Review: Taming the Nueces Strip: The Story of McNelly's Rangers - George Durham as told to Clyde Wantland

I mentioned the other day that I sometimes read Western history books, and here’s a good example. As research for the second Johnny Colt novel (currently being written), I just read TAMING THE NUECES STRIP: THE STORY OF McNELLY’S RANGERS by George Durham as told to Clyde Wantland.

Durham was a member of Captain Leander McNelly’s Special Force of Texas Rangers that was sent to the Nueces Strip are of Texas, between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande, to clean out the rustlers and outlaws plaguing the area in the 1870s. Years later, Durham told the story to journalist Wantland, who turned the old Ranger’s reminiscences into this book first published in 1962.

And it’s a great yarn, not the least bit dry and academic. Most of it, in fact, reads like a novel, and I had a fine time reading it. I’m pretty sure I read it when I was in college for the Life and Literature of the Southwest course I took, and I knew quite a bit about McNelly and his Rangers from other research over the years, but that didn’t prepare me for the vividness and sense of authenticity found in this account. It’s a fine example of Texana and Western history, and if you’re interested in those subjects, I give it a very high recommendation. TAMING THE NUECES STRIP is still in print in e-book and paperback editions.

And if you’ll allow me an infrequent bit of blatant self-promotion, JOHNNY COLT #2: BLOOD ON THE BORDER will be along presently from Dusty Saddle Productions.

Review: Kid Colt, Outlaw #106, September 1962

I was feeling nostalgic, so I bought all the issues available on Kindle of KID COLT, OUTLAW, one of my favorite Western comic books when I was a kid. The first one I read, eager to see if it held up, was #106, with a cover date of September 1962. The cover art is by Jack Kirby with inks by Dick Ayers, a combination I always loved.

As usual, the Kid Colt story in this issue was written by Stan Lee with art by Jack Keller. In “The Circus of Crime!”, our hero Kid Colt (an outlaw unjustly accused of a crime and forced to go on the run) is being chased by a posse when he throws in with a traveling circus in order to elude pursuit. The owner of the circus seems a little too eager to shelter a wanted outlaw, but we quickly discover there’s a reason for that: the circus performers are all outlaws, too, and use their travels to cover up their bank robbing spree! Well, the Kid’s not going to put up with this, of course, so we get some nice scenes of him clashing with the strongman, the knife thrower, the acrobats, the tightrope walker, etc. In the end, he brings the owlhoots to justice and rides off before the local law can corral him. Lee’s script moves along nicely, as they always did, and other than constantly misspelling Abilene as Abiline, it comes across as reasonably authentic for a Western yarn. I always liked Jack Keller’s art when I was a kid, but it seems a little inconsistent to me now with some excellent panels and some that are rather crude and sketchy. But I still found it enjoyable.

The lead story has 13 pages, and it’s followed by a couple of 5-page backup stories. “The Black Mask”, again written by Lee but with art by Dick Ayers this time, is a pretty traditional tale about a lawman trying to track down a masked bandit. Even though it’s only 5 pages, it has a couple of minor plot twists in it. Ayers’ art is really good, too, reminding me of Joe Kubert in places. I don’t know what sort of reputation Ayers has these days as an artist, but I loved his long run on SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS and consider him Kirby’s second-best inker from those days, behind Joe Sinnott.

The issue wraps up with a 5-page Kid Colt story, again by Lee and Keller, called “Fury at Fort Tioga”. The Kid is captured and winds up at a fort under attack by Apaches. He comes up with a novel way of ending the attack. This is kind of an oddball story and I’m not sure I buy the plot, but it’s the kind of ending you don’t see often in a Western comic book from those days.

Overall, I enjoyed this issue quite a bit. It’s nice to read a simple, well-told comic book story that has a beginning, middle, and end and no need to read the previous 400 issues to know what’s going on. If you’re hankerin’ to give the Kid a try, you can find the e-book edition on Amazon.

Movies I've Missed Until Now: Easy Virtue (2008)

I’d never heard of this movie, let alone seen it, and I’m not a huge fan of British drawing room comedies, but hey, I liked DOWNTON ABBEY, so why not give it a try?

EASY VIRTUE is based on one of Noel Coward’s lesser-known plays. A young Brit from an aristocratic family is touring Europe when he meets and falls in love with a female race car driver from America. He marries her and takes her home to introduce her to his eccentric and somewhat dysfunctional family. Cultures clash and witty banter ensues, along with a few surprisingly poignant dramatic moments, leading up to a so-so but somewhat satisfying conclusion.

