Noah Benton, a teenager with a great memory, a head for arithmetic, and dreams of excitement, is hired along with his older brother to help drive a herd of Texas longhorns to Abilene, Kansas. But Noah's trail boss happens to be John Wesley Hardin, a notorious killer who thinks Texas lawmen won't look for a fugitive in a crew of hardworking cowboys. After Hardin sees a profit in Noah's ability to count and memorize cards in gambling dens, Noah's dreams of excitement quickly turn into nightmares—for Hardin will kill with little provocation. Earning the nicknames "Counting Boy," "The Abilene Kid," and "Abilene," Noah survives the bloody journey to Kansas, only to learn that Abilene rightfully deserves its nickname as a Sodom or Gomorrah. In a town where anything goes, the marshal, legendary gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok, reluctantly forms a truce with Hardin—leaving Noah caught in the middle. As summer stretches into fall, Noah finds another friend, a special deputy...

In 1913, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Lawrence, Kansas Massacre, former bushwhacker Cole Younger stands before a preacher at a tent revival. "I was, I remain, and I will always be a wicked man," Younger states, taking a step toward salvation. And for a man like Cole Younger, there is much to confess.

A powerful, trailblazing adventure inspired by the harrowing true story of the1866 cattle drive from Texas to Montana—and the legendary man who dared the impossible . . . A THOUSAND TEXAS LONGHORNS The Civil War is over. The future of the American West is up for grabs. Any man crazy enough to lead a herd of Texas longhorns to the north stands to make a fortune—and make history. That man would be Nelson Story. A bold entrepreneur and miner, he knows a golden opportunity when he sees one. But it won't be easy. Cowboys and bandits got guns, farmers got sick livestock, and the Army's got their own reasons to stop the drive. Even worse, Story's top hand is an ornery Confederate veteran who used to be his enemy. But all that is nothing compared to the punishing weather, the deadly stampedes—and the bloodthirsty wrath of the Sioux... This is the incredible saga of a man named Story. A true legend of the...

Saddle tramp Sam MacKinnon is in trouble. Double-crossed by his partners after robbing a saloon and gambling hall, MacKinnon has been left behind in the mountains of southern New Mexico with busted ribs, a banged-up head, no gun, and no horse. And no chance—because aging lawman Nelson Bookbinder and his Mescalero Apache scout, Nikita—both made legendary by dime novels MacKinnon has read—are leading a small posse hot in pursuit of the bandits. Miraculously, MacKinnon escapes the law, finds his horse and rifle, and, despite his injuries, sets out on the vengeance trail. But fate has something else in mind for Sam MacKinnon.Miles away in the desert furnace between Ruidoso and Roswell, nineteen-year-old Katie Callahan has troubles of her own. Her mother has died of tuberculosis, and her worthless stepfather has abandoned the family, leaving Katie with her younger sister and five-year-old stepbrother, a busted wagon, a blind mule, little water and food, and her mothe

What's a sixteen-year-old boy to do when he learns that his stepmother and a local judge have murdered his father and now plan to kill him, too? Well, when it's 1906, and you can play pretty good second base, you join a barn-storming baseball team making its way across Kansas. It also helps that the team is the Kansas City National Bloomer Girls. After all, who'd look for a runaway boy disguised as a girl on a women's team that competes against town-ball teams of male players?Of course, it'll take more than long hair, a Spalding glove, and a quick bat to stay alive. Luckily, another Bloomer Girl, Buckskin Compton, alias Dolly Madison, is on the dodge after some shootings and beatings in Wyoming—and he takes the kid under his tutelage.Staying alive won't prove easy for either of the reluctant female impersonators as they deal with a budding romance, hitting slumps, a crooked manager, bean balls, drunken teammates, bank robbers, lousy umpires, a revolution for women's...

Weather and creaking joints permitting, Jim Hawkins could be found every weekend sitting in that rocker right outside the Manix Store in Augusta, whittling and spitting. But Jim Hawkins didn't say much. Few knew what age Jim Hawkins might own up to, but Big Clem Ellis said he'd heard that Jim Hawkins was fifty years old, which might explain why his hair was so gray, or why he needed a scarred hickory cane to push himself out of that rocking chair, especially when it got cold, and it got bitter cold in Augusta. Especially the past winter.Folks figured the Chinooks would never get there, and the warm winds didn't arrive in time for many farmers. Come spring, homesteaders by the score gave up, saying good-bye to their mortgages, the unforgiving wind, and forlorn dreams. Still, Jim Hawkins said hardly anything. Ever. That's how Henry Lancaster felt.That all changed when Jim Hawkins took Henry along on a scouting trip. The man who so rarely talked told his grandson how it...

