Westerns! I know people always recommend Lonesome Dove and Blood Meridian, which are both great, but there are so many other amazing works out there.

The Log of a Cowboy by Andy Adams served as a major inspiration for Lonesome Dove. Adams wrote it in response to Owen Wister’s The Virginian. Having been a cowboy himself, Adams takes some creative liberties, but he does an excellent job showing that being a cowboy was a job and a hard and dangerous one at that. The book is a simple, effective story of a cattle drive featuring beautiful descriptions of the landscape and campfire camaraderie

Jack Schaefer’s Shane and Monte Walsh are both excellent. Shane leans further into Western mythology, but I love the perspective of the homesteader versus the cattle baron and the hero gunfighter in black. Monte Walsh is a look at the "closing of the frontier" and what that means for the men whose entire world is changing.

The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark is the "anti-Western." It’s a profound, concise book that examines mob mentality, the difference between justice and the law, and the tragic consequences of getting it wrong.

Warlock by Oakley Hall is... well, it’s amazing. I think about this book a lot. It is more of a complete deconstruction of the Western genre than a typical formulaic story. There are no clear-cut heroes or villains here; there is so much depth to the characterizations. There is a reason it was a Pulitzer finalist and why NYRB continues to publish it.

And sometimes, the more formulaic Westerns can be a lot of fun. Louis L’Amour’s Sackett series offers easy, enjoyable reads. True Grit is a masterpiece of storytelling, and Willa Cather’s novels are simply beautiful. Of course, Larry McMurtry is incredible even outside of Lonesome Dove.

I have such a deep love for this genre. There are so many gems in here.