Review: The Outlaw and the Lady - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

THE OUTLAW AND THE LADY by Chap O'Keefe (really our friend Keith Chapman) was published originally by Robert Hale in 1994 as part of Hale's Black Horse Western line. It's now available in newly revised e-book and paperback editions that include an entertaining foreword about how this book almost became a movie.

THE OUTLAW AND THE LADY is certainly deserving of finding a whole new audience of Western readers. The protagonist is Tod Larraby, a former Confederate guerrilla who rode with Quantrill until he got sick of the violence and bloodshed. Although he tried to go straight after the war, he was charged unfairly with crimes he didn't commit and has spent nearly twenty years on the dodge, growing wearier all the time. Because of his status as an outlaw, he has to take whatever jobs he can, so when he's blackmailed by a corrupt lawman into helping an English nobleman find his missing son, Larraby is forced to shoulder this dangerous chore. It's made even more hazardous by the fact that the Englishman insists on coming along on the quest and bringing his beautiful young wife with him.

Chapman's work continues to remind me of the hardboiled Westerns published by Gold Medal during the Fifties and Sixties, and this one also has echoes of the early Lassiter novels by "Jack Slade" (really W.T. Ballard, Ben Haas, and Peter Germano, among others). The plot moves along at a suitably brisk pace, and the action scenes have a nice gritty feel to them. Larraby is a good hero, too, world-weary but not so full of angst that it leads to an excess of navel-gazing. As always, Chapman includes some effective twists and complications in the plot.

THE OUTLAW AND THE LADY is lean, fast, and very entertaining, and as usual when I finish a Chap O'Keefe book, I'm eager to read more. If you're a Western fan I think you'll enjoy it, too.

(An earlier version of this review appeared on March 11, 2012. Keith Chapman is doing a fine job of making his novels available again, and Western readers who haven't yet discovered his work definitely need to check out his books. The Amazon links for this one are above, and you can find it for all the other platforms here.)

Review: Liberty and a Law Badge - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

For those of you who don’t know, prolific Western author and occasional commenter on this blog Chap O’Keefe is really Keith Chapman, who’s been writing and editing a wide variety of genre fiction in comics, magazines, and books for many years now, in addition to his work as a journalist. LIBERTY AND A LAW BADGE is another adventure of range detective Joshua Dillard, a former Pinkerton’s operative with tragedy in his past that drives him to fight outlaws of all stripes.

As the book opens, Dillard is on his way to his latest assignment, stopping a range war in Montana and finding out who’s been rustling cattle from his employer’s ranch. Pretty standard stuff, you say? Well, maybe at first glance, but not by the time Chapman gets through throwing twist after twist into the complex plot. The Liberty of the title is actually a young woman who’s been blackmailed into a sordid affair with a crooked sheriff, who’s the brother-in-law of the cattle baron who hired Dillard, who owns the cattle that Liberty’s husband is accused of stealing. Got that? Then there’s the cattle baron’s sister, who’s married to the crooked sheriff, and she goes on a rampage when she finds out about her husband’s adulterous affair with Liberty (said affair really being nothing more than a series of rapes). Add in a brutal deputy with an agenda of his own, and there’s a whole lot for Dillard to untangle before he can straighten everything out. Naturally, that untangling involves a number of fistfights and shootouts.

This book is a lot of fun, pulpish but with a sharp, contemporary edge. The dark, complex plot, the emotional angst, and the gritty storytelling remind me very much of many Westerns published in the Fifties by Gold Medal, by authors such as Lewis B. Patten, Dean Owen, and William Heuman. The pace is very fast, the action scenes are handled well, and Joshua Dillard is a very likable hero, tough and competent enough to handle just about any situation, despite his occasional self-doubts, but not a superman by any means. You can order LIBERTY AND A LAW BADGE here or at Amazon, and if you’re a fan of hardboiled action Westerns, I definitely think you’ll enjoy it.

(This review originally appeared in a somewhat different form on December 21, 2009. I'm rerunning it now because there's a brand-new edition of LIBERTY AND A LAW BADGE available with an entertaining bonus essay about how and why the book came to be written. You can order it at the links above, they're the current ones, and I can only second my own recommendation from 2009. It's an excellent Western action yarn.)

Review: Doomsday Mesa - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

DOOMSDAY MESA was published originally by Robert Hale in 1995, making it one of the earliest Chap O’Keefe novels I’ve read. It’s available now in new e-book and paperback editions from Amazon. That’s a great title, and being a long-time fan of the work of Keith Chapman, the veteran writer/editor behind the O’Keefe pseudonym, I was looking forward to this one. It’s safe to say, I wasn’t disappointed.

