a classic western about a western cattle baron
929001
In 1870's New Mexico a cattle baron and his daughter
come to terms with their Mexican squatters on a ranch the size
of a Texas one. But for a man who issues IOU's as legal tender
the days are numbered? The gambler, the Mexican squatter/cowboy, his classy
lady friend and his daughter all lead to his downfall.
This movie is the Barbara Stanwyck signature role.
I liked this 50's approach to a western.
The driving of Mexicans from their rightful lands
in the south west is called driving off "squatters".
The banks knew the Mexicans  had legal land rights, but
the big ranchers were a law to themselves?
When the law is subverted, revenge seems the only
recourse?
2473037
High Noon is a classic tale of a man who is torn between his duty and love.  Gary Cooper stars as Will Cain, a sheriff of small town Hadleyville, NM, who has just gotten married to Amy played by Grace Kelly.  Amy is a Quaker and in deference to her pacifist beliefs, Will is turning in his badge.  But just as the newlyweds are preparing to leave town for a new life, Will learns that a criminal, Frank Miller, he put behind bars is being paroled and arriving in town on the 12 noon train for a showdown.  Tension fills the air as the anticipated showdown draws closer.  Amy begs for Will to leave with her, but he knows he can't run away.  He must stay and defend the town and his honor.  Will finds himself alone in the battle as everyone in town, including his deputy sheriff Harvey Pell, played by Lloyd Bridges, have turned away from him.  The film is just a little over 80 minutes long and it unfolds in essentially real time on the screen.  Director Fred Zinnemann effectively uses clocks to convey the time ticking away towards the battle.  The movie is filled with tension as the showdown draws near and Mr. Cooper brilliantly plays his part for which he won his second Best Actor Oscar.  Tex Ritter, John's father, sings the Oscar winning song, "Don't Forsake Me" which perfectly captures the essence of the film.  High Noon is not only a classic western, but a classic American film.
3224647
Except for the Colorado scenery, this is not your standard Western.  The  emphasis is on character rather than action.  James Cagney plays a tough  rancher who is actually not such a bad man.  There is an interesting  romantic triangle involving Cagney, Irene Pappas, and Don Dubbin.  There is  an excellent supporting cast, including Lee Van Cleef, Stephen McNally, Vic  Morrow, and Jeanette Nolan.
Justice is one of the main themes of this  excellent film.  Cagney is a loner who is used to delivering his own  peculiar kind of justice.  Once Cagney gets the "hanging fever"  nothing can stop him, Irene Pappas comments.  In the end, the film has much  to say about love, justice, and humanity.  Most Westerns deliver much less.
4765543
Serialized in Western Story magazine in August and September of 1939 under the title Death Rides Tornado Basin this is early Luke Short at his finest.  It is the story of the nesters and cattlemen fighting among themselves, and as they are doing so Sands and his hired guns meant to swoop down off the rimrock and take over the town and the whole rich Basin.  But in order to stop this, Tim Enever frames Sands for the murder of a man he himself killed.  He did so in order to provide enough time to get the ranchers and the nesters to  agree to work together at least long enough to top the assault by Sands' men.  An interesting concept for sure, but that is what Luke Short is known for, and for his historical accuracy.  Good book.
3982111
Ranchers are not the mythic figures that cowboys became as the cattle industry spread across the American West 100 years ago, and the stories of ranchers make up a smaller part of Western literature. But for readers interested in the business end of raising cattle, there are several good books to entertain their curiosity. This is one of them.

Duncklee, while a young man in his twenties, leased a small ranch south of Tucson for three years during the long drought of the 1950s. This well-written account of that experience, building a herd and keeping it fed and watered, provides a fascinating look into the heart and mind of a rancher, whose intelligence is pitted against a number of challenges: unpredictable weather, less than scrupulous stock buyers, the fluctuating markets for both cattle and feed, the vagaries of government programs, untrustworthy neighbors, and the risk of loss as disease and mischance threaten to make any of his cows a meal for buzzards.