Jessica Biel plays the young race car driver. She’s gorgeous, no doubt about that, and although some of the reviews for this movie fault her acting, I thought she was okay. I’ve always liked Colin Firth, and he’s fine as Biel’s new father-in-law with some dark secrets in his past. The rest of the cast is all right, and the movie looks great. It sort of plods along at times, but overall, I enjoyed it. Except . . .

The filmmakers make the choice to use deliberately anachronistic music in the score, a technique that seldom works for me. In this movie, it’s not too jarring other than the moment we hear the theme from CAR WASH, but I’m still not a fan of it. (I did, however, love CAR WASH when I saw it back in the Seventies, but that’s neither here nor there.) The other problem I have with this movie is that it has a cute little dog in it, and (SPOILER) the dog does indeed die. So if this bothers you, be warned. I might not have even watched it if I had known.

And that wouldn’t have been a great loss. EASY VIRTUE isn’t a terrible movie, and it has some very nice moments scattered through it. But I can only give it a mixed recommendation at best, if you’re a big Noel Coward and/or Colin Firth fan.

Review: Secret Agent X vs. Doctor Death - Will Murray

Will Murray has written the Wild Adventures of Doc Savage, Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes, The Spider, and Cthulhu, and included in those books such iconic characters as The Shadow, John Carter, King Kong, G-8, Operator 5, the Suicide Squad (the original pulp version), and others I’m probably forgetting. Now he tackles another famous pulp character, along with some more obscure ones, in SECRET AGENT X VS. DOCTOR DEATH.

Secret Agent X, for those of you unfamiliar with the character, was a master of disguise who could pretend to be anybody, almost at a moment’s notice. A former intelligence agent, he has abandoned his former identity to fight crime as the nameless, faceless Secret Agent X. He starred in his own pulp that ran for more than forty issues from Ace Magazines. The character was created by Paul Chadwick and written by Chadwick and various other pulp hands, most notably G.T. Fleming-Roberts.

On the other hand, we know who Doctor Death was. A former academic named Dr. Rance Mandarin, he is a master of both scientific and mystical arts and believes our modern society should be wiped out so Earth can return to a more primitive state. One of the few super-villains to headline his own pulp, he appeared in several short stories and five novels, all of which have been reprinted by Altus Press. (I own these volumes but haven’t read them.) Doctor Death was the creation of Harold Ward, who penned the novels under the pseudonym “Zorro”. (I don’t know what Don Diego Vega, or Johnston McCulley, for that matter, had to say about that.)

Anyway, at the end of the final Doctor Death novel, he was apparently, probably, maybe dead. I think we all know how unlikely that is. And sure enough, in SECRET AGENT X VS. DOCTOR DEATH, the crazed genius has returned and menaces humankind again with a bat-owl that can compel people to commit suicide, a couple of minotaurs, a flock of harpies, a ray that can transmute people and objects into golden-colored stone, and other threats that, again, I’m probably forgetting. Who can stop his campaign of terror?

Well, police detective Jimmy Holm, who battled Doctor Death in his previous appearances, intends to try. So does Secret Agent X, and after clashing a few times with the deadly doctor without much success, he recruits a Secret Circle of fellow pulp heroes: criminologist Wade Hammond (also a creation of Paul Chadwick in a long-running series), occultist Ravenwood, Stepson of Mystery (protagonist of five novelettes by top-notch pulpster Frederick C. Davis), the Moon Man (another long-running series by Davis), the mysterious Cobra (star of a short-lived series by Richard Sale, who went on to much bigger things), and high-flying pilot/detective Kerry Keen, the Griffon (from Arch Whitehouse, author of scores of aviation-related pulp yarns). That’s a pretty potent line-up of heroes to battle one guy and his minions, but as this novel slam-bangs along with almost non-stop action, the reader can’t help but wonder if even they can emerge triumphant over Doctor Death.

This is another wonderful pulp adventure from Will Murray, who’s been writing this kind of stuff for decades and does it better than anyone else. I’ve read more than half of the original Secret Agent X novels, and this is a worthy addition to the series as Murray really captures the character, although the menace X faces in this one is considerably different. I’ve also read and enjoyed many of the Wade Hammond stories. Although I’d heard of all the other characters, I hadn’t read any of their exploits, but now I think I’ll have to do that.

So if you’re a pulp fan or just want to read a well-written, strikingly bizarre adventure that barrels along full-tilt, I highly recommend SECRET AGENT X VS. DOCTOR DEATH. It’s available in e-book and paperback editions on Amazon.

