The wild man of the West vs The writings of Bret Harte: Which Should You Read?

Both live on shelves: Frontier and pioneer life, Westerns

Cover of The wild man of the West

The wild man of the West Robert Michael Ballantyne · 1800 ★★★★☆ 3.8 217 pages · ≈ 4 h 01 m · Challenging Find on Amazon

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Cover of The writings of Bret Harte

The writings of Bret Harte Bret Harte · 1874 ★★★★☆ 3.7 20 pages · ≈ 22 min · Challenging Find on Amazon

The verdict

Ratings are close: 3.8 vs 3.7 — either is a safe pick by score.
The writings of Bret Harte is the quicker read — about 1 hours vs 4 for The wild man of the West.

Side by side