Diana's Books
ISBN: 9781937147167
Trade paperback - 416 pages
$21.95
ISBN: 9781937147174
Kindle Edition
$9.99
ISBN: 9781937147150
Limited collectors edition hardcover signed & numbered - 416 pages
$50.00
Nighthawk Rising: A Biography of Accused Cattle Rustler Queen Ann Bassett of Brown's Park
Published: 2019, High Plains Press
Subject: Old West History/Biography
Awards: 2020 Spur Award Winner - Best Western Nonfiction Biography, Western Writers of America; 2020 Award Finalist - Best Woman Writer, High Plains Book Awards; 2020 Award Finalist - History, Colorado Humanities Center for the Book Colorado Book Awards; 2020 Winner - Best Biography, Wyoming State Historical Society
​
This is a sweeping history from the American West wherein readers are beckoned into the remarkable narrative of a green-eyed, red-haired beauty. The author breathes life into Anna Maria "Queen Ann" Bassett and also into Ann's wondrous valley, Brown's Park, located in the area where Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming converge.
Ann Bassett thrived, untamed within the realm of her family's homesteaded cattle ranch on the eastern edge of Brown's Park in Colorado. She was a child of branding irons, cattle drives, and drifting trail dust, and she and her valley were romanced by wild horses, chaps, and big hats. She came into bloom as a skilled cowgirl, and she presented a stunning portrait when on the back of a horse. Nonetheless, she lived in a tumultuous time of outlaws and range war. Violence and death were part of her surroundings.
Nighthawk Rising conducts a splendid inquiry into what is one of the most intriguing chapters in the settling of the Rockies, complete with massive cattle herds, range wars, outlaws, Native American struggles and conflicts, and the indomitable pioneers who settled the land. This comprehensive history has an abundance of new information and never-before-seen photographs. It is both beautiful in word and genuinely stark in its portrayal of the Old West.
With artistry and truth, the author takes her readers into the throes of the Meeker Massacre and unveils, for the first time, the vivid and intimate details of the bloody uprising and its aftermath through the accounts of three white women held captive by the Utes. This book also gives a voice to some of the Ute men and women involved, and their individual stories are expressed in their own words which the author gleaned from direct testimony in government documents.
This biography reveals in unembellished detail the truth behind the men Isam Dart and Mat Rash, and the terrorism inflicted on them - and on Ann - by hired killer Tom Horn. It takes the reader alongside Queen Ann Bassett when grim-faced and enraged, she rides alone with her thoughts of vengeance to patrol the range and prevent cattle baron Ora Haley's herds from swamping the Brown's Park range. Carrying a rifle strapped to her saddle and a bullwhip in hand, the young woman sends encroaching cattle away at a swift gallop.
Queen Ann lives a full life of great wonder and severe tragedy. She is arrested at the point of a shotgun and twice tried for rustling. About herself living in the wilds of the West she said, "I was a mangy coyote and loved it."
Ultimately, Queen Ann Bassett rides into legend as did others in her domain including Butch Cassidy, Tom Horn, and her family - disparagingly called the "Bassett Gang."
aWhat Others Say About this Book:
Dan Davidson, Director of the Museum of Northwest Colorado: "In Nighthawk Rising, Diana Allen Kouris has painted a new masterpiece of what life was like in the remote, rugged, and yet beautiful Brown's Park. Through her years of tireless research, she has in another sense become a master restorationist - bringing back color and depth to a canvas once obscured by generations of smoke and grime of half-truths and misinterpretations regarding Ann Bassett and her family and their neighbors. Diana's own Brown's Park roots, combined with her love of its history and a talent for the written word, has gifted her with the unique ability to accomplish such a monumental task."
​
Wild West (magazine) - Candy Moulton, author of 15 books including Roadside History of Colorado: Moving beyond the Legend:
"Diana Kouris again takes on a subject tied to Brown's Park, Colorado, where she was reared, this time profiling one of the state's best-known women - 'Queen Ann' Bassett. Much has been written about Bassett, but Kouris mined the archival documents, many never before used, to write this sympathetic but honest portrayal.
Kouris relates an intimate story. She painstakingly dug into the archives, gleaned details long-buried within existing documents, and unearthed new sources. Nighthawk Rising reads like a novel, but every story in it is verifiable history."
​
Craig Press - Diane Prather: "I can't say enough about this book. It's superb, and I admire the author's extensive research and her gift for writing."
​
Chronicle of the Old West - Phyllis Morreale-de la Garza: "A fascinating story. Diana's writing is filled with original detail and generates a feeling of respect and empathy for Queen Ann. A truly haunting story."
ISBN: 9781937147167
Trade paperback - 416 pages
$17.95
Riding the Edge of an Era: Growing Up Cowboy on the Outlaw Trail
Published: 2009, High Plains Press
Subject: Ranch Life/Memoir/Western History
Awards: 2010 WILLA Literary Award Finalist - Creative Nonfiction, Women Writing the West; 2010 Wyoming State Historical Society - Nonfiction Book; 2010 Award Finalist - Best Woman Writer, High Plains Book Awards
From: RIDING THE EDGE OF AN ERA
On this range we called home, old-time cowboys worked cattle on snaky broncs, and the stories and signs left behind by Native Americans and outlaws were still fresh. Without telephones or electricity, we depended on each other and read at night by the candle-like light of coal oil lamps. Tightly woven into the cowboy life, Nonie Bobby and I thrived within a loving family and within the bond we shared with each other and this beautiful place.
