Hanging Woman Creek (Center Point Premier Western (Large Print)) [Large Print] [Library Binding]

Louis L'Amour (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2010 | Series: Center Point Premier Western (Large Print)

Barnabus Pike is no gunfighter and not much of a street fighter. Eddie Holt is a black boxer in a white man's world. They've both taken their share of hard knocks. Now they're looking to survive a brutal winter in a remote Montana line shack, collect their pay, and settle down for good. Then they cross paths with a hardworking Irish immigrant and his beautiful, spirited sister, who've been burned off their land. It's a fight Pike and Holt don't want, don't need, and don't dare turn their backs on--especially when one of the perpetrators might be one of Pike's old friends. Hunted like animals across the frozen countryside, Pike and Holt will risk everything--including their reputations, their dreams -- and their lives.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

Barnabus Pike is no gunfighter and not much of a street fighter.  Eddie Holt is a black boxer in a white man's world.  They've both taken their share of hard knocks.  Now they're looking to survive a brutal winter in a remote Montana line shack, collect their pay, and settle down for good.  Then they cross paths with a hardworking Irish immigrant and his beautiful, spirited sister, who've been burned off their land.  It's a fight Pike and Holt don't want, don't need, and don't dare turn their backs on--especially when one of the perpetrators might be one of Pike's old friends.  Hunted like animals across the frozen countryside, Pike and Holt will risk everything--including their reputations, their dreams -- and their lives. --This text refers to the Mass Market Paperback edition.

About the Author

Louis L Amour is undoubtedly the bestselling frontier novelist of all time. He is the only American-born author in history to receive both the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Congressional Gold Medal in honor of his life's work. He has published ninety novels; twenty-seven short-story collections; two works of nonfiction; a memoir, Education of a Wandering Man; and a volume of poetry, Smoke from This Altar. There are more than 300 million copies of his books in print worldwide.

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Product Details

• Library Binding: 187 pages
• Publisher: Center Point Pub; Lrg edition (January 1, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1602856400
• ISBN-13: 978-1602856400
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #493,105 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

"I think of myself in the oral tradition--as a troubadour, a village tale-teller, the man in the shadows of a campfire. That's the way I'd like to be remembered--as a storyteller. A good storyteller."

It is doubtful that any author could be as at home in the world re-created in his novels as Louis Dearborn L'Amour. Not only could he physically fill the boots of the rugged characters he wrote about, but he literally "walked the land my characters walk." His personal experiences as well as his lifelong devotion to historical research combined to give Mr. L'Amour the unique knowledge and understanding of people, events, and the challenge of the American frontier that became the hallmarks of his popularity.

Of French-Irish descent, Mr. L'Amour could trace his own in North America back to the early 1600s and follow their steady progression westward, "always on the frontier." As a boy growing up in Jamestown, North Dakota, he absorbed all he could about his family's frontier heritage, including the story of his great-grandfather who was scalped by Sioux warriors.

Spurred by an eager curiosity and desire to broaden his horizons, Mr. L'Amour left home at the age of fifteen and enjoyed a wide variety of jobs, including seaman, lumberjack, elephant handler, skinner of dead cattle, and miner, and was an officer in the transportation corps during World War II. During his "yondering" days he also circled the world on a freighter, sailed a dhow on the Red Sea, was shipwrecked in the West Indies and stranded in the Mojave Desert. He won fifty-one of fifty-nine fights as a professional boxer and worked as a journalist and lecturer. He was a voracious reader and collector of rare books. His personal library contained 17,000 volumes.

Mr. L'Amour "wanted to write almost from the time I could talk." After developing a widespread following for his many frontiers and adventure stories written for fiction magazines, Mr. L'Amour published his first full length novel, Hondo, in the United States in 1953. Every one of his more than 120 books is in print; there are more than 300 million copies of his books in print worldwide, making him one of the bestselling authors in modern literary history. His books have been translated into twenty languages, and more than forty-five of his novels and stories have been made into feature films and television movies.

The recipient of many great honor and awards, in 1983 Mr. L'Amour became the first novelist to ever to be awarded the Congressional Gold Medal by the United States Congress in honor of his life's work. In 1984 he was also awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Reagan.

