Life in the Old West

Understanding and appreciating life in the Old West requires passion, not just a knowledge of the facts. I was reminded of that today by one of our site visitors. I got the message through this site’s feedback form. I wasn’t quite sure whether he was being serious or sarcastic (I’ll get into that further along.) Here’s what the person who left the comment had to say:

“Hey,

“Do you know of any good websites where I can find updated blogs and popular websites that cover the Old West with a passion?”

Read more on Passion for the Old West — here are some sites…

Ran onto a nice resource blog for all of us who love Western novels. Don’t know why I hadn’t found this before. It’s a blog called “Western Fiction Review,” and it pretty much does exactly that: The author of the blog has some really nicely written reviews of Western novels, current and past, and some fascinating interviews with some Western writers — also current and recent past.

I haven’t looked all around the site yet, but I already would recommend it. I found this blog by Googling the name of an old friend of mine who’s been a very prolific Western novelist for more years than he or I would be willing to own up to — Frank Roderus (whom I believe I’ve referred to here before). Be sure to look around the “Western Fiction Review” site and read that interview, as well as several other very interesting interviews.

Read more on Love Western fiction? Here’s a site that reviews Westerns…

As crime/private eye novelists go, Robert B. Parker of “Spenser” fame is not too bad of a Western writer, too.

If you are completely unfamiliar with the private-eye character Spenser of novel and television fame, you must be living in an alternate universe, or completely uninterested in detective fiction/crime novels. Tell me that isn’t true. I’m a major Spenser fan myself, and I’ve read just about all of Robert B. Parker’s novels, including the Sonny Randall crime novels, his first Phillip Marlow novel, and all but three of his “non-genre” novels. So, yes, I am a big fan.

Read more on Robert B. Parker: Not a bad Western writer for a crime novelist…

Robert M. Utley is a first-rate historian and a terrific writer of the history of the old west. If you haven’t read his books, they are well worth getting from Amazon, other online sources, and/or your local public library.

One I remember in particular is one I bought many years back and that I actually used a few years ago in a graduate level course on history of the west — “The Last Days of the Sioux Nation.” An especially vivid scene in that book is Utley’s narrative of Sitting Bull’s arrest and death in 1890. Those who came to arrest the great warrior got into a gun battle with his supporters. Sitting Bull was wounded and died from the wounds. The most poignant part of Utley’s recounting was the dancing circus pony. It seems that Buffalo Bill (William Cody) gave a trained circus pony to Sitting Bull out of the friendship the two shared over the years of Sitting Bull’s work as part of Cody’s Wild West Show.

Read more on One of western history’s best — get Robert Utley’s books…

Richard S. Wheeler’s novels run the gamut from shoot-em-up rip roarin’ tales to gripping historical novels set in the West. He does traditional westerns and he does terrific historicals.

Wheeler’s best known series novels are those crafted around a scruffy renegade mountain man named Barnaby Skye. At last count, there were 16 Barnaby Skye novels in print, though I haven’t kept up personally in recent years. The Skye character was shanghaied into the British Navy, jumped ship in the Pacific Northwest, and settled in as a mountain man, trapping and living with the Indians. He earned a reputation as a man of true justice, fearless courage, fearsome battle, and tenderness with his two Indian wives, Victoria and Mary.

Read more on Western writers of note: Richard S. Wheeler — no one does it better…

If and when the average reader thinks of “Westerns” he probably things of a small hand full of writers. Somewhere near the most-recalled names of Western writers would be Louis L’Amour.

I know first-hand that many fine Western writers who have done and continue to do better work than L’Amour do NOT think of him as a particularly good writer. But all would respect the impact he has had on modern Western novels. He was indeed a force to be reckoned with. And with all his failings as a writer, L’Amour indeed knew how to tell a story. If you haven’t read his stuff, look around this site, “The Louis L’Amour Trading Post,” and you’ll find some good books and some fascinating information by L’Amour’s son about the writer’s career. (If you’ve read my “About” page regarding the “Old Hoppy” nickname, there’s an especially interesting discussion of the Hopalong Cassidy books L’Amour refused to claim authorship of.)

Read more on Western writers of note: Love him or not, Louis L’Amour was a force of nature…