The classic novel that inspired the motion picture Lonely Are the Brave—a stirring and unforgettable tribute to the American hero and American West.

A classic of modern Western literature, The Brave Cowboy follows Jack Burns, a loner at odds with modern civilization. He rides a feisty chestnut mare across the New West—a once beautiful land now smothered beneath airstrips and superhighways. An “anarchist cowboy,” he lives by a personal code of ethics that sets him on a collision course with the keepers of law and order. After a prison breakout plan goes awry, he finds himself and his horse, Whisky, pursued across the desert toward the mountains that lead to Mexico and to freedom. With local law enforcement, the feds, and the military on their tails, the cowboy and his horse race toward their destiny.

“One of the best writers to deal with the American West.”—Washington Post

“The Thoreau of the American West.”—Larry McMurtry