In this third book of the Wagons West! series, the wagon train must endure a winter in the Rocky Mountains. The vaious trials the party endures, whether it be from newcomers to Indians to foreign agents, is wonderfully done. Also of interest is Whip having to deal with his former indiana lover, La-ena. Also of interest is Delores, who deals ith the spirit world in a believable way. Well Done.

[FROM THE BACK]******* FROM WYOMING RENEGADE TO THE GREATEST DAD OF THE WEST? -- Cameron Wade reveled in the solitude of mountain vistas and a cloudless Wyoming sky. He was a man of the land, but his life was about to be invaded by three ornery kids and their single mom, Patricia Erhart.

His bachelor instincts urged him to run but this lady had something he wanted -- his old family ranch. So, to get close to the lovely widow, he had to risk his own heart......

Courting Patricia, Cameron was shocked to find himself wanting to be the perfect father to her kids -- and win over the wary rancher for real.

Could this ready-made family show the lonesome bachelor that being Wyoming born and bred, could lead to being a dad ... and to wed? ************
These are hard to tame -- and impossible to resist -- cowboys who meet their perfect match! from the mini series "Wranglers & Lace"
Another Highly Recommended book -- enjoy!

This book contains more information on the Laramie North Park and Western Railroad Line including photographs back into the 1910 area. History is the main subject and extremely well written showing and telling of my old Railroad and all the problems associated with building a line climbing nearly 10,000 feet in the dead of winter with snow five feet deep and 40 below zero. I lived at the summit (Foxpark) where a lot of the pictures were taken and can honestly say it's my best source

information on these train lines. If you are into Trains and Locomotives in Colorado or Wyoming you must read this book.

I've lived in Wyoming for 13 years and even I was interested in the detailed discription of Wyoming, I learned alot more about Wyoming than I thought I could know. I recammend this book to anyone, who lives in Wyoming or just wants to know more about this untamed wilderness we call wyoming.

I just can't put this book down! Ms. Coble has done her homework about the forts in Wyoming during the settling of the American West. Her characters are real, and she has inspired me with her accounts of how difficult life was within these forts, how our ancestors triumphed over so much adversity to settle this great nation and secure it for us today. Difficulties of women in childbirth, soldiers in the line of duty, and maintaining civilization where none before existed are brought clearly and beautifully to mind with her great writing skills. Her characters have feelings, depth and faith. Please, Ms. Coble, write some more Barbour books for this thankful reader!!! - Deborah Smith Embree in Nashville, Tennessee....

I live in Virginia. But I have been to Wyoming on vacation and I believe it is the most beautiful place on earth. Someday I hope to live there. Finally there is a beautiful picturebook of the whole state {not just the National Parks}. It is perfect! I just LOVE it! The day I received it I went through it 4 times from beginning to end {that was yesterday}. After I get off this computer I will go through it again. The photography is incredible. It takes you right to Wyoming and it gives me goosbumps just thinking about it. THANK YOU MR.PFLUGHOFT! I only wished I could get your signature in my book.

I was absolutely stunned by the superb story telling and the poetic quality of the well-crafted prose in James Galvin's _The Meadow_. This is *literature.* So if you have literary tastes and an interest in the American west, there is absolutely no doubt that you will enjoy this wonderful book.

The realism of rural life in the mountains is combined with haunting personal stories that keep you reading. The author has a genuine empathy for nature and for the individual people who have the stamina to survive in a harsh environment. Highly recommended.

Galvin captures the feeling of third and fourth generation ranch people. Those looking for a narrative such as found in so many chronicles of the settling of the west may be dissapointed. I was raised with my brothers Frank, a character in the book, and Charlie about twenty five miles east of the "meadow" as the crow flies and also on the Colorado-Wyoming state line. Frank, a fountain of common sense, but not nearly as philosophical as Galvin, shared his passion for the meadow and its environs as do all who were brought under its spell some time during their lives. None of us could have put it into words and we are thankful James did. The style is difficult even for those who know the area and characters, but it is exactly appropriate for the task at hand.

