Action Fiction Western

Using his father’s handwritten notes, journal entries, and correspondences, Beau L’Amour uncovers how and why many never-before-seen manuscripts were written - and speculates about the ways they might have ended. These selections celebrate L’Amour’s vision and virtuosity, including the first seven chapters of a powerful novel about the Trail of Tears, a chilling Western horror story, and a tale of the American Revolution featuring a character related to L’Amour’s well-known Sackett family.

He was etched by the desert's howling winds, a big, broad-shouldered man who knew the ways of the Apache and the ways of staying alive. She was a woman alone raising a young son on her own on a remote Arizona ranch. And between Hondo Lane and Angie Lowe was the warrior Vittoro, whose people were preparing to rise against the white men. Now the pioneer woman, the gunman, and the Apache warrior are caught in a drama of love, war, and honor.

Authors of over 200 books combined, William W. and J.A. Johnstone write action-packed tales of Western life. In Rampage of the Mountain Man, a job offer to deliver 3,000 head of cattle sounds like just the payday Smoke Jensen needs. But when an angry Cheyenne warrior attacks him and his comrades, Smoke discovers that he's not the only one looking to cash in.

The tales of the Mountain Man represent the best of the Western genre in all its thundering glory—and few gunfighters are as compelling, or as deadly, as Smoke Jensen. In Shootout of the Mountain Man, Billy Ray Cabot is set to hang, but the people planning to string him up haven’t reckoned on his old association with Smoke Jensen.

Texas Ranger Rory Yates is not keen for hero status. But it's unavoidable once his girlfriend, country singer Willow Dawes, writes a song about his bravery. Rory escapes his newfound fame when he's sent to the remote West Texas town of Rio Lobo, a municipality with two stoplights. And now, according to the chief of police, it has one too many Texas Rangers. Rio Lobo Detective Ariana Delgado is the one who requested Rory and the only person who believes a local councilwoman's seemingly accidental death is a murder. Then, Rory begins to uncover a tangle of small-town secrets.

When beautiful Angelina Foley presents Tom Radigan with a Spanish grant and claims ownership of his land, he realizes he's up against a cunning and deadly opportunist. Foley wants him off Vache Creek immediately, and with 3,000 head of cattle, an outfit of hardcase gunfighters, and winter coming on, she is unwilling to take no for an answer.

When Gaylord Riley walked away from the Coburn gang, he had money and a dream. He worked hard and built a cabin, gathered a herd of cattle, and fell in love with Marie Shattuck. But when he is confronted with false accusations of rustling and murder, Riley is forced to defend his new law-abiding way of life. Outnumbered and facing a lynching party, Riley is surprised when his old friends return to lend him a hand. But how can they help him and keep themselves out of jail?

On the trail to Hangtree, a gang of bandits give chase to a teenage gunslinger. Young Bill is bracing for the end when the crack of a Winchester scatters the bandits. Sam Heller, Hangtree lawman, has saved another life. And Bill will beg Heller to save one more.... Bill rode in from East Texas, where Cullen Baker, the original quick-draw artist, fights a life-and-death battle with a corrupt robber baron for control of the Torrent River. Bill came seeking help from Cullen’s old pal, Johnny Cross, who agrees to ride east to lend a bullet or two.

Western Missouri. Former army scout Jack Gregory returns from battle to a homestead in ruins. A wanted man with no place to go, he chooses an even deadlier career - as a scout for General George Armstrong Custer. Under a new name, Jack serves bravely in the Seventh Cavalry. But when Custer’s disastrous leadership ends in devastating slaughter, Jack sets off to forge his own destiny. Winning a small ranch in a card game, he hopes to settle down and live a peaceful life.

The Byrnes family came to Texas and carved out a place on the land. Three generations who paid in blood and treasure. Children carried off by Comanche. A brother lost to war. Lives shattered. Chet Byrnes was trying to hold the ranch together through one more winter for one more cattle drive when he hanged three horse thieves this side of the Red River - and a blood feud erupted....

