Run to the Mountain

by Theodore V. Olsen

Run to the Mountain (Thorndike Western II) [Large Print] [Hardcover]

280 pages, Hardcover

First published December 30, 1989

About the author

Theodore Victor Olsen (April 25, 1932 in Rhinelander, Wisconsin – July 13, 1993 in Rhinelander) was an American western fiction author.

Olsen's family immigrated from Norway in 1901. Theodore Olsen was born on April 25, 1932 in Rhinelander, Wisconsin. He went to school in Rhinelander and began to write in high school. He began a western novel at that time. Olsen went to college in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. He finally finished his novel, Haven of the Hunted, and it was published in 1956. Olsen also began to sell western stories to pulp magazines at this time. Though Olsen would occasionally travel west, he lived his whole life in Rhinelander and would use exhaustive research to help accurately portray scenes of the west in his stories.

Olsen was married to fellow western fiction author Beverly Butler.

Olsen died in Rhinelander on July 13, 1993, and several works were published posthumously.

Much of T.V. Olsen's family still lives in the Rhinelander region. They own a 300-acre (1.2 sq km) ranch with a century old farm house and dairy barn.

Reviews

[Steve Hockensmith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fine enough, but definitely second-tier. This starts out like the kind of book I know Olsen for -- a tight, taut Western thriller like The Stalking Moon -- but it quickly loses focus. For 80 or so pages it seems to toy with becoming a more sprawling, multi-POV ranch melodrama. But then as the climax approaches it discards that and reverts to a more straightforward, action-oriented approach. It's almost as if Olsen decided early on that his protagonist isn't very interesting (and he's not) so he threw the narrative net wider, only to accept when it was time to wrap things up that he was stuck with the hero he'd started with. Anyway -- OK, but I'd hoped for better from Olsen.