Review: Jedediah Smith - Alfred Wallon

Alfred Wallon is the most prolific and popular German author of Westerns and historical novels published in the United States. His latest release is JEDEDIAH SMITH, a historical novel about the life of one of the most important figures of the Mountain Man era, and it’s excellent.

Jedediah Smith was a member of one of the first fur trapping expeditions to go all the way up the Missouri River. He helped discover the route to the northwest through South Pass, which became one of the vital parts of the great westward migration. He traveled to the Great Salt Lake and on to California, helping to open up the idea of trade with the Mexican settlements on the West Coast. And he helped scout what became the Santa Fe Trail, leading to a fateful encounter with Comanches. Wallon covers all of this in his thoroughly researched novel based primarily on journals kept by Smith and other members of his expeditions.

Along the way, there’s plenty of action: battles with Indians, clashes with Mexican soldiers, even a fight with a bear. Numerous colorful historical characters from the Mountain Man era make appearances, including Jim Bridge, John Colter, Hugh Glass, Jim Beckwourth, and the Sublette brothers.

Wallon captures not only the epic scope of these explorations that shaped the country, but he also provides a compelling insight into the mind of an explorer, as Smith is always pushing on, looking for something new, wanting to see places he hasn’t seen. The fur trapping business is what led Smith to travel throughout the West, but his own wanderlust comes through clearly as well.

JEDEDIAH SMITH is a well-written, informative, but above all entertaining chronicle of the opening of the West. Alfred Wallon has done a fine job on it, and if you’re a fan of top-notch, realistic historical fiction, I give it a high recommendation. It’s available on Amazon in e-book and paperback editions.

The Bozeman Trail War #1: Bluecoat Patrol - Alfred Wallon

Alfred Wallon is one of the leading Western writers in Germany and has been for many years. Recently some of his novels have begun appearing in English translations, as well, including BLUECOAT PATROL, the first in an epic series of historical Westerns called The Bozeman Trail War.

This novel is set against the background of the long-running clashes between the Plains Indians and the U.S. cavalry prompted by the various discoveries of gold in Dakota Territory and Montana. In BLUECOAT PATROL, a group of cavalrymen led by Captain Frank North and guided by scout Buckskin Charly Weatherford joins a group of prospectors headed to Alder Gulch, Montana. North’s assignment is to protect those goldseekers, but not surprisingly, he encounters trouble not only from the warriors led by chiefs Red Cloud and Dull Knife but also from the very men he’s supposed to protect.

Wallon’s historical research is very solid in this novel, and his characters are well-drawn. Frank North is a stalwart hero and Buckskin Charly a top-notch sidekick. The translation gives the prose a voice that’s not quite what we’re used to in traditional Western novels, but at the same time, it works just fine and the story moves along well. Not everything is resolved by the end of BLUECOAT PATROL, but that’s not surprising considering that the series continues for a number of other volumes. It actually reminds me a bit of the old Easy Company series published by Jove under the house-name John Wesley Howard, although it’s more realistic. If you enjoy historically based Western novels or cavalry yarns, check out BLUECOAT PATROL. I enjoyed it. 

Showdown in Abilene - Alfred Wallon

I've been wanting to read some of Alfred Wallon's Western novels for a while, but nearly all of them were published only in Germany, and despite two years of German in college I'm far from being fluent enough to read in that language at anything more than a very rudimentary level.

However, thanks to the good folks at Piccadilly Publishing, some of Wallon's novels are now appearing in English translations as e-books, so I was able to start at the beginning with his first novel, SHOWDOWN IN ABILENE, which is also the first book in his most successful series, Rio Concho.

These books revolve around the adventures of the cowboys who work on the Rancho Bravo spread in West Texas. Foreman Jay Durango is the protagonist in SHOWDOWN IN ABILENE. I don't know if he plays that role in succeeding books, but I'll find out since I have the next two in the series. This one finds Jay and the rest of the Rancho Bravo crew arriving in Abilene with a trail herd they've brought to the railhead, a classic situation in Western novels. They're not there long before Jay encounters an old enemy and several of the cowboys get mixed up in a brawl that causes Abilene's marshal, Bear River Tom Smith, to throw them in jail. The situation quickly escalates with an attempt on Jay's life, a fire that threatens to destroy the town, and a bank robbery that leads to the title showdown.

This is a relatively short novel, and Wallon never lets the action slow down for long. Jay Durango is a fine hero, tough but honorable and with a touch of mystery about his background. We don't really learn a lot about the supporting cast, but they're likable enough and this is just the first book in a long-running series, after all. I really enjoyed the mixture of fiction and history, such as the appearance of Bear River Tom Smith, who was the marshal in Abilene immediately before Wild Bill Hickok. Wallon provides an entertaining afterword about the historical aspects of the novel, as well as some background on his Rio Concho series.

SHOWDOWN IN ABILENE is a good solid traditional Western, and I'm glad it's now available in English. If you're a Western fan, it's certainly well worth reading. You can pick up a copy on Amazon here.