Thorndike Press large print western

Danny Sothern, Henry Read, and Red Clybourne were ten-years-old together in Kansas, peeping on naked girls and stealing whiskey. As they grew whiskers, they moved on to robbing payrolls and mugging passed-out drunks. But now, when they accidentally kill a man, their lucky streak of never getting caught is about to fizzle and burn.... To avoid the gallows, they have to skedaddle. Since they only know how to gamble and steal, the young men are in for the ride of their lives, full of narrow misses and loose women. And when "one for all and all for one" turns into two against one, not all of them will remain standing....

When former Pinkerton Talbot Roper receives a job offer from an ailing Civil War veteran whose Medal of Honor is about to be revoked, he agrees to help. Roper sets out to track down the men who served with Howard Westover and get signed affidavits that his medal was earned. But his plan is derailed when he finds that two of his contacts are already dead. The men who served with Westover are being hunted down, and Roper's been added to the hit list.

Cowboy Hewey Calloway travels to west Texas with his beloved brother, Walter, to find work, struggles to prevent his brother's ill-fated marriage, and drives six hundred head of cattle to a Pecos ranch in the face of dangerous challenges.

"Fernald had been raised from childhood by his uncle with endless tales about the great days of the Wild West and the escapades of his father and Wild Bill - with a certain vagueness about which side of the law Fernald's father was on. But he had left enough money to send the boy to college. Now Robert is back in the West with no ambition but to pursue exploits like those he grew up hearing about."--Back cover of (hbk.).

This first-rate collection of short stories by the incomparable Louis L’Amour showcases the legendary writer at his very spinning a fascinating and wholly authentic set of unforgettable tales. In these extraordinary stories, we meet a man who is forced to defend himself by taking another’s life—and must pay for his actions in a most punishing manner; a young thrill-seeker who finally finds a place he can call home, and vows to stay there—regardless of the man who tries to stand in his way; and a drifter who honors a deathbed promise to a stranger by embarking on an unlikely mission of mercy. Complete with revealing author’s notes, the stories in Law of the Desert Born are historically precise, and filled with L’Amour’s trademark humor and adventure. They are nothing less than modern classics of the American West, told by one of the most beloved storytellers of our time.

Transportation in central Oregon is still by stagecoach and freight wagon, but there's a movement afoot for a people's railroad. Now competing railroad barons James J. Hill and Edward H. Harriman both set about building a line there. Their front men, Lee Dawes and Mike Quinn, have always competed for rights-of-way - and women. Attracted to Deborah Haig, Dawes is nettled to see her in an intimate meeting with Quinn. But there's something else about her ...

A young man out to avenge the death of his father is framed for murder by the very man he's been tracking. With a bounty on his head, who can he trust? And will justice ever be served?

The murder of his father had brought a cold, violent anger to Matt Ross that time had turned to ice but had not diminished. Now he is sheriff, and he means to get his father's murderer legally - not through revenge. He holds the law above all else, until he realizes that you can't fight a .44 with a muzzle-loading popgun. To get his father's killer and the deadly gang that protects him, then law by force - controlled force - will have to be the only law.

Joe Bratt grew up like an unbroken mustang, and trouble never bothers to move out of his way. He scratched and clawed his way through a life of hard knocks and learned three things: fight when you must, never sit down to a fixed game of chance, and never, ever, get involved with a good woman. Joes holds true to his three rules until he meets Raylene Stanfield, a judge's well-educated daughter. That's when his whole world gets turned upside down!

When an old friends family is massacred, legendary mountain man Smoke Jensen hits the vengeance trail. He's soon riding into a bloody Colorado war that has militia cavalry volunteers and Kiowa warriors stalking each other across the territory - matching kill for kill, outrage for outrage.Defying both sides, Smoke uncovers a sinister conspiracy to set ranchers and Kiowas at each other's throats. It turns out that the war's been cooked up by renegade Jack Tatum and his outlaw band, who stand to reap a fortune in gold by selling illegal guns and whiskey to the Indians.High atop the Rockies, a blizzard's white hell sets the stage for the final showdown with Tatum's bloody gang, as the mountain man unleashes an avalanche of destruction. Now his enemies are about to learn that the only thing Smoke Jensen sells is death . . . wholesale.

After rejoining the Texas Rangers as part of the Frontier Battalion, Josiah Wolfe must escort his old friend Charlie Langdon to trial. But the ride to the hangman's noose isn't going to be easy. And Wolfe's killer instinct may be his only chance to see his son again.

