Books by Pam Houston

Cowboys Are My Weakness: Stories

by Pam Houston

"Exhilarating, like a swift ride through river rapids with a spunky, sexy gal handling the oars."―Washington Post Book World In Pam Houston's critically acclaimed collection of strong, shrewd, and very funny stories, we meet smart women who are looking for the love of a good man, and men who are wild and hard to pin down. "I've always had this thing for cowboys, maybe because I was born in New Jersey,” says the narrator in the collection’s title story. “But a real cowboy is hard to find these days, even in the West.” Our heroines are part daredevil, part philosopher, all acute observers of the nuances of modern romance. They go where their cowboys go, they meet cowboys who don't look the part – and they have staunch friends who give them advice when the going gets rough. Cowboys Are My Weakness is a refreshing and realistic look at men and women – together and apart.

Cowboys Are My Weakness: Stories

by Pam Houston

“Brilliant.… [Houston] takes women into grand spaces, both emotional and physical, and isolates them until there’s nothing left to do but sit down and take a hard look at one’s soul.” ―Los Angeles Times
In Pam Houston’s best-selling story collection, we meet smart women who are looking for the love of a good man, and men who are wild and hard to pin down. Our heroines are part daredevil, part philosopher, all acute observers of the nuances of modern romance. Cowboys Are My Weakness is a shrewd and intoxicating look at men and women―together and apart.

Sight Hound: A Novel

by Pam Houston

The long-awaited novel; a very special love story; from the best-selling author of Cowboys Are My Weakness. This is the story of a woman, Rae, and her dog, Dante, a wolfhound who teaches "his human" that love is stronger than fear (the dog has always known this). Dante is the catalyst for change in other characters as well, and they step forward with their narratives: Rae's house-tender; her therapist; two veterinarians; and an anxiety-ridden actor, Howard, who turns out to be as stalwart as Dante himself. As the "seer" who hunts by sight rather than smell, Dante has some things to add, as does Rose, another dog who lives at Rae's heels, and Stanley the cat. Among and above these myriad voices, Rae voices her own challenges. With the wit and dead-on candor we've come to expect from Pam Houston, Sight Hound unfolds a story that illuminates the intangible covenant between loved ones. Here, dogs and humans are simply equal creatures, looking to connect and holding on for dear life when they do. Reading group guide included.

Sight Hound: A Novel

by Pam Houston

The long-awaited novel―a very special love story―from the best-selling author of Cowboys Are My Weakness. This is the story of a woman, Rae, and her dog, Dante, a wolfhound who teaches "his human" that love is stronger than fear (the dog has always known this). Dante is the catalyst for change in other characters as well, and they step forward with their narratives: Rae's house-tender; her therapist; two veterinarians; and an anxiety-ridden actor, Howard, who turns out to be as stalwart as Dante himself. As the "seer" who hunts by sight rather than smell, Dante has some things to add, as does Rose, another dog who lives at Rae's heels, and Stanley the cat. Among and above these myriad voices, Rae voices her own challenges. With the wit and dead-on candor we've come to expect from Pam Houston, Sight Hound unfolds a story that illuminates the intangible covenant between loved ones. Here, dogs and humans are simply equal creatures, looking to connect and holding on for dear life when they do.

Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country

by Pam Houston

Winner of the 2020 Reading the West Advocacy Award
Winner of the 2020 Colorado Book Award for Creative Nonfiction

"This is a book for all of us, right now." ―Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild
On her 120-acre homestead high in the Colorado Rockies, beloved writer Pam Houston learns what it means to care for a piece of land and the creatures on it. Elk calves and bluebirds mark the changing seasons, winter temperatures drop to 35 below, and lightning sparks a 110,000-acre wildfire, threatening her century-old barn and all its inhabitants. Through her travels from the Gulf of Mexico to Alaska, she explores what ties her to the earth, the ranch most of all. Alongside her devoted Irish wolfhounds and a spirited troupe of horses, donkeys, and Icelandic sheep, the ranch becomes Houston’s sanctuary, a place where she discovers how the natural world has mothered and healed her after a childhood of horrific parental abuse and neglect.
In essays as lucid and invigorating as mountain air, Deep Creek delivers Houston’s most profound meditations yet on how “to live simultaneously inside the wonder and the grief… to love the damaged world and do what I can to help it thrive.” 12 black and white illustrations

Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country

by Pam Houston

"How do we become who we are in the world? We ask the world to teach us."
On her 120-acre homestead high in the Colorado Rockies, beloved writer Pam Houston learns what it means to care for a piece of land and the creatures on it. Elk calves and bluebirds mark the changing seasons, winter temperatures drop to 35 below, and lightning sparks a 110,000-acre wildfire, threatening her century-old barn and all its inhabitants. Through her travels from the Gulf of Mexico to Alaska, she explores what ties her to the earth, the ranch most of all. Alongside her devoted Irish wolfhounds and a spirited troupe of horses, donkeys, and Icelandic sheep, the ranch becomes Houston’s sanctuary, a place where she discovers how the natural world has mothered and healed her after a childhood of horrific parental abuse and neglect.
In essays as lucid and invigorating as mountain air, Deep Creek delivers Houston’s most profound meditations yet on how "to live simultaneously inside the wonder and the grief…to love the damaged world and do what I can to help it thrive." 12 black and white illustrations

A Little More About Me

by Pam Houston

“Pam Houston catches the voice of an entire generation of adventurous young women whose intrepid hearts lead them into deep water.”―Elle Renowned author Pam Houston treats us to a celebration of real-life adventures in this rich collection of essays. Ranging over five years and five continents, A Little More About Me introduces us to a woman―adventure-seeking, curious, and awestruck―whose experiences resonate with our own navigation through life’s many pleasures and challenges.