A beautiful woman, a powerful Mexican rancher, and an exotic new breed of cattle come to John Slaughter’s San Bernardino Valley ranch, along with the prospect of making a small fortune. While Slaughter’s men are out keeping the peace in Tombstone, an act of betrayal turns up the heat under his own roof, and a killer is stalking Slaughter’s wealthy Mexican guest. Indians suddenly savagely attack Slaughter’s ranch, but it is only the first shot in a bigger, blazing Arizona bloodbath.

He’s the most notorious cattle rustler in all of Texas. His name — Jebediah Cotton — strikes fear into the hearts of every rancher in the territory. So it’s more than a little strange that someone would shoot Cotton’s youngest son in the back. Whoever did it is either a coward, a fool, or a crazy man. Whoever did it must die. Even if he’s a US deputy marshal named Will Tanner....

U.S. Deputy Marshal Will Tanner earned his badge the old-fashioned way. He shot the bad guys, saved the good guys, and won the fear and respect of everyone in between. That’s how legends are born. But when he visits a friend at his ranch and ends up confronting a trigger-happy horse thief, Will earns the wrath of the deadliest, lowlife killers west of the Mississippi. This is how legends die....Turns out Will Tanner is nothing but a moving target on a blood-soaked trail of revenge.

At the Sugarloaf Ranch, Smoke and Sally Jensen prepare to welcome Preacher home for the holidays — unaware that their friend is trailed by a storm full of trouble. On a mission of vengeance, an old trapper is rescued by Ace and Chance Jensen from ruthless outlaws — and wanted by a driven bounty hunter named Luke Jensen.

While most folks are busy preparing for Christmas, the tightknit Jensen clan can only hope they’ll make it home. Luke Jensen is in San Antonio tracking down a dangerous outlaw. But when he finds the man leading a wholesome life — as a charity-working Hill Country pastor — Luke agrees to wait until after Christmas to bring him to justice.

Three weeks before Christmas, the little town of Chug Water in Wyoming Territory is stunned by a brutal crime. The mayor's family has been slaughtered in cold blood on their ranch outside of Raw Hide Butte. As the townsfolk gather to pay their last respects, Duff MacCallister saddles up to go after the killers. He returns with two outlaws - a cold-blooded, nasty pair of snakes, Jesse and T. Bob Cave.

Brewster Ritter had a warning for Flintlock: Do not cross the Sabine River. Ritter, the so-called Baron of the Bayou, is a vicious crime king still seething because Flintlock killed one of his gunmen in a Texas dustup. But Flintlock has his own powerful reasons for crossing into the nightmarish swamp country from East Texas. Now in an eerie land of mysterious mists, haunting cypress trees, snakes, gators, and black-hearted, trigger-happy war hogs, Ritter is waiting for Flintlock with enough men and guns to kill him 10 times over.

Reeling from the sudden death of his wife, Daniel Dixon returns to Wyoming’s Powder River country to start anew. It’s the end of the 19th century and the Indians are gone. The growing city of Buffalo, just a stone’s throw from the ruins of Fort Phil Kearny, seems a peaceful place to start a medical practice and raise his sons, Harry and Cal, and his willful daughter, Lorna. But the peace Dixon seeks eludes him. Johnson County is soon engulfed in a bloody range war that will draw in the Dixon family in ways he could never have imagined.

Tyrel Sackett was born into trouble but vowed to justice. After having to kill a man in Tennessee, he hit the trail west with his brother Orrin. Those were the years when decent men and women lived in fear of Indians, rustlers, and killers, but the Sackett brothers worked to make the West a place where people could raise their children in peace. Orrin brought law and order from Santa Fe to Montana, and his brother Tye backed him up every step of the way. Till the day the job was done, Tye Sackett was the fastest gun alive.

Exploring the creative process of an American original, the Louis L’Amour’s Lost Treasures series will uncover the hidden history behind the author’s best known novels...and his most mysterious and ambitious unfinished works. In this second volume, Beau L’Amour examines how his father made the transition from struggling pulp writer to successful novelist and uses his father’s notes, journal entries, and correspondence to continue the process of seeking out how and why many of these never-before-seen manuscripts were written.