Ride On: A Rodeo Novel (ePub)

Go for your dreams, they say. Just do it, they tell us.

Sometimes, though, that dream we pursue with such single-minded intensity can double back and become the pursuer instead. Unwittingly, we become the prey pursued, and the whole thing just goes relentlessly around and around like some crazy carnival ride that won't stop to let us off.

Michael Anders has a dream: to win a Rookie of the Year buckle and then a World Championship buckle riding bareback horses and bulls as a professional rodeo cowboy. Can he do it? Come along and see.

Michael and his two traveling partners, Kirby Jordan and Jim Ed Sarkos, begin this rodeo run in Goshen, Texas, where things don't go quite as planned. After that they set out for New Canaan, Iowa, via some Podunk shows in western Kansas. It's there – in the middle of all those hooking, no-bucking bulls, running-off horses, and "extracurricular" activities – that things take a turn slightly for the better and much more for the worse. But, then, the big rodeo and big money and glory still lie ahead in Iowa.

In New Canaan, it's a hard-won arrival, considering the local rowdies Michael, Kirby, and Jim Ed have to subdue, the host of top hands entered at the rodeo, and the temptations and distractions all around them. But things come together at last, and Michael shows 'em how an Oklahoma cowboy spurs bareback horses and rides rank bulls. They even have a little fun at the midway – there's more than the ride in the arena of course. It's all great until . . . well, until . . .

Travel along with these three through all the bulls and broncs, mud and bruises, wins and losses, triumphs and catastrophes. It's a wild ride. So pull your hat down tight, get a good seat, and get ready to ride.