Events & News

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Awards and other recognition:


Fithian Press nominates Canyons for Pushcart Prize

“I was proud to nominate Samuel Western’s novel Canyons for this year’s Pushcart Prize, because I happen to agree with Craig Johnson that ‘Sam Western is one of the finest writers in the American West.’ Canyons is a stirring, spellbinding book about friendship, remorse, revenge, and reconciliation. A lovely book.”

— John Daniel, Publisher, Fithian Press

 

What other writers are saying about Canyons:


“Sam Western’s first novel punches far above its weight class. From the horrific accident that opens the gates of the story to the colliding destinies of the main characters, this is a stripped down-to-the-essence book that puts the reader inside starkly contrasting lives and landscapes.”

— Hal Herring, contributing editor at Field and Stream and author of Famous Firearms of the Old West: From Wild Bill Hickok’s Colt Revolvers to Geronimo’s Winchester.

 

Western captures such diametrically opposed sensations in deceptively simple prose–so difficult to achieve!–and better yet, all the complexities fold as gracefully as a silk scarf at the close. That’s the best, that the story couldn’t have ended any other way, though I had no clue beforehand how he’d bring this magic about. He transforms his story into reality inside my head so that I feel convinced that it all happened this way and could only have happened this way.”

— Anastasia Hobbet, author of Small Kingdoms and The Pleasure of Believing.