In my teenage years, I read a lot of Louis L'Amour westerns along with some by writers like Zane Grey and Luke Short among others. I was also reading a lot of science fiction at the time. About the time I got into high school at 13, I had begun a lifelong shift to primarily what we sometimes pompously call "GREAT Literature", the masters of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Between the time I was 14 and 18 or so, I met Albert Stewart, William Howard Cohen, Harry Caudill, and others in the field of Appalachian Literature and Appalachian Studies and made a deep commitment to work for the rest of my life to improve the lives of Appalachian people while also studiously preserving Appalachian Culture. At that time, I began a lifelong dive into Appalachian Literature, primarily non-fiction but also a lot of fiction and poetry which has also been coupled with full fledged efforts to improve Appalachian life. But still, once in a while, I will briefly revert to some of the older styles I was reading including science fiction and a rare western.
Long ago, I also developed the habit of frequenting used stores like Salvation Army, Goodwill, and others, both privately and corporately owned, to buy used books, and I have found a bunch of authors and books I never would have read otherwise. I also have found some relatively rare and collectable books that way. But on a recent trip to a Goodwill store in my area, I found that some recent contributions must have come from a devoted reader of westerns. The shelves were stocked with a wide variety of western paperbacks from numerous authors and the pile included at least 20 or 30 by Louis L'Amour. I really had no intentions of buying and reading any of them until I saw this collection of his short stories and a couple of others of his books which I had never seen. One of those was a novel called "Last Of The Breed" which appears to have been prompted by the story of Francis Gary Powers, the US spy pilot who was captured by Russia in the 1950's, and I bought it but haven't started it yet. It is set in Siberia where the protagonist is imprisoned in the Russian Gulag and eventually escapes. That character is of Native American heritage and, after escaping, he is chased by a Russian who is of Native Siberian heritage as the American pilot attempts to make it across Siberia to Alaska which is the fastest, but most dangerous route to safety. I ca't wait to read it. The other L'Amour book I bought was an epic western called "The Lonesome Gods" which I had never seen. It is almost 450 pages and much longer than the standard, well formatted, medium sized western novel that made L'Amour's reputation and fortune. I will eventually read it but not anytime soon.
The book we are actually discussing here is the collection of short stories called "Yondering" as I said in the title of this blog post. I had never read any of L'Amour's short stories and definitely wanted to try it. I was surprised to find that, just like the "Last Of The Breed", it is about subjects which were not standard subject matter in his novels. As a native of Appalachia who had several relatives who worked in coal mines, I was very pleasantly surprised to find that it contains a short story which is one of the best I have ever read about men trapped in a mine by a roof fall. The story is not set in a coal mine but, rather, some form of hard rock mine, maybe a gold, silver, or copper mine, and L'Amour actually had worked in such mines for a short time in his early years. It is a fabulous story of men trapped underground who know they have long odds of ever seeing the light of day again. The ending is maybe a bit impractical but it is a story well worth reading. There are also stories about sailors, which L'Amour was also employed as for a short time, and a couple of good to better stories about life in Asia, in particular, Asian seaports. One of those is an excellent, well written story about a sailor and his crew mates who befriend a poor local family who are among those who live on small boats in the harbor and make a living by both salvaging and begging.
This is a book which many people who would not bother to read one of L'Amour's westerns will enjoy. And, I believe most of you will be pleasantly surprised, as I was, to learn that Louis L'Amour was a better than average author of short stories in several genres he was not well known for. Years ago, I had read his autobiography and was still surprised by this collection.
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