Sunday Morning Book Thread [08/02/2026] JTB

Welcome to my second attempt at a book thread. I'm still learning to include images so this one is just text [I helped...CBD]. And, as always, I hope everyone had a great week of reading.

I enjoy reading westerns. Not just for the shoot-em-ups (although that is part of the appeal) but for the characters and descriptions of town life and the wild country. The plot is usually fast paced, the books are often under 200 pages and in a few hours you have another novel on your 'books I've read' list. The good guys win, the bad guys lose and justice, not necessarily the law, is served. Vivid and satisfying.

It seems to be the universal opinion that Lonesome Dove is one of the best western novels ever written. I won't argue because I haven't read it yet. (McMurtry does have a place in my heart because he wrote all his books on a manual typewriter.) But when I reread a western, it's usually a Louis L'Amour book. I like the way he can provide insight into his characters and circumstances with just a few lines that reveal but don't disturb the pace of the story.

I like all of his books: Flint, Hondo, Down the Long Hills, and the older history periods like The Walking Drum, etc. But the Sackett series books are the ones that stay with me. Maybe it's the span of generations of a family at different points in history, circa 1600 to the late 1800s. Maybe it's a common thread of toughness and fortitude that binds the different family members even though the main characters, all very much individuals, face different problems in different environments. My favorites in the series are Jubal Sackett, Ride the River, and The Sackett Brand. Sadly, L'Amour died before doing a Sackett story involving the American Revolution.

Any particular westerns that got you interested in the genre or keep you coming back to it? What is the appeal for westerns? The Horde is a very varied group so I'm hoping to hear about western books or authors new to me.

If you need a place to start with westerns, check out Sgt. Mom's (Celia Hayes) books like Lone Star Sons: Being The Entertaining and Mostly If not Always True Adventures of Texas Ranger Jim Reade and his Blood Brother Delaware Scout Toby Shaw in the Time of the Republic of Texas, which is a fun read (and a fun title). It's suitable for youngsters and this not so young reader enjoyed it.

By the way, Donald Hamilton (obligatory Matt Helm reference) wrote some westerns in the 1950s and they are excellent. His book The Big Country was adapted for the movie of that name with Charlton Heston. For some reason they were never reprinted and the used copies can be hard to find and are expensive. Definitely worth it if you can find them.

In a recent YT video from Duelist1954, Mike Beliveau lists the top ten selling westerns of all time, the top ten critics choices and his own ten favorites. There isn't a lot of overlap between the lists.

I'm not the first person to notice this but some original Conan stories, especially the ones involving the Picts, are essentially westerns set in Howard's Hyborean Age. The story Beyond the Black River would certainly qualify.

I'm not a fan of most booktubers on YT. I don't care about their latest book haul or that they claim to have read so many books in a short time. Even if true, or possible, what the hell are they getting out of them. I read for pleasure and to expand my world, not to brag about some list to impress others. Having said that, a year of two ago a booktuber, Michael K. Vaughn, suggested June Roundup. This was a casual, informal suggestion to other YT channels to discuss western books during June that they enjoy and why, and reveal some unusual finds they've come across. If you like westerns it is kind of fun.

Recent acquisitions:
- A hardcover edition of Lonesome Dove
- The City of God by Saint Augustine (H/T to A H Lloyd)
- The Penguin Classics edition of Tennyson's Idylls of the King
- The Winchester version of Mallory's Le Morte D'Arthur (as opposed to the Caxton version that is the standard)

Serendipity: Books I've come across unexpectedly that I'll investigate, and probably buy, at some point. (Not quite in the rabbit hole category.)
- Three Bags Full, the book the Sheep Detectives movie is based on
- Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke and a book of his poetry
- A collection of the correspondence between H. Rider Haggard and Rudyard Kipling

Thanks for putting up with my meanderings. What have you all been reading?

Posted by: Open Blogger at 09:00 AM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Tolle Lege

Posted by: Skip at August 02, 2026 09:01 AM (Ia/+0)

2 Nooded.

Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 09:01 AM (NcvvS)

3 JTB!
I think w'all need to be in our Sunday best for this book thread, guys.

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:02 AM (znREB)

4 Read Rex Stout's "Some Buried Caesar," a Nero Wolfe mystery from the late 30s last week. It had the tropes: Wolfe preferring to be at home; preferring Archie be his driver - every time he's driven by someone else, he's holding on for dear life; cultivation of orchids; and his other idiosyncrasies.

I've not read any NW except for this one so far. Archie crashes Wolfe's car in rural New York on their way to an orchid event, and it leads to involvement with a bull in a field: one Hickory Caesar Grindon, a champion Guernsey. Turns out the bull will be the main course at a barbeque by its owner, Mr. Pratt, a restaurateur, as a publicity stunt.

His plan horrifies people in the business because of the bull's value. Archie is engaged to protect Caesar during the night because of threats against it. A man who publicly vowed Pratt would never barbeque Caesar, is found dead in the field, with Caesar standing over him. The local law assumes the bull killed the man, but Wolfe, having seen the bull and the scene, doesn't think so.
(con't)

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:02 AM (1Ff7Z)

5 (con't)
Complicating the case are two family heads who don't like each other and their adult children who do. Throw in a slick cad, dense local law, and a(nother?) murder, you have enough to keep you engaged until Wolfe unravels the crime for you.

Except for a few distinctly 1930s references: mentioning things from specific years as recent, the prices of food, the lack of computers, cell phones, or branded autos would keep you from guessing the publication date. Recommended if you've heard about Stout's work but never read it.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:02 AM (1Ff7Z)

6 Thanks to CBD for adding the visuals to my text. I need to learn how to do that and make more entertaining threads.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (yTvNw)

7 Duelist1954, Mike Beliveau, died this past week.

Posted by: retropox at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (qmhkg)

8 If I recall correctly, Beyond the Black River started out as a historical adventure set in upstate New York before the Revolution — basically Robert E Howard's take on a Fenimore Cooper story. He couldn't sell it like that so he did a quick rewrite and moved it to the Hyborian Age.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (78a2H)

9 The only Western I've seen is TOS Spectre of the Gun.

Posted by: San Franpsycho at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (JvZF+)

10 Working almost walking distance from used book store had to stop. Picked up
The Damned Engineers by Janice Halt Giles
A story of the 291st Engineer Bat in the Battle of the Bulge in 1944.
My Fil was a Combat Engineer from D-Day on so its a topic very interesting to me.

Posted by: Skip at August 02, 2026 09:04 AM (Ia/+0)

11 I enjoy reading westerns.

By golly, have I got some books for you!*

*Whenever they're published (still all in beta)

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:05 AM (1Ff7Z)

12 Having rattled on about how I have a set of classic novels that my parents had owned since the 1960s, I decided that I should read one. Courtesy of Mark Twain, I am accompanying "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court." *

The title character, as yet unnamed, tells how he was the foreman of an armaments factory until a labor dispute brought out crowbars. Our man regains consciousness in unfamiliar territory. Coming to accept that he's in Camelot, headquarters of the Knights of the Table Round, he bluffs his way out of being burned at the stake and takes charge, sidelining Merlin and becoming Arthur's deputy, with the title The Boss.

Twain uses The Boss' thoughts to savage the acquiescence of men to the dictates of nobility, royalty, and the Church. Although I've dozed off twice, literally dropping the book, I'm enjoying it.

* Unfortunately, the book showed its age, shedding its cover and the first few pages. I found a more recent copy -- it looks to be print-on-demand, with no cover art -- at our local used-book store. Sorry, Dad.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:06 AM (4I26t)

13 I had a slight interest in beekeeping and found a book on Gutenberg "How To Keep Bees". Published 1905. In the introduction, when talking about reasons to keep bees, the author came up with this gem:

"Another reason for keeping bees is the insight to be gained therefrom into the conditions of perfect communism. The bees and their relatives are the most intelligent and consistent socialists that have yet been developed in this world; and, through studying their ways, one may discern with startling clearness how the perfect socialism grinds off all the projecting corners of the individual until it fits perfectly in its communal niche."

Posted by: fd at August 02, 2026 09:07 AM (MWfyi)

14 Clifford Simak wrote amazing western short stories. They are very cinematic in my mind. Someone should adapt them to the large or small screen.

Posted by: Perfessor Sqiurrel at August 02, 2026 09:08 AM (P6pHw)

15 JTB captains a Book Thread! Cheers!

Morning, book people. Yes, the Western when well done is one of my favorite genres. I grew up with the Whitman Adventures for Young People Authorized TV Editions of Maverick, The Restless Gun, Bat Masterson, Rin Tin Tin, Gunsmoke, and lots of others. Roy Rogers, of course (the mystery The Ghost of Mystery Rancho was a favorite), and Gene Autry too.

Since then, I've realized just how close the hardboiled crime story and the Western are. More than a few authors moved from the latter to the former when the market for Westerns began to peter out: Hamilton, as JTB mentioned, and Elmore Leonard. I still like his Westerns to a degree better than a lot of his crime stories.

Modern Western authors? There is one champ: Loren D. Estleman, who also writes hardboiled private eye novels. His White Desert is great.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:09 AM (wzUl9)

16 Too hot to read!

Posted by: Biden's Dog sniffs a whole lotta malarkey, at August 02, 2026 09:09 AM (Y+4g7)

17 Over 100 years ago. I couldn't beelieve it. Anyway, I skipped on to the good parts.

Posted by: fd at August 02, 2026 09:09 AM (MWfyi)

18 Reading a collection of Robert Penn Warren short stories. Currently on Prime Leaf, about the tobacco wars in early 20th century Kentucky and Tennessee. Had no idea things got that ugly, with the entire town of Hopkinsville KY being raided.

Posted by: Biff Pocoroba at August 02, 2026 09:09 AM (XvL8K)

19 I was going to post Mr Belliveau was not doing well as saw another video mentioning him.

I always loved Westerns. Movies more these days but as a teenager went through many books on ghe wild west.
Even so much I wanted a cap and ball revolver since I was a kid.
Finally bought a replica of a 1860 Army Colt a year ago

Posted by: Skip at August 02, 2026 09:09 AM (Ia/+0)

20 My sister was reading "Riders of the Purple Sage" and got to the part where the masked stranger's shirt was open, but there were boobs...
I told her it COULD still be a man...her reaction was priceless...LOL

Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at August 02, 2026 09:10 AM (l3cgK)

21 Connecticut Yankee is on my list of Books Everybody Gets Wrong. Weak Geek's summary is unusual because he's obviously read the book. Too often I hear it described as a book about how "a Gilded Age American corrupts the knights of the Round Table with capitalism and technology and stuff." As WG so rightly points out, Twain was doing the opposite: showing that medieval society was as corrupt, or more so, than the Gilded Age robber barons.

Like most Twain it has a bum ending, although I do wonder if you can view it as an allegory of the American Civil War.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 09:11 AM (78a2H)

22 For some reason this morning, my eyes are acting funny...seems like whatever I'm looking at seems to be moving downward, even though it's not moving...and no, it isn't an earthquake or landslide...

Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at August 02, 2026 09:11 AM (l3cgK)

23 Morning, JTB.

Howdy, Horde.

Reading this week -- finished Bradbury's Farewell Summer and then re-read The Martian Chronicles. Was going to do From the Dust Returned, but decided to do the Chronicles instead. Next week maybe, along with Green Shadows White Whale. Hadn't read Bradbury in a long time; still holds up nicely.

Haven't read a lot of westerns. Lonesome Dove. Some L'Amour (Conagher, Hondo, a couple of the Sackett novels). Parker's Appaloosa. Good stuff, but I just don't seem to be drawn to the genre.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 09:12 AM (q3u5l)

24 Add Crow Killer to you list of westerns. It's even got cannibalism.

Posted by: Rev. Wishbone at August 02, 2026 09:12 AM (8E0Ba)

25 OE, I'm glad you liked Some Buried Caesar. You're right, Stout's work is perfectly enjoyable by 21st-century people. SBC is not my favorite Wolfe, Murder By the Book is probably that, but if nothing else SBC gives us that wonderful picture of Wolfe, arms folded and walking stick over one arm, standing safely atop the big rock in the pasture while the bull trots around him.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:12 AM (wzUl9)

26 Hi JTB!

Not a genre I read very often, although I like western movies. Lots of themes: man versus nature, man versus man, the lingering animosity of the Civil War, civilization and its discontents, etc.

