Action at Alameda - Ray Gaulden

Western pulpster and novelist Ray Gaulden was born in Fort Worth in 1914, so I feel a certain kinship to him since I was also born in Fort Worth, although a number of years later. And we’ve both written a bunch of Westerns, so there’s that, too. I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve read by him, so I didn’t hesitate to pick up his novel ACTION AT ALAMEDA when I came across a copy of it recently. Published in hardback by Avalon in 1962, it was reprinted in paperback by Airmont Books in 1963 with a cover by George Gross. That’s my copy in the scan. The images of the original hardback and a British paperback edition were found on-line. Avalon and Airmont were both imprints of Thomas Bouregy and Company, Inc. The Avalon editions were intended for the library market, but some of them got wider distribution in the Airmont editions.

Gaulden was one of the generation of Western authors who practiced a more hardboiled style following World War II. The protagonist of ACTION AT ALAMEDA is rancher Ross Novard, who has just buried his gunslinger brother, killed in a shootout with the local deputy sheriff who’s a pretty shady character despite packing a lawman’s badge. That’s not Ross’s only problem. His herd has been wiped out by disease, and he’s facing ruin. He gets a ray of hope when the local cattle baron offers him a job as foreman, but the man plans on forcing out all the other small ranchers in the area, which would put Ross on the other side from his former friends and allies. But they’ve all turned on him anyway because he killed a man in a gunfight, too, and the girl he loves wants nothing to do with him because her younger brother looks up to him and she’s afraid idolizing Ross will get him in trouble.

There’s almost enough plot and back-story in this one for a Walt Coburn yarn, and Gaulden just keeps piling trouble on Ross Novard. Several enemies are out to get him, he gets jumped and beaten up in a couple of brutal fistfights, the cattle baron he goes to work for has a slutty wife, a tragic killing takes place, and he has to ferret out a murderer while trying to stay alive. It’s enough to make you wonder how the guy is possibly going to get out of this mess.

Gaulden manipulates all these plot elements with considerable skill, and his terse prose is a pleasure to read. Ross Novard is a good protagonist, tough but not superhumanly so, and smart enough to spot the vital clue that leads him to a killer. ACTION AT ALAMEDA is a good hardboiled Western yarn, not a classic but certainly enjoyable and well worth reading if you’re a fan of traditional Westerns. I definitely plan to read more of Ray Gaulden’s novels.