​
In this elegant and illuminating true story, Diana Allen Kouris tells of growing up on the historic Brown's Park Livestock Ranch which lay along the famed Outlaw Trail in the valley of Brown's Park where, in the 1800s Butch Cassidy found sanctuary. Hers was a magical childhood spent in the embrace of a loving and hard-working cattle ranching family. It is a story of joy and loss as Diana and her siblings grow to adulthood in a remote and rugged part of the West. Riding their horses side-by-side Nonie, Bobby, and Diana live a beautiful, poignant story as they search for and find the best of themselves.
​
Opening Paragraph:
We were the three youngest of the six Allen kids and we were best pals. Often given free rein to ride our cow horses on trails disappearing into sunrises and cedars, Nonie, Bobby, and I found the reflection of our heritage in enchanted places where shadows of history live. We didn't know we were riding on the far edge of an era or that our way of life was disappearing even as we lived it.
aWhat Others Say About this Book:
D.L. Birchfield, author of Field of Honor: "Riding the Edge of an Era is one of the most heartwarming and captivating books I've ever read. Diana Allen Kouris is a masterful storyteller with a wonderful story to tell."
​
Mary E. Trimble, author of Tenderfoot: "Riding the Edge of an Era: Growing up Cowboy on the Outlaw Trail is an extraordinary story written by a woman steeped in a western ranching environment."
​
The Billings Gazette - Jana Nelson: "The author is very eloquent in her writing and can paint a picture with her words when she describes the area where she grew up. The way she weaves the stories from the past into her family's experiences helps give the reader a genuine feel for the richness in history that accompanies life along the Outlaw Trail."
ISBN: 9781937147167
Trade paperback - 416 pages
(Currently Unavailable)
The Romantic and Notorious History of Brown's Park
Published: 1988, Wolverine Gallery
Subject: Old West History/Ranch Life/Western History
Regional Best Seller
​
A Preface From the Author:
The valley of Brown's Park sits astride the Green River along the famed Outlaw Trail in the rugged "Three Corners" country of Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming. It was a place of native Americans, pioneers, romance, and lawlessness. Outlaws, including Butch Cassidy and his partner, Elzy Lay, knew Brown's Park as a sanctuary where a meal and fresh horses could be found.
From the time I was a little girl, happily growing up in Brown's Park in our historic ranch house built in the 1880s with logs and wooden pegs, I was very aware of the unique history surrounding me. I often drank from the icy spring where outlaws drank, near a small cabin at the mouth of a canyon where they once hid. When I was still so small that I had to find a boulder or a fence to climb so I could get my foot in the saddle stirrup, I was entranced by the stories my mother told about our beloved valley.
In the very kitchen where we ate our supper each night, outlaw Butch Cassidy had many times eaten his. In that same cozy ranch house, a handsome young cowhand had been killed by a knife during a poker game. My sister, brother, and I sometimes visited his grave on the hill nearby.
Although I listened with great interest to the stories about our valley, I listened and promptly forgot the details. I left it to my mother to tuck them in a corner of her mind or write them in her journals for safekeeping. I depended on her to take care of the history preserving, which she ardently worked to do. Then, suddenly, she was gone.
While enduring the painful emptiness that grief brings, I began to feel the urge to gather together my mother's notes and stacks of research. I felt comforted to be surrounded by it. As I read through her collection of books, journals, interviews, and her handwritten notes in tablets, spiral notebooks, on the backs of envelopes, and on napkins, the desire to continue her work grew strong. Her dream to write a book about the history of Brown's Park became mine.
During my search for Brown's Park's history, I journeyed into the world of the pioneers, outlaws, cowboys, and wolves. I spent many priceless hours interviewing my elderly uncle who, in his youth, knew many of the early pioneers of Brown's Park. His vivid recollections allowed me to travel with him and my grandparents to Brown's Park in a covered wagon when he was five-years-old. I felt as though I was living in Brown's Park with them when my mother was born, and also as the family worked tirelessly to build a cattle ranch. As I continued with my research, I came to know my parents as youngsters, shared their lives, and watched them grow. It was a remarkable journey.
The Romantic and Notorious History of Brown's Park is their story and the history of the legendary valley that held them so close.
​
aWhat Others Say About this Book:
Western Horseman: "Diana Kouris uses Brown's Park as the main character in her book deftly intertwining outlaws, lawmen, cowboys, and pioneer women with the Park's overall view of 'her' occupants. Diana gives us a rich, exciting history."
​
The Denver Post: "A passion drives Diana Kouris, a Brown's Park native who grew up in a house where Butch Cassidy stayed. She rode some of the same trails, ate in the same kitchen, and drank from the same springs. Kouris has written a definitive history of the area, the Romantic and Notorious History of Brown's Park. There is so much history and are so many interesting people that one could swear these were storybook characters."
​
Rock Springs Daily Rocket-Miner: "The author's dream has produced a most thorough and readable account of the valley. This factual chronicle reads like a novel with human emotion, tragedy, and triumph detailed with honesty and warmth."
​
Denver Westerner's Roundup - Ray E. Jenkins: "Books on local history are most often deadly boring, but this book is a major exception. The author pulls the reader into the history of the people, and you develop a strong personal feeling about them and their hard lives. I feel strongly that this book should be brought to the attention of readers interested in the history of Colorado and the West."