Patricia Hampl says that "the function of memory...is intensely personal and surprisingly political. ...if we refuse to do the work of creating this personal version of the past, someone else will do it for us." James Galvin has created his own personal version of the history of an unspoiled place on the Colorado-Wyoming border, and the people who lost and remained there. His book is delightful in its complexity; it's not written in temporal order but in the order of memory. Galvin writes, "...memory becomes a museum with a long shelf on which we arrange a bric-a-brac of deeds, each to his own liking." Here, Galvin gives us a clue into the apparently random arrangement of his one hundred chapters. It has the structure of recall, even "total recall."

The beauty of The Meadow's structure is the way Galvin makes it work. We see in his mind what's important: the character of the land first, and then the people who move through it "like the weather." Concerns about chronology and times and dates slip away as we become engrossed in the more eternal things, like memory.

Let's get the comparisons out of the way. _Marchlands_ is a powerful new work by a talented new voice, but since people find comfort in appeals to appetites already acquired, I will begin by dropping names. Kuban's writing, deliberately or otherwise, reminds one of male and female novelists of no little talent. On the female side, Kuban combines the fecund economy of Cisneros, the homespun hysteria of Allison and the soulful didacticism of Esquivel. On the male side, Kuban evokes Ford's relationships fraught with ambivalence, McCarthy's violent desolation of both surface and soul and London's denial of any difference between human and animal worlds. Good company? Good book. _Marchlands'_ place (Wyoming) and time (Vietnam) provide a compelling backdrop against which a teen's pregnancy augers a variety of painful deliveries: baby from girl, woman from girl, mother from monster, daughter from father, friend from friend and nation from national disgrace. As a first novel the book is amazing--no air-pockets of implausibility, no emotion for emotion's sake, no poor poetry as passable prose--just a story well told using beautiful language. Absolutely beautiful. Denying oneself the pleasure of reading _Marchlands_ commits an even graver offense: denying oneself the pleasure of remembering it.

This is the story of Sophie, a sixteen-year-old girl who lives on a sheep ranch in Wyoming. Like most teenagers, she sees her world in a cynical way and her search for love and acceptance leaves her with a pregnancy. Her father has dissapeared when she was four, and her mother is turning into a seriously nagging nutcase.

There are many qualities, which make this book a must-read: the voice of the narrator is true and hypnotic; the language and descriptions are beautiful and poetic; the plot moves fast and the story is engaging; the research and information about ranch life in Wyoming is fascinating -- to realise that this is Karla Kuban's first novel is nothing short of amazing.

There are some books which help us stretch our understanding of human behaviour and make us sympathize with situations we will never become familiar with -- Marchlands is one of these books -- put it on your must-read list if you like novels which are heart-felt and written in a style so poetic, it makes you wish the story would never end. GET IT NOW!

Wyoming and the world offer too little protection for pregnant Sophie and her imperfect surroundings, but Sophie doesn't muck around in self-pity. She has to keep up with the ranch. She doesn't rely on God's protection or anyone else's. She is her own girl/woman. Kuban's characters (all) are exquisitely carved. Her mother is a pathologically nerve-wracked lunatic, hideously and falsely pious; her brother and cousin are off fighting in Vietnam; her grandmother is ample solace and company when Sophie seeks shelter with her (and for her baby, Frances) in Chicago. Her father? Undependable, rough, dysfunctional. The ranch hands? Some good, some bad. Sophie is tough inside and out, tender as well and incredibly brave. The book illustrates the bloody realities of ranching, from sheep castration and gardening to fence mending and land lore. Kuban has created a well rounded, full voiced book. Listen to the clear language, and Sophie's voice (rendered perfectly and without flaws in first person. It is stark and straightforward): "I don't know on whose or what toe the ring of Saturn lies, or whose or what fingers hung the Milky Way and scattered the dust of heaven, feldspar dust, breathed fire into the sun, and blew winter cold winds across Wyoming to freeze words." Sophie is fierce, wise, soft, loving, vengeful, memorable on every level.

