western novels that don't have a male lead

ValenaGraham

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Hey guys,
Maybe someone out there can tell me what is going on. I have sent my manuscript out to quite a few publishers, the female editors, liked it, the males publishers said it was well written. But it didn't follow the rules of westerns with male leads, absolutely no female gunfighters. My western is a western, with romance. Two gunfighters met and fall in love, their problems getting together. Her adventures in the west. I have seen two other novels with women leads in them. One I believe was called Savannah Rose. Anyone know a publisher who is locked into that view.
 
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Sloane

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This is exactly why I stay away from traditional publishing! Publishing houses are in it to make money, as they have very right to be. If female leads don't sell for them as a rule, they won't buy them. I really believe that the more innovative and creatively-themed novels are happening in the self-publishing world. You have to be willing to market the novel yourself, which is a bit of work, but it can be very rewarding - both financially and personally.

I have to say too that I appreciate - as someone who was born in the West and whose family came in wagon trains and founded towns and ranches - your choice of subject matter. I get so sick of westerns with cliche after cliche. I don't read them as a rule because I spend so much time rolling my eyes. I really like that you are presenting a woman as a strong figure - in reality women DID use guns, and quite well. Many could match men in terms of ranch work. They had to be tough to survive the settlement of the American West. These women were not soft little lilies. They were thorny briar roses.
 

Jack Judah

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Historically, your premise is absolutely believable. I don't find the concept of a female gunfighter at all out of line. Calamity Jane. Kittie Leroy. Mattie Silks. Belle Star. Pearl Hart. Those are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head. My grandparents' first landlady was fond of telling about the time she faced down the Laramie County Cattle Association's hired goons when they came to harass her (or forcibly evict -- these were the guys who hired Tom Horn after all) at her homestead. Her husband was away on business in Cheyenne. Alone, with a baby, she met the "regulators" at the door. With her rifle. Nobody died, but that's just one example of how common it was for women to be comfortable with a gun out here back in the day.

I know Matt Braun wrote a book about one of the famous madames -- I think it was Mattie Silks. So it can, has, and should be done more often. One issue I think you might be running into is a question of marketing. It's possible the romance element is strong enough that they feel male readers won't be interested. I'd say take a cop out and pitch it as a romance, but then you'd run into a whole new set of ossified genre conventions. I agree with Sloane. This might be a spot where self publishing is the way to go. It sounds like you have a case of square peg, round hole.
 
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dpaterso

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I know Western forum can be a tad quiet now and again, but resurrecting a thread from 2005 seems like an act of quiet desperation. :)

The OP hasn't visited since 06-24-2011 according to their profile, but maybe this info will help someone else.

-Derek
 

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And, well HECK, maybe having a few more people interested in Westerns will liven the room up a bit. I love the genre, myself.

And yep, that Matt Braun novel was Mattie Silks.
 

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WTF? If the genre really has stupid rules like this, it could explain why it's such a tough sell lately. I'd be hesitant to go off what just one person tells you. Maybe you just haven't pitched it to the right publisher yet :( Or is it possible to query it as something else? Is the love story central to the plot, and does it end with a HEA? Maybe it's a historical romance. Or could it be an actual historical novel set in the western US in that period? I'm not a lot of help here, though.

HA--just read the date on the OP. How do people find these buried threads?
 

Jack Judah

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I know Western forum can be a tad quiet now and again, but resurrecting a thread from 2005 seems like an act of quiet desperation. :)

Whoops. And I perpetuated the revivification. Saw the last response was recent, got excited that something was happening in here other than blowing tumbleweeds, and didn't even think to check the date of the OP.
 
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Jack Judah

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And, well HECK, maybe having a few more people interested in Westerns will liven the room up a bit. I love the genre, myself.

And yep, that Matt Braun novel was Mattie Silks.

Thought it was. Not one of his best.
 
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MaryMumsy

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OK, this will be a little long, so bear with me. And, full disclosure IANAW (I am not a writer).

At the time of the OP publishers were drawing a distinct line between 'Westerns' and novels set in the West. I don't know if that is still true. Novels set in the West had little to no market at that time. Even 5 years later that was true. One of my very close friends has the ms we refer to as "the epic". It is long enough to be three trilogies. Her agent loves it so much she still says it is the ms she signed my friend with. That's not the case, but nevertheless. It has been shopped. Editors love it. And they all agree that they cannot sell even one volume of it. Because there is no current market for novels set in the West, especially if they have a female MC. My friend is well published with a major NY house. She just submitted ms #12 in her sci-fi series. And has contracts on a couple more. But "the epic", which is dear to both our hearts, sits there on both our hard drives waiting for the day it might have a market.

There is still the occasional Western published. Robert Parker, before his death, published either 3 or 4 in a series. And the series has been continued by someone authorized by his family, but they just aren't the same.

So, those of you out there writing Westerns, or even novels set in the West, keep fighting the good fight. Some day the markets may change and you'll have your chance.

