Showing results by author "Wayne D. Overholser" in All Categories

When Jett Cader comes home to an empty house, he knows that his wife has decided to take their young son away from their tough rural life in exchange for the city and better opportunities. But Jett's troubles go beyond this fresh heartbreak. He’s at the end of his rope with his scoundrel neighbors, three brothers who continuously steal from him and threaten his livelihood.

Small ranchers in Harmony, Oregon, are up against it with the price of cattle down and Skull Ranch, owned by a syndicate, trying to buy them out. Dan Riley spends a month trying to find a bank to help them, but he fails. When the editor of The Clarion is shot, the ranchers blame Black Mike Sand, the manager of Skull, in spite of the circumstances of the shooting. As pressure mounts, Riley is determined to find out who is really in charge of the syndicate, and the only man willing to help him is Andrew Daniels, a former newspaper man whose courage comes from a bottle.

From Spur Award-winning novelist Wayne D. Overholser comes this collection of Western short stories. This collection includes "The Woman from Cougar Creek", "The Price of Pride", "The Devil and Old Man Gillis", "Shooting for a Fall", "It's Hell to Be a Hero", "The Tongue-Tied Cowboy", "From Hell to Leadville", "The Deputy with a Past", "Judge Peterson's Colt Law", "The Breaking of Sam McKay", "Fugitive from the Boothill Brigade", and "The Man Ten Feet Tall".

In the title story, Murdo Morgan left Paradise Valley 16 years ago, after his brothers had been killed at the hand of the Turkey Track outfit. One year later, his father died a broken and defeated man. Broad Clancy, owner of the Turkey Track, has remained the controlling force in this area of high desert in Oregon, considering all the land to be open range, including the six-mile strip on both sides of the old wagon road which belongs to Cascade and Paradise Land Company. He fears that Morgan will return to exact his revenge for the death of his brothers.

The volatile and dangerous Wild Bill Murphy has come to town with a group of settlers who have hired him to represent their interests. A hearing about land rights is to take place, and the adversaries are gathering at the courthouse.

Central Oregon is the last frontier, with transportation still by stagecoach and freight wagon. Now there's a movement afoot for a people's railroad. For years, competing railroad barons James J. Hill and Edward H. Harriman have done nothing, but now they both set about building a line there. And for years their front men, Lee Dawes and Mike Quinn, have competed for rights-of-way - and for women. Attracted to Deborah Haig, Dawes is nettled to see her in an intimate meeting with Quinn. But there is something else....

Sam Cassidy comes home to find himself in a series of tense confrontations. His father expects Sam to work for him at the local bank, and Sheriff Ben Faraday, for whom Sam worked the previous summer as deputy, is suffering from a terminal disease and wants Sam to become a deputy again. "Black Mike" Nickels wants to expand his use of public land and bring in more sheep, backed by guns.

Finding out what really happened to Gunplay Maxwell was not easy. He was a bank and train robber known for the skill with which he pulled off every job. Yet, when one of those explosions in a baggage car left him hard of hearing and nearly blind in one eye, there seemed to be no future for him. He was reduced to raiding backyard chicken coops to stay alive. But his last ride would make him a rich man and remain alive to tell about it.

Neal Clark ramrod of the Circle C Ranch was in Cascade City to see the gunsmith when the Shelly gang attempted to hold up the bank. Neal rushed out of the shop and fired killing Buck Shelly and his son Luke. Buck's teenage son Ed was holding the horses. He escaped but was believed to be mortally wounded. At least that's what Neal thought - until he received a letter from Ed declaring that he’d be back to settle the score.

Old Mike Varney is a callous, bad-tempered ranch owner of the Pitchfork Ranch, located near the Nevada Mesa during the second half of the 19th century. Bill Varney, his 23-year-old son, is often mistreated by his father; he is thinking about leaving the ranch and starting over somewhere else. His sister, Vida, and his girlfriend, Marian Tracy, try to keep him from leaving. Several of the local citizens and ranchers, tired of Mike Varney' s ruthless behavior and the fear of the old man's plans to buy up the local ranches, pay a gunslinger named Ace Kehoe to gun him down.

Dave Lowery lived in Gunlock, a dying western trail town, now an outlaw's haven. Sheriff Arno Slade, the power in town in cahoots with the judge, is suspected of killing Lowery's father. Only through a settling of scores will the town be able to change and be reborn. Does Dave Lowery have the courage to act?

In the early 1890s, after the financial panic, Colorado is changing from mining to ranching. A local merchant, Eli, holds most of the money and the power in the county. Then a stranger arrives and starts to court the merchant's daughter - and the problems begin.

The summer warpath began in late spring 1876 and was laid out under the command of General George Crook, perhaps the most experienced Indian fighter in the US Army at that time. Among other officers under Crook's command was the daring and resourceful Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and the 7th Cavalry. The purpose of the campaign was to round up the wild tribes of the Cheyennes and Sioux and place them on reservations.

The Civil War seems far away from Four Corners in the Oregon Territory. Then two local men take opposing sides. Their children, Jim and Mary, who love each other, are caught in the vicious conflict.

A Western trio of renegades, outlaws and the Alaskan gold rush days of the 1890s.

A young cowboy joins up with two other would-be bank robbers. The robbery succeeds but in getting away but only the cowboy comes away alive, much richer but not in any way he or anyone else had first expected.

Wayne D. Overholser, winner of three Spur Awards from the Western Writers of America, weaves a magic spell in this story with his consistent skill in presenting vibrant characters and his uncommon sensitivity to the depths of human personality.

Dave Cray and Gramps, after the end of the Civil War, moved east from Oregon to settle a new and bountiful territory. What they did, they did with their hands, but they had no money. Smiling Jim Sully opened a store there, and he had money but allowed the farmers to barter hay for goods. But Smiling Jim had other ideas; he wanted the farmer's lands. Dave Cray had his desire: Smiling Jim's daughter, Ann. It was a spark and a fire that brought all sides into a heated confrontation. How will anyone come out of it alive?

Evil is as old as man. Dick Starr was exiled by his hellcat grandmother for not following her orders. Now, after an absence of one year, he is returning to his love, Lannie. Fearing that Dick's brother, Mike, would ambush and kill him, will Lannie be able to save Dick's life?