The Haymeadow By: Gary Paulson John Barron, a fourteen year old boy, lives with his father on a ranch in Wyoming. His father goes to town to help a sick employee that works on the ranch. This employee usually and herds six-thousand sheep up into the haymeadow, but since he is sick it is up to John to help out his father's business. The sheep can not survive outside of the cool mountainous environment of the haymeadow during the summer. This meadow is a two-day trip by horse from the Barron's camp. John is forced to stay there for three months tending to the sheep. While John is there the river floods and his supplies are scattered everywhere. John is faced with possible starvation. Also he loses his rifle and has no way to defend himself or the sheep from the ravenous coyotes. In the haymeadow John has to be very resourceful and brave as he faces many dangerous and difficult situations while he is alone in the valley. The story reveals that Gary Paulson wrote The Haymeadow well. In the novel Paulson describes everything thoroughly and keeps one on the edge of one's seat. Paulson's theme in this novel is different than most. He wishes to convey that everything in nature is beautiful in some way no matter how what an organism's purpose is. To back this up Paulson writes soon after the herd is attacked by coyotes, "By the end of three weeks things had reserved and he decided one afternoon to try and find what wasn't beautiful. He was sitting on the side of the stream and had his pants rolled up and his bare feet in the water and he looked around and thought of the last three weeks and tried to think of something that wasn't beautiful. And he couldn't." This book is filled with action and is interesting. I enjoyed it a lot and would recommend it to many.

The book The Haymeadow was written by Gary Paulsen. John is just a fourteen year old who wants some change in his life. He lives with his father and two permanent hired hands named Cawley and Tink. John's mother died when he was four years old. He barely remembers her. During the years he was told few stories about his mother and his memories are confused with stories. John's father and Tink go to town and were suppose to return in the afternoon. His father only returns. John finds out that Tink had to stay in town with the doctors because they discovered he had cancer. Just like John's grandfathers will be asked to go to the haymeadow. But since Tink can't watch over it John will have to go a little earlier than his grandfathers had. Doubts of not accomplishing the task are all over his mind. Spending a whole month with six thousand sheep, two horses, and four dogs will be lots of work. Going to the haymeadow was a long journey as it is. During the first days at the haymeadow, John already approaches many problems. A snake attacks one of the lambs causing it to have a deep cut. Usually they would shoot a lamb so that it won't suffer but John decided to heal the wound. Also, a bear attacks! These are just some of the many obstacles he approaches in the haymeadow. He continues overcoming the obstacles and before John knew it, it was the end of the month. The figure on the horizon was his father coming to see him. His father brings good news. Tink was not going to die because of the cancer. All of the stories of his mother are told to him by his father. When it's time for his father to head back John doesn't want him to go. He tells him that and his father stays and tells him more stories in the haymeadow.

The reason I liked this book so much was because of the way the author describes the setting. "It was more than a meadow. More than just hay. It was a wide, shallow valley between two rows of peaks. The haymeadow itself was four sections, but the whole valley was close to four miles across and nearly eight miles long and so beautiful, John thought, that it almost took his breath away." I could picture the haymeadow by the way the author describes it. I picture a beautiful valley surrounded by mountains and the grass rolling in the same direction. Everything is so beautiful and peaceful. I really enjoyed learning more about the haymeadow.

What I also liked about it was that included some love. This evened out the book so that it balanced. "One car with New York plates was full of tourists and there was a girl with long brown hair who got out with a camera and John felt a little shy but tipped his hat to her. She smiled back and waved and he felt himself blushing but was glad he'd done it anyway." John continues to think about that girl through the days in the haymeadow. I think he found his crush but he never admitted it to Cawley. Cawley saw everything and teased him about that day. John still hoped to see that girl once again.

My favorite part of the story was when the flood hits his trailer with all of his belongings. John ends up fishing his stuff out of the river. All of his shirts soaked and he lost many supplies. The labels of all the canned food flowed down steam so John ended up with having a mystery meal everyday. This is the part of the book with the most action. I think this was the best part because at one point I questioned if he would survive in the haymeadow after all this.

When 14 year old John Barron is asked to spend the summer in an isolated mountain meadow, he is unsure. I mean, sheep are stupid anyway, right? But Tink, the farmhand is sick, and it IS John's turn, just like his father, and his father before him. So he does end up going up to the haymeadow to waste his summer with these...these... creatures.

