Books in Western Series series

Tom Doan joins the buffalo hunters going into the Southwest’s inhospitable Staked Plain. Seeing huge herds there, he thinks of getting rich off their hides. He proves efficient as a skinner, and what follows is almost a literal baptism in sweat and blood. Fighting the Comanches and Kiowas, some unscrupulous white hunters, and his own conscience, he ages fast—all the faster in facing obstacles to love’s consummation with Milly. She, like Tom, is in constant danger from every side. Finally, they can be united in mind and body only if he agrees to her one condition.The Thundering Herd, originally published in 1925, is Zane Grey’s great lament for the passing of the buffalo. Grounded in the author’s sense of western history, it shows in no uncertain terms how white men were debased by the wanton destruction of the herds.

Tom Kedrick earned his stripes during the Civil War, fought Apaches, and even soldiered overseas. But in the high desert country of New Mexico, the battle-hardened Kedrick is entangled in a different kind of war, fueled by greed and deception. Hired by Alton Burwick to drive a pack of renegades and outlaws off the government land recently set aside for an Indian reservation, Kedrick begins to notice that things are not as they seem. As his suspicions grow, he realizes that he may be fighting on the wrong side of a land swindle. Disillusioned and outraged, Kedrick must take action against the very people who hired him?or be forced to witness the bloody massacre of innocent men and women.From the Paperback edition.

He was called Nevada, a name he took to lose his past. As a boy he had been thrown among brutal and evil men. He had worked himself above their influence time and again, only to be thrown back, by his own desire for justice or vengeance, into the midst of strife. With a new identity he made a new reputation, but old troubles and old enemies haunted him wherever he went. Nevada was the quiet type who would rather work hard and plan for better days. Skilled with a horse and a rope, he could also shoot fast and straight. As he got closer to thinking he could get back to the woman he loved, a gang of rustlers threatened everything. Once again, he had to choose between risks, if his passions didn’t choose for him. First published in 1926 and 1927, Nevada, the suspenseful sequel to Forlorn River, continues to be one of Zane Grey’s most beloved novels. Never out of print, it is now available in an Authorized Edition with a new foreword by Zane Grey’s son, Loren Grey.

In 1968, Jackson J. Benson, then a naïve young literature professor, set out to write a critical appraisal of John Steinbeck, a writer who Benson thought was greatly undervalued by the scholarly establishment. To Benson's amazement, he shortly found his project turning into an authorized biography. Looking for Steinbeck's Ghost is Benson's engaging account of his experiences over the fifteen years he devoted to writing that biography. On one level, the book is a rich collection of anecdotes, character sketches, and memories of Steinbeck and the people with whom he shared his life—wives and children, siblings, friends. Benson interviewed scores of people who knew Steinbeck and read thousands of letters and other primary sources in the course of his research, and the fruits of this diligence offer rich insights into the personalities of Steinbeck—a fiercely private man—and of his closest associates. There is important new information here about Steinbeck's career, the inspiration for some of his characters and plot lines, and some of the people who, in various ways, influenced his writing and his personal life. On another level, Looking for Steinbeck's Ghost is a fascinating account of the biographer's task, with all its triumphs large and small and its numerous pitfalls and frustrations. We follow Benson as he struggles to master the skills of the biographer: locating sources of information, especially tracking down informants; learning to conduct interviews—and then to assess the veracity of his informants' memories; coping with the myriad frustrations inherent in the technologies of tape recording and photocopying; recognizing the pitfalls hidden in his own emotional biases and his tendency to identify with his subject; sifting through all the contradictions and prejudices, favorable and unfavorable, in his sources to find out just who John Steinbeck was. As such, Looking for Steinbeck's Ghost is a lively and completely engrossing case study of the biographer's demanding craft. First published in 1988 to enthusiastic reviews, and long out of print, Looking for Steinbeck's Ghost is available again in this new paperback edition.

Taking a hard look at his position in life, Balum can't say he's pleased. Near flat-broke and aimless, he bites at the chance of a lifetime: a roundup of a thousand wild Texas longhorns. It won't be easy. He might die in a stampede or get hooked by a horn, the cattle might die on the drive or fetch a collapsed price at market. And the biggest obstacle of all: rustlers.There existed two types of rustlers in the old West; those who stole a few head in the dark of night, and those who appropriated an entire herd for everybody to see. The former could be dealt with easily enough. The latter however, was another matter. Balum has no desire to get into a shooting war, but he’s come this far and he’ll be damned if some range bully strips them out of cattle. He has skin in the game. Between cattle thieves, the lure of women, and the ever-present threat of violence, Balum stands at a fork leading to riches or death.

Growing up is never easy, but thirteen-year-old Matt Echbar is finding it particularly difficult. His widowed father is too busy for him, and his grandfather is an embarrassment, an unschooled Basque shepherd whose language and customs are completely alien to Matt's all-American lifestyle. Matt is in serious trouble at school, and his father is threatening to move them back to the grandfather's farm to help the old man. Things only get worse when his grandfather steals a flock of sheep and dragoons Matt into helping him drive them to a secret camp high in the Arizona mountains.As Matt and his aitatxi, accompanied by their two faithful sheepdogs, drive the flock across the burgeoning suburbs of Phoenix and into the remote mountains, the boy learns the ancient skills of the sheepherder and discovers the unexpected wisdom that has given his Old Country grandfather the strength and patience of a sturdy oak. By the time the journey reaches its fateful conclusion, Matt has developed a new bond with the old man along with a new confidence in himself. Moreover, he has learned that becoming an adult includes accepting one's heritage.This is a novel about the precarious borderlands between childhood and manhood, between an American and an ethnic identity. Matt's adventure as an apprentice sheepherder is a tale about the angst and frustration of growing up, and the pride that comes from surviving hard work and honoring the culture of one's forebears.

Austin's charming and evocative stories dramatize the legacy of conquest upon a land and its native peoples. Although these stories, out of print for almost a century, were first intended as delightful and instructive reading for children, on another level they are an intense examination of the dramatic implications of a legacy of conquest upon the land and its native peoples. In Austin’s tales, cocky young glaciers, contemplative pine trees, resourceful ancient Paiutes, and rabbits too clever for their own good all become companions and teachers to Alan, the young son of homesteaders in early Nevada. The kindly but mysterious Basket Woman, who tells him these tales, is a keeper of her people's traditions. She doesn't simply tell stories: she transports her young friend into a powerful and mythic past, where Alan learns the secrets of the trees and animals and the wisdom of the people who flourished in this "land of little rain" before the arrival of foreigners from the east. A new foreword by Austin scholar and environmental writer Mark Schlenz provide ample context for a multilevel appreciation of one of this remarkable writer's most important works.