Jim Sherill is a rancher who plans to sell a herd of horses and then marry the beautiful daughter of a wealthy businessman who owns a riverboat that travels up and down the Missouri River to Montana. The plan is for Jim to take over the riverboat enterprise. But then his horse herd is rustled and in his efforts to locate the thieves and recover the herd, he’s drawn into a dangerous plot that threatens the life of a young woman who’s inherited a ranch from her father.
HIGH COUNTRY is a novel by Peter Dawson, the pseudonym used by Jonathan Glidden,
a successful Western pulpster in the Thirties and Forties who became well-known
as a novelist in the Forties and Fifties. His brother Frederick Glidden was
even more popular with his stories and novels under the name Luke Short, but I
don’t recall ever reading about any particular rivalry between the brothers.
Both did very well for themselves.
HIGH COUNTRY was serialized in the pulp SHORT STORIES in March and April 1947 and published simultaneously in hardcover by Dodd, Mead, Jon Glidden’s regular publisher. It was reprinted in paperback by Lion Books in 1949 under the title CANYON HELL (with a cover by Robert Stanley) and then reprinted by Bantam, as were most of the Peter Dawson novels, in 1955. There were other Bantam editions over the years. I read the one from September 1966, and that’s my copy in the scan at the top of this post. I don't know the artist. The font on the author’s name and the title reminds me a little of the Doc Savage logo on Bantam’s reprints of that series. I don’t know if that was deliberate or not, but those Doc reprints were really, really popular during that era.
As for the novel itself, it’s a good one. Jon Glidden’s work was more low-key and realistic than that of many of the Western pulpsters. There’s some gritty, well-done action here and there, but it never goes over the top and the prose is restrained, not the least bit purple. To be honest, the book maybe could have used a tad bit more blood and thunder. But the characters are complex, Jim Sherill is an admirable, sympathetic protagonist, the villains are suitably despicable, and the romantic triangle, although it doesn’t occupy a lot of space, is handled well. Once things really take off in the final third of the book, it races right along and comes to a satisfying conclusion.
Like every other Peter Dawson novel I’ve read, HIGH COUNTRY is a solid traditional Western yarn. I found it to be well worth reading, and if you’re a Western fan, there’s a good chance you would, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment