Rough Drafts

Summer vacations are a great time to catch up on reading, so why not pack a few good Western novels and Old West histories and biographies to enjoy while escaping the fast-paced life of work and the city?

Here are some big books from 2018 that I highly recommend:

Arizona’s Deadliest Gunfight: Draft Resistance and Tragedy at the Power Cabin, 1918 by Heidi J. Osselaer (University of Oklahoma Press). Osselaer’s chronicle of the Power shoot-out is provocatively enlightening.     

This Scorched Earth by William Gear (Forge). This epic of war and peace is set in Arkansas during and after the War Between the States.

The Trading Post and Other Frontier Stories: A Five Star Anthology edited by H.I. Rumney (Five Star). The fourteen original Western short stories are perfect for summer reading.

Mad Amos Malone: The Complete Stories by Alan Dean Foster (Del Rey). Best-selling author Foster brings his creative storytelling to the Old West, with a fantasy twist.

Blood Moon: An American Epic of War and Splendor in the Cherokee Nation by John Sedgwick (Simon & Schuster). Another family epic, best-selling author Sedgwick chronicles two rival Cherokee families from the early days of the Republic to the Civil War.

The Bonanza King: John Mackay and the Battle Over the Greatest Riches in the American West by Gregory Crouch (Scribner).  Historian-adventurer Crouch deftly brings to life the amazing story of Irish immigrant John Mackay and his rise from poverty to billionaire.

And keep room on your nightstand for award-winning author John Boessenecker’s latest Old West history from Thomas Dunne Books due out October 30:  Shotguns and Stagecoaches: The Brave Men Who Rode for Wells Fargo in the Wild West.

—Stuart Rosebrook

https://truewestmagazine.com/the-luck-of-the-irish/