Gunfight at Laramie - Lee Hoffman

This is the first Western novel that Lee Hoffman wrote, although it was published second after THE LEGEND OF BLACKJACK SAM. Hoffman was an active member of science fiction fandom and wrote this novel at the urging of her friend, SF author, editor, and fan Ted White. She submitted it to fellow SF fan Terry Carr, then working as an editor at Ace Books, and he bought it, which explains the dedication to “Norman Edwards, who made this book possible,” because Norman Edwards was a pseudonym shared by White and Carr for their collaborations. There are a couple of similar Easter eggs later in the book, with the mention of a character named Ron Archer (another pseudonym of White’s) and a Pinkerton operative named Vanarnam, after another of White’s collaborators, Dave Van Arnam. It’s entirely possible there may be others that slipped past me.

Despite that science fiction background, GUNFIGHT AT LARAMIE is a pure traditional Western novel, and a really good one, at that. The protagonist Devereaux (I don’t think we ever get his first name; he’s just known as Dev) is a former railroader who served in the Union army during the Civil War and spent time in a Confederate prison camp. Following the war, he became a telegrapher in Illinois and remained in that job until he was implicated in a train wreck and the robbery that followed it. He was framed, of course, but he was blacklisted anyway and can’t work for any railroad anymore. He’s been working as a skinner in a buffalo hunting camp, but when he gets word that the man he blames for framing him is in Laramie, he hitches a ride on a train heading in that direction. The time is not long after the war, when the transcontinental railroad is just being built. It hasn’t reached the raw new town of Laramie yet, but it soon will. Unfortunately for Dev, the train he’s riding on is derailed, and once again he’s caught in the middle of a disaster for which he may be blamed.

Most of this is back-story, and Hoffman gets it out of the way quickly. When Dev arrives in Laramie, he not only has to hunt down the man he holds responsible for all his trouble, but he also finds himself in the middle of a complex storyline involving a beautiful saloon owner, her husband, a couple of fast guns, a mysterious Indian, and an embittered farmer. A lot of GUNFIGHT AT LARAMIE reads like a hardboiled crime novel as Dev has to sort out friend from foe, figure out what’s really behind everything, and survive several attempts on his life.

Hoffman packs a lot into this short novel (as half of an Ace Double with Brian Garfield’s THE WILD PACK on the other side, it’s maybe 40,000 words). But it all makes sense, the story moves along at a nice clip, and the gritty action scenes are excellent. The characters are well-developed, and there’s a sexual element to the plot that’s unusual for that era of Western novels.

This is the second of Hoffman’s traditional Western novels I’ve read this year, and I’m really impressed by her work so far. I’m glad there are still quite a few more of them for me to get around to. In the meantime, if you’re a Western fan, I give GUNFIGHT AT LARAMIE a high recommendation.