Chapman spends a little time giving us the back-story of his protagonist Yale Cannon, who, as a young man of somewhat shady character with a reputation as a gunman, joins a wagon train heading west in the days before the Civil War. There’s a budding romance between Cannon and a young woman whose family is traveling with the wagon train, but unfortunate circumstances arise to split them up.

The story then moves ahead a couple of decades to a time when Yale Cannon, a decorated war hero and veteran Deputy U.S. Marshal, arrives in the town of Antelope, Colorado, to pick up a captured outlaw from the jail and take him back to Arizona to face charges there. Of course, things don’t work out that easily. There’s a war brewing between the local ranchers and a religious cult that’s been established on a nearby mesa where there used to be a gold mine. The ranchers believe the followers of the charismatic cult leader are rustling their stock, and they’re prepared to go to any lengths to put a stop to it, including breaking out the owlhoot Cannon’s supposed to pick up and hiring him to run off the settlers on the mesa.

That’s enough for a book right there, but Chapman packs several more plot twists into his book, including a connection to Yale Cannon’s tragic past. He weaves all these strands together until they finally result in an explosive climax and one final, very effective twist.

DOOMSDAY MESA is an excellent traditional Western novel with plenty of action and the interesting, slightly offbeat characters you’ll always find in a Chap O’Keefe novel. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and give it a solid recommendation for Western fans.

Review: Faith and a Fast Gun - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

FAITH AND A FAST GUN is another adventure of hard-luck range detective Joshua Dillard, who’s in Del Rio to visit the grave of his late wife when he finds himself drawn into a clash between the daughter of a murdered rancher and the cattle baron responsible for the man’s death. Faith Hartnett’s brother Dick won a herd of longhorns from ruthless rancher Lyte Grumman, who rules Del Rio with an iron fist, then left with the cattle on a trail drive to Montana. Faith wants to head north, too, and rejoin her brother, but Grumman wants to prevent that. Even though it’s not Joshua’s trouble, he decides to help Faith get away from Grumman and be reunited with her brother.

Well-written though it is, with good characters and some nice hardboiled action, this is a pretty standard beginning for a Western novel. But old pro Chap O’Keefe (actually Keith Chapman, as many of you already know) is just luring the reader in before springing some great twists in the plot. Those twists don’t come fast and furious, as they do in some books. The sense that something isn’t quite right builds at a more deliberate but very effective pace, picking up steam as the storyline moves from Texas to Montana and winds up in a stunning climax that’s more like something out of Greek tragedy than a traditional Western.

This is a fine novel, with O’Keefe working solidly in the tradition of noirish Western authors such as Lewis B. Patten, H.A. De Rosso, and Dean Owen. Joshua Dillard is a very appealing, tough but flawed hero, and the other characters are drawn vividly as well. If you’re a Western fan and haven’t tried a Chap O’Keefe novel yet, you really should.

(This review was written about an earlier edition of this novel, but nothing has changed except that there's a new edition with an excellent cover and a fine bonus article "No Trail to Fortune" that discusses some of the editorial resistance FAITH AND A FAST GUN got from its original publisher, Robert Hale, as well as the ever-changing and challenging landscape of writing and publishing. I'm always interested in anything Keith Chapman has to say on this subject, since he's been in this crazy business longer than almost anyone. This is one of the best of the Joshua Dillard series, and I highly recommend it. It's available in e-book and paperback editions on Amazon, as well as all the other platforms, and you can find links to those here.)

Review: Ghost Town Belles - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

Down-on-his-luck cowboy Drift Garrity lives up to his name, wandering through Arizona on an unspecified quest and taking what jobs he can on various ranches. His aimless ways take him to a ranch that’s plagued by rustlers and also involve him with an eccentric old prospector who lives with his two beautiful daughters in a ghost town. Could those things be connected? Well, sure they could, along with a notorious Mexican bandit and some long-buried secrets.

I’ve read and enjoyed several of author Chap O’Keefe’s novels featuring range detective Joshua Dillard in recent months, but GHOST TOWN BELLES is an equally entertaining stand-alone yarn. It was published originally in hardback by Robert Hale in 2006 as part of the Black Horse Western line, reprinted in large print in 2008, and is now available in new e-book and paperback editions.

