Wild West

By Elmer Kelton

Book Overview

Compiled for the first time in book form, seven-time Spur Award-winning author Elmer Kelton's short story collection, Wild West.

From rodeos to rustlers, from ranch life to the outlaw trail, Elmer Kelton's take on the human condition shows us life in Texas as it was back then: simpler, but harder, with danger always present. Readers will meet several unforgettable characters, including a young veteran who overcomes his PTSD to fight a fire ravaging his town, a sheriff who continues to chase bandits despite having lost his job, and a frontier housewife who refuses to let her home be held hostage by dangerous criminals--even when all seems lost. Equally fascinating are the rancher and his wife who protect their adopted son when his abusive biological father returns unexpectedly, and the two women whose argument over a prospective lover leads to a no-holds-barred rodeo barrel race.

As in all of Elmer Kelton's work, readers will, once again, encounter the timeless strength of the human heart and the human spirit when everything else has gone awry. Filled with adventure and imbued with a love of the time, the people, and the place, these stories take us from the earliest days of the Wild West well into the twentieth century, each one embodying a passion for life that's as wide as Texas sky.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1250310555
• ISBN13: 9781250310552
• Release Date: November 2019
• Publisher: St. Martins Press-3PL
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.4" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

The West We Believed

"For some reason I haven't completely figured out, I do not like this collection of short stories as much as I did the one titled, Hard Ride. The stories compiled here all date from the same time period, the 1950's, and are in the same western short story magazines which were so prevalent during that time period. There are "modern" stories about rodeos; and stories of tragedy; and ranch life in general with characters we have all met even in real life. The blurb on the back of the book lists several story outlines: "a young veteran who overcomes PTSD to fight a town fire; a former sheriff who continues to chase bandits; and a frontier housewife who protects her home from dangerous criminals; a rancher and his wife who protect their adopted son from his abusive real father when he returns, and two women whose argument over a man leads to a no-holds barred rodeo barrel race." So you see there is a wide variety of plot lines in this book. I do think there is something for every lover of western stories to find here."