During his stay, John learns more about responsibility as he encounters may complicated tasks, and he also realizes that maybe sheep aren't so stupid after all. An outstanding book. Gary Paulsen does and exellent job of actually telling the reader what the character is really thinking.

While still a Wyoming state game warden trainee, Joe Pickett ticketed a man fishing without a license. The man turned out to be the state governor. One week after being assigned to Twelve Sleep County, Joe fines outfitter Ote Keeley for shooting a buck out of season. However, Ote takes Joe's gun away and points it at the game warden's head before calmly accepting his ticket. Though he continues working hard, Joe has never fully recovered from the Keeley incident.

A few months later, Keeley reenters Joe's life when his daughter finds the outfitter dead at the woodpile near the Pickett home. Next to the corpse is a cooler containing pellets of excrement. Joe and fellow warden Wacey Hedeman assist sheriff Bud Barnum with the investigation. However, soon Joe is in trouble with his superiors, his pregnant wife for jeopardizing his job, and with a killer trying to add a nosy game warden to the list.

OPEN SEASON is an entertaining police procedural tale that works because the author steps out of the box by insuring his star is not superman. Instead he is just an average Joe struggling with learning his new job, obtaining a decent standard of living for his family, and still trying to do the right thing. The story line is filled with twists and turns so that the audience into thinking h wrong person is the villain. The endangered species issue is well designed within the plot with C.J. Box cleverly laying it out so that the reader can decide on this complex question. Fans will want more Wyoming mysteries starring a guy named Joe.

Harriet Klausner

On a lazy sunday morning TROUBLE rode into the backyard and died on Joe Pickett's woodpile, changing his life forever.

Open Season, by C.J. Box is the first in the Joe Pickett mystery series. This first novel has won several awards including the Anthony award for best first novel of 2001.

In Open Season, Pickett, a Wyoming Game Warden has the undaughting task of trying to uncover the truth behind the murders of three men at an outfitters camp. Pickett's fellow law enforcement officials have closed to book on these murders, convinced that they have arrested to killer, Pickett believes otherwise. And so as the new guy in town Pickett sets out to find the reason behind the deaths.

One of the things I like best about this novel is the father-daughter relationship that Pickett has with his two little girls. Also, Pickett comes across as a more average guy and not the "super" sleuth of most novels. From the beginning when Pickett unknowningly gives a ticket to the governor of Wyoming for fishing without a license Joe is somebody we can all relate to.

From the first crack of the rifle to the last this book is sure to please!

Dare I say "different" when speaking of a mystery/thriller? Just when I think I have seen every possible setting, hero/anti-hero, cozy, hard-boiled, police procedural out there; along comes "Open Season" with something new and fresh. Joe Pickett is as nice as they come, but prone to embarrassing errors. His family plays a starring role, not only with him but also as an integral part of the story. His wife and two daughters don't play cute characters or trite supporting roles; there would be no story without them.

Edgar-nominated, Mr. Box's debut novel is set in a Wyoming that could only be written by a native. Someone said a writer should write what he knows about; Mr. Box has followed the advice. He makes Wyoming so real, you can smell the air and feel the forest. He is also honest enough to admit all parts of Wyoming are not nature's paradise, but strikingly ugly. He understands and depicts the particular politics that are unique to small or under-populated states. When almost everyone is on a first name basis with the governor, everyone is in on some kind of a deal or another.

Joe is particularly shocked and offended when a body is found on his backyard woodpile. When three other bodies are found at the victim's outfitters camp, the case is closed quickly and neatly as a falling out among the four of them. Joe is not satisfied, no one is quite who they seem to be, and corruption at every level is gradually exposed. The closer Joe comes to a solution, the more his family is endangered until tension is at the snapping point.

"Open Season" has an agenda: the Endangered Species Act and is it a well thought out piece of legislation. Mr. Box thinks not, and whatever the reader believes, the book will give them something to consider. The characterizations are excellent; I was surprised at how much I cared. "Open Season" has my vote for the best mystery of the year.