters and an abiding appreciation for the Lord's mysterious ways. Ten and Me / by Johnny D. Boggs Unlikely partners: Jack MacKinnon and Tenedore Keogh are recruited by the Texas Rangers because of their prowess with guns. MacKinnon and Keogh become national celebrities through the novels of Robin K. Hunter - the woman both men love. Fame has its price, however, as the two men attract bitter enemies across the West. Despite their differences, Ten and Ranger Jack stick together until a range war forces them to take a stand - against each other. The Copelands / by Doug Bowman Seth Copeland has been changed by his Civil War experiences and by the stories told about their homes by his fellow soldiers. The stories that stuck with him most were about the wide-open spaces and cheap land in Texas. Seth decides that a better life for himself and his family could be waiting in that distant state. Gathering all his earthly belongings together into three wagons, and joined by his parents and his six children, he sets out on a daunting trek across three states. Dakota Kill / by Peter Brandvold After years of wandering Mark Talbot heads home to find some peace and quiet with his brother on the family ranch. Instead, he finds that his brother was murdered five years earlier, and the same range war that killed him and other small ranchers is about to erupt again. Evening Star / by Sigmund Brouwer Sam Keaton, a cowpuncher, rides into Laramie on payday to look for a good time. A few short hours later, however, trouble forces him back into the saddle and into a desperate flight from a vicious posse. Alone on the trail and haunted by the aftermath of the gunfight he hadn’t provoked, Keaton meets an enigmatic Indian who helps him summon all his resources to survive.
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