18 books like McKettrick's choice
Chancy
He was an orphan from the hills of Tennessee and he hadn’t eaten in three days. With the front of his stomach making friends with the back, he was in no position to let an opportunity slip by unnoticed. And when Chancy defended his new herd of cattle with a shotgun, he didn’t miss. The dead man left a pistol on the ground. Chancy needed a spare and, after stowing it in his bedroll, forgot about…
Shares: Cowboys, Western, Westerns
The burning hills
L'Amour's protagonist, Trace Jordan, makes a hard but honest living. Unscrupulous thugs kill his partner and steal his horses. But crime doesn't pay for the villains of this fast-paced western drama. Not only does Trace get the better of the bad guys, he finds love in wide empty spaces of Arizona - New Mexico.
Shares: Cowboys, Ranch life, Western, Westerns
Cattle Brands
From the book:It was a wet, bad year on the Old Western Trail. From Red River north and all along was herd after herd waterbound by high water in the rivers. Our outfit lay over nearly a week on the South Canadian, but we were not alone, for there were five other herds waiting for the river to go down. This river had tumbled over her banks for several days, and the driftwood that was coming down…
Shares: Cowboys, Ranch life, Westerns
Lonesome Land
Valeria had come to Montana to marry a cowboy named Manley, expecting a future full of companionship and bracing freedom, lodges with great fireplaces and bearskin rugs, manageable cattle and sleek horses, and dazzling sunrises. If Val had known what was really waiting for her, she simply wouldn't have gotten off the train.
Oh, the country was impressive, but it could be cruel in winter and…
Shares: Cowboys, Ranch life, Westerns, Romance & Relationships
The Thundering Herd
Great classic western! Subject matter appropriate for ages 12 up.
Description: 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…
Shares: Western, Westerns, Romance
Autumn Lover
Returning to her Wyoming ranch at the Civil War's end, Elyssa Sutton finds it picked bare by scavengers and coveted by determined men. Yet the proud young woman vows never again to abandon her Ruby Mountain home-though it means enlisting the aid of a dark and dangerous stranger who lives for revenge alone.
Hunter Maxwell has suffered from the savagery of outlaws and the faithlessness of a woman.…
Shares: Westerns, Romance & Relationships, Historical Fiction, Romance
Wolfville
The old fellow had lighted a cob pipe and tilted his chair back in a fashion which proclaimed a plan to be comfortable. He had begun to tolerate—even encourage—my society, although it was clear that as a tenderfoot he regarded me with a species of gentle disdain. It came in easy illustration, as answer to my question, for the Old Cattleman to recall the funeral of a former leading spirit of…
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Wolfville Folks
This is a western story book. Which 'f you-all is out to hear of Injuns, son', observed the Old Cattleman, doubtfully, 'the best I can do is shet my eyes an' push along regyardless, like a cayouse in a storm of snow. But I don't guarantee no facts; none whatever; I never does bend myse'f to severe study of savages, an' what notions I packs concernin' 'em is the casual frootes of what I accidental…
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Flint
He left the West at the age of seventeen, leaving behind a rootless past and a bloody trail of violence. In the East he became one of the wealthiest financiers in America--and one of the most feared and hated.Now, suffering from incurable cancer, he has come back to New Mexico to die alone. But when an all-out range war erupts, Flint chooses to help Nancy Kerrigan, a local rancher. A cold-eyed…
Shares: Western, Westerns
Riding for the Brand
The open West was a land where wanderers could find themselves a home--a home to fight for, to be changed by, sometimes to die for. Jed Ashbury was one such journeyman, taking on the identity of a dead man. Allen Ring was another: he'd won his plot of land in a card game only to find he had to win again with a gun. From a has-been boxer to a ranch hand taking on his bosses' troubles, the…
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Utah Blaine
Colonel Utah Blaine, held captive by the Army of the Revolution, broke out of jail and headed north from Mexico with nothing but the clothes on his back. Then he found new trouble struggling at the end of a noose–and stepped in just in time to save the life of a Texas rancher. The would-be executioners were the rancher’s own men, looking to steal his land.
Now Utah has a unique proposition: Have…
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Rivers West
His dream was to build magnificent steamboats to ply the rivers of the American frontier. But when Jean Talon began his journey westward, he stumbled upon a deadly conspiracy involving a young woman’s search to find her missing brother, and a ruthless band of renegades. Led by the brazen Baron Torville, this makeshift army of opportunists is plotting a violent takeover of the Louisiana Territory.…
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The Trail to Crazy Man
A word from Louis L'Amour:"Almost forty years ago, when my fiction was being published exclusively in 'pulp' western magazines, I wrote several novel-length stories, which my editors called 'magazine novels'. In creating them, I became so involved with my characters that their lives were still as much a part of me as I was of them long after the issues in which they appeared became collector's…
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Tucker
If a man won't fight for what is rightly his, then he ain't much account." With this challenge from his dying father, young Shell Tucker rode out after three men who had stolen the twenty thousand dollars his father was carrying. Two of the men he hunted, Doc Sites and Kid Reese, were his friends. Dreaming of adventure, Tucker had wanted to join their gang. But now, with his father gone and the…
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Kilkenny
As part of the Louis L’Amour’s Lost Treasures series, this edition contains exclusive bonus materials!   Kilkenny wasn’t looking for trouble when he entered the Clifton House stage station, but trouble found him when a reckless youngster named Tetlow challenged him, drew his gun, and paid for it with his life. Looking to escape a reputation that he never wanted, Kilkenny settles in the…
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Matagorda
Tap Duvarney lost his innocence in the War Between the States and then put his skills to the test as a soldier in the frontier army. Now he has settled on the Texas coast, working a ranch as the partner of his old friend Tom Kittery--and finding himself in the middle of a feud between Kittery and the neighboring Munson family. Around Matagorda Island, most people are either backing the Munsons or…
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Rider of the Ruby Hills
A WORD FROM LOUIS L’AMOUR “Almost four decades ago, when my fiction was being published exclusively in ‘pulp’ western magazines, I wrote a number of novel-length stories, known back then as ‘magazine novels.’ In creating them, I lived with my characters so closely that their lives were still as much a part of me as I was of them long after the issues in which they appeared went out of print.…
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The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard
No one is more evocative of the dusty, gutsy hey-day of the American West than Elmore Leonard. And no story about a young writer struggling to launch his career ever matched its subject matter better than the tale behind Leonard's Western oeuvre.In 1950, fresh out of college -- having written two "pointless" stories, as he describes them -- Leonard decided he needed to pick a market, a big one,…
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