Later novels depicting the affair, such as the philosopher Josiah Royce's "The Feud of Oakfield Creek" (1887) and novelist Frank Norris' "The Octopus" (1901) are slightly less hagiographic in their portrayals of the Mussel Slough ranchers, but nevertheless give a fairly one-sided, anti-railroad view of the Mussel Slough affair. Richard Orsi's suggests in his history of the Southern Pacific, "Sunset Limited" that some common misconceptions about the Mussel Slough affair have been perpetuated through the mythic retellings of Morrow, Post, Royce, and Norris, among others.