B.M. Bower Books In Order

Publication Order of Flying U Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Collections

Publication Order of Anthologies

B.M. Bower was a published American author of fiction. This is a pen name that was used for Bertha Muzzy Sinclair. She was known for writing short stories, novels, and screenplays, which frequently featured the Old West as its setting.

Bertha was born on November 15, 1871. She would pass away on July 23, 1940. She was born in Minnesota in Otter Tail County to her parents Eunice and Washington. Their family would end up moving in 1889 to a homestead close to Great Falls, Montana. She would begin teaching school before turning 18 years old in the fall in Milligan Valley in a log outbuilding that had been converted and had twelve students. Her experiences teaching would help her to write school madam characters that would appear in her works like The North Wind Do Blow in 1937. She would go back to live with her family after teaching one term.

Bertha got married on December 21, 1890. She eloped with Clayton J. Bower in a move that surprised her family. However, they did not have a happy marriage. They lived with her family at first before going to Great Falls and moving to Big Sandy, Montana in 1898. There she got a good taste of knowledge of what cowboy living on the range was like. She would have three children with Clayton while they were married. In 1891 Bertha Grace was born, in 1893 Harold Clayton was born, and then in 1896 Roy Noel was born. She would move with the family and her husband to a cabin a mile away from Big Sandy. They took on Bill Sinclair, a 22 year old boarder. Bertha would lend him books and teach him on writing while he would give her feedback on the Westerns she had begun writing.

Bower sold her first local short story in 1901, “Strike of the Dishpan Brigade”. Chip, of the Flying U was one of her earlier publishing accomplishments, but her marriage had reached a low point. Her husband came home one time drunken and in a rage, and so Bower decided to move. She got help from Sinclair and with the money from her book publication she stayed with her brother and his wife in Tacoma, Washington. She filed for divorce and it was finalized. Her former spouse took custody of Harry and Bertha Grace. Bower took custody of their son Roy and went to Great Falls, all while continuing to write. Her first short story that came out nationally was published in 1904 in Lippincott’s Magazine, titled “Ghost in the Red Shirt”. She would sign a short story contract with Popular Magazine in 1905.

She married Sinclair in 1905 on August 13th. They both focused on writing and had a daughter together on January 24, 1907 that they named Della Frances Sinclair. The winter also ruined their horse herd in Valley County where they had wanted to move in spring. The couple then moved to Santa Cruz in California, living in a coastal house. They continued their careers writing even as they moved to different homes. However, Bower separated from her husband in 1911 and got her own house in San Jose. She also signed with Little, Brown & Company, changing publishers in August of 1911.

She would get married a third time in 1920. She had relocated to Hollywood. Robert “Bud” Cowan became her third spouse. He was a cowboy that she had met previously. They reopened a silver mine in 1921 in Nevada, running it for a while. Then they moved to Depoe Bay, Oregon due to the Great Depression. Cowan passed in 1939 and Bertha never got married again.

B.M. Bower is the creator and author of the Flying U series of fictional novels. The series started in 1906 with Chip of the Flying U, a Western story. It first came out in Popular Magazine as a serial, first giving readers a chance to get to know the Flying U Ranch and the cowboys there. It features Chip, a cowboy, and his relationship with the independent Dr. Della Whitmore. They first get together after Della claims credit for Chip’s painting, falling for reach other after she gives him credit and he saves her from a horse that’s run away. Its popularity led to a hardback release, including watercolor illustrations done by Charlie Russell. The story made her famous and she would continue the saga with more novels, concluding with The Flying U Strikes, its sixth book, in 1934.

She would go on to write several dozen more Western books. Some were adapted, including Chip of the Flying U (four times to film). Bower would also write When the Cook Fell Ill as well as The Lonesome Trail and the movie How Weary Went Wooing. Many of her stories were adapted to film and she wrote some of her own. Some adapted include The Galloping Devil (based on The Happy Family), The Wolverine (Ranch at Wolverine), Taming the West (The Range Dwellers), Ridin’ Thunder (Jean of the Lazy A), The Flying U Ranch, King of the Rodeo, and Points West.

Bower passed away in Los Angeles in July of 1940. She had sold over two million copies of her books at the time of her passing.

Chip, of the Flying U is the first book in the Flying U series by B.M. Bower. It is set in Montana on a ranch. This is where readers meet the bunkhouse group the Happy Family for the first time.

Chip is the main character, a cowboy who is shy with women. But he’s also a talented artist. When a young woman named Dr. Della takes the credit for a painting he did, he’s not happy.

But soon he finds himself falling for this independent and brazen woman. When she eventually gives him credit and he saves her from a dire situation, romance starts to blossom. Can his lonely life give way to love with this pairing? Read this book to find out!

The Happy Family is the second novel in the Flying U series, written by B.M. Bower. This is where readers get to meet a variety of unique characters, most of them cowpokes or cowboys. There’s Andy Green, who meets Verbena Martin. Andy ends up entering a Great Falls contest and rides a red roan, trying not to embarrass himself.

Read this book yourself to catch all of the action and experience one of the most popular Western series ever!