Chap O’Keefe, of course, is veteran author and editor Keith Chapman, who is one of the best in the business at producing gritty, offbeat Westerns. GHOST TOWN BELLES has some fairly lurid aspects to it, along with a plot twist or two that I found genuinely surprising. The action barrels along in satisfying fashion, and Drift Garrity (a great name) is a really likable protagonist. I really enjoyed this novel, and if you like traditional Westerns that aren’t completely traditional, I give GHOST TOWN BELLES a high recommendation. I love that title, as well.

A Rough Edges Rerun Review: Sons and Gunslicks - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

It was a wandering daughter job.

That's a classic set-up for hardboiled private eye fiction, and Chap O'Keefe's series character Joshua Dillard is nothing if not a hardboiled private eye in the Old West. In this novel, originally published in hardcover by Robert Hale in 2007 and recently released in an e-book version, freelance troubleshooter and range detective Dillard is hired by elderly former lawman and town tamer Jack Greatheart to find Greatheart's daughter Emily, who disappeared during a trip to Arizona. Emily was engaged to the son of a widow who owns a large ranch, and after her fiancée was killed in a gunfight before they could even get married, Emily journeyed to Arizona to meet and offer her condolences to the woman who would have been her mother-in-law. She never came back, and a bloodstained coat is the only clue to her disappearance. It's up to Joshua Dillard to find Emily if she's still alive or find out what happened to her if she's not.

Naturally, once Dillard arrives on the scene, things turn out to be even more complicated and mysterious than they appear on the surface. There's a range war brewing, and Dillard has to survive gunfights, fistfights, and bushwhackings before he's able to untangle the various strands of the plot and uncover the truth of Emily Greatheart's disappearance.

As usual, Chap O'Keefe (who's really veteran author and editor Keith Chapman, as most of you already know) spins this tale in terse, no-nonsense prose and skillfully throws in enough plot twists to keep things racing along to a powerful climax. Joshua Dillard is a fine character, a dogged investigator who's plenty tough when he needs to be, and his own tragic background adds a touch of poignancy to his adventures. I've probably said this before, but fifty years ago these books would have made good Gold Medal paperbacks or Double D hardbacks.

As an added bonus in this one, O'Keefe includes "Crime on the Trail" an informative essay about the links between detective fiction and his Westerns. If you're a fan of those genres, SONS AND GUNSLICKS is well worth reading.

(This post originally appeared in a somewhat different form on September 25, 2013. SONS AND GUNSLICKS is available in new e-book and paperback editions, and I second my own recommendation from twelve years ago that it's well worth reading.)

Review: Ride the Wild Country - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

I read most of Keith Chapman’s Joshua Dillard novels when they were reissued some years ago, but RIDE THE WILD COUNTRY is one that I missed back then. Which is a good thing, because I was able to read it now.

For those of you who don’t know, Joshua is a former Pinkerton operative turned freelance range detective and gun-for-hire in the Old West. In this novel, originally published in hardcover by Robert Hale in 2005 and now available in e-book and paperback editions, he’s hired to accompany a New Yorker who’s paying a visit to Colorado. Instead of the man he’s expecting, his employer turns out to be a beautiful woman with a plan to turn a high country valley into a fancy hunting resort. I don’t recall ever encountering this plot in a Western before, so I was impressed by that.

Ah, but is that what’s really going on? In his usual skillful fashion, Chapman peels back more layers of the plot, adding a shady lawyer, assorted ruffians, some religious fanatics, and a young woman Joshua tries to help, leading to all sorts of trouble.

RIDE THE WILD COUNTRY is a thoroughly entertaining Western yarn with plenty of action and plot twists and a very likable protagonist in Joshua Dillard. He’s fast on the draw and can be plenty hardboiled when he needs to be but is also a genuinely decent guy who seems to have hard luck following him around the West. But that’s good luck for us, who get to read about his adventures. If you’re a Western fan, RIDE THE WILD COUNTRY gets an enthusiastic recommendation from me.

A Rough Edges Rerun Review: The Lawman and the Songbird - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

One of my favorite characters in current Western fiction, Chap O'Keefe's freelance range detective Joshua Dillard, returns in THE LAWMAN AND THE SONGBIRD, a novel originally published by Robert Hale in 2005. It's now available in e-book and paperback editions and is well worth reading. (This post originally appeared in a somewhat different form on November 20, 2014, but not to worry, those links are current and will take you right to the book on Amazon. More about that below.)