I have a copy of "Riders of the Purple Sage" I've been meaning to read forever.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at August 02, 2026 09:12 AM (kpS4V)

27 7 ... "Duelist1954, Mike Beliveau, died this past week."

I saw that. Mike had pancreatic cancer. When he didn't post for the last couple of weeks I figured he was near the end. The tributes have already started and he deserves them. Plan to mention this in the gun thread tonight.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:13 AM (yTvNw)

28 While Bram Stoker made him a famous villain worldwide, in Romania he has long been considered a hero, and his actual exploits are more bloody than his fictional namesake. Dracula, Prince of Many Faces by Radur Florescu and Raymond McNally delves into the actual history of the Voivode of Wallachia.

Vlad Tepes was born in 1431, the same year that Joan of Arc was burned at the stake. His father was coerced to send the boy as a hostage to the Ottomans, which likely formed his early hatred of the Turks. When he returned home and his father died, he took over as prince, and began to force his will on the Boyars who controlled his country. He also began to resist the suzerainty of the Turks.

Sultan Mehmet decided to punish the Christians by leading a force of 90,000 to crush them. Dracula used strategic retreat and guerilla attacks, along with scorched earth to deny his enemy supplies. Most famously, when Mehmet reached Tergoviste, he was faced with a forest of 20,000 dead Turkish captives impaled on spikes, a sight which demoralized his army, and he turned back for home. This bloodthirsty act merged into the ancient vampire myth, which then influenced Bram Stoker's novel.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at August 02, 2026 09:14 AM (0U5gm)

29 Thanks for putting this together JTB.

I'm sure there's some really interesting stuff in that Haggard-Kipling book. How long did they correspond?

Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at August 02, 2026 09:14 AM (KaHlS)

30 20 My sister was reading "Riders of the Purple Sage" and got to the part where the masked stranger's shirt was open, but there were boobs...
I told her it COULD still be a man...her reaction was priceless...LOL
Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at August 02, 2026 09:10 AM (l3cgK)
----

Spoilers!

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at August 02, 2026 09:14 AM (kpS4V)

31 Art on the Book Thread?

I'm a bit confused.

Posted by: dantesed at August 02, 2026 09:14 AM (Oy/m2)

32 Good Sunday morning, horde.

Some years ago, I picked up a couple of Zane Grey novels at an antique store. One was Riders of the Purple Sage, with a Mormon vs. Gentile theme. I don't remember the title of the other, but it was about a horse--a really mean and aggressive horse. Told from the horse's point of view.

I enjoyed them both, and would read more.

Most of my Western reading is modern, like C. J. Box, and Craig Johnson's Longmire series.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 09:15 AM (h7ZuX)

33 read Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose....Lewis and Clark story.....now re-reading The Odyssey by Homer

Posted by: Jeff Carter at August 02, 2026 09:15 AM (tZiDs)

34 I bought Galahad and the Grail by Matthew Guite. It was recommended somewhere and is quite wonderful. It's his epic poem about the search for the Grail. Most versions I've read seem to treat Galahad as a prissy do gooder. He's a bit more Samwise Gamgee here. It is recommended you read outloud, which I have been doing.

And you might check out his You Tube channel. He does it from his library. He's a professor at Oxford and an Anglican priest.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at August 02, 2026 09:15 AM (bkuEU)

35 Getting senile - Elmore Leonard's westerns too. NICE stuff.

Bill Pronzini's westerns are supposed to be pretty good. Ditto Elmer Kelton. Haven't read them, though.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (q3u5l)

36 Sorry, Malcolm Guite, not Matthew.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (bkuEU)

37 3 ... "JTB!
I think w'all need to be in our Sunday best for this book thread, guys."

vmom,
I'm long retired and seriously into comfort. Casual clothing, if any, is the rule.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (yTvNw)

38 Oh, and the brands of automobiles in the Wolfe story? Made up. The Heron sedan, the Wethersill convertible, et al. were all Stout's creations. He invented brand names for nearly everything, a gun brand called Marley, names for locks and rugs. There was one 1950s story where Archie mentions that Wolfe has bought, and he drives, a Cadillac instead of a Heron, but that kind of brand reference was rare.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (wzUl9)

39 As I continue to refine my neovim screenwriting config, I’m thinking I may add some features that would make it suitable for writing novels.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (XV/Pl)

40 Any particular westerns that got you interested in the genre or keep you coming back to it? What is the appeal for westerns? The Horde is a very varied group so I'm hoping to hear about western books or authors new to me.

Probably movies: John Wayne, etc. I've read different genres of books my whole reading life, it's difficult to pick one. Since I started to try writing in my dotage, I've searched for specific authors, like Zane Grey and Clarence Mulford. Funny, I seem to go for older stuff than for "moderns." I just can't much into a 30s cowboy movie set in modern times like a lot of the Roy and Gene pix. At least Hopalong didn't do that.

The appeal is history, and not having modern politics and society intrude into a story. You're right about one thing, the hero wins, the villain loses, unlike many books today.

Am I accurate in my own stuff? Heck, I hope so. Anachronisms in movies don't really put me off, but sometimes makes you shake your head.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (1Ff7Z)

41 Excellent - have never read a western as a city boy but thank you for giving an interesting thread vs sci fi sci fi fantasy sci fi….

Posted by: TG Sam at August 02, 2026 09:18 AM (ud9p9)

42 That's right, C.J.Box -- I have read a lot of westerns. It's the sam issues: desperadoes, land rights, idiot easterners, etc.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at August 02, 2026 09:18 AM (kpS4V)

43 Getting senile - Elmore Leonard's westerns too. NICE stuff.

Bill Pronzini's westerns are supposed to be pretty good. Ditto Elmer Kelton. Haven't read them, though.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026

***
Pronzini did the reverse of Leonard: He began with crime stories (he even wrote one Man From U.N.C.L.E. novelette for the magazine in the '60s), and came over to Westerns.

I've read a couple of Elmer Keltons. I keep getting him confused with the famous gun expert Elmer Keith, though.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:18 AM (wzUl9)

44 What's the title of the Kipling/Haggard book, by the way?

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 09:19 AM (78a2H)

45 It's not a book, but I'll recommend "Support Your Local Sheriff," starring James Garner, as a Western.

Many tropes of the Western can be adopted into space fiction. The solitary hero (or small group of same) braving unknown dangers in unfamiliar if not hostile territory in quest of some sort of riches, not necessarily the kind that you can spend.

As I'm used to current technology in plumbing and travel, I would hate to go back to that earlier time. Stagecoaches don't have AC.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:20 AM (4I26t)

46 I read All The Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker. This is an engaging story spanning from 1973 to 2001. It's a combination of a love story, a missing person mystery, and a serial killer hunter story, all with a unique twist on each. It quickly became a real page-turner for me.

Posted by: Zoltan at August 02, 2026 09:20 AM (KUWG/)

47 Good morning Horde. Thanks JTB! Nicely done.

Posted by: TRex - librarian dino at August 02, 2026 09:20 AM (jnBG1)

48 . . . I just can't much into a 30s cowboy movie set in modern times like a lot of the Roy and Gene pix. . . .
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026

***
Yeah, the movies did that. The Whitman young readers' books I had as a kid set the story without a doubt in the Old West. Roy Rogers was usually in Colorado or the desert Southwest, and I think one of the Gene Autrys was set up in eastern Oregon.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:21 AM (wzUl9)

49 I don't read much westerns, and we rarely get them in our library.
We do get western - set mysteries and thrillers.
But imo the true heirs of the western genre csn be found in scifi.

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:21 AM (GhIJO)

50 Morning, all.

I don't read Westerns; the genre simply doesn't interest me at all. I don't even care to read historical accounts of the frontier. The closest thing I have to a 'western' in my collection is a short graphic novel about the Bender family.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:21 AM (qRla/)

51 The Flashman series includes a couple of westerns. Highly recommended. Kit Carson makes an appearance, and he's also with Custer at Little Bighorn.

Posted by: Biff Pocoroba at August 02, 2026 09:22 AM (XvL8K)

52 Finished Dan Simmons' excellent, very, very dark "Carrion Comfort," which is a story of some incredibly evil people who can manipulate others with just their minds, which power they use to murder, murder, and more murder. Very interesting story.

Also read "The Abominable," Dan Simmons' tale of mountain climbing, specifically Mt. Everest in the 1920s, and international intrigue and monsters. I confess that despite Simmons' wonderful ability to describe scenery, i wasn't really able to visualize Everest and its environs very well. I think that's on me, not him.

Just starting Simmons' "Drood," which is a very dark yarn inviting Charles Dickens' last 5 years of life, when he spiraled into madness. Just getting started on this one.

Good morning, Book Nerdz.

Posted by: Sharkman at August 02, 2026 09:23 AM (/RHNq)

53 Oh, and Robert B. Parker wrote three (?) novels set in the Old West, beginning with Appaloosa -- made into that fine film with Ed Harris and Viggo Mortenson. There have been continuation novels in the series since he died, as with Jesse Stone and Spenser in the crime field, but I haven't read any of those.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:23 AM (wzUl9)

54 Congrats on the post JTB!

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026 09:24 AM (lFFaq)

55 If you're interested in western stuff from history to social customs, historically accurate clothing to guns, I'd recommend visiting a YT channel called "Arizona Ghostriders," an interesting site run by "Santee," AKA John Scott.

Tell him Aitch Enfield sent you.

https://tinyurl.com/3zns5fth

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:24 AM (1Ff7Z)

56 National coloring book day!
Someone tell ketanji Jackson.

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at August 02, 2026 09:24 AM (B5eY6)

57 I think the only western that I've read is 'True Grit'.

Posted by: dantesed at August 02, 2026 09:24 AM (Oy/m2)

58 29 ... "I'm sure there's some really interesting stuff in that Haggard-Kipling book. How long did they correspond?"

As I recall, they corresponded for about thirty years, beginning in the 1890s until Haggards death in 1925.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:24 AM (yTvNw)

59 >>Some years ago, I picked up a couple of Zane Grey novels at an antique store.

Ran across a story long ago that Irish poet William Butler Yeats was a fan of Western novels, especially Zane Grey, and that Yeats's last words were 'Send for the sheriff!'

Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 09:25 AM (NcvvS)

60 Posted by: TRex - librarian dino

--
Are you a librarian, TRex?

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (znREB)

61 Thanks JTB. I really like the ~1960-70's Louis L'Amour paperback cover art.

Posted by: 13times at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (fnZRl)

62 A history professor friend of mine who specializes in the old west recommends The Virginian, the first western novel. Someday I may get around to it .

Posted by: Perfessor Sqiurrel at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (P6pHw)

63 Just starting Simmons' "Drood," which is a very dark yarn inviting Charles Dickens' last 5 years of life, when he spiraled into madness. Just getting started on this one.

Good morning, Book Nerdz.
Posted by: Sharkman at August 02, 2026

***
I'm just starting his The Terror, an 1840s novel of the Royal Navy trying to find the Northwest Passage from the North Atlantic out to the Pacific. Two steam-powered sailing ships get frozen into the ice near Baffin Bay . . . and something huge and dangerous is out there in the dark picking off the men one by one.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (wzUl9)

64 Yay Book Thread! Not a fan of westerns at all. I don't think I've read a single western. I enjoy some of the films, though.

Now on book VII of City of God. It's slow going because St. Augustine is just going so deep into things that it takes time to unpack it. I will once again note that the translator needs to be slapped around for constantly "correcting" a man with linguistic guesswork by modern scholars or saying some obscure Roman god is unknown elsewhere.

No shit. Very few works have survived, but St. Augustine had an encyclopedic knowledge of this stuff, as befits one of history's greatest Latin stylists. *He* is the default, not modern scholars pushing their ignorant pet theories.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (ZOv7s)

65 As I recall, they corresponded for about thirty years, beginning in the 1890s until Haggards death in 1925.

Posted by: JTB

I find it fascinating that Haggard wrote King Solomon's Mines in essentially a weekend, on a dare, after he told someone that writing an adventure novel would be easy, and they bet him he couldn't.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (0U5gm)

66 @21 --

Hey, hey, hey -- hold up! I've barely started the book. I just finished the first tournament, in which the surgeons ruined one of his saws.

