A Fresh Start

I've wondered for a long time what might be done to restore western fiction to the splendid estate it once enjoyed. When I first started writing western stories in the seventies, numerous mass-market publishers were producing all sorts of good novels, abetted by library lines and occasional hardcover publication. People loved western stories and bought them by the millions.

That's gone now, and not likely to return. I don't think this decline is cyclical this time. I think modernity and urban life have overwhelmed stories of horse travel and rural survival. But if there is to be any sort of revival of the traditional western story, it would likely be the work of a single charismatic western author, who reopens the field with a new approach and a unique voice. Until then, things will probably stay pretty much the same. A small cadre of writers, some of them genuinely gifted, will continue to produce the sort of derivative stuff we're seeing on the racks, and that will continue indefinitely as a sort of niche market.

I'm in the twilight of my writing life and unlikely to see any change, but maybe some happy day some bright and skilled novelist will give the world a new and better sort of western story, and the publishers will gladly get on the bandwagon. The fiction of the real west, as opposed to the mythic one, is healthier, and likely to continue in both hardcover and trade paperback publication.