Western Fiction

Some people don't know when to leave bad enough alone. Just when it seemed that Smoke Jensen's life had settled down to something resembling normal, he'd all but forgotten the vicious young gunfighter who called himself Sundance. Smoke had hoped to teach that twisted kid a lesson by shooting off his ear. But the lesson didn't take. Now, after years on the run, Sundance's hunger for revenge has pushed him over the edge.

Malcolm Theodore Puddle is a 21-year shipping clerk — from way back East. What is he doing out here? The Mountain Man’s former neighbor, Humbolt Puddle, has died and left his crumbling 600-acre ranch to his only living heir, just as a greedy and ruthless cattle baron is circling the Humbolt ranch like a ravenous vulture. Poor, unsuspecting Puddle is walking into a death trap. Smoke is the not the pitying kind. But any enemy of Smoke’s neighbor is his enemy, too.

Sally has traveled to the silver-mining town of Goth, Colorado to open a restaurant with a friend. That's where she crosses paths with five bank robbers in a hurry to strike it rich. With the local sheriff lying dead in a pool of blood, Sally fights for her life while a frontier surgeon tries to work a miracle. Burning with fury, armed with a gun and a badge, Smoke Jenson goes on the hunt - a posse of one against a gang of outlaws more dangerous than he can know.

Drake Carson is the quintessential cowboy. In charge of the family ranch, he knows the realities of this life, its pleasures and heartbreaks. Lately, managing the wild stallions on his property is wearing him down. When an interfering so-called expert arrives and starts offering her opinion, Drake is wary, but he can't deny the longing - and the challenge - she stirs in him. Luce Hale is researching how wild horses interact with ranch animals - and with ranchers. The Carson matriarch invites her to stay with the family, which guarantees frequent encounters with Drake.

Holiday, Texas is known far and wide as the most celebratory town south of the Mason-Dixon - and no shindig is complete without one of its founding members. It's a shame the last remaining Holiday is a city slicker, but what's that old saying about putting lipstick on a pig? Beckett has no intention of being charmed by some crazy Texas town, but the minute he lays eyes on his grandfather's old honky tonk - and Charlie, the beautiful cowgirl who runs it - he finds himself wishing maybe things could be different.

Kansas doesn’t want it. Neither does Texas. The 35-mile wide strip of land destined to become the Oklahoma panhandle is a place unlike any other on the frontier: with no laws, no rules and a powerful attraction for killers, looters and fugitives. Frank Morgan, a gunfighter feared by all and hated by some, has been warned to stay the hell out of "the strip." But warnings never did work well on Morgan. So when an ambush robs him of his heart’s desire and nearly takes his life and his would - be murderers take refuge in the strip, the die is cast....

Conrad Browning, aka The Loner, knows what it’s like to a have a family and a home. And he knows what it’s like to lose it all. Now, he has met a man living on the edge of sanity: a good man, a flawed man, a solitary man who might just cost The Loner his life.... Jared Tate is an aging US marshal who has saved lives, made enemies, and planted a lot of bad men in hallowed ground. But Tate is in deep trouble, the kind that comes from a troubled mind. Not remembering as much as he wants to, not forgetting as much as he should, Tate has one person to trust.

It is 1893, and the first generation of immigrants who came to America for the promise of free land and a good life for their children have finally achieved their dreams. They labored hard on the land and now have a bountiful heritage to pass on to the next generation. However, many of the young people aren't interested in becoming farmers - they have aspirations of their own. Thorliff Bjorklund has been writing stories and plays since he was a young boy and longs to attend college to study journalism. But his father has other plans for him and refuses to agree.

The damsel is in distress, or so it seems to Conrad Browning. On his way across the wide, tall Utah territory to California, the Loner meets a beautiful Mormon girl on the run from a forced wedding - and the gun-toting faithful trying to hunt her down. But there are two sides to every story - and the ones you don't hear are the ones that can get you killed. The runaway bride has a little history of her own. Soon, the Loner touches off a storm of unholy gunfire, drawing blood from an outlaw and a death sentence from a patriarch.

