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"Red River Valley"

When I decided to try my hand at writing books, I began by writing contemporary romances—a career move than didn't work out too well judging by the pile of unsold manuscripts buried away in my closet.

I knew my true heart belonged in the American West—after all, I grew up watching movies like SHANE and APACHE, loving the texture and feel of those gritty, often funny westerns, and listening to my father's endless country music collection. When it came to writing, however, the thought of putting together a 100,000+ manuscript seemed way too daunting for me to even try.

Then I heard about Romance Writers of America (RWA). While attending my first conference in 1988, I quite literally stumbled into a workshop about writing historical romance. I have no idea how I wound up in there, because that was not my writing interest, but I went, and when it was over, I came out of that workshop fired up like never before.

I wrote the first draft of my first western in my head while flying home from that conference. I'd barely unpacked before I raced to the library and started looking for anything and everything I could about 1886 Arizona Territory. It was then, even before that book sold that I knew I'd found my writing "home".

Part of my love for the American West comes from the humor which sprang up along with our towns and cities. The trailblazers, cowboys, miners, and ranchers who opened the doors to the west included some of the wildest, wackiest characters I've ever come across—and I absolutely adore writing about wild and crazy people.

The American West was a tough place to conquer, with often harsh and unpredictable weather. The way many American adventurers dealt with that harshness was through humor. That, in my opinion, is what makes humor a natural for western historical romance. A woman, in particular, who traveled west had to have endurance and courage, and a tremendous sense of humor to survive. She had to be as tough as the dirt she claimed, and sometimes—Calamity Jane comes to mind—she was even wilder than the land she tamed.

Although some politicians and many historians would have us believe otherwise, the old west was not won and tamed by statesmen or lawmakers. It was built by gunslingers, gamblers, pimps, habitual failures, soiled doves, and criminals running from the law as well as those simply chasing a dream.

It's impossible for me NOT to find a humorous feel to my work when the pioneers of the American West called their towns by such graphic names as Cripple Creek, Deadwood, Bucksnort, Busted Heel, Purgatory, and Hangtown.

On top of that, they populated those towns with folks who took nicknames like: Johnny the Oyster, Blonde May, Club Foot Frank, Colorado Charlie, Old Frenchy the Bottle Fiend, Cold Deck Johnny, California Jack, Cheating Sheely, Pancake Bill, Mysterious Jimmy, Pink Bedford, Potato Creek Johnny, Laughing Sam, Bloody Dick—and last, but my favorite, Swill Barrel Jimmy.

I didn't make any of those names up. Those were actual characters who lived in Deadwood during the 1870's and 1880's, and hung out with the likes of Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok. I also used every last one of those names in the book I wrote about the characters of Deadwood titled, WILDCAT (Harper, 1993).

Early on in my career, before I sold a book, I came across a verbatim transcript of a sentence imposed upon a defendant convicted of murder in the Federal District Court of the Territory of New Mexico in 1881. I saved it because to me it embodied all that is unique, humorous, and special about the American West. Times were tough, so the tough got going—and sometimes they did it with quite a flair!

A United States judge actually intoned the following:

Jose Manuel Miguel Xavier Gonzales, in a few short weeks it will be spring. The snows of winter will flee away, and the ice will vanish, and the air will become soft and balmy. In short, Jose Manuel Miguel Xavier Gonzales, the annual miracle of the years will awaken and come to pass, but you won't be there. The rivulet will run its soaring course to the sea, the timid desert flowers will put forth their tender shoots, the glorious valleys of this imperial domain will blossom as the rose. Still, you won't be here to see. From every tree top some wild woods songster will carol his mating song, butterflies will sport in the sunshine, the busy bee will hum happy as it pursues its accustomed vocation, the gentle breeze will tease the tassels of the wild grasses, and all nature, Jose Manuel Miguel Xavier Gonzales, all will be glad, but you. You won't be here to enjoy it because I command the sheriff or some other officers of the county to lead you out to some remote spot, swing you by the neck from a notting bough of some sturdy oak, and let you hang until you are dead. And then, Jose Manuel Miguel Xavier Gonzales, I further command that such officer or officers retire quickly from your dangling corpse, that vultures may descend from the heavens upon your filthy body until nothing shall remain but bare, bleached bones of a cold-blooded, copper-colored, blood-thirsty, throat-cutting, chili-eating, sheep-herding, murdering son-of-a-b****.

And with that, my friends, I rest my own case!

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Sharon Ihle is the bestselling, award-winning author of twelve historical novels set in the American West. For information about Sharon and her books, visit her web site.