western Archives - Lehua Parker

Dude vs. Chick Lit

by Lehua Parker | Aug 21, 2013 | Blog Tours, Guest Posts, & Interviews, Jolly Fish Press Titles & Authors

My friend and fellow author Eric Bishop just published his debut novel, The Samaritan’s Pistol. (Click here for my review.) We’ve had long conversations that have twisted and turned like an old cow trail about writing, literature, and ’80s rock bands. One of my favorites is our Dude vs. Chick Lit debates. Eric graciously wrote some of his thoughts on this topic.

Me: Dude vs. Chick Lit. Is there such a thing and if so, what are your favorite he-man titles?

Eric: Dude vs. chick lit? I think there is, or at least used to be, such a thing. As for my favorite he-man titles I really don’t have any, but I’ll offer an explanation. I’ve never seen any data to support it, but I think boys read more as teenagers in the eighties. Even as an author, I read less now than I did then.

Janilee and I have four daughters. The oldest is twenty-one and my baby is fourteen. They’ve grown up on the Twilight, Hunger Games and, of course Harry Potter series to become voracious readers.

Their reaction to Katniss was similar to my experience reading Louis L’amour in the eighties. We all love tough resilient heroes and heroines, who problem solve their way through some crucible. The western stories I read as a teenager tapped into something primal. The heroes were usually in their twenties or early thirties. I related in a personal way, wondering who I’d become. Would I grow up to be capable like the protagonists who cleaned up a corrupt town or chased down the runaway herd?

Eventually, I tired of Louis L’amour’s formulaic stories. The names and towns changed, but there was the same tough loner cowboy, fighting a stacked deck in the form of a corrupt sheriff, rancher, or crazed killer. I still like stories with these elements, but as a middle aged guy, I want something more than formulaic good and bad reflected in what I read. I’ve wondered what Louis L’amour’s protagonists would do with a biker gang who was trying to extort them, while going through a custody dispute with their third wife, some way of showing me the complexities of life.

While I enjoy the work of lots of different authors, The Samaritan’s Pistol is the story I look for in book stores but can’t find. I wonder if there isn’t an untapped market right now for guy or dude fiction.

Some say teenage boys don’t read because books can’t compete with over the top action and graphics of video games. I wonder what picture a great action author could put in the reader’s head if “Tour of Duty” or “Grand Theft Auto” was in paperback. Done right, I think teenage boys will read again in droves. Just like I did in a decade long, long ago!

Me: Rock on, Eric. I think you can define Dude Lit as more adrenaline action and less sparkly vampires and there’s a real need for that in bookstores and libraries. Like Harry Potter proved, kids (and guys) are willing to read good fiction that sparks the imagination and speaks to the secret inner hero in all of us.

By the way, if you’re looking for the perfect read for the hardworking, rather-be-fishing, what-these-moody-vampire-kids-need-is-a-job man in your life, The Samaritan’s Pistol fits the bill.

The Samaritan’s Pistol by Eric Bishop is published Jolly Fish Press and is available as a hardback, trade paperback, and eBook from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other purveyors of fine books.

Connect with Eric Bishop

Website: http://eric-bishop.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ericbishopauthor

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ericbishopwords

Book Review: The Samaritan’s Pistol
by Eric Bishop

by Lehua Parker | Aug 19, 2013 | Adult Fiction, Book Reviews & Announcements, Jolly Fish Press Titles & Authors

Eric Bishop likes to say that The Samaritan’s Pistol is about a guy who had a gun and used it when he needed it. It’s a pithy, memorable way to describe his book and the cover certainly conveys this idea.

But Eric’s book is much deeper than a simple gunslinger western—although there are horses, guns, ranches, sheriffs, and hay bales a plenty. I tease him that it’s cowboys versus mobsters, but even that’s too reductive. The Samaritan’s Pistol blends several different genres into one rip-roaring read that sure to delight readers of thrillers, westerns, spy, literary fiction, and crime novels. There’s even a little skinny dip into romance.

With a few keystrokes, Eric paints rural life in small town Wyoming where people generally let people live as they please, but fiercely circle the wagons at the first sight outsider trouble for those they consider their own. I’ve lived in these kinds of communities and the small kindnesses that Eric describes are as real and as genuine as the characters he creates. In many ways his story is as much about this way of life as it is about murder, revenge, and money stolen from the mob.

But you knew it had to come back to the mob, right?

Jim Cooper’s ex-military and living as a rancher and wilderness guide in the town he grew up in. Except for a couple of ranch hands and his dog, Duke, he’s pretty much a loner. Like most modern-day cowboys, he’s got his own moral code about fair fights and damsels in distress, so it’s no surprise that when he comes upon three men on a mountain trail about to shoot an unarmed fourth he decides to even up the odds. When the smoke clears, Jim has three bodies to pack out, a dead horse, an injured man to care for, and more trouble than he knows what to do with. It’s a journey that sends him to Las Vegas and back and gives a new meaning to shoot, shovel, and shut up.

But I gotta warn you. The fight doesn’t end in this book. I think Eric’s got a couple more novels about Jim Cooper simmering in the ol’ dutch oven.

If you’re looking for the perfect read for the hardworking, rather-be-fishing, what-these-moody-vampire-kids-need-is-a-job man in your life, The Samaritan’s Pistol fits the bill.

The Samaritan’s Pistol by Eric Bishop is published Jolly Fish Press and is available as a hardback, trade paperback, and eBook from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other purveyors of fine books.