Robert J. Conley

Author Information
Robert J. Conley's Latest Book

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  • Bibliography:
    54 Books (2 Series)
  • First Book:
    November 1986
  • Latest Book:
    August 2018
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Full Series List in Order

Kid Parmlee

Fugitive's Trail (Aug-2000)
A Cold Hard Trail (Apr-2001)

The Real People

1 - The Way of the Priests (Nov-1992)
2 - The Dark Way (Feb-1993)
3 - The White Path (Jun-1993)
4 - The Way South (Dec-1993)
5 - The Long Way Home (Aug-1994)
6 - The Dark Island (Apr-1995)
7 - The War Trail North (Nov-1995)
War Woman (Oct-1997)
The Peace Chief (Oct-1998)
The Cherokee Dragon (Mar-2000)
Spanish Jack (Sep-2001)
Sequoyah (Jun-2002)

Book List in Order: 54 titles

  • Back to Malachi

  • The Actor

    When Bluford Steele and the traveling acting troupe he has joined arrive in the dangerous town of West Riddle, the evil tyrant of the town forces them to perform and then steals their money, and Bluford must play the role of a lifetime as a ruthless ...

  • Wilder and Wilder

    When the ugly spector of drug trafficking interferes with their luxurious dude ranch vacation and a reunion with an old friend becomes a nightmare of deceit, Maggie and Jack Wilder, professional writers and amateur sleuths, spring into action...

  • Killing Time

  • The Saga of Henry Starr

    Henry Starr was one of the most notorious criminals of the Old West, famed far and wide for robbing two banks in the same town at the same time -- a feat even the Dalton Gang couldn’t pull off. Still, Henry Starr was a reluctant outlaw.  An ho...

  • Colfax

  • The Witch of Goingsnake: And Other Stories

    Based on Cherokee history, oral storytelling, and personal experience, these stories, taken as a whole, reflect the depth of Cherokee historical experience and the range of contemporary Cherokee life. Several stories, including the one from which ...

  • Strange Company

  • Ned Christie's War



  • Nickajack

    In the East, his people has lived on the land for thousands of years. Now it was a nation bitterly divided, and Nickjack had decided to leave it behind. But when his country's broken heart came chasing after him in the West, he found himself with ene...

  • Go-Ahead Rider

    When recent Harvard graduate George Tanner returns home to Tahlequah in the Cherokee nation, he finds the town bustling and accommodations scarce. The council is in session and everyone is in town.Captain Go-Ahead Rider, the district sheriff, offers ...

  • The Way of the Priests

    The Real People - 1

    When a drought forces the Cherokee to the brink of annihilation, the people turn to their priests for salvation, but the tyrannical spiritual leaders are more concerned with preserving their own power than with helping their people....

  • Border Line

  • The Dark Way

    The Real People - 2

  • The Long Trail North

  • The White Path

    The Real People - 3

  • The Way South

    The Real People - 4

    A native American author's series of novels about the Cherokee people continues with the tale of Carrier, whose trading trip south brings him into contact with hostile bands and with strange men from across waters who call themselves the Espanols....

  • Geronimo, an American Legend

  • To Make a Killing



  • Cherokee Outlaw

    Betrayal, a killing, and escape from a lynching turn Cherokee Civil War veteran Zeke Proctor into an outlaw; and, protected by his people, he strives to prevent a destructive war between the Cherokee and the United States. ...

  • The Way of the Priest

    In America prior to European settlement, the Cherokee people look to their priests to rescue them from famine, drought, and death, but the priests are only interested in preserving their own power, in a story based on Cherokee legend. Reprint....

  • Zeke Proctor, Cherokee Outlaw

  • The Long Way Home

    The Real People - 5

    Planning an expedition for gold, ruthless Spaniard Hernando De Soto journeys towards the northern tribe of the Cherokee, accompanied by Deadwood Lighter, an Indian slave who dreads the perilous quest but hopes for a chance to escape....

  • Crazy Snake

    Rising to Principal Chief after witnessing the government's betrayal of a treaty that forced Creeks off their lands, Crazy Snake becomes the target of a United States conspiracy to rid the nation of the proud Creek forever. Original....

  • Mountain Windsong

    Set against the tragic events of the Cherokees' removal from their traditional lands in North Carolina to Indian Territory between 1835-1838, Mountain Windsong is a love story that brings to life the suffering and endurance of the Cherokee people....

  • The Dark Island

    The Real People - 6

    Hearing of the atrocities committed by the Spanish invaders, Squani, the son of a Timuca woman raped by a Spaniard and taken in by the Cherokee, ventures off on a dangerous and painful journey of discovery that leads him to the Spanish and a confront...

  • Outside the Law

    Investigating the surprising murder of a well-liked schoolteacher, Sheriff Rider an Deputy Tanner begin to suspect that the killer is not among obvious suspects and delve into the victim's past. Original....

  • The War Trail North

    The Real People - 7

    The seventh novel in a series focusing on the author's own Cherokee heritage centers on a young Cherokee called Young Puppy, who witnesses the death of his brother at the hands of another tribe and seeks revenge. By the Spur Award-winning author of <...

  • War Woman

    The Real People

    Spanning ninety years and both the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, this story of War Woman documents the life of a remarkable Cherokee woman, who was there when trading began with the Spanish in Florida and at the first conflict with the newly a...



  • The Meade Solution

  • Incident at Buffalo Crossing

    A landmark hill in the heart of the American wilderness draws many different men, each with their own individual dreams, including steamship captain Mat McDonald, sent to head off a threatened war between the Spanish and Americans, and Walker, a Cher...

  • The Peace Chief

    The Real People

    In The Peace Chief, one young Cherokee must be reborn to lead his people through the difficult early days of sixteenth-century European expansion into America. Conley tells the story of Young Puppy, a member of the Long Hair Clan who mistakenly ki...

