Benedict and Brazos #2: A Badge for Brazos - E. Jefferson Clay (Paul Wheelahan)

A while back, I read ACES WILD, the first novel in the long-running Benedict & Brazos series by E. Jefferson Clay, actually the extraordinarily prolific Australian author Paul Wheelahan. I thoroughly enjoyed that one, so there was no question I’d read the next one, A BADGE FOR BRAZOS. Several people have mentioned that this series gets better as it goes along, and so far I’ve found that to be true. A BADGE FOR BRAZOS is a very entertaining Western novel.

In case your memory needs to be refreshed, the two protagonists of this series set shortly after the Civil War are former Union officer Duke Benedict and former Confederate sergeant Hank Brazos. The two met during the war, fought first against each other and then on the same side against a gang of renegades who stole a fortune in Confederate gold. Even though there’s a lot of friction in their relationship, Benedict and Brazos have teamed up to hunt down the varmints who stole that gold. Benedict is the slick one of the pair, a handsome, fast-on-the-draw gambler, while Brazos is bigger and more of a rough-and-tumble brawler.

When they run short on funds, they come up with a scheme where Brazos will go into a town without any lawman, pretend to kick up a ruckus, and then Benedict will ride in and “subdue” him, thereby prompting the grateful citizenry to offer him the job of marshal, which he’ll hold down until they have enough money to move on again and continue their quest for the stolen gold.

However, through a series of unexpected events, Brazos is the one who winds up wearing a lawman’s badge, and because of that, our heroes find themselves in the middle of a shooting war between the crew from a local ranch and a group of miners working a silver vein that’s just about played out. Not surprisingly, more is going on that is obvious at first, and there are hidden villains to be uncovered. Also on hand are a beautiful librarian, a world-weary gunslinger, and a female saloon owner tougher than any of the men thereabouts.

There’s nothing in the plot of A BADGE FOR BRAZOS that will surprise anybody who’s read many Westerns, but Wheelahan writes well overall and has an extremely likable pair of protagonists. He’s also a master at pacing, keeping the action moving along at a very fast clip and wrapping things up with a huge, very effective gun battle that also features some poignant moments.

These books remind me very much of episodes in the various Western TV series I grew up watching in the late Fifties and early Sixties. I loved those sorts of yarns then, and I still love them now. So A BADGE FOR BRAZOS gets a big recommendation from me, and I look forward to reading the next one. This series is available in e-book editions from Piccadilly Publishing and in handsome trade paperbacks from Bold Venture Press.

Benedict and Brazos #1: Aces Wild - E. Jefferson Clay (Paul Wheelahan)

Paul Wheelahan has to be one of the most prolific writers of all time. I wouldn’t be surprised if he wrote well over a thousand novels, most of them Westerns for the Australian publishers Cleveland and Horwitz, under a number of different pseudonyms, the most common being Emerson Dodge. A few of his books under the name E. Jefferson Clay were published (pirated, most likely) in the U.S. by Leisure, all of them in his series featuring handsome, womanizing gambler Duke Benedict and burly saddle tramp Hank Brazos, one a former Yankee (Benedict), the other a former Confederate (Brazos), who fought against each other during the Civil War but then teamed up, albeit reluctantly, for a long series of adventures in the post-war Old West.

The Benedict and Brazos series is being reprinted from the start by Piccadilly Publishing as e-book editions and Bold Venture Press as handsome trade paperbacks. I recently read the first novel, ACES WILD, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It begins in a Kansas cattle town where the two protagonists run into each other months after the war is over, then flashes back to their first meeting during a battle in Georgia, where they fight against each other, then team up to ward off an attack by renegades not loyal to either side. There’s a wagonload of Confederate gold mixed up in the affair, and it’s still unaccounted for when Benedict and Brazos meet after the war.

Along with the missing gold, Wheelahan throws several other things into the plot: a gang of outlaws, a bounty hunter and his beautiful, flirtatious wife, a newly opened bordello, and the leader of the renegades Benedict and Brazos tangled with during the war. The story races along in fine fashion, with plenty of action and interesting twists as Benedict and Brazos not only work together when they have to but also plot against each other when it suits them.

ACES WILD is a really entertaining traditional Western with a pair of likable protagonists, and I’m glad that the books are readily available again. I’ll be reading more of them, you can count on that. Recommended.