Best Reads (And They Aren't All Westerns)
Western writers share the books that most influenced their lives and craft.
Categories: Book Reviews
By: TW Editors 07/01/2007
Monte Walsh
Jack Schaefer
Schaefer tells the story of a cowboy who faces the passing of the Old West. The movie was only half as good as the book. And this book is 10 times better than Shane.
The Searchers
Alan LeMay
LeMay’s story is one of family and love, and one man’s quest on the frontier. Everybody mainly remembers the movie with John Wayne. The Duke did a great job, but the book is better.
The Sea of Grass
Conrad Richter
Cattlemen and settlers struggle for control of the open range in Richter’s novel. The plot has been used in God knows how many Western novels, yet Richter told the story in a way that nobody has yet equaled.
The Ox-Bow Incident
Walter Van Tilburg Clark
Civilized men abandon humanity in this tale of the travesty of justice. Here again, the book was better than the movie, as the brutality of men against other men rings better in words.
The Good Old Boys
Elmer Kelton
Kelton admirably tells the story of hardscrabble, salt-of-the-earth Texans who never quit. He also allowed me to quote from his novel for How to Write Western Novels. Tommy Lee Jones did a fine job in the movie, but Hewey Calloway, the main character, comes alive in print.
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