MM
 
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ValenaGraham

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Thank you, for your reply. That was the last one like this that I tried writing. Now days it seems that tv shows, movies and books are along the same lines. Nothing different, and my great great grandmother was a strong woman, who was from that time, and she grew up on a plantation and ended up homeless, and she was strong and never gave up. She made a lot of lemonaid, out of all of lifes lemons that came her way. She did it with a can do attitude. Because of her I wrote the book. I don't like it when women in movies, or books are just fainting, or screaming and just stand there waiting for someone else to help. I'm glad to see others who have answered my post here. It's not per say a romance, that is secondary. It's a young womans' story, her view of her world, her take on it.
 

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Both Zane Grey and Max Brand, two of the major icons of the old Western genre, featured major female lead characters in numerous novels. They aren't exclusive, but usually paired with, or against, a lead male character, but they are strong and well-developed characters. Max Brand's early trilogy The Untamed, The Night Horseman, and The Seventh Man is a good example. They are still in print, good reads, and gooooogle will get you there.

caw
 
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Ozziezumi

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The setting is probably more modern than what you are looking for, but you could take a look at Joe Lansdale's Sunset and Sawdust, which has a female protagonist and plays around with Western genre conventions quite a bit.
 

Jamesaritchie

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This is exactly why I stay away from traditional publishing! Publishing houses are in it to make money, as they have very right to be. If female leads don't sell for them as a rule, they won't buy them. I really believe that the more innovative and creatively-themed novels are happening in the self-publishing world. You have to be willing to market the novel yourself, which is a bit of work, but it can be very rewarding - both financially and personally.

I have to say too that I appreciate - as someone who was born in the West and whose family came in wagon trains and founded towns and ranches - your choice of subject matter. I get so sick of westerns with cliche after cliche. I don't read them as a rule because I spend so much time rolling my eyes. I really like that you are presenting a woman as a strong figure - in reality women DID use guns, and quite well. Many could match men in terms of ranch work. They had to be tough to survive the settlement of the American West. These women were not soft little lilies. They were thorny briar roses.

Female leads have always sold well, and publishing houses have always bought them. The only thing they don't buy is bad writing and bad storytelling. In reality, you're making a rule out of rare exceptions. Just because women could shoot well, or do ranch work well, has nothing at all to do with it. The truth is most, and I do mean MOST, women then were no different than women today, and darned few went around shooting guns or roping cattle.
 
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Elenitsa

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I have a western with a female lead (the second volume of "Lives in turmoil", titled "A New World") and it was well received by the critics. Hopefully the sequel (from the same point of view), going up to 1848, will also be well received...

My characters get to US in 1802, go West, and settle on the Mississippi (where it was the frontier then, across the Mississippi, on Saint Louis, it was Louisiana). The settlement they created, Venice IL, really exists in greater St. Louis. They witness Louisiana purchase, the New Madrid Earthquake in 1811, the war in 1812... and their village gets stronger.

The main character and a few others get captured by the Shawnees, (yes, I have seen maps of that time and there were a few Cherokees and Shawnees South from Saint Louis, in certain places, those who had already been displaced by other tribes from their initial lands), they succeed to run away together with a Cherokee fellow prisoner and spend a while with the Cherokees, who will remain their friends all their lives... Bison hunt, mustang taming are featured too.
 

Charke

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Film design is like this. There is a guide for every minute of the movie and it will tell you what has to happen in that minute. The trouble is that the audience is SO used to this formula. If you don't do it, if you leave something out, the audience feels that something is missing, even if they can't put their finger on it. You need to fill that back in somehow.

What is missing from the book that would be there if the protagonist was male? You don't need a male, you just need to figure out what isn't there because the character is female. You need some replacement for that. Pitch that to the agents. Maybe you'll have more success.

Maybe a male character would be meaner, or spit, or go to the brothel. You don't want the female character to do these things "just because". You need to find some other nasty western traits they could have that would be normal for a female in that time.

I know how hard it is to go against the norm and try to be successful. It's a pain. I'm surprise though because there are a lot of female westerns these days. Maybe pitch your book to the Western Romance crowd? I don't mean make it a romance. Just spit balling ideas.

- Mark Charke
 
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Helix

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...What is missing from the book that would be there if the protagonist was male? You don't need a male, you just need to figure out what isn't there because the character is female. You need some replacement for that. Pitch that to the agents. Maybe you'll have more success.

Maybe a male character would be meaner, or spit, or go to the brothel. You don't want the female character to do these things "just because". You need to find some other nasty western traits they could have that would be normal for a female in that time...

I'm no expert on Westerns, but I suspect that people don't read them for the spitting. My 2c worth.
 
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RBEmerson

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Reviving a corpse and hoping to hear Colin Clive's "It's alive! Alive!"...

I have two reactions to the notion of a female MC in "Trail of Dust"... First is, why ever not?!? Second is, this is in an era when women were (even more?) expected to stay in their place. The result is either a female MC who really stands out when trying to stay close to period correct. (Remember the Japanese adage, the tall nail is hammered down - or something close to it) Or accept "right costuming, different social setting".

Marketing? Boy howdy! Good luck!

Or maybe I'm clueless?
 

RBEmerson

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