Draw
The Greatest Gunfights of the American West
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- €3.99
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- €3.99
Publisher Description
Known for his ability to make history come vividly to life, Reasoner strips away the dime novel legends and Hollywood myths to show us how the gunfighters of the Old West really lived, killed, and were killed.
Praised for his “well-researched” (Booklist) and “lively, suspenseful” (Publishers Weekly) novels, James Reasoner now proves that truth can be even more exciting than fiction.
Among the true stories he brings us:
• Doc Holliday’s Last Gunfight
• The Last Bloody Ride of the Dalton Gang
• The End of the Notorious John Wesley Hardin
• Wild Bill’s Tragic Mistake
• The End of an Earp
• Turkey Creek Canyon Shoot-out
• Gunfight at Stone Corral
• The Doolin Bunch vs. the U.S. Marshals
• Rourke’s Bad Luck Robbery
• Shoot-out at the Tuttle Dance Hall
• Wichita’s New Year’s Day Gunfight
• Bat Masterson and the Battle of the Plaza
• The Sam Bass Gang’s Luck Runs Out
• The Long Branch Saloon’s Spectacular Fray
• Ben Thompson’s Christmas Day Shooting
• The Man Who Killed the Man Who Killed Jesse James
• and more!
These are the shoot-outs and showdowns that gave the Wild West its name, recounted here with gritty accuracy, colorful detail, and all the drama of life—and death—on the frontier.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Reasoner, a novelist who specializes in the American West, now turns his skills from fiction to fact, relating 30 or so true tales of western gunslingers and their fates. From one-on-one duels to gang battles to posse pursuits, Reasoner covers the gamut of gunfights, telling the tales in compact but dramatic fashion. He relates the sad story of Warren Earp, the runt of the Earp brothers' litter, who missed the historic shootout at the O.K. Corral, and, trying to live up to his family name, challenged a man to a duel, only to be shot when he was unarmed. Reasoner tells the story of Bakersfield, Calif., a"sleepy little" town that in 1903 was"the scene of one of the West's last great shoot-outs." The author doesn't glorify the violence or the men who perpetrate it--one is struck by the senselessness of many of the fights, which were committed by men with hair-trigger tempers and too much booze in them. But these are satisfying tales for readers of western literature.
