Three By Brand

Max Brand was one of the most prolific and, at his best, masterful writers of western fiction who ever lived. Brand penned over 300 westerns. But he was never happy with his success. Brand's westerns were authentic. He had grown up working as a hand on the ranches of the San Joaquin Valley, in a time just before the coming of the horseless carriage, when a man who couldn't ride a horse wasn't going very far in the world.  As these three western novels prove.

Alcatraz is a novel of love: that of man and horse, and that of woman and man. Folks said neither the wild horse Alcatraz nor the man Red Jim could never be caught or tamed. The man set out to prove them wrong about the horse – and a woman who set out to prove them wrong about the man. The Garden of Eden is considered one of Brand's finest achievements, the story of a western Adam and Eve who reject the sins of the world by locking themselves into their own garden of Eden forever. Bull Hunter is the prototypical elegiac westerner who foreshadowed the television cowboy hero. Only as he is riding out of town after dispatching the bad guys does this peripatetic wanderer realize he loves the girl. Will he return to her someday, he wonders? Will Maverick, will Cheyenne, will the Duke, will Eastwood? Or are they fated to endlessly roam alone across the plains – tumbling tumbleweeds all?

With a new Introduction, and a recommended reading list and filmography of motion pictures based on Brands westerns. Cover design: Frankie Hill.