Don't credit me with what I haven't done. Although it's a nice change from being blamed for not completing an action.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:27 AM (4I26t)

67 On the Kindle I read War King: A Viking Age Novel by Eric Schumacher. This is the third and final book in Hakon's Saga series. After 20 years of ruling what is now southwest Norway, Hakon Haraldson, who brought Christianity to the region, is still fighting his nephews, sons of Eric Bloodaxe. The nephews are now backed by sword-Danes and finally defeat and kill King Hakon. This series of historical novels is based on scant remaining records, but tries to remain true to the life and times of the mid 8th century A. D.

Posted by: Zoltan at August 02, 2026 09:27 AM (KUWG/)

68 MP4, I'm proceeding handily with your new novel. Very good so far. I should have a few notes for you early next week.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:27 AM (wzUl9)

69 I read a really taught thriller about the secret power dynamic pulling the strings in a wealthy New England suburb, "Valley of the Moms". Good stuff. Then I made the mistake of glancing at the (presumably Jewish) author's acknowledgments: "To the people of Gaza. I do not give up hope. I will use my platform as a microphone. I still believe that words matter." 🤮

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (kpS4V)

70 Do the Hillermans' (Tony & his daughter) books count as westerns if they are set on the rez?
I enjoy those books.

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (znREB)

71 44 ... "What's the title of the Kipling/Haggard book, by the way?"

It's "Rudyard Kipling To Rider Haggard: The Record Of A Friendship".

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (yTvNw)

72 I think the only western that I've read is 'True Grit'.
Posted by: dantesed at August 02, 2026

***
It is a good one.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (wzUl9)

73 Read an article this week about the difference in your brain between reading a book and listening to a book. MRI's show little to no difference in brain activity between listening and reading, but there is a difference when it comes to learning things, i.e. textbooks and academic books. When it comes to to learning, physical books/materials by far, had better outcomes.
Listening to stories is something our brains are hard wired to do. After all, we were passing stories down long before there was a written language. Conclusion was audio books are good for lighter reading like fiction but when it comes to to heavier reading, physical books are the clear winner.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 09:29 AM (VCgbV)

74 The only Western I've seen is TOS Spectre of the Gun.
Posted by: San Franpsycho at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (JvZF+)

What about The 'Frisco Kid?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:29 AM (1Ff7Z)

75 I find it fascinating that Haggard wrote King Solomon's Mines in essentially a weekend, on a dare, after he told someone that writing an adventure novel would be easy, and they bet him he couldn't.
Posted by: Thomas Paine at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (0U5gm)

The same thing happened (more or less) to Texas feed salesman Hal P Warren. He told the screenwriter Sterling Silliphant that it was the easiest thing in the world to make a movie, so Silliphant challenged him to do it.

And so the world was gifted. . .Manos: The Hands of Fate.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (qRla/)

76 >>Stagecoaches don't have AC.

Have to laugh when people exit a stagecoach all clean. Anyone in a front-facing seat would be dusty as hell.

Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (NcvvS)

77 “There Will Come Soft Rains” by Ray Bradbury, which I believe is part of the Martian Chronickes, took place on August 4-5, 2026.

Posted by: Cow Demon at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (4g5V+)

78 Greatest Western film, hands down, is _The Phantom Empire_ starring Gene Autry.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (78a2H)

79
6 Thanks to CBD for adding the visuals to my text. I need to learn how to do that and make more entertaining threads.
Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:03 AM (yTvNw)

I had to look up the piece of art at the top of the post. Of course - Bierstadt! Highly appropriate, as his art did much to establish the mythology of the American West from the beginning. This piece is a perfect example of that, pioneers headed into a glorious, golden future.

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (Ol0VD)

80 And so the world was gifted. . .Manos: The Hands of Fate.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (

MST3K was never the same ever again.

Posted by: Cow Demon at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (4g5V+)

81 MP4, I'm proceeding handily with your new novel. Very good so far. I should have a few notes for you early next week.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:27 AM (wzUl9)

Many thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying it. I still have a few minor edits to make, so no massive rush.

Yesterday I came up with a wonderful opening for the next book in the series, but I don't know whether I want to write it.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (qRla/)

82 My favorite Western's are A. B. Guthrie's
'The Big Sky' and 'The Way West'

Also Manfred's "Lord Grizzly"
(a better Hugh Glass tale than 'The Revenant')

And... Vardis Fischer's 'Mountain Man', the far
better source for the movie 'Jeremiah Johnson'.
His depiction of the natives as mostly superstitious
bug-eating savages is brutal.

The early 'mountain man' era is more interesting
than the 'cowboy' West. To me.

Posted by: retropox at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (qmhkg)

83 Could someone please write a "cultivation" style LitRPG that doesn't immediately descend into depravity? I like the tropes, but am 3/0 for enjoyability on the ones I've tried due to harem, psychopathic main character, or constant foul language issues.

This is a case where I won't be writing the book I want to read, because I already have my weird west dino gunslinger setting I haven't been writing.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026 09:32 AM (lFFaq)

84 62 A history professor friend of mine who specializes in the old west recommends The Virginian, the first western novel. Someday I may get around to it .
Posted by: Perfessor Sqiurrel at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (P6pHw)

Oh, that's another that I picked up at a thrift or antique store, along with The Oxbow Incident. Haven't gotten around to reading either of them.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 09:33 AM (h7ZuX)

85 Yesterday I came up with a wonderful opening for the next book in the series, but I don't know whether I want to write it.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026

***
Go ahead and set it down. Who knows, it may pull you along into the new story, as you answer the questions you ask or ask yourself in the opening.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:33 AM (wzUl9)

86 After poking around presume you've got 'Rudyard Kipling To Rider Haggard: The Record Of A Friendship' by Morton Cohen. from 1975 and presume never reprinted, this kind of book would make the shortlist browsing a used book store.

Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at August 02, 2026 09:33 AM (KaHlS)

87 My first born son is named after Logan Sackett.

Posted by: Ironwood at August 02, 2026 09:34 AM (ob2d4)

88 So, I guess the idea of Westerns appeals to me, but they rarely make it to the top of the TBR list. I should try those when I'm in a rut where nothing looks interesting.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 09:34 AM (h7ZuX)

89 All The Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker. This is an engaging story spanning from 1973 to 2001. It's a combination of a love story, a missing person mystery, and a serial killer hunter story, all with a unique twist on each. It quickly became a real page-turner for me.
Posted by: Zoltan
---
I listened to this last month and enjoyed it too.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 09:34 AM (VCgbV)

90 For some reason this morning, my eyes are acting funny...seems like whatever I'm looking at seems to be moving downward, even though it's not moving...and no, it isn't an earthquake or landslide...
Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at August 02, 2026 09:11 AM (l3cgK)

I had something like that happen to me recently. My eyes kept wandering from what I was looking at. Since coming back from the road trip a week ago, every time I stand up I feel dizzy for a few seconds. Ah, the travails of getting older.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:35 AM (1Ff7Z)

91
I've read almost no westerns.

The first western I ever read was Ol' Looey L'Amour on the recommendation of a friend when I was maybe 12-13.

I was bored silly. It seemed no different than the multitude of TV westerns on the tube at that time.

So, I've stayed away.

I suppose I should try "Lonesome Dove" since so many people like it, and maybe-

Cormac McCarthy since he's always popping up on lists and in reviews. His writing style annoys me though.

We'll see.

Posted by: naturalfake at August 02, 2026 09:35 AM (iJfKG)

92 Not a book, but book adjacent - I decided to dust off Avalon Hill's old "1776" wargame and set it up. It's been a long time since I got it out and I'm really appreciating the elegance of its design. Because I can't help myself, I'm tinkering with the combat system, and for true gaming nerds, I'll have a blog post up later today (link in nic).

Also, I've posted the second essay analyzing a PRC invasion of Taiwan for those that are interested. This is basically "thinking on the page" (or the screen), so it's an open-ended project.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 09:36 AM (ZOv7s)

93 Cedar Sanderson's 6th Grounds Keeper is out. Called Fen Dead I believe. Quick read, decent mystery. Maybe a little heavy on early adulthood angst, but that's probably accurate for modern young adults.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026 09:36 AM (lFFaq)

94 And so the world was gifted. . .Manos: The Hands of Fate.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (qRla/)
---

Bwahahaha!

Torgo the White takes TV's Frank to Second Banana Heaven:

https://tinyurl.com/bdr6sdm8

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at August 02, 2026 09:37 AM (kpS4V)

95 The Roy Rogers YA novel The Ghost of Mystery RAncho, which I've mentioned here a couple of times, was a big favorite of mine as a kid. Rereading it as a grownup -- I have a copy bought on eBay -- I see plot holes here and there. But it has an amazing narrative drive. And it is the classic "closed" mystery, where we do not know the identity of the villain until almost the end. Roy, a young Texas Ranger, is hunting a murderous Rio Grande-area bandit known as The Ghost, who wears a skeleton mask and costume on his raids. Not even his minions know his real identity. So added to the action is the built-in puzzle factor, and the revelation is a true thunderbolt worthy of Christie or Queen.

As well as stoking my love of Westerns, it started me on a lifelong affair with the classic mystery.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:38 AM (wzUl9)

96
62 A history professor friend of mine who specializes in the old west recommends The Virginian, the first western novel. Someday I may get around to it .
Posted by: Perfessor Sqiurrel at August 02, 2026 09:26 AM (P6pHw)

I found that in my grandpa’s library when I was young and read it - quite good! Much of it will seem cliche now, but it was one of the first serious novels about cowboy life in the west, and it was the dozens of writers who copied it that made it cliche.

It is one of those pieces of work that set the form for much of the genre to follow.

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026 09:39 AM (Ol0VD)

97 Amazon has/had a Josephine Tey collection on Kindle for only a couple of dollars and many of the Horde have recommended her books so I got it. Just started the first in the book, an Inspector Grant story.

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026 09:39 AM (lFFaq)

98 Combination book/movie/TV comment. After having avoided Harlan Coben, I eventually read Nobody's Fool and quite liked it. I then discovered Netflix has a bazillion Coben limited series (many set in England despite the books upon which they are based being set in the US). I looked him up and he has sold over 100,000,000 books. Plus his movie revenue. And his Final Twist TV series. And now I see there's talk of a Myron Bolitar TV series based upon his twelve book series about a sports agent who always gets himself involved in murders. Yeah, life must be pretty sweet for Harlan Coben.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (ndZc7)

99 Do the Hillermans' (Tony & his daughter) books count as westerns if they are set on the rez?
I enjoy those books.
Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (znREB)

Yes!
After living on ranch on the 'North Rim' for six
summers (in the '70's) I read "A Thief of Time"
30 years later. Hillerman made me feel I though
I had time traveled. I was THERE again.
The smell of the pinyon and sage, the smell of the
summer rain, the very way the air felt in a canyon.

Posted by: retropox at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (qmhkg)

100 For some reason this morning, my eyes are acting funny...seems like whatever I'm looking at seems to be moving downward, even though it's not moving...and no, it isn't an earthquake or landslide...
Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at August 02, 2026
*
I had something like that happen to me recently. My eyes kept wandering from what I was looking at. Since coming back from the road trip a week ago, every time I stand up I feel dizzy for a few seconds. Ah, the travails of getting older.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026

***
I had something similar back in 2018. Turned out to be an inner-ear problem, solved with some physical therapy that helped to shake something loose that was stuck in my vestibular canals.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (wzUl9)

101 Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:06 AM (4I26t)

WG, I came across a YT vid yesterday covering a comic collection of PI stories. Can't remember who did it, but it was talking about "PIs," a set of stories done in various styles, even inside the same story. Thought you might be interested.

Link to Amazon:
https://tinyurl.com/9kbm4vcy

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (1Ff7Z)

102 The Searchers, by Alan Le May, is a very close second to Lonesome Dove. I've read both multiple times and given away every copy I've bought.

I read The Good Old Boys, by Elmer Kelton, last year. It's a story of the end of the cowboy age and wandering cowboy Hewey Calloway who tries, but doesn't fit in modern life with West Texas farming and automobiles and staying in one place for more than a few days or weeks. It is a dandy book, that was made into a tv movie with Tommy Lee Jones 30 years ago. I haven't seen it, but if they followed the book, it would be a good one.

Posted by: huerfano at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (VJX5o)

103 "Trigger! It was you all the time!"

