NEW RELEASE--LANDON--BY CHERYL PIERSON

Hi everyone! I am so excited to announce RELEASE DAY for my book, LANDON, Book #9 in the GUN FOR HIRE series! This is a 10-book, multi-author series that is the brainchild of Charlene Raddon, and I’m so grateful to her for having this fabulous idea and putting this all together.

Each of these stories is a stand-alone tale, but they are all about a hero who lives by the gun. In the end, of course, he’s going to find happiness when he meets the woman he comes to love passionately and who loves him back just as fiercely. Is there any better kind of story?

The books began making their debut in March, and we are about to complete the series with mine and Winnie Griggs’ stories, so they are all available but Winnie’s now, and hers will be out in 2 weeks! In the back of my book is a sneak peek at Winnie’s story (and it is a grabber!) Take a look at these beautiful covers Charlene created for us. Every one of them just makes me itch to pick it up and sit down in a comfortable chair and read all afternoon!

When I started thinking about the characters for this story, I knew I had to have a hero who was fueled by the need for justice of some kind, and he was determined to get it no matter what. Though I don’t go into his former life in the story, I mention that he was responsible for other men at one point. Was he an outlaw? A fugitive? A lawman? A soldier? A prisoner? It’s not clear, and I liked it like that because it leaves a bit of mystery in his personality, and we don’t know whether he is on the side of the law or not. All we have to go on is the same thing Alissa can see in him when she first meets him and gets to know him through their time together.

Alissa has been in a tight spot for many years now. After her own mother dies, her father marries a much younger woman. When the woman dies almost as soon as their baby is born, it’s up to Alissa to step in and raise the boy, even though she’s only 14 at the time. With a no-good gambler for a father, her life has been misery to try to provide even the most basic necessities for her younger brother. When her father is killed, she sees it as both a blessing and a curse. Set to travel to Indian Territory for the land rush of 1889, she has no choice but to continue with the plans her father has made and try to do it alone with a 5-year-old to care for.

Some of this series is available in paperback and in Kindle, and Landon is one that can be purchased in either format—and, hopefully, soon, in Audible, as well.

Here’s the blurb to whet your reading appetite! You can order LANDON now, as well as the rest of the series, all except Winnie’s – and of course, you can PRE-ORDER hers!

BLURB FOR LANDON

Alissa Devine finds herself in an unthinkable situation when her father is murdered, and she’s left to raise her young brother, Zach. With $22 to her name and her no-account gambler father’s burial to pay for, Lissie has no choice but to carry on with her father’s plan to take part in the Oklahoma land run. But single women aren’t allowed on the wagon train.

Landon Wildcat’s mission for months has been to find the man who abducted his younger sister. His search ends when crooked gambler Happy Devine gets what he deserves at the end of Land’s gun. But that act of vengeance leaves Lissie and Zach alone with no man to accompany them on the wagon train.

Wagon Master Bill Castle hires Land as his scout; a devil’s bargain—for both of them. Land offers Lissie his protection, suspecting the unscrupulous Mr. Castle has indecent intentions toward her.

When one of the settlers is murdered, Land takes the outlaws on in a desperate battle to protect the only witness, and nearly pays the ultimate price. Land’s life hangs in the balance, but the wagon train moves on, callously deserting him and the teen boy he saved, along with Lissie and Zach.

Through the hardship, Lissie and Land both realize how much they love one another, and what they have come so close to losing. Though danger lurks around every curve in the road, Lissie believes with all her heart there is a place for their small band of settlers in this untamed Territory. Now that love has finally come, will Fate allow a miracle for their happiness with this new beginning?

I love series like this one. The heroes and heroines are all different because they come from varying backgrounds and places, but the heroes have something in common that holds the thread of the series together.

On This Day in the Old West July 11

 On This Day in the Old West July 11

 

Alas, I can find nothing of significance that occurred on July 11 in the Old West, other than a couple of Civil War battles, which have been covered in detail in various other history books and blogs. So I thought I’d recycle an old blog from several years ago, since chances are our newer members have never seen it.

