Ryder of the Hills: A Western Story (Five Star Western Series) - Hardcover

Horton, Robert J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1594145075 ISBN 13: 9781594145070

Publisher: Five Star, 2008

Synopsis

Book by Horton, Robert J.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly:

Horton, along with contemporaries Max Brand and Zane Grey, was a popular writer of western adventure novels that idealized the Old West's rugged codes. In this 1927 reprint, available in paperback for the first time, Jess Sneed, rancher, gunslinger and leader of a notorious band of robbers, reveals a surprising tender side. When a man whom Sneed merely wanted to scare accidentally falls to his death, his 14 year old son Ted is left orphaned. Sneed takes the boy to his ranch where he is mothered by Lucy Ware, Sneed's housekeeper, and taught the rudiments of cattle ranching by Buck, a trusted newer member of Sneed's gang. These halcyon days end several years later when Ted quarrels with Lute Balmer, the foul-mouthed foreman for the neighboring ranch. Although Sneed prevents a fight, Balmer harbors bitter resentment and plans revenge. The denouement, complete with a gunfight, struggles against the harsh Western climate and a metaphorical ride into the sunset, contains all the classic hallmarks of this genre, but despite these clichés the book has an authentic voice that reveals the clear-cut iconic values of an earlier time.
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From Booklist:

Fans of good old-fashioned westerns need look no further than this novel, originally serialized in Western Story Magazine in 1927. The plot is traditional western fare: good man confronts bad man; good man dies accidentally; bad man, showing remorse, takes good man’s son under his wing; later, son learns the truth about bad man (i.e., that he’s actually a thieving murderer). It’s a lively story, and Horton, a master of the genre, tells it exceedingly well. His characters are comfortably larger than life—Jess Sneed, the bad-guy protagonist, could almost be called Shakespearean in his compelling nastiness and conflicting morality—and his dialogue is sharp, to the point, and memorable. Westerns have come a long way since the late 1920s, and yet this one, with its emotional depth and characters who seek truth and compassion, could have been written today, perhaps by a contemporary master such as Larry McMurtry. --David Pitt

About this edition

• Publisher: Five Star
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 1594145075
• ISBN 13: 9781594145070
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 252