When I read Cotton's first Jeston Nash novel, I thought it was the best non-Louis Lamour western I'd ever read. Powder River's content is less graphic than his first, and even more entertaining. One almost begins to feel sorry for Jeston; but luckily the misanthrope manages to let his true greedy nature show through. The two anti-heroes (Jeston Nash and Quiet Jack) are the biggest thing to stagger out of the west since US Grant!

This is the kind of western I always look for but hardly ever find. Ralph Cotton tells it like it is when it comes to the government and what they did to the sioux indians. Once I started reading it and seeing the war from both sides, I realized this was no ordinary western. Sometimes the language is a little strong but that's easy to overlook for a person who enjoys real life like stories

I didn't think another western could top While Angels Dance, but Powder River does. It is more like watching a Sam Peckinpaw movie than reading a book. Cotton is one heck of a writer with a lot to say. These are the kind of westerns that I've been looking for

This book number 8 in the Plainsmen series tells of the BATTLE OF THE POWDER RIVER AND THE BEGINNING OF THE GREAT SIOUX WAR OF 1876. In this book as in all of the other Plainsmen stories Frontier Scout Seamus Donegan leads as a guide General George Crook and his 2nd. and 3rd. Cavalry and a band of scouts and interpreters into the bloody battle. All of Johnstones books are very wordy and can sometimes lose me as I can not always understand what he is trying to tell me. But that does not mean he is not a good writer, it just means I should maybe use the dictionary more often.

North to Powder River

Broke and down on their luck. Buckshot McKee and his sidekick Tortilla Joe took a job from an old friend. All they had to do was drive 32 Brahma bulls from Texas to Wyoming. It was a dangerous ride with every two-bit tought they met gunning for possession of the valuable bulls. And when the journey was over, Buckshot and Tortilla Joe found more trouble in the shape of a double-crossing gunman. But nothing was going to stop them from collecting the money they had worked so hard to earn.

The Gringo

Cliff Blanton drove his heard from Texas to a new ranch in California where he hoped to start a new life. But the minute he arrived in Santa Barbara, Blanton started receiving threats, For the Mexicans hated all gringos after the recent war, and they refused to recognize American claims on their land. Despite the danger, Blanton was determined to settle the land that was legally his. If the Mexcians wanted another war, he was more than ready to fight.

(from the back cover of the book)

I loved the story about sheep ranching and the first women doctor in the us. I especially loved the notes at the end of the book giving insight to the real life people and events that the fictional story was inspired by.It inspired me to go to the library and read about and learn about the real thing.

The Powder River Basin is full of coal, just under the surface and waiting to be dug up. Millions and millions and millions of tons of the black stuff are carried yearly in what is one of the busiest high-tonnage railroads in the world. Big trains too, mostly over a mile long, some using more than eight diesels to pull incredible loads over the nearby hills. All the ingredients for what should be a stunning photo book, regrettably it is not this one.

Most of the photos are black and white (twenty four in color) and in so many of them the trains occupy less than fifty percent of the photo area. They are very repetitious, far too many taken from above with the trains in the middle distance, no dramatic trackside shots of huge diesels here, no close-ups of the wagons or for that matter no people either. Not a single photo goes across a spread, for a big dramatic image. The captions to the photos are all in one paragraph blocks surrounded by masses of white space. It all looks so very dull and boring.

There is a strong visual story to tell about the trains of the Powder River Basin but this book is so amateurish that you would be better served by watching a Trains Magazine video 'Powder River Showdown', it has a good commentary and some excellent railroad action.

This book describes all aspects of unit coal trains operations originating in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming - from the mines and the local railroad (the BNSF Orin Line) through the connecting lines of both UP and BNSF to the final destinations of these coal trains: the power plants. Also included are lots of photographs and listings of all the mines and power plants.

"Powder River Coal Trains" is a vivid story (told mostly in pictures) of how the Union Pacific and BNSF transported coal from the mines in Wyoming's Powder River Basin coal corridor to Power Stations throughout the United States.

In both the Foreword and the first chapter, author Jeremy Taylor gives a straightforward introduction to the "seventy-five miles of windswept high plains" that separate the outlying mines in the Powder River Basin and the background on the development of the mines.

There are 130 color and b&w pictures, as well as graphs and tables. Many of the b&w photos are fuzzy and shot from too far away. But nearly all of the color pictures are sharp and interesting.

Freight lovers and rail historians are sure to take a fancy to this book.

...I finally read all of Louis L'Amour's books and short stories. The other writers I've tried have left me cold, but Nesbitt has the touch.

There is one flaw in the verisimilitude in "Coyote Trail," I think, and that is having Quinn feel bad about Newman not thanking him outright. That's a modern touchy-feely sensibility that the real cowboys of the period weren't necessarily burdened with.

This is a very fine, well-written book, and it has become pretty much a standard text in the history of the West. Though the setting is by and large eastern Wyoming of the late nineteenth century, and the subject matter is cattle ranching, this book will be much more satisfying to liberal-minded historians and populists than typical cattle ranchers. Anyone who appreciates or sympathizes with the underdogs in SHANE but would like a more historically accurate picture of the struggles for land and cattle in the West might want to give this a look. It is wholly satisfying from expository, sociopolitical, and historical standpoints.