Sweet Apple, Texas, is the deadliest town west of the Mississippi--where getting killed is as easy as ordering a beer. Which is why East Coast big shot Cornelius Standish sends his lily-livered nephew, Seymour, to Sweet Apple. With Seymour out of the way, Cornelius will own the company that rightfully belongs to his nephew. His plan backfires, though, when Seymour is dubbed "The Most Cowardly Man in the West" by a newspaper and the hardcases of Sweet Apple are too proud to kill him. Soon Seymour thinks he's bulletproof--until an outlaw gang, some Mexican revolutionaries, a train full of army rifles and a team of hired gunfighters all head to Sweet Apple at the same time. Now, Seymour and his border town are sure to get blown off the map. But blood brothers Matt Bodine and Sam Two Wolves are about to get there first--and they're setting off some fireworks of their own

Hired by Gallatin City Bank owner Isham Ransdell to bring back the Porter boys--who are responsible for killing his associates--either dead or alive, bounty hunter Bladen Cole becomes the hunted when his search leads him into the middle of a battle between two rival Blackfeet bands.

Dan Wade left Big Bill Krask's Double K Ranch because there was little chance for advancement when everything Big Bill did was to benefit his son and heir, Little Bill. Then a letter comes to Wade in Abilene from Marshal William Krask, asking him to come back and help out. Wade returns to find that much has changed: The marshal is not Big Bill, but his son Little Bill. And the great enemy to law and order is Big Bill and his gang of hardcases.

A wild race to claim a fortune in buried gold pits such adversaries as a kidnapped hostage, a gambler, a group of prison escapees, a hired detective, and the gold's rightful owner against each other on a dramatic Southern Pacific train ride bound for Los Angeles.

Mountain man Smoke Jensen lives by the rules of the frontier. The first rule is: the strongest survive. But when bad breaks, bad weather and bad bovines back Smoke into a corner, he needs something to go right. Instead, he faces the kind of tough luck only a gun can beat... A contract to deliver 3000 head of cattle might just do the trick. But a renegade Cheyenne warrior uses an early winter blizzard to attack Smoke and his out-gunned cowboys. Too bad it's only the first step in journey built to test Smoke's mettle, because some people are hunting a payday of their own-for killing Smoke Jensen. Soon the streets of Laramie will run with blood...

It didn't matter that the warrant was years old, or that Smoke Jensen had been cleared of all charges. A Texas bounty hunter named Bill Pike believed he could still collect a $10,000 reward for killing Jensen—and he intended to do just that. But when Pike and his men came calling, Jensen was nowhere to be found. So they took the next best thing—Smoke's woman—left behind a ransom note, and headed up into the Rocky Mountains. Now, Smoke is going after a gang of vicious shootists. With time running out, and Sally's life hanging in the balance, he is returning to the high country where he came of age and built his legend. But this time, the mountain man won't come back down until he's stopped a bounty hunter bearing a worthless piece of paper and a mother lode of greed. It's kill or be killed, and Smoke Jensen intends to be the last man standing, no matter how many people—or guns—he has to face…

Matt Talbot was a scout with Sharp Grover and Bill Comstock at a parley with Cheyenne chief Bull Bear along the Solomon River in western Kansas. It was 1868, and the army was concerned about an uprising among the young braves. Comstock was so confident that the trio arrived unescorted. The chief would tell them nothing, but granted them safe conduct out of the camp - until the sentinels were replaced by a band of hostile braves who attacked them, killing Comstock.

"Black Thunder is the true story of a slave insurrection that failed ... Garbriel is a young slave, who ... decides to avenge the murder of a fellow-slave by leading the Negroes of Richmond, Virginia, against the landowners"--Cover.

WHERE THERE'S SMOKE, THERE'S FIRE... A visionary has a dream: to drive a railroad across the North American continent and through the vast Canadian Rockies. A thousand miles of rugged land stand in the way. So do hostile Indian tribes and outlaws who the see the railroad--and the men building it--as easy prey. But the project has a guardian angel of its own... Smoke Jensen. Smoke knows that this is one job he can't do himself, so he heads to Canada with some hard-fighting mountain men from the Colorado Rockies at his side. By the time the railroad passes through Vancouver, Smoke needs every gun he can get. An army of cross-border outlaws who call themselves The Midwesterners is wreaking havoc on the tracks. Now, with a dream turning into a nightmare of steel ribbons stained with blood, Smoke Jenson knows there's only way to run this railroad: over mountains, though clouds of choking gun smoke--and straight into one hell of a fight.

A young buffalo hunter and the leader of a gang of hide thieves, are at war with a tribe of Indians over the reckless killing of buffalos.

Born to an Indian mother and a white father, Blade became a gunfighter to avenge his loved ones. Now, tired of a reputation that haunts him wherever he goes, Blade needs one last paycheck before he can quit. Escorting Angel Windsor on the long journey to California should be easy for a man of his abilities. Yet her intriguing blend of innocence and defiance tempts him with every step.

