All the Pretty Horses (1992), by Cormac McCarthy, focuses on the coming of age of its two protagonists in the Southwest and Mexico.

Larry McMurtry's novel Lonesome Dove (1985) weaves together stories of cattle herding that portray the difficult lives men and women experienced in the American West at the end of the nineteenth century.

Proulx's “The Half-Skinned Steer” (1998) appears in the same collection as “Brokeback Mountain” and focuses on the hard landscapes of the West and the troubled people who live there.

American West (1994), by Dee Brown, explores the last half of the nineteenth century and the development of the enduring myths of the West.