The Border Trilogy

The Border Trilogy follows John Grady Cole and Billy Parham across Texas, New Mexico and northern Mexico during the erosion of the traditional ranching world. Although the novels were published in the order All the Pretty Horses, The Crossing and Cities of the Plain, their internal chronology begins with Billy’s journeys between 1940 and 1944, continues with John Grady’s ride into Mexico in 1949 and brings both men together in New Mexico in 1952.

Across the sequence, crossing the border is both a physical journey and a test of identity, loyalty and moral responsibility. Memories of the Mexican Revolution, the disruption of the Second World War, expanding military land use and the mechanisation of ranching place the young cowboys at the end of a frontier culture they understand more clearly than the modern world replacing it.