And to end on a bibliographic note, Doctor Death’s original stories and novels were published by Dell, while all the other characters in this novel originally appeared in Ace Magazines.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Top-Notch Magazine, July 1, 1928

Well, that cover makes me nervous just looking at it. I don't know who painted it. There's a signature in the lower right corner, but my eyes aren't good enough to make it out. I think it's safe to say that the most well-known author in this issue of TOP-NOTCH is Erle Stanley Gardner with a story in his Speed Dash series. I haven't read any of these and don't really know anything about the character. Burt L. Standish, the author of the Frank Merriwell series, is also on hand, but he's pretty much forgotten these days, I would think. Other than that, we have George E. Powers, Seaburn Brown, Vic Whitman, Ruland V.E. Waltner, Reg Dinsmore, Harold Bradley Say, George Commodore Shinn, and William Wallace Whitelock, and I don't know a blessed thing about any of them.

Saturday Morning Western Pulp: Dime Western Magazine, April 1948

This is a pulp that I own and read recently. That’s my copy in the scan, ragged edges and all. That’s one tough-lookin’ hombre on the cover! I think it was painted by Robert Stanley, but I’m not sure about that.

Walt Coburn leads off the issue, as he so often did, with a novelette called “Law of the Lawless”. The Table of Contents may refer to it as a novel, but it’s about 10,000 words, I’d say. And man, does Coburn pack a lot of back-story in those words, also as usual. Most of the story takes place at the outlaw hideout known as Hole-in-the-Wall, and it consists of tense verbal clashes between two owlhoots who share some history. There’s a neglected wife, a crippled kid, an attempted suicide, hidden loot from a bank robbery, and a sinister bounty hunter who has already wiped out all of the gang led by one of the main characters. Yeah, this is melodramatic stuff, but nobody did it better than Coburn. This suspenseful opening leads up to a couple of fine action scenes that provide a satisfying conclusion. I’ve been told that by this time in his career, the editors at Popular Publications were rewriting Coburn’s stories pretty heavily because his drinking caused him to turn in unpublishable manuscripts, and that may well be true. But the complex plot, the emotional torment some of the characters go through, and the sense of frontier authenticity are pure Coburn, as far as I can tell. It’s not a perfect story—there are a couple of continuity errors that can probably be chalked up to the above-mentioned boozing—but I loved it anyway. It’s just a real gut-punch of a hardboiled Western yarn.

As I mentioned last week, Tom W. Blackburn was a very dependable Western author. His story in this issue, “A Matter of Quick Buryin’”, is about a government investigator trying to break up a ring of thieves that’s been selling stolen horses to the army. Reluctantly, he winds up with a colorful sidekick in a drunken ex-preacher. The ending in this one seems a little rushed to me, but other than that it’s excellent and is still very good overall.

In addition to being a pulp writer, William Chamberlain was in the army and in fact had a long, successful career there, retiring as a general. So it’s not surprising that his numerous Western and adventure yarns for various pulps usually had some sort of military connection. “Mount Up, You Sons of Glory!”, his story in this issue, is a cavalry tale about a campaign against the Sioux in Dakota Territory in the dead of winter. It uses the standard plot of a new, heavy-handed commanding officer ignoring the advice of his more seasoned junior officers, but Chamberlain’s straightforward, effective prose, his sense of realism, and a very poignant ending elevate this to something more than the ordinary.

I’ve come to appreciate C. William Harrison as one of the better Western pulpsters. His short tale in this issue, “Too Tough to Tame”, is about a young man whose father was an outlaw, and when he’s unjustly accused of a crime, he decides he’ll go ahead and follow the owlhoot trail. There are a couple of twists in this one, one that I saw coming and one I didn’t, and that makes for a very good story.

When he wasn’t writing classic comic book scripts in the Forties, Gardner F. Fox was writing Westerns and science fiction stories for the pulps, just as he would soon be turning out dozens of paperback original novels during the Fifties and Sixties while continuing his comics career. “The Town That Bullets Built” in this issue is about a lawman who has retired but keeps getting drawn back into trouble. Fox was a fine storyteller and keeps this one moving along briskly with well-drawn characters until a couple of very good action scenes wrap things up and bring the story to a heartwarming and satisfying conclusion. I haven’t read that many of Fox’s Westerns, but this is certainly a good one.

Peter Dawson was one of the most dependable Western writers of the Twentieth Century. In real life, he was Jonathan Glidden, brother of Frederick Glidden, also known as highly successful Western writer Luke Short. I’d hate to have to pick between the two of them as far as which one was the better writer. The Peter Dawson novella in this issue, “Hell’s Free for Nesters!” is excellent. Against his better judgment, a drifting cowboy helps a nester girl whose wagon is stuck in a river, and that lands him in the middle of a range war, a land swindle, and a murder for which he’s blamed. Just top-notch stuff all the way around, with plenty of action, good characters, and polished writing.