Ths story is told with good humor, intelligence, and some sentiment, and the men whose work lives engage with the author's come to life on the page, especially the 80-year-old vaquero, Chico, who works with him and becomes a dearly loved friend. Also recommended: John Erickson's "Panhandle Cowboy," David McCumber's "The Cowboy Way," and Linda Hasselstrom's "Windbreak: A Woman Rancher on the Northern Plains." Also, for a good history of the cattle industry, read David Dary's "Cowboy Culture: A Saga of Five Centuries."
3302262
Old time western with a good story about an aging gunfighter that longs for a "normal" life.
3615168
John Ford's 1939 classic "Stagecoach" is a landmark film in the history of western movies in so many ways, the most memorable of which is the emergence of John Wayne as a major star.  But more importantly the good guys in the white hats versus the bad guys in the black hats is finally replaced by real human beings who have their strengths and weaknesses.  "Stagecoach" is about six passengers, the driver, a sheriff and an outlaw who joins them on their journey.  Wayne plays the Ringo Kid, who has been framed for a murder and is seeking the real killers; Claire Trevor plays Dallas, a prostitute fleeing her unhappy life; Thomas Mitchell is the courageous but alcoholic Dr. Josiah Boone; John Carradine is the gambler, Hatfield; Berton Churchill is Henry Gatewood, a banker who has embezzled a fortune; Donald Meek is Samuel Peacock, a mousy little salesman; Louise Platt is Lucy Mallory, a pregnant woman traveling to join her husband; Andy Devine is the stagecoach driver, Buck and George Bancroft is the tough but fair minded Sheriff Curly Wilcox.
"Stagecoach" was filmed in what would prove to be Ford's favorite locale, Monument Valley, Utah.  During their journey the personality of each character is revealed as Lucy gives birth, the stagecoach is attacked by Indians, and the Ringo Kid gets revenge on his enemies.  A nice balance between character study and action, "Stagecoach" sets standards for how westerns should look and how characters should be real people.  Wayne does not really stand out in this strong ensemble cast, but we can clearly see all the elements of the persona that would make him a screen legend.  Final word of advice: skip the sequel and stick to the original.  Whether you are a fan of the Duke or of the genre, this is one western you have to watch at some point in your life.
4660690
A solidly done western, blended with a coming-of-age story.  The tale revolves around a ranch run by a strongman who dies early on, leaving his wife and young cow-puncher (the main character) to try and hold things together.  Things get complicated quickly, with quasi-utopian homesteaders moving in, another ranch hand becoming increasingly dangerous and deadly, and secrets of the ranch bubbling to the surface.  A lot of character drama, decent amounts of action.  A fun read all around.
2609289
This is also one of my favorite Louis L'Amour books.  I've read it several times and plan to read it several times
more.  The main character is a cowboy who likes what he does and also loves to travel and explore new country.
He is very easy going, quiet natured, humorous, relates well with others of his kind, is daring and keeps things
lively.  In this book, he is helping to round up  cattle to drive to market for his boss and ends up being a target
for someone who has a grudge against him.  It is a very exciting book!!!
1791209
I would recommend this to anyone who likes to read classic works. I've been a fan of his westerns for years.
4472851
I've always enjoyed movies and stories about the legendary exploits from the old west that included Wyatt Earp, Doc Holiday, and others in that vein.  The gunfight at the O.K. Corral has been told in numerous ways, and in "Gunman's Rhapsody" by Robert B. Parker, we get to see the New York Times bestselling author, and creator of Spencer, Jesse Stone, and Sunny Randall, provide his take on the fateful events of old Tombstone.  Even though I am very familiar with the story, I enjoyed Parker's telling, and thought it was a good, enjoyable, quick read.  I think I like his other westerns such as Appaloosa better, but this was still a good book.

Parker is a great story teller, and he weaves a fun tale that includes all of the characters you would expect.  These include Doc Holliday, Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp and his brothers, as well as the John Ringo, Curley Bill Brocius, and the Clantons.  But the story also examines the relationships between Wyatt and his brothers, especially Virgil, and the relationships with the women of his life, the showgirl Josie Marcus, and his wife Mattie.  It also expands on the relationship between lawman Johnny Behan and Josie, and how that was behind much of the tragedy the story contains.

I have to admit, "Tombstone" starring Kurt Russell is my favorite telling of this story, and I could not help but hear the voices of Russell, Val Kilmer, and especially Sam Elliot as I read this novel.  And if you too enjoyed that movie, you will notice that much of this book follows along the same path, because they are telling the same story.  However, there are noticeable differences.  And I'll admit this too, I preferred some of the scenes in the movie to the way Parker wrote them here.  That still didn't take enjoyment from reading the book, but I did stop and think, "I liked the way they did it in the movie better," a couple of times.  I'd liked to have seen more of Doc Holliday in the story, but it was more focused on Wyatt and his relationships with others.  Nothing wrong with that, I just like Holliday.  I did find it interesting that in several places of the story, Parker puts in short passages as newspaper articles with some of the history and events of the times.  These were not necessary for the story, but helped place you there in that time.