His Arrows Fly Straight into the Hearts of His Enemies was the Comanche name given him by his father. But the Pale Eyes gave him a new name, Daniel Killstraight, and that was the name by which he was known after his return to the reservation of the Kowas, Comanches, and Apaches. He became a native police officer, called a Metal Shirt by the Indians.When Toyarocho, drunk on contraband whiskey, rolls over onto the body of his four-year-old daughter, smothering her to death, Leviticus Ellenbogen, the new Indian agent, is appalled and wants Killstraight to find out who supplied Toyarocho with the whiskey. If it was a white man, Killstraight cannot make an arrest, but he can collect evidence. There is one clue. The whiskey Toyarocho had drunk was in a ginger beer bottle manufactured by Cox and Coursey Bottling Works of Dallas, Texas.In the course of his investigation, Killstraight finds additional instances of whiskey running among the Indians, all of it in the same kind of...

William Clarke Quantrill was a hated name during the War between the States by the Federals of the Union Army as well as by many non-combatants. Even the high command of the Confederacy distrusted him. But there were others who were passionate sympathizers. He was both friend and mentor‚ but also manipulator and opportunist.Alistair Durant was someone who came to know him in all these guises. Durant was a young Confederate soldier‚ captured by the Yankees‚ and released when he took an oath never again to bear arms against the Union. He had a long walk back to his home in Clay County, Missouri. It is on this trek that Alistair meets another youngster‚ Beans Kimbrough.The two become companions and then friends on the way to Clay County, and it is there that Beans will introduce Alistair to a man calling himself Charley Hart. Hart has a fantastic plan—to organize a militia to fight against the Federals.

For twenty years, a half-crazed albino has been scheming to recover $30,000 in gold coin buried in Doubtful Canon. But a number of setbacks have kept Whitey Grey from claiming the prize—Apache, Mexican bandits, rustlers, thieves, bushwhackers and the like. Even if he did manage to get through the treacherous territory, the gold is stashed in a hole so narrow only a child could get through. Then Whitey meets three enterprising twelve-year-olds craving adventure, and a plan begins to take shape…Notorious gunfighters Curly Bill Brocious and Johnny Ringo have other ideas for that gold. So does Eleora Giddings, a young woman seeking her father’s grave. Add to that a band of Apaches fleeing the San Carlos reservation, and there will be plenty adventure for all in a mad race for the money.

An American original, the great Johnny D. Boggs weaves a Texas-sized tale of an 1880s badlands—under the grasp of a lawman gone rogue. . .In For JusticeIn For The KillBetween the Pecos River and Rio Grande a vast, harsh land was ruled by Texas Rangers Captain Hector Savage. Savage's motive wasn't duty, it was money; he's turned this desolate place into a bloodied, terrorized kingdom. Now, a protégé of Savage, Sergeant Dave Chance, has come with a prisoner—a big-talking murderer in his own right—shackled at his side. A decent, honest Ranger, Chance cannot stand idly by while Savage runs roughshod over the territory. Now, to save a traumatized people, he must turn his prisoner loose and give him a gun. Only their combined firepower can penetrate Savage's fortress and kill him.That is, if they don't kill each other first. . .

Johnny D. Boggs turns the battlefield itself into a character in this historical retelling of Custer's Last Stand, when George Custer led most of his command to annihilation at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in southern Montana in 1876. More than forty first-person narratives are used—Indian and white, military and civilian, men and women—to paint a panorama of the battle itself. Boggs brings the events and personalities of the Battle of the Little Bighorn to life in a series of first-hand accounts.

After a priest is lynched, gunfighter Britton Wade is the only one left who can guarantee justice!In Santa Fe, Jeremiah Cole has been convicted and sentenced to hang for the lynching of a priest. Still, most people believe Cole will never be executed. He is the son of Senator Roman Cole, a man with both the wealth and political power to stop the hanging. The odds are so good that Jeremiah Cole will escape execution at Chama, where he must be taken to be hung, that a reward is offered to anyone who will successfully transport the prisoner.Britton Wade, a gunfighter and gambler, accepts the challenge. Wade's reputation as a gunfighter might stop most people dead in their tracks, but that's not likely to deter Senator Cole's riders. To further complicate his mission, Britton Wade is in dire health, and doesn't know just how much longer he has to live.The greatest mystery of all is that Wade doesn't seem the least interested in the money. Why has Wade accepted...

“Boggs is among the best Western writers at work today. He writes with depth, flavor, and color." —BooklistYoung Comanches Daniel Killstraight and Charles Flint have been called to Texas. Captain Pratt will be giving a talk on the transformations brought about by the Carlisle Industrial School, of which Killstraight and Flint are shining examples. They'll be joining a Comanche delegation led by Quanah Parker, who will be negotiating grasslands leases—until blown-out gas lamps in Quanah Parker's room kill a Comanche chief and put Parker in a coma.But the question of who tried to murder Quanah Parker is not an easy one. He had many enemies among both native and white men. Daniel attempts to unravel the mystery while fulfilling his original purpose in Texas—to support Captain Pratt's talk. But he doesn't know who to trust, especially as the list of suspects begins to dwindle.Will Killstraight figure out who is after Quanah Parker?...