An intimate history of the famed Old West outlaw that plumbs the origins of power in America and the precariousness of democracy—from the Goncourt Prize–winning author of The Order of the Day.

Henry McCarty, William Bonney, Billy the Kid. Born in 1859, orphaned at 14, he killed his first man at 17 and died at just 21. His story was written by his killer—the New Mexico lawman Pat Garrett, whose Authentic Life of Billy the Kid aimed to counter the growing legend of a folk hero unfairly ambushed in the night.

Deconstructing this larger-than-life figure through a series of poignant vignettes, Éric Vuillard shows the bleak reality behind the American Western. He highlights the poverty and desperation of the desperado, the dark side of the “self-made man,” who played a vital role in the expanding economy. Drawing a line between these orphans of the frontier and present-day vigilantes, Vuillard’s timely account makes a powerful statement about the eruption of violence amid increasing inequality.