In three of his finest short novels, "The Cowboy Author" captures the West as it was. In "The Block K Rides Tonight," Cole Griffin returns to Montana intent on learning the identity of the man responsible for his father's hanging. In "Rusty Rides Alone," Jim Rusty finds Apache Basin in the grip of a range war instigated by sheep herder Jude Quillan. And "Border Wolves," set in the years just after the Great War, paints a vivid picture of whiskey, smuggling, and strife along the Mexican border.