This novel delves into Joshua's past, flashing back to his days as a Pinkerton operative when he was sent to a mining boomtown in Montana to corral a gang of outlaws operating in the area. While he's tackling that job, he gets mixed up in the schemes of a beautiful saloon entertainer and is unable to prevent a deadly saloon robbery. The loot vanishes, and so does the songbird.

Years later, after personal tragedy has led him to quit the Pinkertons and embark on a hardscrabble life as a drifting troubleshooter, Joshua returns to that same Montana town, which is still plagued with lawlessness. This time he's hired as the local marshal, and a daring stagecoach robbery is the first act in a chain of events that might give Joshua a chance to redeem himself for his earlier failure—if he can survive a hail of outlaw lead.

As usual, Chap O'Keefe (who is really Keith Chapman) throws in some nice plot twists and packs the yarn he's spinning with plenty of gritty action. The pace never falters, and THE LAWMAN AND THE SONGBIRD delivers top-notch Western entertainment. Highly recommended, as are all of Keith's books.

(In addition to being a very entertaining Western yarn, the new edition of this novel has been expanded with a bonus article about how it came to be written and the editorial back-and-forth between the author and the publishing company. I find behind-the-scenes stuff like this fascinating, and it's one more reason I still highly recommend this book.)

Review: Shootout at Hellyer's Creek - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

SHOOTOUT AT HELLYER’S CREEK, recently reprinted in a new edition that’s available in e-book and paperback on Amazon, is the first novel in the Joshua Dillard series by one of my favorite Western writers, Chap O’Keefe (who is actually veteran author and editor Keith Chapman, of course).

In this novel, originally published in 1994 as a Black Horse Western by Robert Hale Ltd. in England, a stagecoach is on its way to the Arizona settlement of Hellyer’s Creek carrying three passengers and a very special cargo: $50,000 intended for the vault of the bank in Hellyer’s Creek. The passengers are a special agent for Wells, Fargo guarding the money, an English actress who’s married to the owner of the biggest saloon and gambling den in the settlement, and Clement P. Conway, a bespectacled Easterner better known as Nate Ironhorn, the author of dozens of popular Western dime novels who wants to interview the legendary lawman who’s currently the marshal of Hellyer’s Creek.

Not surprisingly, the stagecoach is ambushed by outlaws after the loot, which involves the rider who has been trailing the stage: Joshua Dillard, a former Pinkerton operative who is now a freelance gun for hire. Joshua is on a mission of his own, which he interrupts to save the passengers and help them escape from the bandits, which also brings into the story the tomboyish but beautiful redheaded daughter of a drunk who operates the next way station along the stage line. Eventually, everybody winds up in Hellyer’s Creek, trying to navigate and survive a twisty plot rife with corruption, betrayal, and violence.

As always, Chapman weaves together the various strands of his story with great skill and keeps the reader flipping the pages, eager to find out what’s going to happen next. The characters are colorful, downright eccentric in some cases, and interesting. Joshua Dillard, tough and smart but haunted by grief from a tragedy in his past, is a compelling and sympathetic protagonist.

As an added bonus in this book, Chapman includes an essay about the writing and original publication of this novel, including the fact that it wasn’t intended to be the first book in a series, but Joshua was too good a character not to bring back. Likewise, the young redheaded tomboy is a direct forerunner of Misfit Lil, the star of several later novels by Chapman and also a favorite of mine.

If you enjoy traditional Western novels that are fast-moving, full of action, and just a little offbeat, I give SHOOTOUT AT HELLYER’S CREEK a high recommendation, along with all the other Chap O’Keefe novels. I love a book with a distinctive, entertaining voice, and Keith Chapman always delivers.

A Rough Edges Rerun Review: The Sandhills Shootings - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

THE SANDHILLS SHOOTING is one of Chap O'Keefe's novels featuring range detective/hired gun Joshua Dillard. In this one, Dillard gets a letter from his brother-in-law, who is serving as a deputy marshal in a small town in Nebraska, asking him to come and help prevent a range war that's brewing in the sandhills area of that state. At the same time, Dillard is summoned to Omaha by a wealthy businessman who also has connections in the sandhills. Naturally, those two cases turn out to be related, but Dillard doesn't discover that until there are several attempts on his life, in one of which he's shot and left for dead.

