The Taming of Red Butte Western

A man who fears his own cowardice is handed a railroad running through hell. Howard Lidgerwood, newly appointed superintendent of the Red Butte Western, must impose order on a Utah desert line populated by outlaws, drunkards, and workers who've never answered to anyone. His predecessor died trying. The company calls it an opportunity. Everyone else calls it a death sentence. What unfolds is Lidgerwood's reluctant transformation from trembling bureaucrat to a man who must learn to command respect in a world that respects only force. Lynde's 1910 Western works as both adventure and psychological study: the frontier wasn't just wild land, it was wild people, and taming them required more than a badge and a timetable. For readers who want their Westerns with real interiority, a hero who must manufacture bravery rather than simply possess it.