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (78a2H)

104 lin-duh,
Fully concur on audio vs physical book retainage and comprehension.
It's the difficulty juggling driving, mowing and chores while reading that have mostly pushed my to audio ratio up.

Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at August 02, 2026 09:41 AM (KaHlS)

105 Amazon has/had a Josephine Tey collection on Kindle for only a couple of dollars and many of the Horde have recommended her books so I got it. Just started the first in the book, an Inspector Grant story.
Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026

***
She was great. The strong thing with a Tey novel is the flavor and the characters, often people you'd want to spend time with after the book is over.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:41 AM (wzUl9)

106 Not even his minions know his real identity. So added to the action is the built-in puzzle factor, and the revelation is a true thunderbolt worthy of Christie or Queen.

As well as stoking my love of Westerns, it started me on a lifelong affair with the classic mystery.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:38 AM (wzUl9)

When his mask is pulled off, does he say “and I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn’t for you darn kids!!!” ???

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026 09:41 AM (Ol0VD)

107 MST3K was never the same ever again.
Posted by: Cow Demon at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (4g5V+)

Servo's high-velocity riff at the end was classic.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 02, 2026 09:41 AM (PiwSw)

108 Alan LeMay was also the fellow who wrote The Unforgiven -- not the Clint Eastwood classic, but the 1950s film with Burt Lancaster and Natalie Wood.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:42 AM (wzUl9)

109 OE, I'm glad you liked Some Buried Caesar. You're right, Stout's work is perfectly enjoyable by 21st-century people. SBC is not my favorite Wolfe, Murder By the Book is probably that, but if nothing else SBC gives us that wonderful picture of Wolfe, arms folded and walking stick over one arm, standing safely atop the big rock in the pasture while the bull trots around him.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:12 AM (wzUl9)

Yes, I did like it. I have those other two waiting, but I think I'll read one of the ERB's I bought with them. Kid number one bought those other books you recommended, but I'll have to wait until she comes by in November.

I wonder if the scene with Wolfe on the rock was the one mentioned last week that someone thought was laugh out loud? I thought it was cute, but didn't laugh out loud.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:43 AM (1Ff7Z)

110 Yesterday I came up with a wonderful opening for the next book in the series, but I don't know whether I want to write it.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (qRla/)
---
I keep a pad next to the bed to write down phrases that occur to me. I also have lots of writing paper around the house as well. Never let an idea go to waste!

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 09:44 AM (ZOv7s)

111 Fully concur on audio vs physical book retainage and comprehension.
It's the difficulty juggling driving, mowing and chores while reading that have mostly pushed my to audio ratio up.
Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at August 02, 2026 09:41 AM (KaHlS)

Same. I have tried a couple of non-fiction and historical books on audio, but they don't work for me. Mysteries, funny stuff, all that is good on audio. Currently listening to We Sold Our Souls, by Grady Hendrix. I guess you would call it comic horror, and I'm just going to declare that Hendrix owns this genre.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 09:44 AM (h7ZuX)

112 Vardis Fischer's 'Mountain Man', the far better source for the movie 'Jeremiah Johnson'. His depiction of the natives as mostly superstitious bug-eating savages is brutal.

Posted by: retropox at August 02, 2026 09:31 AM (qmhkg)

Yes! And Fischer's historical version of the Lewis and Clark expedition "Tale of Valor" is also very good. I think Fischer had a grim outlook on life in general, and that grimness buttresses the struggle between nature and human existence.

Posted by: 13times at August 02, 2026 09:44 AM (fnZRl)

113 Thanks for the plug for my books! There are two sequels/story collections to Lone Star Sons: Lone Star Blood and Lone Star Glory.

When I was still trying to go the trad-pub route and looking for a literary agent, I had my first two books in hand in manuscript - To Truckee's Trail, and the Adelsverein Trilogy. It seemed like every agency website I looked at had a snotty little notation that they did not consider westerns. And those that didn't have it on their website so informed me in the letter of rejection. Me pleading "It's historical fiction set on the 19th century trans-Mississippi western frontier" cut no ice at all.
But westerns seemed still to be a popular genre - so I said F**k it, I write westerns!" and embraced the category. And twenty or so books later...

Posted by: Sgt. Mom at August 02, 2026 09:45 AM (Ew3fm)

114 26 ... "I have a copy of "Riders of the Purple Sage" I've been meaning to read forever."

AHE,
Good morning. Purple Sage is a good start. A few personal favorites that might appeal to you, all Louis L'Amour and easily found in used book stores. "Ride the River" with it's teenage girl protagonist. She is competent in the wild but doesn't refuse male help. L'Amour's female characters are capable but not stupid. "Jubal Sackett" is one of the last of the Sackett series. Jubal is in the second generation of Sacketts, so 1600s. Exploring unknown territory, touches of mysticism, romance, and desperate fights. His sense of wonder at the new world makes for pleasant and exciting reading. Then "Flint", the ultimate competent loner who wants peace but encounters greed and corruption. The insights into life in the later wild west is fun.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:45 AM (yTvNw)

115 Not even his minions know his real identity. So added to the action is the built-in puzzle factor, and the revelation is a true thunderbolt worthy of Christie or Queen.

As well as stoking my love of Westerns, it started me on a lifelong affair with the classic mystery.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:38 AM (wzUl9)

When his mask is pulled off, does he say “and I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn’t for you darn kids!!!” ???
Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026

***
Nope. These Whitman stories, while written for young adults, never wrote down to them. I can reread many of them now with enjoyment. In fact one, Roy Rogers and the Enchanted Canyon, proved a revelation some years ago. I hadn't liked it as a kid. As an adult I loved it -- party because of the atmosphere the author generates about the abandoned Anasazi canyon dwellings. I was not an atmosphere guy at age nine.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:45 AM (wzUl9)

116 InspiredHistoryMike,
I resisted audiobooks for a long time but now I am always listening to one while driving, at work when bored or doing repetitive things, while doing chores, and cooking. I still read on my kindle nightly but usually a different book.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 09:45 AM (VCgbV)

117 100 wolfus is right - go get checked out

Most vestibular issues can be corrected IF addressed quickly; if you ignore it it can get so much worse

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:46 AM (eZ5tL)

118 Same. I have tried a couple of non-fiction and historical books on audio, but they don't work for me. Mysteries, funny stuff, all that is good on audio. Currently listening to We Sold Our Souls, by Grady Hendrix. I guess you would call it comic horror, and I'm just going to declare that Hendrix owns this genre.
Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026

***
I just finished that in print. I didn't find it comic at all -- but horror, oh, yes.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:46 AM (wzUl9)

119 Ah, publishers.

"There Will Come Soft Rains" takes place in August 2057. That's in the current William Morrow pb/Kindle edition.

Originally, as reprinted by Library of America in their 2-volume Bradbury set - yep, August 2026.

Why Morrow feels the need to do that is beyond me. Next week I suppose Orwell's reprints will be issued as 2084.

Recently revisited It! The Terror from Beyond Space, which set its Mars landings in 1973. Guess they'll have to do an AI edit of the voice-overs.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 09:47 AM (q3u5l)

120 Ah, the travails of getting older.
Posted by: OrangeEnt

No, it's not old age. Get it checked, OE

Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:47 AM (eZ5tL)

121 @101 --

Thank you. When I'm on YouTube, it's primarily to watch "Gutfeld!" -- we no longer have cable -- or to listen to Larry O'Connor, which I do at work.

Outside of that, the videos I choose all relate to comics.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:48 AM (4I26t)

122 >> Alan LeMay was also the fellow who wrote The Unforgiven -- not the Clint Eastwood classic, but the 1950s film with Burt Lancaster and Natalie Wood.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:42 AM

Good book. The movie was absolutely a 50s western. I didn't believe Audrey Hepburn as half Kiowa.

Posted by: huerfano at August 02, 2026 09:48 AM (VJX5o)

123 One of my favorite quotes is from Washington Irving, in which he quite succinctly describes the joy of traveling in a stagecoach;

“There is certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse! As I have often found in traveling in a stagecoach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position, and be bruised in a new place.”

- Washington Irving

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026 09:49 AM (Ol0VD)

124 I wonder if the scene with Wolfe on the rock was the one mentioned last week that someone thought was laugh out loud? I thought it was cute, but didn't laugh out loud.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026

***
Probably so.

To me the classic LOL moment in the Wolfe saga comes from another, later book. Archie mentions again at the climax that Wolfe does not always tell even him what he, Wolfe, plans, or who the murderer is. "He says that I can control my face better if I don't know. The real reason is that he loves to have a curtain go up revealing him balancing a ball on the end of his nose."

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:49 AM (wzUl9)

125 Oh, and the brands of automobiles in the Wolfe story? Made up. The Heron sedan, the Wethersill convertible, et al. were all Stout's creations. He invented brand names for nearly everything, a gun brand called Marley, names for locks and rugs. There was one 1950s story where Archie mentions that Wolfe has bought, and he drives, a Cadillac instead of a Heron, but that kind of brand reference was rare.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (wzUl9)

That keeps the story from being dated. Ages the story when a defunct brand is still used as something current.

Unless it was a story about AOP, someone daily driving a Studebaker certain locks it into a time gone by.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:50 AM (1Ff7Z)

126 Thanks for the dandy Book Thread, JTB!

Currently reading The Radicalism of the American Revolution by Gordon S. Wood. Still early into the book, but the history of the social order in England and America during the 17th and 18th centuries is fascinating.

Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 02, 2026 09:51 AM (D/6p1)

127 Alan LeMay was also the fellow who wrote The Unforgiven -- not the Clint Eastwood classic, but the 1950s film with Burt Lancaster and Natalie Wood.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:42 AM
*
Good book. The movie was absolutely a 50s western. I didn't believe Audrey Hepburn as half Kiowa.
Posted by: huerfano at August 02, 2026

***
Oh, that's right, it was Audrey. Natalie was the grown version of the girl Wayne and Jeffrey Hunter were seeking in The Searchers.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:51 AM (wzUl9)

128 As I continue to refine my neovim screenwriting config, I’m thinking I may add some features that would make it suitable for writing novels.
Posted by: Thomas Bender at August 02, 2026 09:16 AM (XV/Pl)

How would that work? AI assisted writing, or templates?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:51 AM (1Ff7Z)

129 Got interested in Louis L'Amour a while ago for reasons I don't remember. Probably because someone recommended his autobiography-of-sorts: Education of a Wandering Man. It sounded more interesting than it was, and was more a catalog of the prodigious amount of books he read over the first half of his life than anything else. It was OK. Then I thought I'd try reading his fiction writing and got a couple Westerns. Did not find his writing style very compelling, but that's just me.

Posted by: Ex Rex Reeder at August 02, 2026 09:52 AM (QaH55)

130 This bloodthirsty act merged into the ancient vampire myth, which then influenced Bram Stoker's novel.

Posted by: Thomas Paine

Tom Homan is doing a great job as Border "Czar," but he could probably use a decent assistant like Vlad Tepes.

Posted by: Sharkman at August 02, 2026 09:52 AM (/RHNq)

131 Read a couple of those Bobby Boyle, Ike's detective.wwii mysteries, someone here recommended, they are good, but there's like twenty of them socertainly won't get to them all.
Also read 111 Days in Stanleyville, about the 1964 uprising in the Congo, by Dave Reed, a friends godfather. Reminded me of the weird times I came of age in.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 09:52 AM (sl73Y)

132 "The Searchers, by Alan Le May, is a very close second to Lonesome Dove."

Posted by: huerfano at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (VJX5o)

Another very good book!

Posted by: 13times at August 02, 2026 09:52 AM (fnZRl)

133 I've read a couple of Elmer Keltons. I keep getting him confused with the famous gun expert Elmer Keith, though.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:18 AM (wzUl9)

Better than confusing him with Pert Kelton!

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:53 AM (1Ff7Z)

134 Sgt. Mom, I have a feeling my somewhat "hardboiled" approach to fantasy is not going to go over with traditional publishers either.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:53 AM (wzUl9)

135 For some reason this morning, my eyes are acting funny...seems like whatever I'm looking at seems to be moving downward, even though it's not moving

Not to be a panican but if it persists, you might want to seek medical attention. It could be nothing or it could be a warning sign of something serious. No point in taking chances.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 02, 2026 09:53 AM (vTZFs)

136 OrangeEnt,

Look up BPPV ( Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo )

It would be best to see a professional, but if you want to try a home remedy first, look up "Epley maneuver"

Alternately, slap hot iron to it.

Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 02, 2026 09:54 AM (PiwSw)

137 @95 --

Not even his minions know his real identity.

How does that work? Does he waylay them behind the bar and make his pitch?

In the Spirit comics, his primary recurring foe, the crimelord the Octopus, keeps his identity secret by killing the underlings who convey his orders.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 09:54 AM (4I26t)

138 I read the whole CJ Box Joe Pickett series and really enjoyed it.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 09:54 AM (VCgbV)

139 I don't read much westerns, and we rarely get them in our library.
We do get western - set mysteries and thrillers.
But imo the true heirs of the western genre csn be found in scifi.
Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:21 AM (GhIJO)

Well, as seen above, westerns and sci-fi get written by the same authors. They do go together. I do both.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:55 AM (1Ff7Z)

140 For any Book Thread denizens who don't frequent all the other threads --

Yesterday's thread from K.T., Sowell Weekend, is well worth a look. He links to a panel discussion (Niall Ferguson, Victor Hanson, and Coleman Hughes) on Sowell. Nice stuff.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 09:56 AM (q3u5l)

141 Lonesome Dove and its prequels and sequel are not the usual Western fare. They are more like "Westerns for people who hate Westerns." I'd think anybody who liked True Grit, the novel or either movie version, would like LD.

McMurtry does have one style quirk. He changes point of view from one character to another, not just within the same scene, but within the same paragraph. It can be disconcerting.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:56 AM (wzUl9)

142 Currently reading The Radicalism of the American Revolution by Gordon S. Wood. Still early into the book, but the history of the social order in England and America during the 17th and 18th centuries is fascinating.
Posted by: Legally Sufficient at August 02, 2026 09:51 AM (D/6p1)

He also wrote The American Revolution: A History, a short (166 pages) well-done retelling of the conflict.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:56 AM (qRla/)

143 “I hadn't liked it as a kid. As an adult I loved it -- party because of the atmosphere the author generates about the abandoned Anasazi canyon dwellings. I was not an atmosphere guy at age nine.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:45 AM (wzUl9)

I should look for that. Having visited some of those ruins, I know the eerie, almost otherworldly feel you get as you approach them. There’s something about great works of men who lived a thousand years ago, where everyone just left and abandoned them to the foxes and the scorpions.

Or maybe they never left. Only their descendants did.

Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026 09:57 AM (Ol0VD)

144 A western I enjoyed was A Distant Trumpet by Paul Horgan. It was made into a mediocre movie (although it did have Suzanne Pleshette) but the book is much better and very well written. It's about a young cavalry officer fighting Indians and the Army during the last of the Indian Wars.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 09:57 AM (ndZc7)

145 Sgt. Mom, I have a feeling my somewhat "hardboiled" approach to fantasy is not going to go over with traditional publishers either.[/i.]

Unless your name is Loren Estleman, trad pubs don't want silent film mysteries, either.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:58 AM (qRla/)

146 I'm just starting his The Terror, an 1840s novel of the Royal Navy trying to find the Northwest Passage from the North Atlantic out to the Pacific. Two steam-powered sailing ships get frozen into the ice near Baffin Bay . . . and something huge and dangerous is out there in the dark picking off the men one by one.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere

The Terror is next on my Kindle after Drood.

Posted by: Sharkman at August 02, 2026 09:58 AM (/RHNq)

147 34 ... "I bought Galahad and the Grail by Matthew Guite. It was recommended somewhere and is quite wonderful. It's his epic poem about the search for the Grail. Most versions I've read seem to treat Galahad as a prissy do gooder. He's a bit more Samwise Gamgee here. It is recommended you read outloud, which I have been doing.

And you might check out his You Tube channel. He does it from his library. He's a professor at Oxford and an Anglican priest."

notsothoreau,

I'm so glad you are enjoying Guite's poetry. And his YT videos are my favorites. So much entertainment, so much insight into literature: Lewis, Tolkien, MacDonald, Dante, The Faerie Queene, sources of the Arthur legends. Many comments have asked him to narrate the complete LOTR on CD. His readings are excellent.

BTW, the second volume of the Arthuriad comes out in November. I've already ordered mine.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 09:59 AM (yTvNw)

148 Do the Hillermans' (Tony & his daughter) books count as westerns if they are set on the rez?
I enjoy those books.
Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:28 AM (znREB)

If set at Mohegan Sun, no.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:00 AM (1Ff7Z)

149 @109 --

I wonder if the scene with Wolfe on the rock was the one mentioned last week that someone thought was laugh out loud?

No, it was Archie's proposal for the county jail's prisoners' union. One demand was for a closed shop.

I enjoy "Some Buried Caesar," but the book gives away the game before you open it. IYKYK.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (4I26t)

150 OT, left a gallon of milk in the garage coming in from the store. Overnight temp was around eighty, left out for fifteen hours. Put it in the fridge this morning, fully intend to drink it.
Poll: still drinkable, or will I die.
Momma cow got no refrigeration.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (sl73Y)

151 That keeps the story from being dated. Ages the story when a defunct brand is still used as something current.

Which reminds me, apparently Amazon is doing a series of Neuromancer. I'm not entirely sure if I trust them not to f*ck it up like they did Tolkien. OK, I am sure -- that I don 't trust them. Anyway, one of the things Gibson did was mix in familiar brand names (Braun in particular) with fake ones (e.g. Ono-Sendai) to help create an impression of pervasive Asian-European technocracy. Offhand, I don't recall any mention of identifiably American tech.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (vTZFs)

152 “I hadn't liked it as a kid. As an adult I loved it -- party because of the atmosphere the author generates about the abandoned Anasazi canyon dwellings. I was not an atmosphere guy at age nine.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026
*
I should look for that. Having visited some of those ruins, I know the eerie, almost otherworldly feel you get as you approach them. There’s something about great works of men who lived a thousand years ago, where everyone just left and abandoned them to the foxes and the scorpions.

Or maybe they never left. Only their descendants did.
Posted by: Tom Servo at August 02, 2026

***
The author was Jim Rivers, and it dates to 1954.

Oddly enough, Louis L'Amour wrote a set-in-modern-times SF novel about exactly that, The Haunted Mesa.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (wzUl9)

153 Frank Herbert does the same viewpoint-hopping within the same scene or paragraph. In his case it's because all the characters are lying, or have hidden agendas, or something they won't express openly.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (78a2H)

154 Speaking of Dracula and stone age game shows . . .

https://tinyurl.com/4a4t6hre

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:02 AM (ndZc7)

155 And so the world was gifted. . .Manos: The Hands of Fate.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 09:30 AM (qRla/)

Hey! It got made, didn't it?

(looks at latest "thanks, but" email from another publisher)

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:02 AM (1Ff7Z)

156 Oddbob: I believe in N'mancer Molly packs a "Remington Recoilless" handgun.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 10:03 AM (78a2H)

157 My brother-In-law picked up several books at the Goodwill for us which I think I will enjoy reading. One is about the Kings and Queens of England edited by Antonia Fraser I have read a few chapters already The other is a novel by Per Olov Enquist about one of the men who started the Swedish Pentecostal movement . ( I didn't even know That Sweden had a Pentecostal movement) , and the last one is a biography of George Washington by John Ferling . FenSpouse has already started that and is enjoying it . He told me that Washington used to get up at 4:00 and spend a few hours at his desk reading and responding to his correspondence

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 02, 2026 10:03 AM (vxQju)

158 Poll: still drinkable, or will I die.
Momma cow got no refrigeration.
Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (sl73Y)

You'll want the smell test on that one. I don't think it will actually make you ill, because pasteurization and all that, but it probably won't taste good.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 10:03 AM (h7ZuX)

159 Do Weird West stories count?

I highly recommend Ryan Williamson's "The Widow's" and its sequel, "The Spear of Destiny." Demons, mechs, zombies, cavalry, and Christianity mashed up in a couple of great stories.

Posted by: Sharkman at August 02, 2026 10:04 AM (/RHNq)

160 I went through "Six Frigates" via audiobook. I'd like to find a copy to see whether it's illustrated.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 10:04 AM (4I26t)

161 I enjoy "Some Buried Caesar," but the book gives away the game before you open it. IYKYK.
Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026

***
Stout, like Josephine Tey (though for different reasons), belongs in the first rank of mystery writers. But he was not a great puzzle constructor like the Queens, Christie, or Carr. In the Wolfe novels there is rarely a dazzle moment like the reason for the corpse's reversed clothing in EQ's Chinese Orange Mystery. In some of Stout's Wolfe novelettes, yes, but not often in the novels.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:04 AM (wzUl9)

162 It's very humid today; I think I'll crank up the A/C and relax.

Hope you all have a lovely day.

Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026 10:05 AM (qRla/)

163 Yesterday I came up with a wonderful opening for the next book in the series, but I don't know whether I want to write it.
Posted by: Mary Poppins' Practically Perfect Piercing (aka Eloquent Depression) at August 02, 2026

I know the feeling. I've come up with endings and beginnings for books I'm not sure I'll ever do. They just come to me while I'm thinking about something else.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:06 AM (1Ff7Z)

164 Smell and taste the milk. It is pasteurized and unopened so it won't kill you but see what it smells and tastes like before drinking it.

Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 10:07 AM (VCgbV)

165 When it comes to the masked boss in Westerns, my guess is that it's the town banker, the saloon owner, or the heroine's younger brother.

Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 10:07 AM (4I26t)

166 I got into watching Western movies kinda late in life, and, alas, never got into reading Western novels. So I can't contribute much today. (Dood thing, too, because I'm kinda late.)

That said, I did read some mountain-men themed novels as a youth, which is sorta related. But I may mostly be remembering the trapper-and-his-dog novels that were set closer to the modern age than to the actual old west...

Posted by: Castle Guy at August 02, 2026 10:10 AM (N5RnR)

167 I didn't believe Audrey Hepburn as half Kiowa.

-
She was from the Netherlands wing of the Kiowa tribe.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:11 AM (ndZc7)

168 I had something similar back in 2018. Turned out to be an inner-ear problem, solved with some physical therapy that helped to shake something loose that was stuck in my vestibular canals.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (wzUl9)

Ah. I do get the occasional ear bother early in the morning because the fan runs all night over the bed. That should stop when we don't need it in a couple months.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:11 AM (1Ff7Z)

169 I read The Good Old Boys, by Elmer Kelton, last year. It's a story of the end of the cowboy age and wandering cowboy Hewey Calloway who tries, but doesn't fit in modern life with West Texas farming and automobiles and staying in one place for more than a few days or weeks. It is a dandy book, that was made into a tv movie with Tommy Lee Jones 30 years ago. I haven't seen it, but if they followed the book, it would be a good one.
Posted by: huerfano at August 02, 2026 09:40 AM (VJX5o)

Sort of a Monte Walsh story?

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:13 AM (1Ff7Z)

170 To be candid, I find it hard to believe Audrey Hepburn as Dutch, either. She's the archetypical Frenchwoman.

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 10:13 AM (78a2H)

171 I know the feeling. I've come up with endings and beginnings for books I'm not sure I'll ever do. They just come to me while I'm thinking about something else.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026

***
I love scenes with mechanized movement, cars, buses, etc. One scene haunts me: My amateur detectives, a brother-sister duo, escape (from a trap laid by the murderer) by stealing a motorcycle and racing on a truck motorway along the Miss. River.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:16 AM (wzUl9)

172 I've only read a few Westerns. The Robert B Parker ones starting with Appaloosa are terrific. The movie actually enhances the book because the casting is perfect. The series is co tinued by the guy who wrote the screenplay for the movie so the dialogue continues as if Parker is still writing.
There is a book by Michael Christin set in the o,d West called Dragon Teeth. It is about rivals searching for dinosaur bones. It is a fun read.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 02, 2026 10:17 AM (kJmSS)

173 Most vestibular issues can be corrected IF addressed quickly; if you ignore it it can get so much worse
Posted by: vmom deport deport deport at August 02, 2026 09:46 AM (eZ5tL)

Well, I don't know if that's what it could be, vmom. Besides, I have no health insurance until April 1. I'm also not eating as well as I should. A carryover from the vaca, I assume.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:17 AM (1Ff7Z)

174 Wolfus

I have never read anything by Josephine Tey except for "The Daughter of Time" which I enjoyed very much. What else of hers should I start with?

