About the Book
Billy the Kid--a.k.a. Henry McCarty, Henry Antrim, and William Bonney--was a horse thief, cattle rustler, charismatic rogue, and cold-blooded killer. A superb shot, the Kid gunned down four men single-handedly and five others with the help of cronies. Two of his victims were Lincoln County, New Mexico, deputies, killed during the Kid's brazen daylight escape from the courthouse jail on April 28, 1881. After dispensing with his guards and breaking the chain securing his leg irons, the Kid danced a macabre jig on the jail's porch before riding away on a stolen horse as terrified townspeople--and many sympathizers--watched. For new sheriff Pat Garrett, the chase was on. To Hell on a Fast Horse re-creates the thrilling manhunt for the Wild West's most iconic outlaw. It is also the first dual biography of the Kid and Garrett, two larger-than-life figures who would not have become the stuff of legend without the other. Drawing on voluminous primary sources and a wealth of published scholarship, Mark Lee Gardner digs beneath the myth to take a fresh look at these two men, their relationship, and what they would come to mean to a public enamored of the violent past of the Wild West.
Contains mature themes.
About the Author :
Mark Lee Gardner is the author of To Hell on a Fast Horse and Shot All to Hell, which received multiple awards, including a Spur Award from Western Writers of America. An authority on the American West, Gardner has appeared on PBS's American Experience, as well as on the History Channel, the Travel Channel, and on NPR. He has written for the Los Angeles Times, True West, Wild West, American Cowboy, and New Mexico magazine. He lives with his family in Cascade, Colorado. Winner of several AudioFile Earphones Awards and a multiple finalist for the APA's prestigious Audie Award, Alan Sklar has narrated nearly two hundred audiobooks, including Black Hawk Down by Mark Bowden, The Kennedys: America's Emerald Kings by Thomas Maier, and The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright. Named a Best Voice of 2009 by AudioFile magazine, his work has earned him a Booklist Editors' Choice Award (twice), a Publishers Weekly Listen-Up Award, and Audiobook of the Year by ForeWord magazine. The Dartmouth graduate's theatre credits include Hamlet, The Taming of the Shrew, The Seagull, and many modern roles. Alan has also narrated thousands of corporate videos for clients such as NASA, Sikorsky Aircraft, IBM, Dannon, Pfizer, AT&T, and SONY. For several years, he has been the spokesman for TracFone Wireless Co. and can often be seen and heard on TracFone radio and TV spots and infomercials. "I am so pleased, as is my husband, to have found a narrator that holds our attention so well that we have come to compare every other narrator to him (you). So far we have found none with such a talent as yours. We very much plan to listen to as many of your works as we can find." -Sandi King, a letter to Mr. Sklar Graham Rowat is an award-winning narrator who has appeared in numerous television shows and stage productions. He has had roles on Broadway in Meteor Shower, Sunset Boulevard, Mamma Mia, Guys and Dolls, LoveMusik, Dracula, and Beauty and the Beast, and his Off-Broadway credits include The Blue Flower (Second Stage) and The Boys in the Band (Transport Group). Nationally, he has appeared in productions of White Christmas and Les Miserables, and his regional credits include Arsenic and Old Lace, Constellations (Berkshire Theatre Festival), and A Funny Thing . . . Forum (Two River Theater, Williamstown Theatre Festival). His television credits include Elementary and The Good Wife.