Waltzing the Cat

by Pam Houston

"Self-assured and self-revealing, Waltzing the Cat will gratify Pam Houston’s many admirers, and it will lure plenty of new readers into her wild rivers" ―Portland Oregonian
In this remarkable follow-up to the best-selling Cowboys Are My Weakness, Pam Houston traces the story of peripatetic photographer Lucy O’Rourke through eleven linked fictions “full of memorable paragraphs and…sentences worth underlining” (Rocky Mountain News). Lucy is prone to the wrong decisions at critical times―not to mention natural disasters―but a surprise encounter with Carlos Castenada sends her back to her beloved Rocky Mountains, where she takes comfort in animals, the jagged landscape of Colorado, and the sage advice of women friends. Houston serves up her characteristic blend of relationships and adventure in this story of one woman’s struggle for balance in a world that keeps pitching and rolling under her feet.

Contents May Have Shifted: A Novel

by Pam Houston

Heart-stopping prose and crackling observations on a spiritual journey toward a life rich in love and freedom. Stuck in a dead-end relationship, this fearless narrator leaves her metaphorical baggage behind and finds a comfort zone in the air, “feeling safest with one plane ticket in her hand and another in her underwear drawer.” She flies around the world, finding reasons to love life in dozens of far-flung places from Alaska to Bhutan. Along the way she weathers unplanned losses of altitude, air pressure, and landing gear. With the help of a squad of loyal, funny, wise friends and massage therapists, she learns to sort truth from self-deception, self-involvement from self-possession.

At last, having found a new partner “who loves Don DeLillo and the NHL” and a daughter “who needs you to teach her to dive and to laugh at herself”―not to mention two dogs and two horses―“staying home becomes more of an option. Maybe.”

Contents May Have Shifted: A Novel

by Pam Houston

“An absorbing, generous, ravishing book by a high priestess of you-have-to-read-this prose." ―Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild
Pam Houston, an "early master of the art of rendering fiercely independent, brilliant women in love with the wrong men" (Sarah Norris, Barnes & Noble Review), delivers a novel that whisks us from one breathtaking precipice to the next. Along the way, we unravel the story of Pam (a character not unlike the author), a fearless traveler aiming to leave her metaphorical baggage behind as she seeks a comfort zone in the air. With the help of a loyal cast of friends, body workers, and a new partner who helps her to be at home, she finally finds something like ground under her feet.

Lonely Planet Tales from Nowhere

by Simon Winchester, Pam Houston, Pico Iyer, Tim Cahill, Anthony Sattin, Jason Elliot, Rolf Potts, Danny Wallace

Lonely Planet: The world's leading travel guide publisher*

Unexpected stories from unexpected places.

Many places can feel like nowhere: a desert, an isolated village, even the middle of a bustling, impersonal city. And then something happens: an adventure, a revelation, an experience that changes the whole landscape. The discovery that every place is the centre of the world to somebody and has its own riches and wonders. The authors of these 30 real-life tales find passion, surprise and illumination in the middle of Borneo or Beijing, in a Mayan mountain village, along a timeworn trail in Tuscany, on an isolated South Pacific island, or under a desert moon in Mali.

These richly varied stories all celebrate and illuminate one simple truth: if we embark on each adventure with an open heart and an open mind, travel will take us places we never planned to go, and enrich and enlighten us in ways we never otherwise would have known.

Featuring stories by:Anthony Sattin, Danny Wallace, Jason Elliot, Pam Houston, Ralph Potts, Pico Iyer, Tim Cahill, Simon Winchester

About Lonely Planet:Started in 1973, Lonely Planet has become the world's leading travel guide publisher with guidebooks to every destination on the planet, as well as an award-winning website, a suite of mobile and digital travel products, and a dedicated traveller community. Lonely Planet's mission is to enable curious travellers to experience the world and to truly get to the heart of the places where they travel.

TripAdvisor Travellers' Choice Awards 2012 and 2013 winner in Favorite Travel Guide category

'Lonely Planet guides are, quite simply, like no other.' - New York Times

'Lonely Planet. It's on everyone's bookshelves, it's in every traveller's hands. It's on mobile phones. It's on the Internet. It's everywhere, and it's telling entire generations of people how to travel the world.' - Fairfax Media (Australia)

*#1 in the world market share - source: Nielsen Bookscan. Australia, UK and USA. March 2012-January 2013

Without Exception Reclaiming Abortion, Personhood, and Freedom

by Pam Houston

Without Exception is an unflinching call for freedom by way of abortion rights.

"A story told with honesty. I thank Pam Houston for this timely and timeless book"
--CAMILLE T. DUNGY, Soil: The Story of a Black Mother's Garden

Written with equal parts candor and lyricism, Pam Houston illuminates the interconnected histories of abortion in the United States and in her own life during the decades when Roe v. Wade was the law of the land. Houston guides us through the shifting landscapes of politics, the law, and self-determination in a country where access to medical care and the power to determine your own destiny are increasingly--and once again--dependent on geography and circumstance.