Entering this year I decided I needed to read more books by female authors. When I actually considered  the situation, I realized that, apart from a zillion Agatha Christies, I'd read very few books written by women. Surely less than 10% of all books read, maybe less than 5%, were by women. And so far this year, I've made a decent dent in the problem. A Jane Austen here, a George Eliot there, a great novel by Maggie O'Farrell, and a few others. Not bad.

But now I'm thinking that I need to read more western novels. As in, you know, cowboys and Indians and bad guys stuff.  I can only remember reading 5 westerns ever, though I might be forgetting one or two. And the average quality of those 5 is extremely high.

The least of them is BLAZING GUNS ON THE CHISHOLM TRAIL by Borden Chase. It's actually quite good, and was the basis for the classic film RED RIVER. But still, good as it is, it's the least of this small selection I've read.

Next would be SHANE by Jack Schaefer. Another excellent novel which spawned an even better movie.

The last three I hesitate to separate or rank in any way. All three are superb. Classics. They are...

THE OX-BOW INCIDENT by Walter Van Tilburg Clark.  Powerful, beautiful, and so damn depressing. Seed for yet another great movie.

TRUE GRIT by Charles Portis. This one gave us two terrific movies, both of which were smart enough to retain much of Portis's dialogue. 

LONESOME DOVE by Larry McMurtry. This could "only" lead to a TV miniseries, but that was the right way to go. There's a lot of story in these 1000+ pages.

All these are great. I think TRUE GRIT and LONESOME DOVE, at least, are among the very best novels--of any type--that I've ever read.

So, yeah, based on this history, I should read more westerns. Unfortunately, the preponderance of male authors is probably more dominant in this genre than any other so I may have to double up on the Jane Austen to balance things.