“Them’s Fighting Words” (Part III)

In the Old West, a man had to know how to cut another to the quick without cursing. As most of us know, cursing was taboo, especially in public or in the presence of a woman. Yet there are times when a man just needs to vent his feelings. Here are some choice insults and descriptions from the Old West for your enjoyment.

Anger:

When I'm done with you, there won't be enough left of you to snore.

He was mad enough to swallow a horn-toad backwards.

He was so mad he could bite himself

 

Bad Tempered or Generally Unpleasant:

He's so mean he'd steal a fly from a blind spider.

He was so mean, he'd fight a rattler and give him the first bite.

He was mean enough to steal a coin off a dead man's eyes.

He made an ordinary fight look like a prayer meetin'.

He was mean enough to eat off the same plate with a snake.

He was mean enough to hunt bears with a hickory switch.

He didn't have manners enough to carry guts to a bear.

He's as welcome as a rattlesnake as a square dance.

He's so crooked, he could swallow nails and spit out corkscrews.

He told lies so well a man would be a foot not to believe them.

He's as crooked as a dog's hind legs.

He's lyin' like a rug.

He ain't fit to shoot at when you want to unload and clean yo' gun.

He's as popular as a wet dog at a parlor social.

Mental State:

He was crazy enough to eat the devil with horns on.

He's off his mental reservation.

His intelligence shore ain't at this camp.

He's as crazy as popcorn on a hot stove.

He's as crazy as a sheepherder.

Somebody stole his rudder.

He's crazier than a run-over coon.

He's studying to be a half-wit.

He ought to be bored for the hollow horn.

His brain cavity wouldn't make a drinkin' cup for a canary.

He couldn't teach a hen to cluck.

He knows as much about it as a hog does a hip pocket in a bathing suit.

His knife's so dull it wouldn't cut hot butter.

He don't know dung from wild honey.

If all his brains were dynamite, there wouldn't be enough to blow his nose.

He couldn't cut a lame cow from a shade tree.

He couldn't track an elephant in snow.

He was so dumb he couldn't drive nails in a snowbank.

He's as dull as dishwater.

He don't know any more about it than a hog does a sidesaddle.

He is plumb weak North of his ears.

He can't tell skunks from house cats.

He had a ten dollar Stetson on a five-cent head.

His family tree was a shrub.

He couldn't track a bed-wagon through a bog hole.

He didn't have nuthin' under his hat but hair.

He couldn't hit the ground with his hat in three throws.

He was as shy of brains as a terrapin is of feathers.

Physical Appearance:

He was uglier than a new-sheared sheep.

He has teeth so crooked he could eat corn on the cob through a picket fence.

His face was puckered like wet sheepskin before a hot fire.

Her face looks like a dime's worth of dog meat.

He was ugly as a burnt boot.

He was so ugly he had to sneak up on a dipper to get a drink of water.

He looked like the hindquarters of bad luck.

His lip hangs down like a blacksmith's apron.

He looks so bad his ears flop.

She's so ugly, she'd make a freight train take a dirt road!

He's as ugly as homemade sin.

She's so ugly she could bluff a buzzard off a meat wagon.

He's as ugly as a mud fence.

He is so thin he could take a bath in a shotgun barrel.

He was so fat, you'd have to throw a diamond hitch to keep him in the saddle.

If he closed one eye he'd look like a needle.

He is built like a snake on stilts.

  

Additional Insults:

His voice sounded like someone forgot to grease the wagon.

His singin' was enough to make a she-wolf jealous.

He punished the air with his singing. 

He had a voice like a burro with a bad cold.

He couldn't hit a bull's rump with a handful of banjos.

He was as drunk as a fiddler's clerk.

She's as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

He'd been in the desert so long, he knew all the lizards by their first names.

His mustache smelled like a mildewed saddle blanket after it had been rid on a soreback hoss three hundred miles in August.

He was grittin' his teeth like he could bite the sights off a six-gun.

This saloon's so bad, a rattlesnake'd be ashamed to meet his mother.

He lasted as long as a pint of whiskey in a five-handed poker game.

