The Cherokee Trail
by Louis L'Amour
On This Page
Description
Fiction. Western. Thriller. Historical Fiction. HTML:A woman ahead of her time, Mary Breydon knew how to get things done. Raised on a Virginia plantation, she learned how to care for livestock, respect her workers, and keep good books. But after her husband is killed, Mary must provide for her young daughter by running a stage coach station on the Cherokee Trail. With the help of an Irish maid and a mysterious stranger, Mary faces challenges that even the men eagerly anticipating her failure show more would have a difficult time overcoming. After firing the previous station manager with the aid of a bullwhip, she must track down stolen horses, care for a wayward boy, and defend against Indians. If that wasn’t enough, she also has to protect herself from the man who murdered her husband—and is coming for Mary next. show lessTags
Recommendations
Member Reviews
I’m not sure why, but I’ve never been interested in “Western” fiction. Then, I had a little bit of a paradigm shift when I realized that Westerns are historical fiction, and usually about a time that I really enjoy reading about. I recently inherited a bunch of Louis L’Amour novels from my grandfather, so I decided to pick one up, and really enjoyed it. I particularly like that it has a female protagonist, which I think is unusual for Louis L’Amour, and I think that he wrote her well. I gave it 3 and a half stars because, though I enjoyed the story, the plot and events seemed very rushed (to be fair it is a small book). While I would recommend it to readers that enjoy historical fiction, it is not a novel I think I would go show more back to and read over and over. show less
A couple of good scenes, but by and large this seems to be a novella trying to be a novel, which would have benefited from tighter editing.
This is a good tale. A recently-widowed woman heads west with her young daughter to take over the management of a stagecoach station on the Cherokee Trail. She learns to love the work and the people of the west, while fighting off bad guys. The story doesn't end with her marrying any of the strong, silent types out there, which I thought was great.
Back in the saddle again with a good L'Amour reread. The locale is Colorado, about 1863. Mary Breydon is a newly widowed survivor of the battles that destroyed her family's plantation, a mother, and in desperate need of a job. After cleaning up the Cherokee Trail stagecoach station she has a home for her daughter as well as income for their future. But a face from the past is determined to make sure she never will be able to identify him as her husband's killer...
This story is probably in the top ten L'Amours that I have read...and I've read over 100 of his books...Nuff said.
This story is probably in the top ten L'Amours that I have read...and I've read over 100 of his books...Nuff said.
This was a fun read. A young woman and her husband and daughter are traveling to a stagecoach station near Laporte, Colorado, to take up the position of station agent there. On the way the husband is murdered, and his wife decides to take the station agent position herself. The men responsible for her husband's death are also on their way to the Laporte area, and they don't want to leave her alive.
One of the better books by L'amour. Main character was woman and a family of individuals from all over. Just a different kind of western.
I found this an interesting read if only that the heroine was a strong woman dealing with the scumbags and winning.
Members
- Recently Added By
Author Information
871+ Works 100,022 Members
Born in Jamestown, North Dakota on March 22, 1908, Louis L'Amour's adventurous life could have been the subject of one of his novels. Striking out on his own in 1923, at age 15, L'Amour began a peripatetic existence, taking whatever jobs were available, from skinning dead cattle to being a sailor. L'Amour knew early in life that he wanted to be a show more writer, and the experiences of those years serve as background for some of his later fiction. During the 1930s he published short stories and poetry; his career was interrupted by army service in World War II. After the war, L'Amour began writing for western pulp magazines and wrote several books in the Hopalong Cassidy series using the pseudonym Tex Burns. His first novel, Westward the Tide (1950), serves as an example of L'Amour's frontier fiction, for it is an action-packed adventure story containing the themes and motifs that he uses throughout his career. His fascination with history and his belief in the inevitability of manifest destiny are clear. Also present and typical of L'Amour's work are the strong, capable, beautiful heroine who is immediately attracted to the equally capable hero; a clear moral split between good and evil; reflections on the Native Americans, whose land and ways of life are being disrupted; and a happy ending. Although his work is somewhat less violent than that of other western writers, L'Amour's novels all contain their fair share of action, usually in the form of gunfights or fistfights. L'Amour's major contribution to the western genre is his attempt to create, in 40 or more books, the stories of three families whose histories intertwine as the generations advance across the American frontier. The novels of the Irish Chantry, English Sackett, and French Talon families are L'Amour's most ambitious project, and sadly were left unfinished at his death. Although L'Amour did not complete all of the novels, enough of the series exists to demonstrate his vision. L'Amour's strongest attribute is his ability to tell a compelling story; readers do not mind if the story is similar to one they have read before, for in the telling, L'Amour adds enough small twists of plot and detail to make it worth the reader's while. L'Amour fans also enjoy the bits of information he includes about everything from wilderness survival skills to finding the right person to marry. These lessons give readers the sense that they are getting their money's worth, that there is more to a L'Amour novel than sheer escapism. With over 200 million copies of his books in print worldwide, L'Amour must be counted as one of the most influential writers of westerns in this century. He died from lung cancer on June 10, 1988. (Bowker Author Biography) Louis L'Amour, truly America's favorite storyteller, was the first fiction writer ever to receive the Congressional Gold Medal from the United States Congress in honor of his life's work, & was also awarded the Medal of Freedom. There are over 260 million copies of his books in print worldwide. (Publisher Provided) show less
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1982-07-05
- People/Characters
- Mary Breydon
- Important places
- Colorado, USA; Wyoming, USA; The Cherokee Trail
- Epigraph
- [None]
- Dedication
- To Harry and Ruth
- First words
- When the stage slowed to allow the horses to walk up the long grade, Mary Breydon was the only passenger awake
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Somebody, he thought, had dealt him a black deuce.
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 850
- Popularity
- 32,277
- Reviews
- 12
- Rating
- (3.64)
- Languages
- English, German, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 21
- ASINs
- 12
