Customer Reviews

Classic Cowboy Stories: Eighteen Extraordinary Tales of the Old West

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Michael McCoy has compiled an enjoyable collection of eighteen cowboy tales written in the late 1800s and early 1900s. I had expected Classic Cowboy Stories to be entirely fictional short stories. However, many entries are chapters taken from novels, biographies, and travel writings. McCoy was careful in his choices; these selections function quite effectively as independent stories. There is no sense of fragmentation or incompleteness.

Several authors were familiar like Owen Wister, Theodore Roosevelt, Frederic Remington, Zane Grey, and O. Henry, but most were new to me, including William MacLeod Raine, Clarence Mulford, Isabella Bird, F. R. Buckley, B. M. Bowers, Frank Benton, Bill Nye, Stewart Edward White, Eugene Rhodes, and Emerson Hough. For those that are counting, there are only fifteen authors; Owen Wister, Zane Grey, and O. Henry each had two selections.

I quite enjoyed these varied stories and I now make a few predictions. First, at some point I will return to this collection and read these stories again. Second, I will track down and read the sources of several of the biographical selections, particularly Theodore Roosevelt's Ranch Life and the Hunting-Trail (1888), Isabella L. Bird's A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains (1879), and Frederick Remington's Pony Tracks (1895). And third, I will once again read those two classic westerns, Owen Wister's The Virginian and Zane Grey's Riders of the Purple Sage.

I bought this for my grandpa for christmas, the print is a little small-but he enjoyed the book

I bought this book for my brother's birthday as he is an avid western story reader.He said the stories are mostly good, but a few are "oddly" written and hard to follow.

I bought this book as a gift for my husband's birthday, he enjoyed it very much. I was impressed by the way it was wrapped for shipping and the promptness I received it. Thanks Amy Jones

Very mis-named. The first story is a long winded tale about a CHICKEN. Hardly a cowboy story. The book does not get better throughout. Stories about women, stories oddly written and hard to follow. Not worth buying. Keep looking.