Chap O'Keefe (who is really friend-of-this-blog Keith Chapman) takes a traditional Western plot and as usual spins it into something more with clever plot twists, well-developed and interesting characters, and plenty of tough, hardboiled action scenes. Joshua Dillard has turned into one of my favorite Western characters. Although he's fast with a gun and can handle himself just fine in a fistfight, he's hardly a superman, but rather a flawed but determined man trying to make his way on a brutal frontier.

THE SANDHILLS SHOOTING is now available in an affordable e-book edition. If you're a Western fan, I highly recommend it.

(This post originally appeared on August 1, 2011. A new edition of THE SANDHILLS SHOOTING has just been released, including a bonus article on researching Western novels and a new cover. I've added a link to the new edition above. A paperback version is also in the works. My recommendation from more than 14 years ago still stands. Keith Chapman is a fine author of traditional Westerns and always worth reading.)

Review: Misfit Lil Hides Out - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

Misfit Lil returns in MISFIT LIL HIDES OUT, the fourth book in the excellent series by Chap O’Keefe (Keith Chapman). This one was published originally in hardback by Robert Hale in 2008, reprinted in large print by Ulverscroft in 2009, and now available in e-book and trade paperback editions. I always enjoy a visit with Misfit Lil, and this novel certainly lives up to expectations.

It begins on a rather grim note as a war party of renegade Apaches who have jumped the reservation massacre some settlers. Misfit Lil witnesses this atrocity and is able to help one of the potential victims, the wife of a soldier at the nearby fort, escape with her life.

This trouble brings a couple of obnoxious cavalry officers from back east to the fort. They’re there to take charge of the effort to round up the renegades, but instead, they quickly make enemies of some of the locals, including Lil. When one of them winds up dead, she’s blamed for the murder and has to take off for the badlands with both a sheriff’s posse and the cavalry in pursuit. Lil has to deal not only with those threats but also the Apaches, who are still on the loose and looking for more victims.

Chapman weaves these plot strands together with expert skill, leading to a final showdown that verges on the apocalyptic in its intense action. This is a great scene that also reveals a few surprising twists.

As a bonus, Chapman includes an article about female protagonists in Western fiction. Altogether, it makes for a very entertaining package and another outstanding adventure for the Princess of Pistoleers. If you’re a fan of traditional Westerns with a slightly gritty edge, you need to make the acquaintance of Miss Lilian Goodnight.

Review: Misfit Lil Fights Back - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

I’m a long-time fan of Keith Chapman’s Western novels about Misfit Lil, also known as Miss Lillian Goodnight. I recently read the third book in the series, MISFIT LIL FIGHTS BACK, originally published by Robert Hale Ltd. in 2007 under Chapman’s Chap O’Keefe pseudonym, reprinted in large print by Ulverscroft in 2008, and now available in e-book and trade paperback editions on Amazon with a cover by Michael Thomas that really captures the character.

Misfit Lil is an Arizona rancher’s daughter who was a tomboy growing up. She prefers wearing buckskins to fancy dresses and is happiest riding the range and getting into adventures. Her father sent her to a finishing school in Boston to try to turn her into a lady, but it didn’t take. Even though she’s semi-estranged from her father, she stays true to her nature when she returns home and can usually be found getting mixed in one ruckus or another. She can outride, outshoot, and outfight most men, but she’s definitely female and has a crush on army scout Jackson Farraday, who considers himself too old for her and resists her advances.

In MISFIT LIL FIGHTS BACK, all hell is breaking loose in Arizona Territory. Cattle are being rustled, rifles are being smuggled to renegade Apaches, corruption runs deep at the local Indian Agency, and a pair of hired killers show up looking for a young man who’s involved with the local madam and a flashy gambler. Lil has a couple of shootouts early on which get her neck-deep in this whole mess. She’s convinced all of it is connected and is determined to uncover the truth—if her investigation doesn’t get her killed first.

Chapman’s books are always fast-paced, but this one is a whirlwind! Lots of action, a twisty but logical plot, and great protagonists in Lil and Jackson Farraday. Chapman just keeps piling on the problems until it seems like it’s going to take a real slam-bang climax to straighten everything out, and then that’s exactly what he gives us.

I really enjoyed reading this book. If you’re a fan of traditional action Westerns, I give it a high recommendation and hope that there’ll be more Misfit Lil novels in the future.

Review: Peace at Any Price - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

As regular readers of this blog know, I’ve been a fan of Chap O’Keefe’s Western novels for quite a while now. O’Keefe, of course, is actually Keith Chapman, who has been in the genre fiction business as a writer and editor for a long time. His novel PEACE AT ANY PRICE is set in Texas in the Reconstruction era following the Civil War, fertile ground for many great Western yarns over the years.