Louis L'Amour died on June 10, 1988. His wife, Kathy, and their two children, Beau and Angelique, carry the L'Amour publishing tradition forward with new books written by the author during his lifetime to be published by Bantam.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars PRONTO & EDDIE--LINE CAMP RIDERS ON THE CRAZY WOMAN, July 23, 2007

By 

Kay's Husband (Virginia, U.S.A.) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Hanging Woman Creek: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

Reading this book reminds me that this particular April, 1964, western has always been one of my favorites. Some of Louis L'Amour's writing seem to surpass the formulaic western to approach good literature, this is one of those.

The story takes place 9 years after the U.S. Army and Indian battles of the Rosebud and the Little Big Horn Rivers, making 1885 the story's date. The locale is in Montana, southwest of Miles City, bordering on the Tongue River. With Hanging Woman Creek resting between the Little Big Horn 40 miles to the west, and the Powder River 15 miles to the east. This Powder River country is a very rough, wild, picturesque mountainous area holding, among others, cattle, grizzly bears, elk, deer, and wolves.

Of late, much rustling of range cattle has been taking place making it not only downright dangerous, but almost impossible to hire men during the winter for the high country line camp on the Hanging Woman Creek. The two main characters of our story need work, and having some experience working cattle, agree to take on the job on the Hanging Woman. Stocked up with adequate grub, pistols, and 500 rounds ammo each for two Winchester rifles, they feel more than confident.

However, discovering the door to their line camp cabin shot full of lead, with a loosened log at the back end of the cabin for escape, that confidence begins to fade. As time passes they begin to see that many things do not seem right: just who has wrapped their mule's hoofs in with Indian style rawhide to shoot people in the back? And who are the rustlers stealing the cattle from the herd Pronto and Eddie are here to watch over? Are the vigilantes working to rid the areas of Montana and western Dakota Territory of rustlers? Will rope law and revenge run rampant to settle old scores? And why is that mysterious cave stocked with canned food for at least a week's stay? These among other questions begin to trouble the minds of both Pronto Pike and Eddie Holt.

Later with Pronto and Eddie being fired from their jobs due charges lodged against them of using a running iron to rustle cattle, then awhile later added to this, when both are accused of murdering a nester brother and sister, the plot really begins to simmer.

Eddie Holt, being a very good cook and baker, makes a whole washtub full of 'bear sign' which attracts everyone in the area's interest. Well, why not, I mean doughnuts were not that available out in the Hanging Woman Creek wilderness area. And as any $30 a month cowboy knows, 'bear sign', or fresh doughnuts, mean good eating for anyone fortunate to be Pronto and Eddie's friend.

As with all Mr. L'Amour's writings good does eventually triumph over evil, and at book's ending, all is well in both Miles City, Montana, and on the banks of Hanging Woman Creek. As die hard readers of Louis L'Amour will recognize, his home town of Jamestown, Dakota, or 'Jim Town' on the Northern Pacific Railroad makes its appearance early in these pages. Bet he had fun with that one.

If you enjoy the writings of Louis L'Amour or just are looking for a much above average book from him, you can do no better than read this one.

Semper Fi.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Better than average LaMour western, characters more real, November 16, 2007

By 

harry "confederate yankee" (gainesville, ga, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Hanging Woman Creek: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

Hanging Woman Creek has better, more realistic characteriZation and doesn't make the main character a super cowboy, LaMour didn't skimp on character development or on period description just to move the plot along. Often Louis LaMour is formulaic, you either love it or hate it, but you know what you are going to get. Not so this time. Pronto overcomes his adversaries, but the author scripts scenes showing Pronto choosing to grow up in the process.
Not all loose ends are tied up and the story is more focused because of it, leaving irrelevant details unexplained reinforces their unimportance to the story.
Hope it will be a movie some day,

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Anything by Louis L'Amour, April 6, 2010

By 

C. Morgan "CMorgan" (Clarksville, Tennessee United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Hanging Woman Creek: A Novel (Mass Market Paperback)

My husband loves anything written by Louis L'Amour--especially the Westerns. This was no exception. He couldn't put it down and I can guarantee that it's not the first time that he's read this book.