Book review # 1

Do you want to know what a real rancher thinks? There are some excellent novels by "ranchers and..."; that is, writers who come to ranching from something else. But if there is another first- rate writer who comes from three generations on the harsh plains of eastern Montana, I don't know of him. John Moore is the real deal,  a poet and novelist who believes in saving the Sage grouse but not that government regulations are the best way to do it; who loves horses, but thinks it is tragic that horse slaughter is forbidden by sentimentalists who cause more pain than they save (actually John has written more sensibly about horses than most anybody recently).

I will not go on too long about his newest book, Looking for Lynne, because I have blurbed it, as follows: "John L Moore, rancher, horseman, poet, and serious novelist, is unembarrassed about the cowboy way; relentless in his examination of politically correct dogma, and darkly humorous. Looking for Lynne is suspenseful and sad, funny and moving and true." But as I have emphasized his seriousness, let me give you a little of his dry wit.

"Have any of you boys been to Elko?" Garcia asked.

"You mean the big cowboy poetry gathering?" Barney said.

"That'd be slumming for Renaissance men",  Joe joked.

"Slumming?" Garcia. "You don't like cowboy poetry?"

"Barn Wall's got nothing against cowboy poets," Ezra said. "Except that half of them aren't cowboys and fewer are poets."

"What?" Garcia said. "I don't believe this. I love cowboy poetry."

Nothing wrong with it," Joe said. "Except they need to cull the herd. They've been reproducing too quickly and overstocking the country."