Gladstone Brass found out how to make his livelihood during the thirty years he prospected the arid wastes of the Nevada desert. He pried ore out of the few small deposits he discovered, then went to town—which he hated—only long enough to trade his bits of gold for the supplies he needed. Otherwise, he was devoted to keeping these arid, secret wastes all to himself, and that meant driving out rivals, invaders, interlopers, and adventurers. His only friend and companion was Tía María, a bu...

**Travelling performers struggle to impress rowdy western towns in Anything Goes, and ambitions clash as Montana miners fight for control of The Richest Hill on Earth; two novels from six-time Spur Award winner Richard S. Wheeler.Anything Goes**The cowboys, gold miners, outlaws, gunmen, prostitutes, and marshals who populate the Wild West never see much big-city entertainment. Those western towns are too wild and rowdy for entertainers to enter, le...

Collected here are ten Western short stories by Richard S. Wheeler, the award-winning author who makes storytelling look easy.In “Mugs Birdsong’s Crime Academy,” celebrated criminal Mugs Birdsong decides to found an academy that will instruct lawmen on the ways and means of lawlessness. “The Last Days of Dominic Prince” is the tragic tale of a cattle baron and his final conflict with the forces of political correctness. “Dead Weight” introduces us to a coffin maker who constructs a...

Gladstone Brass found out how to make his livelihood during the thirty years he prospected the arid wastes of the Nevada desert. He pried ore out of the few small deposits he discovered, then went to town—which he hated—only long enough to trade his bits of gold for the supplies he needed. Otherwise, he was devoted to keeping these arid, secret wastes all to himself, and that meant driving out rivals, invaders, interlopers, and adventurers. His only friend and companion was Tía María, a bu...

Buffalo Bill Cody, Bat Masterson, and other legendary heroic figures of America’s Old West get the royal treatment in White Hats, a collection of stories by esteemed Western authors. This anthology is expertly compiled by Robert J. Randisi, who has gathered extraordinary stories of those who wear the white hat from well-known authors like John Jakes, Richard S. Wheeler, James Reasoner, and others.In this collection you will hear the following excellent stories: “The Winnin...

Collected here are ten Western short stories by Richard S. Wheeler, the award-winning author who makes storytelling look easy.In “Mugs Birdsong’s Crime Academy,” celebrated criminal Mugs Birdsong decides to found an academy that will instruct lawmen on the ways and means of lawlessness. “The Last Days of Dominic Prince” is the tragic tale of a cattle baron and his final conflict with the forces of political correctness. “Dead Weight” introduces us to a coffin maker who constructs a...

Two young men in the gold fields of California spend a last evening together as one of them, very sick, confronts his own imminent death. The tenderness between them may seem idealized, but you understand reading this story how premature death from accident and disease haunted the lives of far more westerners than death by violence.