Under my tree.

With Christmas in the offing, I thought I’d give myself a couple of gifts for the season.

My web site, www.writerRodMiller.com, was originally built by my friend and finer author Michael Zimmer. But the technology is now outdated, and updating the site was time consuming and difficult. So, I bit the bullet and brazened myself for some frustration and built a new one.

Same address, www.writerRodMiller.com. It’s not as spiffy looking as the earlier one, but I think it should serve. It has links from all my books to either the publisher or my Amazon Author page, so should you want to buy a book (or subscribe to a magazine) you can “click through” as they say in the trade.

Also new is a little promotional video for my new novel, Rawhide Robinson Rides the Tabby Trail. You can view it below, on YouTube, or on my Amazon Author Page. It will only occupy 38 seconds of your time and you will, I hope, find it—the book it’s about, rather—intriguing. All thanks to banjo magician extraordinaire Mike Iverson for permission to use “Oh! Susannah.”

Enough self-serving crass commercialism. But it is, after all, the Christmas season. May you all have a merry one.

Wrangler Winning Amigos.

In mid-April, two of my friends will be in Oklahoma City to receive what may well be the highest honor anyone who writes about the West can earn.

Each year, the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum bestows Western Heritage Awards in a variety of categories. This year, my good friends Michael Zimmer and Larry Thomas are among the winners—Michael for "Outstanding Western Novel" for The Poacher’s Daughter and Larry for "Outstanding Poetry Book" for The Goatherd. Each will walk down the red carpet to receive The Wrangler, a handsome bronze trophy that all Western writers would love to get their hands on.

Both these men have written a passel of good stuff that deserves recognition, so this honor is no big surprise to those who have read their work. And, having read The Poacher’s Daughter and The Goatherd, I can vouch for the quality of these books. If you haven’t read them, do so. Both are "Outstanding" examples of the best in Western writing today.

Congratulations, felicitations, compliments, cheers, praises, accolades, and a big tip of the hat to Michael Zimmer and Larry Thomas.