Actually, this one starts during the war, as ranchers Jim Hunter and Matt Harrison dissolve their partnership after their herd is rustled and their barn and bunkhouse are burned down. Jim supports the Confederacy and Matt the Union, so they each go off to join those respective armies, although unlike some friends who found themselves on opposite sides, their parting is amicable.

Instead of fighting in the regular army, Jim finds himself riding with a group of irregulars and involved in smuggling across the Mexican border. After the war, when Jim returns to the small town in South Texas near the ranch he and Matt established, he finds that Matt is back, too, trying to get the ranch up and running again—but Matt has also married the girl Jim was in love with. Jim can’t stay, so he goes off and gets mixed up with the smuggling gang again, but circumstances keep dragging the fates of the former partners together.

The plot and tone of this novel remind me of some of the classic Gold Medal Westerns from the Fifties and Sixties. Femme fatales, double crosses, and a gritty, noirish feel make it a very entertaining tale. And for someone who’s never actually been to Texas, O’Keefe really nails the Gulf Coast setting, including a humdinger of a hurricane that’s very realistic. PEACE AT ANY PRICE really races along and I had a fine time reading it. If you’re a fan of traditional Westerns, I think there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy it a lot, as well. It’s available on Amazon in paperback and e-book editions.

Review: The Rebel and the Heiress - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

Prolific Western author Chap O’Keefe is actually regular commenter and long-time friend of this blog Keith Chapman. Something of a legend as a writer and editor, Keith worked on the Sexton Blake series right out of high school, founded and edited EDGAR WALLACE MYSTERY MAGAZINE, wrote and edited for numerous British comic book publishers, and wrote many well-regarded Western novels for Robert Hale’s Black Horse Western line before branching out on his own with both new and reprinted Westerns. I’ve just read his novel THE REBEL AND THE HEIRESS, originally published by Hale in 2005 and revised and published as part of Chapman's Black Horse Extra line in 2023. Purely by coincidence, it deals with the post-Civil War, Reconstruction era like the last Western I read, CALHOON by Thorne Douglas (Ben Haas).

Unlike CALHOON, however, THE REBEL AND THE HEIRESS takes place in Arizona, a setting that’s somewhat neglected in its relation to the war and its aftermath. Former Confederate Tom Tolly arrives back in the territory to find his father dead and the family homestead burned to the ground. A corrupt politician has gotten his hands on the property, and as a former Rebel, Tom is no longer welcome in the nearby Union-leaning settlement. He’s not the only one who has shown up in the area recently, though: a disreputable hobo is squatting on the property, and he knows some things that may lead to trouble.

Also visiting the settlement are a mining tycoon and his beautiful daughter, and there are unexpected connections between them and Tom. Throw in a shady mining superintendent, some crooked lawmen, and a trio of hardcases looking for trouble, and Tom is surrounded by mystery and danger.

Chapman keeps things moving along at a brisk pace and manipulates the plot with considerable skill. The action scenes are very good, and Tom Tolly is a likable protagonist, no superhero but tough and determined to get to the bottom of things and make a place for himself in his former home. THE REBEL AND THE HEIRESS is a very solid traditional Western yarn spun by a real professional. I enjoyed it, and if you’re a Western fan, I think it’s well worth reading. It's available on Amazon in e-book and paperback editions.

Witchery Plus: A Weird Tales Trilogy - Keith Chapman

Several years ago my friend Keith Chapman published a pair of stories--a fantasy in the mold of Clark Ashton Smith and a sword and sorcery yarn--in a double volume. He's redone that book, added a third story, this time a modern-day horror yarn set in Australia, and published it as WITCHERY PLUS: A WEIRD TALES TRILOGY, which is available in both e-book and print editions on Amazon.

"Night Howl" is the new story in this volume. Chapman sold a number of comic book scripts to Charlton for their horror titles, and the original version of this story was one of them, but it went unpublished when Charlton switched over to mostly reprints. Converted to prose, it appeared first on the BEAT TO A PULP website and now is in print for the first time. It's about a pair of lovers on the run from a murder charge, and in that respect, it works very well as a noir crime yarn. But there's also a possibly supernatural element involving an old Gothic paperback featuring a heroine with the same name as one of the characters in this story. Are the bizarre events of that old paperback replaying themselves in real life? Chapman uses that question as the springboard for a very well-written tale that generates suspense all the way to the end.

