Them Old Cowboy Songs is the story of Archie and Rose McLaverty, their life in the West and what became of them. To ruin the ending, what became of them is death. And not of old age either.

Had I come up with the seeds of this story - the idea behind the fiction - never in a million years would I have been able to turn it into something entertaining and meaningful. Any stories of a 'heavy' nature that I come up with tend towards pointless, embarrassing and, commonly, both. Meanwhile Annie Proux has typed up a storm of awesome, with enough old-west terminology and spelling as to make me believe I'm standing next to Rose and Archie as they work through a typical day. She really knows how to reveal the soul of a cowboy and a way of life foreign to most of us any more.

I have to wonder what else Annie Proulx has written.