Books on the West by Award-Winning Author and Western Historian Mark Warren

by Mark Warren
|
7 books
Mark Warren has been researching the Old West for more than 60 years. He has always been interested in courage, and the raw West offered many opportunities to draw on that quality. He has written on Wyatt Earp, Billy the Kid, and Nate Champion as well as fictional characters such as Clayton Jane from "Indigo Heaven," and Kid Concho from the hilarious collection of short stories in The Westering Trail Travesties. Warren lectures on Western frontier history presenting at museums and cultural centers around the country. His Wyatt Earp, An American Odyssey trilogy was honored by WWA’s Spur Awards, The Historical Novel Society, and the 2020 Will Rogers Medallion Awards. Indigo Heaven and The Westering Trail Travesties are both Will Rogers Medallion Award Winners.
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A Last Serenade for Billy Bonney

A Novel on Billy the Kid
Mark Warren, 2024
In this deeply researched novel of America's most celebrated outlaw, Mark Warren sheds light on the human side of Billy the Kid and reveals the intimate stories of the lesser-known players in his legendary life of crime. Warren's fictional composer and Santa Fe journalist, John Blessing, is assigned to report on a jailed prisoner who calls himself "Willima H. Bonney," but what begins as a formal interview evolves into an unexpected relationship and a self-examination of Blessing's own cultured, city values. After the Kid's death, Blessing embarks on a journey to find Billy's comrades and acquaintances - those who loved the Kid . . . and others who despised him. Through the reporter's interviews, the reader is exposed to the historical events and the influential people who helped to shape the Kid's life. Was Billy Bonney a cold-blooded killer without a conscience, or was he a victim of the machinations of corrupt politicians in "the Santa Fe Ring"? Ride along with John Blessing as he unravels one of Western history's most fascinating enigmas.

Indigo Heaven

Mark Warren
After the gore of the War for Southern Independence, Clayton Jane journeys from Georgia to Wyoming Territory to trade his battle-hardened soul for a measure of grace. Working his way to ranch foreman for an English cattle baron, he finds redemption in his relationship with the land and with the crew that works beside him. His life begins to unravel when a Pinkerton detective arrives in the Laramie Plain to probe a conspiracy with roots that trace back to the war.

The Westering Trail Travesties

Five Little-Known Tales of the Old West that Probably Ought to A' Stayed that Way
Mark Warren, 2024
These five stories range from the surreal to the tear - jerker, as the Old West is turned upside down by its boots and shaken until all common sense falls out into a crucible of parody. In "Rumors From the Edge of the World," Kid Concho and his Arizona outlaw gang of misfits stumble upon a phophetic Apache spring. "Too Long in the Saddle" follows the exploits of a Boston newspaper reporter who is ordered on assignment to frontier Kansas. "Code of the Ranger" travels with a quartet of Arizona Rangers who - without extradition papers - must ride undercover into Texas to bring back Bad Bob Banning. Once they capture him, can they make it out of Texas alive? In "Gourd," fourteen-year-old Curtis Blaydes loses his father and mother. Alone he continues to run the family homestead in the hinterlands of south Texas, until a visitor arrives. "Niobrara" introduces a notable triangle of youngsters in northern Nebraska. When they grow older, the triangle breaks under the stress of divergent careers.

A Law Unto Himself

Wyatt Earp, An American Odyssey Book Three
Mark Warren, 2021
Drawn to the silver boom in Tombstone, Arizona Territory, Wyatt and his brothers start anew with aspirations to strike it big in business. Fate seems to have other plans for Wyatt, as he reverts to the foot-soldier status of a hard-nosed enforcer of the law. Enemy lines are drawn between the Earps and the cow-boy rustlers, finally culminating in the famed gunfight near the O.K. Corral. When the Earps prevail in this face to face battle, the cow-boys resort to midnight back-shooting, killing one Earp and maiming another. When the courts cannot adjudicate over perjuring outlaws, Wyatt Earp takes the law into his own hands and dispenses a personal justice that will elevate his name into American legend.

Wyatt Earp Novel, Book 1

Mark Warren, 2021
Young Wyatt Earp grows up on the Iowa frontier and learns the balance of servitude to a demanding father and the self-esteem of independent fortitude. In California he is introduced to an adage that will forever haunt him and his failed ambitions to be a businessman: that, like most men, he might have to settle for less. After a year of marriage his wife and child die, leaving him in a wasteland of misery that leads him into trouble with the law. Eventually, he pulls himself up and embraces an occupation for which he seems to be perfectly suited: an officer of the law.

Nate the Texas Story

A Historical Fiction Novel
Mark Warren, 2024
Nate Champion might be the most heroic figure of America’s Old West . . . and yet one of popular history’s best-kept secrets. Now he finally gets his due in this historical novel duology. His humble beginnings in Texas prepare him for a life with horses and cattle. Though a well-known horse trainer in his own time, Nate holds the simple aspiration of running his own cattle ranch, a dream he will carry to the Wyoming Territory as the Johnson County Range War drags him into its clutches and climaxes in one of the most impressive last stands of American history. Coming in August 2024, Nate, The Wyoming Story Book 2 in the Nate Champion Duology

Born to the Badge

Wyatt Earp, An American Odyssey Book Two
Mark Warren, 2021
As a policeman in Wichita and Dodge City, Wyatt earns a reputation as a no-nonsense officer who will back away from no man. The economy of these towns depends upon cattle drives from Texas and the roughshod drovers who accompany them. In the height of the cattle season, the towns bustle with activity, including wild drunken sprees intended to test the mettle of Kansas lawmen. Wyatt proves himself time and again as he faces down the likes of Mannen Clemens, Melvin King, and Clay Allison. In Texas he meets a man whose name will be forever linked with his own. Doc Holliday is a testy, Southern ex-dentist turned gambler, who is dying from tuberculosis. By giving Wyatt information about the train robbers, Doc offers the first thread in an unlikely friendship that will weave the two men’s lives into a common story that will be told through the ages.