Now here's what I had to say (slightly edited) about the other two stories when I reviewed them back in 2013:

"After an interesting introduction that addresses the genesis of these tales, Chapman produces a fine Clark Ashton Smith pastiche set in Smith's evil-haunted French province Averoigne, "Black Art in Yvones". A young protagonist, a beautiful blonde, and a sinister femme fetale even give this tale a slight noirish feel. In the second novelette in this collection, Chapman ventures into sword-and-sorcery territory with "Wildblood and the Witch Wife", featuring a very likable pair of adventurers reminiscent of Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. It's set in historical England rather than a fantasy world, but there's still plenty of sorcery and action."

Although probably best known for his Westerns, Keith Chapman is one of those authors who can write just about anything and do a good job of it. He's a fine storyteller, as these stories amply demonstrate. If you've never sampled his work before, WITCHERY PLUS would be a very good place to start. 

The Gunman and the Actress - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

I’ve read several books featuring Chap O’Keefe’s range detective character Joshua Dillard and always enjoyed them. Dillard is a former Pinkerton agent who quit that agency after his wife’s murder at the hands of an outlaw gang he was pursuing. Now he’s a drifter, hiring out his gun and his detective skills and usually winding up taking hard luck cases that put him in danger and never net him much profit.

In THE GUNMAN AND THE ACTRESS, Dillard’s second recorded case, originally published in 1995 by Robert Hale as part of the Black Horse Western line and now available in a revised and expanded e-book edition, he’s hired by a theater impresario to protect the scandalous French actress Giséle Bourdette, who is on a tour of the West with her troupe, putting on shows at various frontier opera houses. Dillard joins the troupe in Argos City, Texas, where they will perform at a fancy new opera house built by the local cattle baron.

That cattle baron has a beautiful, headstrong daughter who dislikes the potential husband her father has picked out for her, and there’s a gang of Mexican bandits raising havoc in the borderlands, too. Both of those things will complicate Joshua Dillard’s efforts to keep Giséle safe and incidentally protect the proceeds from her tour, and he also has to navigate an unexpected passionate affair with the actress.

Chap O’Keefe, who is really veteran author and editor Keith Chapman, is a fine storyteller and keeps the action moving along at a very nice pace in THE GUNMAN AND THE ACTRESS. Joshua Dillard’s adventures always play a bit like hardboiled detective yarns set in the Old West, and this one is no exception. Chapman throws in a number of plot twists and brings everything to a suitably rousing climax. I had a lot of fun reading THE GUNMAN AND THE ACTRESS, and if you’re a traditional Western fan, there’s a good chance you will, too. Recommended.

A Gunfight Too Many - Chap O'Keefe (Keith Chapman)

When it comes to popular fiction, Keith Chapman is something of a treasure. He’s a long-time reader and commenter on this blog, of course, but beyond that he’s a writer and editor whose career stretches back 60-some-odd years, to the days of Sexton Blake and EDGAR WALLACE MYSTERY MAGAZINE, of which he was the founding editor. Over the years he’s also been a prolific author of fine Western novels under the pseudonym Chap O’Keefe, many of them published originally as Black Horse Westerns by Robert Hale. The good news for Western readers is that quite a few of those novels are available again as e-books, and more are in the works.

The latest of these is A GUNFIGHT TOO MANY, originally published by Hale in 2008 and reprinted in large print by Ulverscroft in 2009. I really like that title, and it’s fitting, too, because the protagonist is Sheriff Sam Hammond, an aging lawman who wonders if he’s lost enough of his edge that one of these days he’ll come up against some badman who’s faster on the draw than he is and lose his life in a gunfight too many.

That worry doesn’t relieve Sam of his devotion to duty, though, and his job as sheriff becomes more complicated—and more dangerous—when a detective shows up in Rainbow City on the trail of an elusive, notorious bank robber known as Dick Slick. Is it possible that this ruthless outlaw is hiding out in plain sight in Sam Hammond’s bailiwick, posing as a respectable citizen?

Sam has to deal not only with that problem but also with a beautiful widow who has her sights set on him, an equally beautiful rancher’s daughter, a deputy who’s wounded and laid up for a spell, and various rustlers. Everything leads up to a spectacular underground showdown in an abandoned mine.

