it encompasses the hikes that every avid hiker must do before or during death.

In a simple, straightforward style Percy Wollaston relates a memoir of his youth and his family's attempt to wrest a livelihood by dryland farming on Montana's eastern plains in the 1920s & 1930s. Their experience was heartbreaking, but there was nothing pitiful about these resilient people. What a treasure Wollaston left his descendants and all of us who want to hear a first-person account of that era! It's easy to see why the British writer, Jonathan Raban, was so taken with Wollaston's story. Wonderful!

Deftly edited by Robert Bigart, "I Will Be Meat For My Salish": The Montana Writers Project And The Buffalo Of The Flathead Indian Reservation is the compiled saga of the relationship of the Native American Salish people to the buffalo, including their dependence on it for survival in prehistory and their role in preserving the species today. Individual chapters include buffalo-related legends and history, the management of buffalo herds on the Flathead reservation today, Salish biographies, and much more. An amazing insight into the interrelationship of human beings and nature, "I Will Be Meat For My Salish" is a strongly recommended addition to Native American Studies supplemental reading lists and reference collections.

Now that Tap's a husband and soon-to-be father, he tries to settle into a quiet routine. He's no longer an escaped fugitive running from his past, just a rancher and family man. But there's intrusions to deal with: Indians camped in their yard, cattle grazing in their living room, a pack of outlaws harassing them, and pacifist neighbors being forced from their homestead. Good conclusion to the series.

Beneath some of Montana's grandest mountain peaks lurked a preditor. Caught in the crosshairs of Don Nichols twisted logic was Kari Swenson. The idea of a mountain bride, stolen from a remote wooded trail. Most amazing is how the Nichols' not only managed to elude the persistance of Johnny France, but stayed one step ahead certain death in the Montana winter of 1984 with just the packs on thier backs. You wont be able to put this one down!

sweet looking photos and touches on everything from his days at Notre Dame to the 49ers to the Chiefs to his sports cards and joe montana memorbilia and shows tons of stats. awsome book. there are two versions though. this one, and a paper back edition, althought you can't tell until you open the paper back book and look at the pages. regardless, a great book for Montana fans.

"Thomas McGuane lives here" I was told last year during a Montana visit. "Who cares?" say I, never having heard of him. Oh, how I wish I had known, wish I had read this wonderful book and taken the time to visit Mr. McGuane and thank him for wonderful vacation reading a year later. Raced through this book; raced back to the bookstore for "Some Horses", embarked on "An Outside Chance" and contemplated sending Mr. McGuana a fan letter! Seldom does a book make me laugh out loud and have to put it down until I recover. This book is delightful and you wonder how anyone can possibly think up a story like this.

This is a very inspiring Christmas tale, set in the Mexican mountains, somewhere around the late 19th century. Amidst the civil wars that tear the country, a political refugee finds peace and quiet in his small home town, and comes to listen to the message of the birth of the Saviour.

Very similar in spirit to Dickens's A Christmas Carroll it makes a very nice reading. My mother gave it to me as a present many years ago. It still is one of the warmest memories I keep about Christmas past.

This is one of the best collections of short stories I have ever read. The settings for the stories is Montana and the inevitable impact of the harsh environment on the people living there. In seven short stories and less than one hundred pages Blew has managed to combine the effects of an unforgiving climate with the turbulent lives of so-real characters that experience conflict, brutality and heart breaking violence. The environmental effect on the characters in the title story "Lambing Out" is stark and readily apparent. However, the impact in "Paths Unto The Dead" and "Monsters" is more subtle and will give the reader pause and, upon reflection, insight into the incredible talent of the author. This blend of human and natural landscape into the written word is powerful and unforgetable. If you ever wondered why anyone would live "out there", try these stories. For anyone interested in first-rate writing about the interrelationship between a regional environment and the people that inhabit it, this is as good as it gets. Don't be surprised if you end up with the impression the characters are real, that somehow Blew is not making these stories up. She is that good. These are powerful, thoughtful, moving stories that come very close to transcending region.

The Last Best Place is an anthology with incredible breadth and scope. It was put together over a three year period by a group of dedicated editors and researchers headed up by Annick Smith and William Kittredge. The goal was to identify and preserve Montanna's rich literary heritage ranging from the earliest Native American inhabitants and explorers to contemporary authors such as Rick Newby and Bill Hoagland.

The size of the anthology is proof that it was a daunting if rewarding task. Over 1,000 pages long, it cannot be considered "light" reading, and yet the writing shines. There are sections from Lewis and Clark, Osborne Russell and James Audubon, (all early visitors to Montana), side by side with Native American stories and myths by the like of Jerome Fourstar, James White Calf and Pete Beaverhead( don't miss "Chickadees" as told to Frank Linderman by Pretty-shield, Medicine Woman). Here too you will find cowboys, settlers and wild west characters such as Mary MacLane who declared from a very early age, "I want Fame...Let me but make a beginning, let me but strike the world in a vulnerable spot, and I can take it by storm." There are essays, legends, journals, tall tales and poetry; tales of stunning beauty, adventure, disaster, brutality and vision. This is a book that belongs on the shelf of anyone who understands the importance of place and is fascinated by the literature that has evolved out of it.