The Last Ranch: A Novel of the New American West

The great saga of an American ranching family that gripped readers in the New York Times bestselling novel Hard Country and its sequel, Backlands, concludes in The LastRanch, the final, mesmerizing novel in Michael McGarrity's powerful and richly authentic American West trilogy.

When Matthew Kerney returns to his ranch in the remote, beautiful San Andres Mountains of New Mexico, honorably discharged after serving in Sicily during World War II, he must not only endeavor to recover physically and emotionally from a devastating combat injury, but he must also fight attempts by the U.S. Army to seize control of his land for expanded weapons testing. Yet keeping his land is only half the battle as he struggles with an aging father no longer able to carry his load at the ranch, an ex-convict intent on killing him, and a failing relationship with a woman he dearly loves. As Matt's personal and family life unravels, a punishing drought pushes him to the brink of ruin, and he is forced to draw upon all his mental and physical resources to keep his world--and the people in it--from collapsing.

Spanning the era from World War II to the end of the Vietnam conflict, The Last Ranch enthralls with the deeply rich, sometimes heartbreaking Kerney family saga as it steps brilliantly into the mid-twentieth-century world of the new American West.

MICHAEL McGARRITY is the New York Times bestselling author of Backlands, Hard Country, the Anthony Award-nominated Tularosa, and eleven other bestselling Kevin Kerney crime novels. A former deputy sheriff for Santa Fe County, he also served as an instructor at the New Mexico Law Enforcement Academy and as an investigator for the New Mexico Public Defender’s Office. He lives in Santa Fe with his wife, Emily Beth.