As you’d expect from his background, Chapman is an excellent yarn-spinner and storyteller. He writes books that are just plain fun to read, and A GUNFIGHT TOO MANY is no exception. The action moves along at a good pace and Sam Hammond is a really likable protagonist. The villains are properly despicable, as they need to be in a book like this. I had a fine time reading this novel and think most traditional Western fans would agree. The e-book edition is available on Amazon and several other platforms, which you can find here.

By the way, the cover artist is Duncan McMillan, and this painting appeared originally on the February 4, 1931 issue of the pulp WEST. Just one more indication that Keith Chapman is working in a legendary tradition.

The Saint Settles a Score - Keith Chapman

When I was in junior high, it would have been difficult to decide who was my favorite fictional character: the Saint, Doc Savage, or Ben Grimm. I'm sure it depended on what I was reading at the time. But I loved all three of them and still do. I've written before about how I discovered the Saint and told the story again in the introduction I provided for the most recent reprint of THE SAINT IN MIAMI, which is available in an inexpensive e-book edition and can even be read for free if you have Kindle Unlimited.

So I don't know how I missed "The Saint Settles a Score", a 16-page Saint comic book story from the early Sixties written by Keith Chapman, an old friend of this blog. It was reprinted on Gary Dobbs' Tainted Archive blog a number of years ago, but I'm just now catching up to it. And I'm glad I did, because it really takes me back to those days when I was devouring Saint stories as fast as I could get my hands on them.

"The Saint Settles a Score" is very much influenced by Leslie Charteris's early stories about the character. Simon Templar answers a call for help from an old friend, a professional burglar who's opposed to violence. The fellow is in trouble, and it catches up to him quickly when he keeps a rendezvous with Simon. He's gunned down by some thugs and lives just long enough to put Simon on the trail of his killers, an investigation that involves wealthy art dealers, a beautiful blonde, a fabulously valuable painting, and some deadly double crosses.

Chapman's script is swift, humorous in places, and has plenty of action. Its light yet adventurous tone matches up very well in comparison to Charteris's Saint yarns. The art, furnished by an unknown Spanish artist, does a pretty good job of capturing Simon's personality and conveying the action. All in all, this is a very good story and I really enjoyed reading it.

If you're a Saint fan and missed this one like I did, you can find all 16 pages in two posts on the Tainted Archives blog, here and here. Be sure and read the comments, too, as they contain further information about the story and Chapman's involvement with the character. Check out this post, as well, for more background. It's great stuff.

Now Available: Blast to Oblivion - Chap O'Keefe

In Denver, a shotgun blast brutally ends a man’s life and sets in motion a deadly chain of events that threatens Joshua Dillard, drifting detective and former Pinkerton agent. Hired by a beautiful woman to untangle the mystery of her brother’s murder and bring the killer to justice, Joshua’s investigation takes him to the raw and dangerous mining town of Silverville, where he finds a web of deception, greed, lust, and violence. Aided only by an eccentric hermit, Joshua will need all his cunning and gun-skill to avoid being blasted to oblivion himself! 

Inspired by the classic Sherlock Holmes novel THE VALLEY OF FEAR, veteran Western author Chap O’Keefe spins another exciting tale filled with action and plot twists galore. Rough Edges Press is proud to welcome O’Keefe and his popular series character Joshua Dillard. This edition is newly revised by the author and includes an afterword about the origins of the novel. BLAST TO OBLIVION is sure-fire entertainment for Western and mystery readers alike!

Now Available: Weird Menace Volume 2

The Shudder Pulps are back! In fact, it's like they never left in this second great collection of new stories inspired by the classic Weird Menace magazines such as DIME MYSTERY and TERROR TALES. Those pulps may have ended in the early 1940s, but some of today's top authors give us the same sort of pulse-pounding, spine-chilling tales they might have published if they had stayed around. 

World War II casts its looming shadow in Mel Odom's "The Spider-God of Nauru!" 

Hell comes to a tropical paradise in Keith Chapman's "Lust of the Cave Spirit". 

American GIs encounter a horror unlike any they ever expected in Michael Bracken's "Attack of the Nazi Snow Warriors". 

Weird Menace mixes with hardboiled detective thrills in Paul Dellinger's "Ghost Writer". 

The protagonist of John McCallum Swain's "The Hades Mechanism" confronts a legendary, undying evil. 

And Ray Lovato's popular character Doc Atlas returns to face a new challenge in "Howl of the Werewolf"! 

These action-packed stories are sure to entertain. Editor James Reasoner and Rough Edges Press are proud to present WEIRD MENACE VOLUME 2!