Here’s the opening paragraph of the story “The Comanche Kid’s Last Ride” by William Heuman, from the September 1946 issue of FIFTEEN WESTERN TALES:“It was hot and stuffy inside the coffin, and black as the pit of hell. The Comanche Kid stretched himself on the blanket, the tips of his boots just touching one end of the coffin and his sand-colored hair the other end. He kept his face turned to the small holes Velasco Sam had bored in the wood, and breathed deeply, the sweat rolling down his bronzed face.”
If that doesn’t make you want to keep reading so you can find out what’s going on and why the Comanche Kid is inside that coffin, then you’ve got more self-control than I do. I’ve liked everything I’ve read by William Heuman, mostly pulp stories. I have a couple of his novels on hand that I hope to read soon.
Update: I've read the Heuman story now, and it's pretty good, although I'm not sure that it lives up to that opening. Can't say much about it without ruining the plot, but it has a nice hardboiled tone and some good action, both of which I've found to be typical of Heuman's work.
3 comments:
Agreed! A superb opening. My access to the old US western pulps has always been limited by the geography of my places of residence. Also, the hardback and paperback anthologists have not mined the western titles as extensively as, say, the fantasy and SF titles. Leastways, that's my impression. I am at this moment awaiting arrival from an Amazon seller of The Big Book of Western Action Stories. Sounds promising. . . Any views, anyone?
Definitely. Now I'm gonna have to try and get this story.
Thanks. Once again you have brought an author to me that I was unaware of.
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