Book Monday-Author Stephen Bly & Cowboy for A Rainy Afternoon

Today's book is Cowboy for a Rainy Afternoon by Award-winning Author Stephen Bly.

"A 10-year-old boy with red straw cowboy hat, cap gun, and silver-painted wooden bullets. Six story-telling, cribbage playing old cowboys. A ’49 Plymouth with open trunk. A damsel in distress. All the fixings for a summer’s day adventure at the Matador Hotel in 1954 Albuquerque. Maybe you weren’t born 100 years too late!

Cowboy For A Rainy Afternoon is a twist on the traditional Western story. In 1954, six men who spent their youth as cowboys in the Southwest, now gather at the Matador Hotel lobby in downtown Albuquerque, New Mexico, for weekly games of cribbage. One rainy afternoon, one of the men brings his grandson. They’re delighted with this captive audience. They all play cribbage and the men tell stories of their exploits in the old days. The eldest was born during the Civil War. All of them cowboyed from the late 1880s until the 1940s. They tell first-hand stories of what the West was truly like.

Many years later, the boy looks back and remembers the day he heard of a way of life and western tradition that’s quickly becoming extinct. He also recalls the lessons he learned and the excitement of a drama that unfolded before them that provoked the cowboys’ last stand. This reminiscent account of real cowboy lives resonates like Andy Adams’ book, The Log of a Cowboy, written in the early 1900s.

Author’s suggestion: this book is best read aloud, as though around a campfire, by someone who gets the hang of the rhythm of the language.

EXCERPT FROM CHAPTER ONE: http://snipurl.com/z5n0g


REVIEW QUOTES from previous Stephen Bly novels: “I have always been a fan of Louis L’Amour but I must say your book is as good if not better than anything of his. I shall remain a fan of Stephen Bly.” -- Jimmy Dickens, Grand Ole Opry
“Bly offers a kinder, gentler Western that should appeal to fans of Louis L’Amour.” – Library Journal
BIO:
Stephen Bly has published 103 books of historical and contemporary fiction (37 classic westerns) and Christian life and family nonfiction for adults, teens, and kids (9-14 yrs.). Eighteen books were co-authored with wife, Janet. Four of his novels were finalists for the Christy Award. His historical western, The Long Trail Home, won a Christy. The Blys have 3 married sons and 3 grandchildren and live in north-central Idaho at 4,000 ft. elev. on the Nez Perce Indian Reservation.

Learn more about the Blys at their website www.BlyBooks.com or “On A Western Trail” blog www.BlyBooks.blogspot.com or follow then on twitter www.twitter.com/BlyBooks or friend them on Facebook (Stephen Bly or Janet Chester Bly). Cowboy For A Rainy Afternoon (hardback, Center Point) is available by order through your local bookstore (Ingram Distributors) or online www.Amazon.com or www.BlyBooks.com . You may also check it out at your local library.

Western Author Stephen Bly Speaks About Western Women

My guest today is Author Stephen Bly, a longtime Western author. Here's Stephen:

"A WESTERN WOMAN’S CHARM
For cowboys, sticking up for a woman’s honor…no debate. They don’t blink. And they don’t hesitate to offer help for a damsel in distress. But most cowboys admire strong women. That’s why I write about them. Gals like. . .wayward, banished Grace Denison in The Senator’s Other Daughter. Lixie Miller and her fight for peace and purpose (The General’s Notorious Widow). Determined Oliole Fontenot’s attempt to succeed or fail on her own merit (Miss Fontenot). Isabel Leon’s struggle with heartache and revenge in The Marquesa. Alena Louisa as a confident entrepreneur in a man’s world in Red Dove of Monterey. Christina Swan of Proud Quail of the San Joaquin, who strikes out on her own to oversee newly acquired family property that is barren, hot, and almost impossible to cultivate. Carolina Cantrell (Sweet Carolina), who is used to running her family’s import business, but finds a very difficult challenge to her business sense in the untamed Montana Territory.

But my favorite heroine is gutsy Martina Swan, the Last Swan in Sacramento. In a land and a time where reputations were gained and lost in a matter of weeks, Martina Swan discovers whether she has the faith and courage to survive. They were supposed to live happily ever after. Instead, Martina Swan, daughter of the legendary Wilson and Alena Merced, grappled to find peace in a marriage that is falling apart. Her husband is in Virginia City, Nevada, trying his luck at mining the Comstock Lode. A promise to come home a wealthy man “in three weeks” was given a year before. Meanwhile, Martina struggled to keep the family store solvent in Sacramento. And the pressures mount as she seeks to raise their child, the bank tries to close the store, and armed outlaws insist she possesses their stolen treasure.

Always living in the shadow of her mother’s beauty and her father’s valor, Martina finds that her one true source of joy is her daughter. But when a stranger shows up with a message from her husband, Martina determines to go and bring her man home. A shocking and toughening experience awaits her as she fights the most difficult battle of her life—learning to forgive and love again as she faces a deep lesson about herself, the nature of love, and God’s unwavering concern for her entire family.

My newest release, Cowboy For A Rainy Afternoon, features not a female protagonist, but a 10-year-old boy in 1954 who suffers a first crush on his own damsel in distress. . .a woman who reminds him of a movie star like Clara Bow, Betty Grable, Marilyn Monroe.

It was Grace Kelly in High Noon that stole my own ten-year-old heart. I figured she wasn’t too smart, ‘cause she couldn’t understand why Will had to turn back and try to save the town. Shoot, that’s in a cowboy’s bones. . .and in the grit of a strong woman. But, my oh my, she surely was purdy. "--Stephen Bly. Christy Award Winner for Westerns"
Thanks, Stephen, that was quite a list of strong women. How many of you enjoy a good Western?

If you want more, drop by

www.BlyBooks.com

www.BlyBooks.blogspot.com