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 02, 2026 10:18 AM (W90Ou)

175 When it comes to the masked boss in Westerns, my guess is that it's the town banker, the saloon owner, or the heroine's younger brother.
Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026

***
Mystery Rancho avoids all that. And because the villain's outfit is a full-body skeleton costume, it's even harder to discern who he might be.

Damn suit would be pretty hot along the Rio Grande in Texas, though.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:18 AM (wzUl9)

176 OT, left a gallon of milk in the garage

-
When I was in Kindergarten, we had milk boxes. One day, I didn't feel like drinking mine right then so I put it in my desk. The next day it stunk to high Heaven and I thought I'm in for it now! I didn't know what to do so I just got through the day and by the next day it was magically gone. I credit Jesus.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:19 AM (ndZc7)

177 I finally remembered the name of the horse book: Alcatraz. And, apparently, it's by Max Brand, not Zane Grey.

Wonder what I ever did with that? I can't find it on my shelves.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 10:20 AM (h7ZuX)

178
Fauci: “I can tell you, I, I take no pleasure at all in being in a situation of contradicting the president. Right. It was really something, right, that you didn’t feel that you could actually say something. Exactly. And there wouldn’t be any repercussions about it. The idea that you can get up here and talk about what you know, what the evidence, what the science is, and no, that’s it. Let the science speak. It is somewhat of a liberating feeling.”

Rush: Oh ho ho ho! It’s orgasmic! Finally the science speaks! He doesn’t have to go out and say what Trump told him to say. That’s what he means. He doesn’t need to go out there and he doesn’t have to be in block and tackle chains over what Trump wants. Now the science can speak. You know what these people are doing to science? They’re corrupting science like they’ve corrupted everything else, folks. Let the science speak. What arrogance. This is, this is Fauci who essentially is saying, you can’t challenge me, you can’t question me, I am science.

Posted by: r hennigantx at August 02, 2026 10:20 AM (/+uur)

179 The real reason is that he loves to have a curtain go up revealing him balancing a ball on the end of his nose."
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 09:49 AM (wzUl9)

I'd read about that line in a forward to one of the books. That line did make me laugh out loud.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:21 AM (1Ff7Z)

180 That post was from 1/24/2021, right after Uncle Joe was sworn in.

Posted by: r hennigantx at August 02, 2026 10:21 AM (/+uur)

181 Most of my westerns consumption was movies and television; they were all over the tube when I was a kid. Not just Maverick or Gunsmoke. The Deputy, The Rebel, Wyatt Earp, Tombstone Territory, Trackdown, Lawman, The Rifleman, Have Gun Will Travel and onandonandon.

When there were still a lot of movies being shown in prime time, you could count on seeing some decent westerns then too. The Fastest Gun Alive and 3:10 to Yuma and quite a few John Waynes used to show up fairly regularly in the lineups IIRC.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 10:22 AM (q3u5l)

182 I may have mentioned before, in 1966 my wife and I with our infant son, attended a book signing with Rex Stout. He was promoting his new Wolfe story, Death of a Doxy. We were the only customers so got to spend almost 2 hours with him. We had a lot in common, having attended the same school and having been in a Kansas jail. I have read all of his books and recommend them highly. After he died, I sent his wife a picture of us together. He was quite a charming man

Posted by: Buck Ofama, K4WTJ at August 02, 2026 10:22 AM (z6ONu)

183 I have never read anything by Josephine Tey except for "The Daughter of Time" which I enjoyed very much. What else of hers should I start with?
Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 02, 2026

***
Daughter is superb, her best work. But I love The Singing Sands, her last novel, in which Inspector Grant, felled by an attack of claustrophobia, is on a trip to Scotland to recover when a death draws him out of himself. Her non-Grants Brat Farrar and Miss Pym Disposes are grand stories too. The first is a variant on the old "posing as the heir to a fortune" story, and the other, well, the actual crime doesn't happen for a while. But you love spending time with Miss Pym and the girls and women at the "physical culture college" (a school for women who want to teach physical education, I think).

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:23 AM (wzUl9)

184 After about a year break, back on Audible plus. The included plus selection is deep enough for it to be worthwhile. AI virtual voice is now the majority of new titles. This works for some titles, not as much for others. Appendix N, about Gary Gygax D&D source library was released virtual voice and was very entertaining and interesting.

A rare complete virtual voice failure was a book on President Reagan's leadership. I didn't feel the book was bad, but it was not engaging.
A frustrating thing is many non-fiction books with good narrators are released without proper chapter indexing. Virtual audio I've tried usually has better indexing. Of course some titles have had NO effort made, and may can include reading of footnotes, glossary or captions that add no value to an audiobook.

Posted by: InspiredHistoryMike at August 02, 2026 10:24 AM (KaHlS)

185 "By the way, Donald Hamilton (obligatory Matt Helm reference) wrote some westerns in the 1950s and they are excellent. His book The Big Country was adapted for the movie of that name with Charlton Heston"

Also starring Gregory Peck and Jean Simmons and features one of the all time great western scores by Jerome Morass. Once heard,never forgotten.

Posted by: Tuna at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (lJ0H4)

186 Started a new Sanderson written in collaboration with Peter Orullion titled Songs of the Dead. A depressing title right off the bat. Not quite 100 pages in and something just not right. I don't hear Sanderson's voice at all. It is a fantasy involving resurrecting thanatists who can controll minions with threads around their wrists with magic runes set in London with lots of references to Metal music. Not feeling it. Disappointed.

Posted by: Sharon(willow's apprentice) at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (kJmSS)

187 Alternately, slap hot iron to it.
Posted by: I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper at August 02, 2026 09:54 AM (PiwSw)

The Horde remedies are the best remedies.

I hope it's not vertigo. I'm too far from San Juan Batista.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (1Ff7Z)

188 “…in decaying civilizations it was always the case that real gifts were ignored. They devoted themselves to the criticism of style and other details. They no longer had the mind to appreciate mind.” — H. Rider Haggard, Kipling to Haggard, p. 70

Posted by: Stephen Price Blair (sniping just before Mass) at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (TNVmU)

189 FenSpouse has already started that and is enjoying it . He told me that Washington used to get up at 4:00 and spend a few hours at his desk reading and responding to his correspondence
Posted by: FenelonSpo

I can see why, I've often wondered whether you, and a few other morons, ever sleep.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (sl73Y)

190 Gary Gygax D&D

-
I called my 30s aged daughter the other day and she told me she and her husband were over at a friend's playing D&D.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:27 AM (ndZc7)

191 >>> Read an article this week about the difference in your brain between reading a book and listening to a book. MRI's show little to no difference in brain activity between listening and reading, but there is a difference when it comes to learning things, i.e. textbooks and academic books. When it comes to to learning, physical books/materials by far, had better outcomes.
Listening to stories is something our brains are hard wired to do. After all, we were passing stories down long before there was a written language.
Posted by: lin-duh at August 02, 2026 09:29 AM (VCgbV)

When I had a very long commute, 45min - 1.5 hours both ways, I started listening to books. I would generally pick ones with long run times so they would last a good number of weeks. Big books. Later when that was over I decided to read the books that I really enjoyed listening to. It was like a completely different novel. A lot of the long ones were sizable Mark Helprin tomes. And I feel like I have two versions of each one, written by the same author, living in my head now.

Posted by: banana Dream at August 02, 2026 10:28 AM (3uBP9)

192 As his approval collapses, Big Orange begs Iran for a deal. Art of the Cuck.

Sad!!

Posted by: MAGA lol at August 02, 2026 10:28 AM (S+xAM)

193 Fen, the other great thing about The Daughter of Time is that Tey somehow manages to keep the family relationships, those of Henry VII and Richard III and the Tudors and Plantagenets, etc., clear -- without having to resort to a family tree in the front or back of the book! Amazing.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:28 AM (wzUl9)

194 This is, this is Fauci who essentially is saying, you can’t challenge me, you can’t question me, I am science.
Posted by: r hennigantx at August 02, 2026 10:20 AM (/+uur)

It worked. A large part of the population bought it hook, line, and sinker. I do have to hand it to the dems on this. It was a well run op.

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 10:30 AM (g8Ew8)

195 No, it was Archie's proposal for the county jail's prisoners' union. One demand was for a closed shop.

I enjoy "Some Buried Caesar," but the book gives away the game before you open it. IYKYK.
Posted by: Weak Geek at August 02, 2026 10:01 AM (4I26t)

Oh. (blushes) I didn't laugh at that scene. Sorry.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:30 AM (1Ff7Z)

196 I credit Jesus.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:19 AM (ndZc7)

Jesus, the school custodian? Yeh, probably.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:31 AM (sl73Y)

197 I hope it's not vertigo. I'm too far from San Juan Batista.

When we lived in the bay area some 30 years ago*, we would occasionally drive to San Juan Bautista for lunch on the weekend because it was the only place to get good Tex-Mex.

* geez, I'm old.

Posted by: Oddbob at August 02, 2026 10:31 AM (vTZFs)

198 Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:26 AM (sl73Y)

I am up about 5:00 but usually conked out about 9:00 or earlier Some of The other early bird morons and ettes may be made of hardier stuff.

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 02, 2026 10:32 AM (xSAlF)

199 I had something similar back in 2018. Turned out to be an inner-ear problem

-
I had something similar and it turned out to be excessive ear wax. A nurse dug it out, which was rather unpleasant, but problem solved.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 10:32 AM (ndZc7)

200 I recall an Archie scene where he spends the night in jail. He tells us he shared his cell "with about 30,000 others. Ten thousand of them were fleas, ten thousand were bedbugs, and I never found out what the other ten thousand were."

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:33 AM (wzUl9)

201 Reading Ghost Rider by Neil Peart again.
The only thing I like about westerns are the horses and firearms.

Posted by: Billythesquid at August 02, 2026 10:34 AM (gN+5I)

202 "That keeps the story from being dated. Ages the story when a defunct brand is still used as something current.

Unless it was a story about AOP, someone daily driving a Studebaker certain locks it into a time gone by.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:50 AM"

I've been enjoying the Joe Pickett series from CJ Box as someone here recommended. It needs to be consumed in order.
The first one seems to be set in about 1998. The most recent I've listened to (I'm doing it via audiobook) is about 2003. I can pick up on the changes in technology as the series proceeds - cell phones, email, internet access and the like.

So will every story set in 2021 have characters wearing masks, staying six feet apart and anguishing over clot shots?

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 10:35 AM (2Ez/1)

203 One of the networks had a revolving western series. Sugarbush, Bronco Lane, and I forget the third. They were pretty good. Guess they got to recycle scripts, efficient.

Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026 10:35 AM (sl73Y)

204 Probably ticks, I hate those bastards

Posted by: Buck Ofama, K4WTJ at August 02, 2026 10:35 AM (z6ONu)

205 I love scenes with mechanized movement, cars, buses, etc. One scene haunts me: My amateur detectives, a brother-sister duo, escape (from a trap laid by the murderer) by stealing a motorcycle and racing on a truck motorway along the Miss. River.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:16 AM (wzUl9)

I usually get germ of an idea and a bunch of dialog. Sometimes I remember it, sometimes, not.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:37 AM (1Ff7Z)

206 Milk in the plastic style gallon jug? Will be fine. Not for very long though, I would expect the shelf life will be reduced by quite a lot.

Back when I drank a lot I’d get 4 or 5 gallons and keep in the fridge at 34F or somewhere near that. I could get maybe 3 or 4 weeks before it started to sour.

Then I realized my in between meal snacks were busting 1000 calories, a pint or two of ice cold Milk was part of that. No more Milk.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 10:38 AM (dLnkr)

207 Today, I am sitting down and finishing Heart of the Mountain by Larry Correia. It's the last book in the Saga of the Forgotten Warrior series and I kept forgetting to return to it.

Posted by: NR Pax at August 02, 2026 10:39 AM (/k3in)

208 What a coincidence! I finished reading the Sackett series just this morning, for the first time since first reading them fifteen years ago. My memory was that the earliest books in the series were the best ones, and the series finale must have been an early draft rushed into publication. I still largely think that, except some of the middle books are much better than I remembered. I wish Echo Sackett made other appearances, for she was an interesting character, and Jubal Sackett was also.

