Badluck Way: A Year on the Ragged Edge of the West Hardcover - 2014

The gripping memoir of a young man, a wolf, their parallel lives and ultimate collision, Badluck Way is also an ode to the satisfaction of hard work on some of the wildest and most beautiful land in the world.

Mine might have been a simple, pretty story, if not for the wolves. In late July, they emerged from the foothills...

Reminiscent of Farley MowatâÈçs Never Cry Wolf and Matthew CrawfordâÈçs Shop Class as Soul Craft, this vivid narrative of a year on the wild, windswept Sun Ranch in southwest Montana describes life on the range in haunting language. Just over the border from Yellowstone, the Sun holds thousands of cattle and elk amid many predatorsâÈ'bear, mountain lions, and wolves. Ranch hand Bryce Andrews recounts marathon days and nights of building fences, riding, roping, and otherwise learning the hard business of caring for cattle, an initiation that changes him from a city kid into a skilled cowboy. But when the wolves suddenly begin killing the ranchâÈçs cattle, Andrews has to shoulder a rifle, chase the pack, and do what heâÈçd hoped he would never have to do.

Badluck Way is about transformation and complications, about living with dirty hands, every day. It is about the hard choices that wake a man at night and take a lifetime to reconcile. Called, âÈêAn important meditation on what it means to share space and breathe the same air as truly wild animals,âÈë (Tom Groneberg, author of The Secret Life of Cowboys), Badluck Way is the memorable story of one young manâÈçs rebirth in the crucible of the WestâÈçs wild landscape, a place at the center of the heartâÈçs geography, savage and gorgeous in equal measure.

Details

• Title Badluck Way: A Year on the Ragged Edge of the West
• Author Bryce Andrews
• Binding Hardcover
• Edition First Edition
• Pages 238
• Volumes 1
• Language ENG
• Publisher Atria Books, Qk4
• Date 2014-01-07
• Illustrated Yes
• ISBN 9781476710839 / 147671083X
• Weight 1.05 lbs (0.48 kg)
• Dimensions 9.1 x 6 x 1.2 in (23.11 x 15.24 x 3.05 cm)
• Library of Congress subjects Montana, Ranch life - Montana
• Library of Congress Catalog Number 2013011635
• Dewey Decimal Code B

âÈêIn Badluck Way, cattlehand and writer Bryce Andrews takes us on a fascinating ride through one of the most beautiful landscapes and thorniest issues of todayâÈçs American WestâÈ'how can the newly reintroduced wolf and traditional cattle ranching coexist? Badluck Way is by turns an adventure story of a young man on a sprawling Montana ranch, a thoughtful reflection on the ranching life, and a visceral exploration of the cruel amorality of the natural world. Beautifully written, AndrewsâÈçs book delivers a powerful emotional punch.âÈë