  • Brass

    Winner of the Beginnings of Horror Award! The ancient Cherokees knew him as "Untsaiyi", or Brass, because of his metallic skin. He was one of the old ones, the original beings who lived long before man walked the earth. And he would live forever. He ...

  • Barjack

    When he arrived in Asininity, Barjack didn't intend to stay for long, let alone take on the job of sheriff, but soon enough he is doing both, and taking on the dreaded Benson brothers as well. Original....

  • The Cherokee Dragon

    The Real People


    Acclaimed novelist Robert J. Conley once again mines the history of his people, the Cherokee. In a fascinating and compelling novel, he explores the life of Dragging Canoe, the last great war chief of the united Cherokee tribe.

    In the late...

  • Broke Loose

    Tired of the peaceful, boring routine of Asininity, Barjack is delighted to be able to claim the reward for a wanted prisoner by bringing the outlaw in, not realizing that his prisoner's brother and the rest of his bloodthirsty gang is eagerly awaiti...

  • Fugitive's Trail

    Kid Parmlee

    The thrilling saga of a boy turned gunslinger, and the legend that would chase him across the West...

    "I was a wanted killer, and that made me an outlaw, and I forced myself to think hard and to accept myself for just that. If I was to be an o...

  • The Gunfighter

    The people of the small Western town of Asininity worry when a notorius gunfighter called the Widowmaker comes to town, especially when he and Marshal Barjack become pals, but soon more trouble arises....

  • A Cold Hard Trail

    Kid Parmlee

    "The devil's on my tail, and he's wearing a badge. Arrested for a robbery I didn't commit, I broke out of jail and took it on the 1 a.m. I had no choice. No sheriff's going to believe I have a double-unless I find the outlaw myself. If I live that lo...



  • Spanish Jack

    The Real People


    Robert J. Conley is one of the most acclaimed writers of the American West and of his own people, the Cherokee, having won myriad fans with his moving historical novels about the Real People. In Spanish Jack, he brings to vivid life one of the mo...

  • Medicine War

    George Panther, a respected medicine man within the Cherokee nation, kills a white man who brought bad medicine into the territory, and begins to use his medicine to elude United States marshals and wage war against the enemy....

  • War Woman,a Novel

    Few writers portray Native American life and history as richly, authentically, and insightfully as Robert J. Conley. Conley represents an important voice of the Cherokee past. The novels in his Real People series combine powerful characters, gripp...

  • The Devil's Trail

    He lit out of Texas with ten dollars and a swayback horse, a wanted man at age 13. Kid Parmlee's crime--he shot the man who shot his dog, Farty. Now, in the town of Fosterville, the Kid has found a hideaway--until his legend finds him. The West's scr...

  • Sequoyah

    The Real People

    A novelization of the life of the revered Cherokee leader traces the major events and conflicts that occurred throughout his late-eighteenth-century life, from the expulsion and massacres, to the Indian wars fought at the side of Andrew Jackson, to t...

  • Captain Dutch

  • Quitting Time

    For many years Oliver Colfax worked as a hired killer. But after he developed a friendship with one of his targets, Colfax lost heart in that line of work and quit. A few odd jobs keep body and soul together, but until Colfax decides what to do with ...

  • No Need for a Gunfighter

    The town of Asininity didn't think they needed a tough-as-nails former gunfighter for a lawman anymore, so they tried--as nicely as they could--to fire Barjack. But Barjack likes the job, and he's not about to move on. With the dirt he knows about so...

  • Barjack and the Unwelcome Ghost

    Marshal Barjack likes to keep peace and quiet in the tiny town of Asininity. It's better for business at the Hooch House, the saloon that Barjack owns. But peace and quiet got mighty hard to come by once Harm Cody came to town. Cody's made a lot of e...

  • Rio Loco

    Marshal Barjack didn't really want to arrest the troublemaker, but he didn't have much choice. After all, the drunk jackass pulled out a gun and shot an unarmed man to death right in front of Barjack in Barjack's very own saloon. So now the marshal&r...



  • Good Wives Assailed

    In this Old West retelling of Shakespeare's [i]Merry Wives of Windsor[/i], Fat Stuff and his gang of outlaws are always causing trouble. Most recently, they broke into Justice Short's warehouse, killed his cow, and beat his men. Somehow the men alway...

  • The Brothers

    Half Cherokee and Civil War veteran Captain Skylar Garret returns to the home of Phillip Garret, his white father, seeking an inheritance that he believes to have belonged to his late mother. Intertwined now into the lives of his three half brothers-...

  • Walking the Trail

    They named him Striker, because the day he was born he was said to have tried to hit the midwife. It's a name the young Cherokee would live up to throughout his early years, carrying with him the anger of watching his parents and best friend die on t...

  • Wil Usdi


    Adopted into the Cherokee tribe as a teenager, William Holland Thomas (1805"1893), known to the Cherokees as Wil Usdi (Little Will), went on to have a distinguished career as lawyer, politician, and soldier. He spent the last decades of his ...

  • Plastic Indian


    “So what does it mean to be a Cherokee?” asks Cherokee author Robert J. Conley at the start of this delightful collection of his writings. Throughout his prolific career, Conley used his art to explore Cherokee identity and experience. Wit...

Award-Winning Books by Robert J. Conley

The Dark Island
1995 SPUR Award -- Western Novel
Nickajack
1992 SPUR Award -- Western Novel


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Robert J. Conley has published 54 books.

Robert J. Conley does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, Plastic Indian, was published in August 2018.

The first book by Robert J. Conley, Back to Malachi, was published in November 1986.

Yes. Robert J. Conley has 2 series.
Author Series
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