Like other Parker novels, "Gunman's Rhapsody" is easy to read and moves along at a quick pace.  If you enjoy his style of writing and telling stories, and like the tale of old Tombstone, you'll enjoy this quick entertaining novel.

Reviewed by Alain Burrese, J.D., author of Hard-Won Wisdom From the School of Hard Knocks.
3635623
This is the second book I've read by Andy Adams after discovering him through excerpts in an anthology of western writing. He's tops in writing from authentic personal experience as a cattle driver in the 1880s, though even at his best he's no McMurtry or Louis L'amour when it comes to writing vivid narrative. You actually get some sense of what it was really like to be a cowboy, or in the case of this book, what it was like to build up a cattle empire in the 1800s. This book is more about the business side of being a cowman than it is about the experience of a cowboy, except for the early chapters when the protagonist hasn't really gotten into the business side. Those early chapters are actually the best in the book. As the book continues, he becomes a top-tier cattle trader and owner of 750,000 acres of Texas ranchland, more of a hands-on CEO than a cowboy. Andy Adams was not writing from his own first-hand personal experience as any kind of CEO, since he left Texas and the cattle business to go into gold mining and then took up living in Colorado Springs and became a writer. This may explain why this book doesn't have as much life to it as some of Adams' other books focusing on the humble cowboy. Also, it suffers too much from poor narrative pacing, meaning that it tells the account of each year's business in about the same amount of detail. Rarely is there a particularly entertaining episode which is expanded in greater detail. Rather, there is a preponderance of the following kind of account, for page after page, chapter after chapter (I selected this excerpt pretty much at random from the middle part of the book):

"George Edwards was accordingly sent for, and met us at Waco. He was furnished a letter of credit on our San Antonio bank, and authorized to buy and equip two complete outfits for the Uvalde beeves. Edwards was a good judge of horses, there was an abundance of saddle stock in the country, and he was instructed to buy not less than one hundred and twenty-five head for each remuda, to outfit his wagons with four-mule teams, and announce us as willing to engage fourteen men to the herd. Once these details were arranged for, Major Hunter and myself bought two good horses and struck west for Coryell County, where we had put up two herds the spring before. Our return met with a flood of offerings, prices of the previous year still prevailed, and we let contracts for sixty-five hundred three-year-old steers and an equal number of dry and barren cows. We paid seven dollars a head for the latter, and in order to avoid any dispute at the final tender it was stipulated that the offerings must be in good flesh, not under five nor over eight years old, full average in weight, and showing no evidence of pregnancy. Under local customs, 'a cow was a cow,' and we had to be specific."
3681594
I was really impressed with this western story and the movie was just as good. I read this a few years ago and I really enjoyed it. It is part one of a series involving two popular characters, Everett Hitch and Virgil Cole. It displays the partnership nicely of these two cowboys and how they because sheriff and deputy in a corrupt western town called Appaloosa. There are a lot of twists and turns and it is a really interesting story about loyalty and honor in the old west. Overall, this book is highly recommended in my opinion.
3044433
This review originally published in www.lookingforagoodbook.com.  Rated 3.5 of 5

I have a soft spot for westerns, classic westerns, though I haven't read a great many of them.  In part it comes from my enjoyment of the desert countryside of the American Southwest and ares like the Badlands of South Dakota. I have not read Paul Lederer (or 'Logan Winters' which is the name under which this was first published), but I'll certainly make an effort to read more of his works in the future.

Despite shooting in self-defense, Jake Worthy is victim to a time when the wild west was looking to become more civilized and so was jailed for killing a man.  He isn't jailed for long, and when he's released he heads out for home and hopes that his sweetheart is still waiting for him.  But the west is still wild and bandits shoot him in the leg and kill his horse, stranding Jake in the desert.  He is found and saved by another group of bandits who recruit him.  His choices are few - stay with his rescuers and follow a path crime, or die.  But rescue comes from the most unlikely of places and Jake, a good man at heart, does everything he can to make the right choices.

Everything about this book is 'classic' western.  From the 'good man fallen on hard times' to the lawless bandits and the strong, good-hearted women - this book has it all.  And there's something comforting in book in which you have the confidence that all will be well.  The writing is crisp and the action quick.  This is escapism reading and sometimes we just need that.  People who love to read sometimes need something that diverts their attention just a little but doesn't require too much investment - I know I do!  This fits that bill.

