The Lure of the Dim Trails Illustrated

In this book the main character is an Eastern writer who has had a Western story rejected. His friend the artist tells him he should go West and study the local color so he can write properly about it, and this is exactly what happens. And it turns out that Phil Thurston is only living in the East: he was actually born in the West. He has vague memories of his father being brought home dead and his Mother taking him away. On his train trip cross country, Thurston meets (somewhat miraculously) a Montana rancher who had been great friends with Thurston's father back in the day, and even remembered Thurston himself, insisting on calling him Bud he way he used to do. An invitation is issued and eventually Bud finds himself learning how to be not only a cowboy but his father's son, a true man of the West. And of course there is a young woman to fall in love with, Mona of the gray eyes.