 

J.E.S. Hays
        www.jeshays.com 
        www.facebook.com/JESHaysBooks 

Sources:

A Dictionary of the Old West, Peter Watts, 1977

Legends of America website: www.legendsofamerica.com

 

 

A Western Perspective: Good Guys, Bad Guys, White Hats, Black Hats

 Howdy Everyone, 

I hope you all are having a great summer so far! 

For a lot of westerns, there is an easy depiction of who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. The good guys have the white hats and the bad guys have the black hats. Sets these two groups far apart as you now expect the guys in the white hats to do good deeds, right wrong and be the hero while the guys in the black hats you expect them to do evil things. It is like a melodrama where the hero comes onto the stage and everyone claps and cheers and when the villain comes on the stage everyone boos and hisses at them. 

Now don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of the classic westerns with the white and black hat formula and just saw a melodrama in Cripple Creek Colorado this past weekend where there was a lot of cheering for the hero and booing for the villain. These classic themes in story sets us up to know that good will prevail in the end and that the bad guy will in some way have to answer for all the wickedness they have played part in. 

When I was younger, I tried to apply this lens to historical figures and events. The biggest one that comes to mind for me was the famous gunfight in Tombstone Arizona known as the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral even though it was more so the Gunfight on Fremont Street. For a long time, I took it as gospel truth, that the Earps and Holliday were the good guys and the McLaury's and Clanton's were the bad guys. Now right off, I just have to say it that the Earps and Holliday were wearing black hats and more than likely the McLaury's and Clantons were probably wearing lighter color hats. 

My last time in Tombstone Arizona, I noticed a plaque near where the famous gunfight took place that had Frank and Tom McLaury on it. It was a plaque in their memory that was erected by the McLaury family and friends and has a quote "One owes respect to the living, but to the dead, one owes nothing but the truth." This reminded me of the paragraph's in history books that says something about an event where people died but it is strictly that. Not how it is sad those people died, how their families were impacted or expected to survive and so on. From there, I went to a book store and found a book called "Murdered On The Streets Of Tombstone" written by Joyce Aros. Seeing that plaque and reading this book challenged the way I saw the McLaury brothers. Most of what is universally known about the famous gunfight comes from Wyatt Earp's testimony in the case that followed the bloodshed. The famous saying is that history is written by the victor and that proved to be true in this case. Now I am not going into Wyatt's testimony but I do think it is important to really try and view all historical figures and events with a keen eye and try and view them from different perspectives. What I learned about the McLaury's was that they were ranchers and had befriended the Clantons but were not necessarily straight up outlaws as they have been portrayed. That actually on that cold October day, they were in town to make a deal on their beef they would be providing. The Clantons are difficult to find something showing them as a completely innocent party but the McLaury's seem to have both made the wrong friends and been in the wrong place at the wrong time. There is even some evidence showing that the McLaury's were trying to leave town but never got a chance to. Once the gunsmoke settled, they were no longer breathing and were not able to explain their side of the story or defend themselves. They were laid to rest and over the next one hundred years or so, they were branded as common outlaws who got on the wrong side of the Earps and were shot down because of it. 

There is debate back and forth on this and so many other things within the gunfight on Fremont street. It is fun to challenge others and to in turn be challenged as well. This kind of out of the box thinking is so important to view historical figures and events to hopefully help us learn and grow as individuals and as a society.  It was very eye opening for me to view the McLaury brothers as normal people and not straight up outlaws who would cut you down faster than you could blink. Sometimes the good guys and bad guys are not as cut and dry as we may like to think. Both sides are humans and both sides made mistakes and had their faults. Viewing both sides in this light shows more so a struggle for survival rather than a struggle between right and wrong.   

Challenging my historical perspective was great as it gave me an idea for a short story I wrote for the Saddlebag Dispatches Magazine Winter Issue 2023 called "My Friend Tom." In this story, I explore who Tom McLaury was through the eyes of a young boy. This story was recently announced to be a winner of a 2025 Will Rogers Medallion Award. Challenging our historical perspective is a great way to not only grow but to possibly get fresh ideas on topics that have been written about in so many different ways. 

Well pardners, that is this months Western Perspective. I hope you all enjoyed this take on historical perspective and I look forward to seeing you all down the trail a ways. Adios! 🤠