Also on that list of most dependable Western writers of the Twentieth Century is Clifton Adams, who nearly always turned in really fine yarns. As an Oklahoma writer, Adams was very familiar with the oil industry there and wrote a number of stories and novels set in the early days of that business. “Boss of Purgatory’s Pipeline”, Adams’ novelette in this issue, finds a range detective becoming an oilfield detective when his client, the owner of an oil pipeline suffering from sabotage, is murdered before the protagonist even arrives on the scene. The mystery is a good one and fairly complex for a story of this length, and as always, Adams’ writing is very, very good, carrying the reader along at a swift pace. This is a terrific story.

In fact, this is a terrific issue, one of the best Western pulps I’ve ever read. If you own some issues of DIME WESTERN, I’d advise you to check your shelves for this one, because it’s definitely worth reading.

A Rough Edges Rerun Review: Puzzle for Fiends - Patrick Quentin

Years ago I read quite a few novels by Patrick Quentin (a pseudonym used by several different combinations of writers, but most often Richard Webb and Hugh Wheeler) featuring producer Peter Duluth and his movie star wife Iris. I remember these as being witty and sophisticated and generally enjoyable, a little along the lines of the Pam and Jerry North books by Richard and Frances Lockridge, but not as good.

I never read PUZZLE FOR FIENDS until now, though. It’s a Peter Duluth novel, too – sort of. I say that because for most of the book, Peter has amnesia and doesn’t know who he is.

Ah, the old amnesia plot! Well, it wasn’t quite as old in 1946, when this book was first published. After a brief opening in which Peter sends Iris off to Japan for a post-war USO tour, he wakes up in a mansion populated by three beautiful but vaguely sinister women who claim to be his mother, his wife, and his sister, as well as a vaguely sinister doctor who’s there because Peter has been in a car wreck and has a broken arm and leg. Only he’s not Peter anymore (although the reader knows he really is). Everybody claims he’s somebody named Gordon Friend, whose father died recently under mysterious circumstances.

I like a book where nothing is what it seems and the plot has twist after twist. That’s the case here, especially in the second half, which winds up playing like something from an Alfred Hitchcock movie. The first half is mostly set-up and pretty slow, but I can forgive that if there’s a good payoff, as there is here. PUZZLE FOR FIENDS is more of a psychological thriller than an actual mystery, although Peter does wind up solving several murders. It’s worth reading, and in fact I’d recommend just about anything under the Patrick Quentin pseudonym. (Webb and Wheeler also wrote as Q. Patrick and Jonathan Stagge, but I don’t believe I’ve ever read any of the books published under those names.)

(This post originally appeared on September 5, 2008. I've meant to read more by the various authors who wrote as Patrick Quentin since then, but you know how that goes. These days, PUZZLE FOR FIENDS is available as an e-book on Amazon, as are the other Peter Duluth books, and it's a series well worth reading.)

Review: Tex: Challenge at the Old Mission - Pasquale Ruju, Sergio Tisselli, Luca Barbieri, Walter Venturi

Tex Willer is the hero of a very long-running Italian comic book series that debuted in 1948. The creation of writer Gian Luigi Bonelli and artist Aurelio Galloppini, Tex is both a Texas Ranger and an adopted member of the Navajo tribe, of which he becomes a chief known as Night Eagle. Neither of those things keeps him from gallivanting all over the West and having all sorts of adventures that have been chronicled by dozens of Italian comics creators and an occasional American, too.

Recently I backed a Kickstarter for a collection of hardcover Tex Willer graphic novels translated into English. The boxed set of six volumes is beautiful. I’ve just read the first one, TEX: CHALLENGE AT THE OLD MISSION, written by Pasquale Ruju with art by Sergio Tisselli. In this story, Tex and his sidekick Kit Carson (who is also a Texas Ranger; historical accuracy is not something with which this series greatly concerns itself) are in Arizona to rescue a white woman named Patricia Graves from the Apaches who have taken her captive. Patricia is the wife of an army colonel who broke a treaty with the Apaches, and the chief, Octavio, kidnapped her as a means of taking revenge on the colonel.

However, there’s more to the story than that, as there usually is, and although Tex and Kit succeed in freeing Patricia after a stand-off at the old mission of the title, that’s not the end. Things do come to a satisfying conclusion, though.

Tisselli’s impressionistic artwork isn’t the sort that usually appeals to me, but I have to admit, I like it. It has a strong sense of storytelling and dramatic action. Ruju’s terse, understated script is effective. The combination makes for an enjoyable Western yarn.