A border town like Casita is no place for a drifter - especially a rich man's son looking for adventure. From the moment Dick Gale steps into the stinking, sun-baked hellhole of gambling and corruption, revolution, and revenge, he gets more than he bargained for. His old friend Thorne is in love with a beautiful Senorita who's been targeted by Mexican rebel Rojas. A bold, sneering devil of a man, feared, envied, and idolised by his people, Rojas spends gold like he sills blood - and collects women like trinkets. Gale knows that defying such a man could be suicide. Defeating him is his only chance to survive - in a brutal one-on-one battle on the parched desert cliffs.

Genesis was a peaceful place that was prospering. John Fontana, a capable marshal, had no trouble preventing lawlessness until a strange, unkempt group of men rode into town - and one of them was in fact Fontana's own brother. After the killing, raping, and plundering, Genesis was peaceful no more. The men rode out of town, but there was no doubt that revenge had to be taken for all the men who had died and all the women who had suffered.

When Milt Dorn overhears a local rancher plotting to kidnap two girls, he's forced to take action-;even if it means kidnapping them himself first!

Roy Talley wasn't looking for a fight, but two of his brothers had been among the Unionists killed in the bloody Nueces Massacre. Now Talley saw his chance for revenge. With malaria raging through the camps, the South needed quinine--needed it more than anything--except gold. And Talley meant to bargain smuggled quinine for a fortune in gold.

"Life, not death, drove Jubal Young, but memories of his ma and pa, and his beautiful, bright sister are all he has left. Memories of the peaceful days before Jubal stumbled home with his .22, his blood running cold with fear, terror, and anger. When it was over, the homestead was half burned to the ground. Someone had to bury the bodies. Someone had to set things right. Now, as Jubal rides west into New Mexico, he remembers his family's laughter and love, his pa's wisdom, ma's thick books, and everything that was defiled by a band of drunken renegades towed along by one man's murderous grudge. A reprobate lawman won't believe his story. A soft-hearted mountain man won't survive Jubal's one-man war. And a judge and his beautiful daughter cannot stop Jubal from climbing a peak of blood and madness: for justice, or payback, or something he can live for--or die for--redeeming. "--Back cover.

"In this ... tale of Manifest Destiny, Stephen Moran comes of age with the young country that he crosses on the Union Pacific, just as the railroad unites the continent. Propelled westward from his Brooklyn neighborhood and the killing fields of the Civil War to the Battle of Little Big Horn, he befriends Walt Whitman, becomes a bugler on President Lincoln's funeral train, apprentices with frontier photographer William Henry Jackson, and stalks General George Custer. When he comes face-to-face with Crazy Horse, his life will be spared but his dreams haunted for the rest of his days"--Page 4 of cover.

In 1917, wheat from Washington State's rich farmlands will be vital to winning the war in Europe and feeding the world. Kurt Dorn, son of a German father and an American mother, has a successful wheat farm. Yet there are groups that would like to prevent the harvest -- including a group of Bolsheviks called the Industrial Workers of the World, which is financed not by Germany, and, secretly, by a German wheat magnate.

521 pages (large print) ; 23 cm

Jack Hare, a tough, young cowboy, owes his life to August Naab, the stern but kind old settler who rescued him from sure death and offered him refuge. But Hare soon learns that Naab's Utah ranch is little more than an island paradise surrounded by a sea of danger. Hare must meet the challenge of a brazen gang of cattle thieves and of a corrupt rancher who attempts to steal Naab's water rights.

When a corrupt sheriff tries to take his daughter as his bride and force him to sell his ranch, George Cullen, refusing to go down without a fight, hires the west's toughest gunslinger to destroy his enemy.

A cache of gold, buried in a lost mine, is more than a flickering ignis for it burns brightly- to lure Mackenna, a prospector, and a wolfpack of out Mexicans with whom he falls in- and out. The long, long trail winds through hostile country of Apaches- and buffalo soldiers- but Mackenna discovers something more valuable the end, a girl to love.... Substantial and superior.

Begin with the massacre of twenty-seven innocent men. Follow it with two brutal murders almost ninety years later. Add two curious, hard-bitten veterans of guerrilla fighting and a beautiful, terror-stricken girl. Mix with a pack of vicious killers who would have been more than a match for the most notorious gunmen of the old West, and you have Louis L'Amour's blistering novel of action and adventure in the new West.

"The whistle of the Texas Pacific express train nerved Wade Holden to dare one more argument against the unplanned holdup and robbery his chief had undertaken. Standing there in the dark night under the trees with the misty rain blowing in his face and the horses restlessly creaking leather, Wade thought swiftly, realizing the peril in speaking ill of men Simm Bell chose as comrades for a job of banditry"--Amazon.