My previous western reading consists primarily of Louis L'Amour, a couple Zane Grey's and Tony Hillerman's, and not much else.  I will definitely be adding more Paul Lederer/Logan Winters to my list.

Looking for a good book?  If you enjoy westerns, then you will be very pleased with <em>The Reluctant Gun-Hand</em> by Paul Lederer, and if you're looking to try a western, this isn't a bad place to start.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.
3058621
It's the rare western book that invites a Marxian analysis, but Elmer Kelton, who died recently, was the rare western writer.

"The Day the Cowboys Quit," takes place at the intersection of rugged American individualism and the collective efforts of the undercapitalized to improve their lot.

The book renders a cowboys' strike - a fascinating concept - that actually happened, on ranches in the Canadian River region of west Texas circa 1883.

By Kelton's lights, the strike occurred in the crucible of corporate encroachment upon the cattle industry that brought an end to the free range. Rationalization and greater efficiency in the beef business left the liberty loving cowboys with a beef of their own and they struck in response to it.

This novel is a beautifully paced, tightly constructed page-turner that manages to treat deeper afflictions in the American condition for those who want to see them, without boring those who just want a good western yarn.

Here's an exchange between the central protagonist, Hugh "Hitch" Hitchcock and the Kansas City corporate rancher Prosper Selkirk, who notes that:

"If I invest my entire fortune in a bad venture and lose it, nobody guarantees to take care of me the rest of my life. When a man gets on one of those bad horses he knows the risks: he implies his willingness to accept that risk when he agrees to the job."

[Hitch] "He accepts the job because he's partial to eatin'.'
"The same reason I take a risk and invest capital."
"There a difference between a man's limbs and his money."

A political writer might take pages to explain this naturally occurring friction so skillfully dispatched in a few terse exchanges by Kelton.

What do the "big ranchers" want? New rules forbidding the use of a company horse for personal affairs or keeping one's own mount without management's consent; the expulsion of "tramps and idlers" from the cowboy camp's traditional protective care; and the outlawing of a ranch hand's, "owning cattle in their own brand less than two fences away from the ranch where they worked, which in the Panhandle's open range country effectively canceled out their right to own cattle anywhere."

Each of these, if you're not familiar with late 19th-Century western ranch life (and who is?), comes with a back story Kelton fills in easy as an Arkansas maiden in an Dodge City cathouse.

"The Day the Cowboys Quit," treats the labor action with surprising sensitivity for a manuscript packaged as pulp fiction. Kelton had a deep comprehension of the strike psychology, of the ambiguity that plagues supporters and opponents alike.

He paints those too sure of themselves in a less flattering light than those with doubts. The pioneering, don't tread on me individuals opposing the strike are slaves to the American winner-take-all mentality and obsequious to those with more money simply because they have more money. They lack a dissident and skeptical spirit.

The strikers are scattershot in their efforts; too closely identified, and easily taken advantage of, by the cattle thieves and drifters littering the fast-closing frontier.

The author aptly develops the unspoken reasons behind labor actions that actually prop up the prosaic demands for higher wages and better working conditions.

And speaking of prosaic, Elmer Kelton has a fine ear for plain-spoken dialogue between down home folk while investing his narrator with an-all-too-familiar, but no less colorful klatch of colloquialisms that move his story along like bulls through a brier patch.

"The Day the Cowboys Quit," alternately delivers on resolutions that leave a reader satisfied, without tying every loose end so that the story finishes in an uneven fashion that comes mighty close to looking like life beyond books.
1480914
Interesting Western. Young man deals with a thuggish cattle baron. Gets the best of him, and the girl to boot. Cushman's work always contains more emotional realism than one sometimes expects from the genre.
2436857
This is an odd little Western set in the 1850s, with Jeff Chandler and Fess Parker on opposite sides of the law. Chandler, as Luke Darcy, plays a  very noble yet misguided self-appointed leader of a band of outlaws bent on  seeing his vision of society's mores come to fruition. Chandler brings  integrity and determination to his role. Parker is always good in his  homespun way. Henry Silva is also on hand demonstrating his wry presence.  The film's greatest asset (and probably why I always liked this film) is  its score by Jerome Moross, best known for "The Big Country." If you listen  close you can hear strains of his theme for the TV show "Wagon Train." The  VHS color print is vivid.