Anyway, L'Amour is always a fun summer read.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 10:41 AM (UdkHl)

209 One of the networks had a revolving western series. Sugarbush, Bronco Lane, and I forget the third. They were pretty good. Guess they got to recycle scripts, efficient.
Posted by: From about That Time at August 02, 2026

***
Cheyenne, Sugarfoot, and Bronco. I think they ran it under the umbrella of The Cheyenne Show -- Clint Walker as Cheyenne.

Yes, Warner Bros. did that. An early Cheyenne is a out-and-out rewrite of Treasure of the Sierra Madre. They credited B. Traven, but WB owned the property and the original film. They did the same thing with Strangers on a Train on 77 Sunset Strip, except they changed it to a jet airplane (early '60s).

The Cheyenne rewrite of TotSM (1955) was quite well done, with Rod Taylor in a guest role and character actor Edward Andrews in the Bogart role.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:41 AM (wzUl9)

210 The judge during Watergate really hooked Gordon Liddy up but good. The DC city jail. It was ancient, and not a nice place, as far as jails go. This was a not so veiled threat to try and get him to cooperate.
He never did. But he paid the price for sure.

Surprisingly enough Jimmy Carter pardoned him.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 10:41 AM (dLnkr)

211 Read The Haunted Mesa by L'Amour a few years ago Not my favorite book by him. Story dragged in middle section. I like his traditional westerns better. I did finish it though.

Posted by: Glenn John at August 02, 2026 10:41 AM (vneJl)

212 In addition to wargaming the Revolutionary War, I'm reading bits and pieces here and there out of my library, and one of the lessons there (and elsewhere) is that wars are non-linear events. The momentum shifts without warning, and what looks sustainable one minute becomes unbearable the next.

If one looks at Saratoga and Yorktown, the number of troops involved is minimal, barely a vanguard on the Continent and a major engagement would have casualties in excess of all troops involved.

Yet in both cases, the outcome was treated as decisive and in the latter case, irrecoverable. That's important to keep in mind in the current context. A country takes a beating for a while and it seems like nothing is working and then one day, everything goes sideways. The speed of the German collapse in 1918 or the Confederates disinitegrating in 1865 stunned everyone involved. (cont)

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 10:42 AM (ZOv7s)

213 L’amour even did Sci-Fi, one book at least. Haunted Mesa perhaps? Something like that. It was good, too.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 10:43 AM (dLnkr)

214 Haven't read them in forever, but Theodore Sturgeon did some western stories as well. They should all be included in that mondo 13-volume set of his complete short fiction, but they were published separately in a book called Sturgeon's West. He also did the novelization of a Clark Gable western called The King and Four Queens; never read that one, though.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 10:44 AM (q3u5l)

215 Josephine Tey?
"The Franchise Affair", which I think ties "Daughter of Time" as her best novel.

Westerns? Read one back in the '70s called "The Cowboy and the Cossack", which was an inspired variation on the Cattle Drive theme.

Mr. S is a huge L'amour fan- he used to listen to them on his lengthy road trips. Like many, the Sacketts were his favorite.

There is a funny and charming movie about the pulp magazine trade called "Blonde Ambition", which shows up on TCM sometimes. Rich boy Aspiring Great American Novelist gets conned into buying a Western pulp and has to write the whole issue in two days, because the regular author is out on a bender.
I never miss it.

Posted by: sal at August 02, 2026 10:44 AM (f+FmA)

216 Haven't read them in forever, but Theodore Sturgeon did some western stories as well. They should all be included in that mondo 13-volume set of his complete short fiction, but they were published separately in a book called Sturgeon's West. He also did the novelization of a Clark Gable western called The King and Four Queens; never read that one, though.
Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026

***
I'd never seen or heard of those, and haven't seen that Gable movie either.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:45 AM (wzUl9)

217 For our Spanish Civil War crowd who haven't read Long Live Death (why not? Are you Communists?), the Republic was still in a strong position in March 1939. The Ebro counteroffensive had failed, but in terms of resources and position, the Nationalists expected it to be a long, slow slog. Catalonia had extensive fortified lines, and Barcelona looked to be another Madrid siege scenario.

But after only a couple of days of resistance, Republican lines collapsed, and their troops began a footrace to the French border. There are photos of French soldiers surrounded by piles of captured rifles. After an abortive coup attempt, Madrid's government disintegrated, so much so that the war ended upon Franco's declaration. There was no one to sign a peace with.

Worth keeping in mind.

Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 10:45 AM (ZOv7s)

218 Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 10:42 AM (ZOv7s)

If Parliament had voted to approve the 'surge' request by King George we would not have won the war. The United States was a Divine creation.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:45 AM (KC5Lt)

219 Most of my Western reading is modern, like C. J. Box, and Craig Johnson's Longmire series.
Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at August 02, 2026 09:15 AM (h7ZuX)
--------------
We love the "Longmire" TV series ("it's a beautiful day at the Red Pony!")

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 10:46 AM (VKTRv)

220 Sugarbush = Sugarfoot?

Posted by: Glenn John at August 02, 2026 10:46 AM (vneJl)

221 So will every story set in 2021 have characters wearing masks, staying six feet apart and anguishing over clot shots?
Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 10:35 AM (2Ez/1)

Alternate history story: someone is killing politicians who pushed the vax.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:46 AM (1Ff7Z)

222 160 ... Weak Geek,

The paper editions of Six Frigates have a lot of illustrations. Used copies on Amazon go for about 5 bucks or so.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 10:47 AM (yTvNw)

223 Posted by: Ace-Endorsed Author A.H. Lloyd at August 02, 2026 10:45 AM (ZOv7

Best part was the Republicans ( commies) turned on each other at that point. But they always eventually do.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:48 AM (KC5Lt)

224 Like todays video author, I love the Lonesome Dove series but, unlike his view, ai also like a few other McMurtry books, particularly "The Sin Killer", the first book in the Berrybender series

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 10:48 AM (VKTRv)

225 "Alternate history story: someone is killing politicians who pushed the vax.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:46 AM"

*pulls up a chair*

Go on...

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 10:49 AM (2Ez/1)

226 Josephine Tey?
"The Franchise Affair", which I think ties "Daughter of Time" as her best novel.

Westerns? Read one back in the '70s called "The Cowboy and the Cossack", which was an inspired variation on the Cattle Drive theme. . . .

. . . There is a funny and charming movie about the pulp magazine trade called "Blonde Ambition", which shows up on TCM sometimes. Rich boy Aspiring Great American Novelist gets conned into buying a Western pulp and has to write the whole issue in two days, because the regular author is out on a bender.
I never miss it.

Posted by: sal at August 02, 2026

***
Yes, I love Franchise. And The Cowboy and the Cossack I saw at the library jsut a couple of weeks ago. I'll look for it again.

Blonde Ambition sounds like it would have been a great vehicle for William Powell. How old is it?

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:49 AM (wzUl9)

227 The judge during Watergate really hooked Gordon Liddy up but good.

I have a picture of my Aikido teacher interviewing Liddy on his way to jail. In the background is the reporter that Liddy punched.

He ran into the man a few years ago and mentioned the picture. Gordon said "Why didn't you bring it in? I would have signed it."

Posted by: NR Pax at August 02, 2026 10:50 AM (/k3in)

228 TACO Trump backs down again
He has no jam in his sack

Posted by: Paul at August 02, 2026 10:51 AM (8BSUZ)

229 Sugarbush = Sugarfoot?
Posted by: Glenn John at August 02, 2026

***
Yes -- Will Hutchins, who looked a lot like Woody Harrelson, played a lawyer who goes out West and had to outmaneuver gunslingers and criminals.

Warners did bend the Western genre with things like that and Maverick.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:52 AM (wzUl9)

230 Carrion Comfort !!! damn good book ...Sharkman

Posted by: qmark at August 02, 2026 10:54 AM (hzpDl)

231 Alternate history story: someone is killing politicians who pushed the vax.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 10:46 AM"

*pulls up a chair*

Go on...
Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 10:49 AM (2Ez/1)

If he was alive, it would have been a good plot subject for Vince Flynn to write.

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 10:54 AM (g8Ew8)

232 The troll and Left's TACO insult has to be the most retarded attempt to insult Trump ever. The bloodied guy who pumped his fist in defiance to their assassination attempt has no balls. You guys are super retarded.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:55 AM (KC5Lt)

233 Well, as seen above, westerns and sci-fi get written by the same authors. They do go together. I do both.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 09:55 AM (1Ff7Z)

I missed that bit. Did Peter Grant get mentioned?

Posted by: Polliwog the 'Ette at August 02, 2026 10:55 AM (lFFaq)

234 Hey, Paul! Fuck off!

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 10:55 AM (g8Ew8)

235 British wanted to keep the Colonies in order to extract wealth from them, both via trade monopolies and taxes.

The Revolution made the Colonies into a very expensive theater of war (3000-mile supply line!) generating no revenue at all.

When it looked like it might be over by Christmas, or maybe next Christmas, the British could justify the expense. But when it kept going and going and European powers kept piling in, the economics just didn't make sense so they quit.

I think Washington et al figured the situation out right from the start. He never sought a decisive battle, but instead showed a genius for preserving his army and making the British spend and spend and spend . . .

Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 10:55 AM (78a2H)

236 Fortunately there hasn't been an attempt to revive Have Gun -- Will Travel, which (along with The Rifleman) was the gold standard for half-hour TV Westerns. I'm not sure there is anybody today who could play Paladin, the educated soldier of fortune, as well as Richard Boone did.

Seems to me I heard a rumor years ago that Eminem (yes, him) was in talks to star in a modern-day version of HGWT, with his lead character a bounty hunter or something. Luckily it never came to anything that I know of.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:56 AM (wzUl9)

237 Cowboys and Aliens was not a good movie though I thought the premise could have been a good movie.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:56 AM (KC5Lt)

238 Can you imagine Mitch Rapp pealing back the layers of The Science lies, trying to decide who to kill first? It would have required multiple books to get even the most evil central characters done.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 10:58 AM (gKbPe)

239 Cowboys and Aliens was not a good movie though I thought the premise could have been a good movie.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:56 AM (KC5Lt)

I liked it. A fun movie.

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 10:58 AM (g8Ew8)

240 "...but instead showed a genius for preserving his army and making the British spend and spend and spend . . .
Posted by: Trimegistus at August 02, 2026 10:55 AM"

The military wins the battle.
The economy wins the war.

Posted by: Pentagon 101 at August 02, 2026 10:58 AM (2Ez/1)

241 Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 10:58 AM (g8Ew

I didn't hate it but I had no desire to watch it again.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM (KC5Lt)

242 Blonde Ambition sounds like it would have been a great vehicle for William Powell. How old is it?
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 10:49 AM (wzUl9)

Well, this is embarassing- It's Blonde Inspiration, from the 40's. Virginia Grey, smokeshow, is in it.

Posted by: sal at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM (f+FmA)

243 'To win a war costs billions; to lose a war costs everything you have'. Ran across that somewhere, forget where.

Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM (NcvvS)

244 The British were worried about the French more than keeping the colonies.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:02 AM (KC5Lt)

245 243 'To win a war costs billions; to lose a war costs everything you have'. Ran across that somewhere, forget where.
Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM
++++

Also known as:

"There is nothing more expensive than the second best military."

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 11:02 AM (2Ez/1)

246 Cowboys and Aliens was not a good movie though I thought the premise could have been a good movie.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 10:56 AM (KC5Lt)

Somebody could write a story about that!*

Too bad you can't read it, because the magazine is defunct now. And, as usual, without printing my story!

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:02 AM (1Ff7Z)

247 Based on the video recommendations in the post I have some reading ahead of me. For example, I love many of Elmore Leonards crime books and yet never read his westerns. "Last Stand At Saber River" here I come!

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:03 AM (JtXDX)

248 Not strictly a "Western" (not a novel), but an interesting read:
"Triggernometry: A Gallery of Gunfighters is a classic 1936 non-fiction book by Eugene Cunningham that profiles famous Old West figures like Wild Bill Hickok, Billy the Kid, and John Wesley Hardin." It definitely is not politically correct.

Posted by: capercaillie4901 at August 02, 2026 11:03 AM (f1WVr)

249 The mention of Cowboys and Aliens brought to mind Daniel Craig. He would have made a good Paladin if they had done a TV-series accurate version of HGWT a few years ago. Paladin in the show was not a *young* man -- he'd gone to West Point and had served in the Civil War on the Northern side, and his adventures were taking place some years after the war. In one he comes within a hair of being at Custer's Last Stand, which was in 1876.