This volume includes a bonus short story entitled “A Rag Horse”, written by Luca Barbieri with art by Walter Venturi. I liked this one even better. It’s a simple tale about Tex tracking down the killers of a family of settlers in New Mexico. Venturi’s artwork is much more traditional than Tisselli’s, and Barbieri’s script is even leaner than Ruju’s, with many wordless panels. The poignant story works very well.

I guess you could call these Spaghetti Western comics. The tone is certainly similar to Spaghetti Western movies. I happen to like those, so it’s no surprise I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the others in the set. It appears that backing the Kickstarter was the only way to get these limited editions, but other Tex graphic novels are available on the website of the publisher, Epicenter Comics.

Movies I've Missed Until Now: Donnie Brasco (1997)

I love gangster movies, by which I mean the classics from the Thirties, Forties, and Fifties. I enjoy gangster movies made after that, too, as long as they’re about those earlier decades. But when it comes to stories about organized crime set after the late Forties, those are a lot more hit-and-miss for me. The closer you get to the present day, the less I’m likely to enjoy them. Movies like that set from the Seventies onward, I consider mobster movies, rather than classic gangster movies. I don’t know if that makes sense to you, but it does to me.

So I definitely took a wait-and-see attitude toward DONNIE BRASCO, a 1997 movie set in 1978. It’s based on the true story of an undercover cop named Joseph Pistone who creates the fictional identity of Donnie Brasco, a low-level fence and would-be wise guy, in order to infiltrate the mob. He becomes friends with a mid-level hood named Lefty Ruggiero and works his way up in the organization. Lots of suspense ensues as Pistone constantly walks a fine line between doing his job, not having his true identity discovered, and being drawn deeper and deeper into the violent world of organized crime. There’s some domestic drama, too, as the strains of being undercover begin to affect Pistone’s marriage.

A movie like this is going to rise and fall largely on the acting. Johnny Depp plays Joseph Pistone/Donnie Brasco. I realize Depp can be sort of a polarizing figure, but I’ve always enjoyed his work and I think he does a good job in this one. Al Pacino plays Lefty Ruggiero and is, well, Al Pacino. I can’t fault his performance, and I really feel for the character at times because he’s kind of a sad sack, but I’m just not a big Pacino fan and never will be. Elsewhere, Michael Madsen and Bruno Kirby play wise guys because of course they do, and they’re fine. The movie perks right along, and I enjoyed it. Not a classic by any means, but I’m glad I watched it.

Review: Faith and a Fast Gun - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

FAITH AND A FAST GUN is another adventure of hard-luck range detective Joshua Dillard, who’s in Del Rio to visit the grave of his late wife when he finds himself drawn into a clash between the daughter of a murdered rancher and the cattle baron responsible for the man’s death. Faith Hartnett’s brother Dick won a herd of longhorns from ruthless rancher Lyte Grumman, who rules Del Rio with an iron fist, then left with the cattle on a trail drive to Montana. Faith wants to head north, too, and rejoin her brother, but Grumman wants to prevent that. Even though it’s not Joshua’s trouble, he decides to help Faith get away from Grumman and be reunited with her brother.

Well-written though it is, with good characters and some nice hardboiled action, this is a pretty standard beginning for a Western novel. But old pro Chap O’Keefe (actually Keith Chapman, as many of you already know) is just luring the reader in before springing some great twists in the plot. Those twists don’t come fast and furious, as they do in some books. The sense that something isn’t quite right builds at a more deliberate but very effective pace, picking up steam as the storyline moves from Texas to Montana and winds up in a stunning climax that’s more like something out of Greek tragedy than a traditional Western.

This is a fine novel, with O’Keefe working solidly in the tradition of noirish Western authors such as Lewis B. Patten, H.A. De Rosso, and Dean Owen. Joshua Dillard is a very appealing, tough but flawed hero, and the other characters are drawn vividly as well. If you’re a Western fan and haven’t tried a Chap O’Keefe novel yet, you really should.

(This review was written about an earlier edition of this novel, but nothing has changed except that there's a new edition with an excellent cover and a fine bonus article "No Trail to Fortune" that discusses some of the editorial resistance FAITH AND A FAST GUN got from its original publisher, Robert Hale, as well as the ever-changing and challenging landscape of writing and publishing. I'm always interested in anything Keith Chapman has to say on this subject, since he's been in this crazy business longer than almost anyone. This is one of the best of the Joshua Dillard series, and I highly recommend it. It's available in e-book and paperback editions on Amazon, as well as all the other platforms, and you can find links to those here.)