The son of legendary gunman Frank Morgan, Conrad Browning goes by the name Kid Morgan - the Loner - and forged a growing reputation of his own. But in the midst of a fight for his life, the Kid discovered that he too was a father: of twins he'd never met. Now, the Kid heads back east to pierce a mystery guarded by murderous criminals for hire. Why is his ex-fiancée hiding his children from him? And why is this secret worth killing to keep?

Once he was a young, happily married businessman. Then he lost his wife to human madness and that young man was gone, replaced by the Loner, the wandering son of legendary gunfighter Frank Morgan and the current occupant of a cell in Hell Gate prison. The Loner’s crime? He looked too much like an outlaw who escaped from this very prison. So the Kid teams up with a fellow inmate with an escape plan, vowing to hunt down a look-alike killer on the loose.

Alex Maguire never thought he'd go home again. The perfect soldier, the perfect leader, he's spent his whole life running away from Blue Valley, Montana - but when a tragic accident bounces him and two of his men out of the SEALs, there's nowhere left to turn but the ranch he used to call his own...and the confusing, innocently beguiling woman who now lives there.

Sadie Wagner has always been devoted to her family. So when her stepfather is injured and can't work, she decides to leave home and accept a position as a clerk at the mercantile in Goldtree, Kansas. Goldtree also offers the opportunity to use her God-given singing talent - though the promised opera house is far different from what she imagined. With her family needing every cent she can provide, Sadie will do anything to keep her job.

Like most families, the Jensens gather together to celebrate the holidays. This year, since half the clan is scattered across the American West, they've decided to split the difference and meet up in Tucson. Matt and Luke will be there, for sure, and maybe Ace and Chance, too. That leaves Sally, Preacher, and Smoke Jensen, who've reserved three seats on a westbound stage to make sure they don't miss out on the festivities. What could possibly go wrong?

Their father is Luke Jensen, supposedly killed in the Civil War. Their uncle Smoke is one of the fiercest gunfighters the West has ever known. It's no surprise that the inseparable Ace and Chance Jensen have a knack for taking risks - even if they have to blast their way out of them. Chance is a bit of a hothead, good with his gun and his fists. Ace is more of a thinker, sharp as a snake bite and just as deadly quick.

For Frank Morgan, a reunion with his estranged son brings back bittersweet memories of another time and place. Conrad Morgan is an Eastern businessman trying to build a railroad through an untamed corner of New Mexico Territory. Even though Frank has revenge-hungry killers on his trail, his kin needs him now. So with a gun-toting, hard-loving beauty named Rebel by their side, father and son ride straight into a pitched battle with hired killers and furious Apache warriors. It’s a firestorm more treacherous and evil than Frank Morgan has ever faced.

The Mountain Man series established William W. Johnstone as one of the most heralded writers ever to pen tales of the Old West. Following in the footsteps of his adoptive father Smoke, Matt Jensen has big boots to fill. Matt's never been one to shy away from a confrontation, and he's got a fire burning in his belly that's leading him straight toward a deadly showdown in the town of Braggadocio.

Frank Morgan, a gunfighter known to many simply as “the Drifter”, finds himself adopted by man’s best friend and by a wide-eyed young fortune-seeker who seems to have more talent for finding trouble than gold. Two vicious outlaw gangs have kidnapped Frank's own son to lure him into a trap, providing the Last Gunfighter with his latest deadly challenge.

High in the Rockies lay the Bayou Salade, a lush beaver-rich valley so untouched that the few white men who had seen it called it paradise. But for Scratch Bass, his young partner Josiah Paddock, and the two Indian women they loved, this paradise would open up a hell of violence. Pursued by a vengeful Arapaho raiding party, Scratch will lead his small band through a flurry of arrows all the way to Taos itself. Yet the trail of blood will not end there. For in St. Louis an old enemy waits.

Restless cowpoke Perley Gates wanted nothing more than to track down the grandfather who abandoned his family years ago. What he found was the crazy old sidewinder barely hanging on after a Sioux massacre. The old man’s dying wish was to make things right for deserting his kin — by giving his strong-willed grandson Perley clues to the whereabouts of a buried fortune in gold.