Craig could have done it.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:04 AM (wzUl9)

250 The Old West was the last stand of Might Makes Right.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:06 AM (KC5Lt)

251 To win a war costs billions; to lose a war costs everything you have'. Ran across that somewhere, forget where.
Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM (NcvvS)

That used to be the prevailing philosophy. Not anymore. No one wants to win. Now it's trying to save enough of the enemy's hardware to call a draw then let them recover what they've lost. It costs too much for a winner to repair the loser.

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 11:08 AM (g8Ew8)

252 Coming to the end of the thread so OT. Anyone have a guess to who shot up the In N Out ?

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (KC5Lt)

253 Craig could have done it.
Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:04 AM (wzUl9)

But he would have insisted on including a scene where he makes eyes at Custer.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (1Ff7Z)

254 Based on the video recommendations in the post I have some reading ahead of me. For example, I love many of Elmore Leonards crime books and yet never read his westerns. "Last Stand At Saber River" here I come!
Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026

***
His Hombre, basis for the Paul Newman film of 1966, is excellent. I like his Valdez Is Coming and The Bounty Hunters, his first. The short story "3:10 to Yuma" is the basis for those two movies, too.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (wzUl9)

255 Interestingly enough, Washington spent a huge proportion of what we would term the defense budget today on spies and counterintelligence. He really was a spook in a lot of ways.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 11:10 AM (dLnkr)

256 Wyatt Earp ended his life in LA, working as an advisor to the movies. Bat Masterson by contrast went east, and became a sports writer in New York, specializing in the sweet science of professional boxing. Bill Cody, I believe, ended his years as a wealthy family man.

A book about the post-mythic careers of these famous folks (at least those that survived) might be a fun read.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:10 AM (YyP71)

257 Edwin "Bud" Shrake wrote a novel called "Custers Brother's Horse". Takes place in Texas around 1865. I read it many years ago, but I recall enjoying it very much. Shrake was a sports page writer for some North Texas newspapers in 1950s and later. He also wrote a book I did not like called Blessed McGill".

Posted by: Glenn John at August 02, 2026 11:10 AM (vneJl)

258 Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:10 AM (YyP71)

Unfortunately Hickok became famous for the Dead Man's Hand.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:11 AM (KC5Lt)

259 Coming to the end of the thread so OT. Anyone have a guess to who shot up the In N Out ?
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (KC5Lt)

Welllll, since they don't say anything, I'd tend to doubt the shooter was wearing a MAGA hat.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (1Ff7Z)

260 250 The Old West was the last stand of Might Makes Right.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:06 AM

*polite cough*

Posted by: Operation Overlord at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (2Ez/1)

261 Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (wzUl9)
-------
I see Amazon has his westerns collected and on sale, including your recommendations I think, so I have some good reading ahead. Thanks!

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (YyP71)

262 To win a war costs billions; to lose a war costs everything you have'. Ran across that somewhere, forget where.
Posted by: Nazdar at August 02, 2026 11:00 AM (NcvvS)

That used to be the prevailing philosophy. Not anymore. No one wants to win. Now it's trying to save enough of the enemy's hardware to call a draw then let them recover what they've lost. It costs too much for a winner to repair the loser.
Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 11:08 AM (g8Ew

I see no reason for the winner to repair the loser.

It certainly wasn't that way historically.

I'd say loot the defeated for the cost of the war, and then go home. Or, seize territory for the cost of the war.

Posted by: naturalfake at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (iJfKG)

263 I'm not sure there is anybody today who could play Paladin,

-
Is Elliot Page unavailable?

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 11:13 AM (ndZc7)

264 The Old West was the last stand of Might Makes Right.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:06 AM

*polite cough*
Posted by: Operation Overlord at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (2Ez/1)

That still stands when you're talking war. I'm talking society.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:13 AM (KC5Lt)

265 Wyatt Earp ended his life in LA, working as an advisor to the movies. Bat Masterson by contrast went east, and became a sports writer in New York, specializing in the sweet science of professional boxing. Bill Cody, I believe, ended his years as a wealthy family man.

A book about the post-mythic careers of these famous folks (at least those that survived) might be a fun read.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026

***
As a movie Western consultant, Earp knew and worked with the young John Wayne. Wayne has said that he copied a lot of his on-screen persona from the way Earp moved and spoke.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (wzUl9)

266 Coming to the end of the thread so OT. Anyone have a guess to who shot up the In N Out ?
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:09 AM (KC5Lt)
--------
I heard it was five guys.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (YyP71)

267 Is Elliot Page unavailable?
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 11:13 AM (ndZc7)

No. Just signed for the lead in the next He-Man pic.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (1Ff7Z)

268 Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (YyP71

Hah. Too soon.

Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (KC5Lt)

269 The British series "Carry On" did one western. It was weird but fun. Side James was in it.

Posted by: Glenn John at August 02, 2026 11:16 AM (vneJl)

270 Here's an idea, Fauci's covid goes dormant, they thought it was just the typical influenza cycle, bloom until it reaches parity with human adaptive immunity and then recede. But this was no simple virus, it was modified by the Chinese to be a smart weapon. And as we wait it changes, grows, learns, and decides it does not like it's creator very much.

A monolithic sub-microscopic infectious agent spanning the entire globe determines one day that Fauci is a danger to all life including its own and discovers it's first sentient emotion, anger. The hunt begins.

Posted by: banana Dream at August 02, 2026 11:16 AM (3uBP9)

271 Least shocking news of the day.

Radical Left Dem Frontrunner for WI Governor Francesca Hong Admitted to Being Diagnosed as Mentally Ill

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 11:17 AM (ndZc7)

272 Leonard's Westerns show us the brave American, the guy who goes his own way and does the right thing because it is the right thing, often against terrible opposition. Probably true of a lot of Western authors, and it's probably true of a lot of his crime fiction heroes too, but it's very noticeable with him.

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:17 AM (wzUl9)

273 One of my favorite western acting performances was Val Kilmer as Doc Holiday. Absolutely amazing job, projecting a quiet and unpredictable menace without moving a muscle. Only Wyatt Earp seemed able to restrain him.

Posted by: Huck Follywood at August 02, 2026 11:17 AM (YyP71)

274 I see no reason for the winner to repair the loser.

It certainly wasn't that way historically.

I'd say loot the defeated for the cost of the war, and then go home. Or, seize territory for the cost of the war.

Posted by: naturalfake at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (iJfKG)

That went out after WWII after we spent billions helping Germany and Japan rebuild. The Marshal Plan set the precedence, now we're stuck with it.

Posted by: Dr. Pork Chops & Bacons at August 02, 2026 11:18 AM (g8Ew8)

275 264 The Old West was the last stand of Might Makes Right.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:06 AM

*polite cough*
Posted by: Operation Overlord at August 02, 2026 11:12 AM (2Ez/1)

That still stands when you're talking war. I'm talking society.
Posted by: polynikes at August 02, 2026 11:13 AM

Look up here.

Posted by: Korean rooftop shooters at August 02, 2026 11:19 AM (2Ez/1)

276 236 ... "Fortunately there hasn't been an attempt to revive Have Gun -- Will Travel, which (along with The Rifleman) was the gold standard for half-hour TV Westerns. I'm not sure there is anybody today who could play Paladin, the educated soldier of fortune, as well as Richard Boone did."

Wolfus,
Totally agree on both shows. I'll add that it would be hard if not impossible to match the Chuck Connors/Johnny Crawford chemistry.

I don't understand why idiots doing revivals or remakes have to screw around with the basics that made the shows so popular and successful. That movie travesty with Will Smith and Kevin Kline of the Wild Wild West is an example.

Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 11:20 AM (yTvNw)

277 I haven't explored Westerns much beyond the 4 that Robert Parker wrote, which I thought were absolutely terrific. The first one pulled me right in and the hold never let go until I had finished all 4.

I have no interest in the continuation of the series by another author.

Posted by: Splunge at August 02, 2026 11:21 AM (JpUeg)

278 I don't understand why idiots doing revivals or remakes have to screw around with the basics that made the shows so popular and successful. That movie travesty with Will Smith and Kevin Kline of the Wild Wild West is an example.
Posted by: JTB at August 02, 2026 11:20 AM (yTvNw)

Because they WANT to. Screw the normies is their battle cry. They want to ruin everything.

Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:21 AM (1Ff7Z)

279 Wiser heads prevailed, if belatedly. The terms after the 1st world war guaranteed another war within 20 years. The idea was to get Japan and Germany on their feet again, and keep them out of the Soviet sphere of influence. They should have nuked the Kremlin along with Berlin, but it was not to be.

Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 11:22 AM (dLnkr)

280
Reporting next Book Thread about Anton Bruckner and the Reception of His Music by Miguel J. Ramirez, an analysis of the critical reception of the symphonies of the Austrian composer and how it was driven by musical politics.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at August 02, 2026 11:23 AM (O0L8i)

281
Well, this is embarassing- It's Blonde Inspiration, from the 40's. Virginia Grey, smokeshow, is in it.
Posted by: sal at August 02, 2026

***
Ah! Maybe it's on YooToob. The only actor in it whose name registers with me is Albert Dekker, "Dr. Cyclops."

Posted by: Wolfus Aurelius, Dreaming of Elsewhere at August 02, 2026 11:23 AM (wzUl9)

282 I am re-reading Drood. I'm a bit surprised at how much I like the book, since the narrator/protagonist is so dislikeable, but somehow it all works for me.

On the other hand, Carrion Comfort and especially The Terror are two of Simmons' best, but are so intense and horrifying that most of the time, the idea of re-reading them strikes me like the idea of re-watching The Deer Hunter.

Posted by: Splunge at August 02, 2026 11:24 AM (JpUeg)

283 267 Is Elliot Page unavailable?
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, and You're Not at August 02, 2026 11:13 AM (ndZc7)

No. Just signed for the lead in the next He-Man pic.
Posted by: OrangeEnt at August 02, 2026 11:14 AM (1Ff7Z)

Tanned, rested, and ready!

Posted by: Dylan Mulvaney or Kaitlan Collins at August 02, 2026 11:24 AM (PiwSw)

284 I am currently in the middle of a re-read of a Rex Stout Nero Wolfe "Western", Death of a Dude.

Archie's vacation to Montana to the lovely Lily Rowan's ranch is interrupted by a murder, possibly a revenge killing. Archie is committed to staying as long as it takes to spring the wrongly accused employee of Miss Rowan. Nero Wolfe then travels to Montana with the intention of solving the mystery so that Archie can swiftly return to New York and to Mr. Wolfe's service.

***

My favorite western novels are True Grit by Charles Portis and Little Big Man by Thomas Berger. I was motivated to read them by my enjoyment of both the movies.

Posted by: Elinor, Who Usually Looks Lurkily at August 02, 2026 11:24 AM (TPFQA)

285 Brisco County Jr. was a steampunk western done right. Wild Wild West would have approved. Much better than the movie. Great actors all around. I think the old USA network was getting their ideas for tv shows directly from my brain. Great action, funny, smokin hot babes left and right. Nothing like it now.

Posted by: banana Dream at August 02, 2026 11:25 AM (3uBP9)

286 "That movie travesty with Will Smith and Kevin Kline of the Wild Wild West is an example."

Another example: the Eddie Murphy and Owen Wilson butchery of I Spy. I made it through about 15 or 20 minutes. Even the chance to look at Famke Janssen couldn't help that one.

Even when they're sorta done right they're not as good. The Fugitive with Harrison Ford & Tommy Lee Jones isn't nearly as good as the David Janssen - Barry Morse tv series.

Posted by: Just Some Guy at August 02, 2026 11:27 AM (q3u5l)

287 "The idea was to get Japan and Germany on their feet again, and keep them out of the Soviet sphere of influence.
Posted by: Common Tater at August 02, 2026 11:22 AM"

Or as I heard it put once: Democracies don't start wars with democracies.

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at August 02, 2026 11:27 AM (2Ez/1)

288
There's always been lots of blubbering, especially from the Krauts, about how cruel the Versailles Treaty was. Believe me, it was creampuffs next to Brest-Litovsk, whereby the Germans sought to make Eastern Europe a huge vassal state.

Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at August 02, 2026 11:28 AM (O0L8i)

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