Now Available: Viral

VIRAL is a new ebook thriller series created by my friend Steven Savile that I'll be contributing to later this year. The first four books have just launched as a Barnes & Noble/Nook exclusive, but they'll be available on the other platforms later on. For now, if you have a Nook you can get started on what's going to be an excellent series full of action and international intrigue.

Now Available: Latchkeys #2: The Ugly Little Bloke - Robert Greenberger

The second Latchkeys adventure is now available from Amazon. Great cover on this one. This is a fine new YA fantasy series. My entry in it will be coming up in a few months. Check it out.

Prologue Books Launches

Here's what I said about the new e-book publisher Prologue Books on their website:


Prologue Books is, in a word, spectacular. This is a treasure trove of the great authors who influenced several generations of writers and are still influencing them.  These books are some of the best examples of sheer storytelling power that you'll ever find.


I meant every word of it, too. I've bought several books already, and there's a good chance I'll buy everything they publish before I'm through. If you haven't checked out their website already, you really need to as soon as you can. Don't get me wrong, I love new books and new authors, too, but the books Prologue is bringing back really are the good old stuff.

Two More Washburn Westerns Now Available

With everything else going on this weekend, I don't want to forget that two more of Livia's Western novels written under the name L.J. Washburn are now available as e-books from Amazon and Barnes & Noble. EPITAPH was her first Western and introduced the characters of Hank Littleton and Buffalo Newcomb. Buffalo also appears in RIDERS OF THE MONTE, and Hank shows up again in BANDERA PASS, making those three books not really a series but certainly connected. And they're all fine books, too.


Barnes & Noble links:


Epitaph

Guest Post on Petticoats & Pistols, plus Free Books

Livia and I have a guest post on the Petticoats & Pistols blog this morning, all about the way we collaborate on our books, and everyone who comments will be entered in a drawing for a couple of copies of my new Redemption, Kansas novel HUNTERS. So check it out, leave a comment, and maybe get a free Western novel. (And a pretty good one, if I do say so myself.)

Hallam: Bigger, Better, and Free

Now with more than 34,000 words of fine hardboiled fiction, Livia's collection of Lucas Hallam stories is free this weekend on Amazon. Two more stories have been added for this promotion, "The Blue Burro" (very BLACK MASK-like and one of my favorite Hallam stories) and "Ladysmith", one of Hallam's adventures when he was still working as a Pinkerton agent. So even if you picked this one up before, you'll want to get it again because it's, did I mention, FREE.

Saturday Morning Western Pulp: Texas Rangers, February 1958

This is the final issue of TEXAS RANGERS, containing the Jim Hatfield novel "Tornado Trail", by Walker A. Tompkins writing as Jackson Cole. Other than the fact that there's no ad for the next issue's novel, there's no indication that this is the last issue of the magazine. The Hatfield novel is an excellent one, a very suspenseful tale that takes place in a much shorter span of time (about a day and a half) than most of the Hatfield stories. This one concerns Hatfield's attempt to corral an outlaw gang that has gotten away with a half-million dollars in loot from a train holdup. Hatfield has the added problem of an inept Ranger trainee tagging along with him. There are plenty of unexpected twists in the plot and well-written, atmospheric scenes, and the only real complaint I have has nothing to do with the story itself -- early on, one of the illustrations is based on a scene that comes much later in the story, and it gives away an important development. I've seen that happen in other pulps from the Thrilling Group, most notably THE PHANTOM DETECTIVE and G-MEN.

Rounding out the issue are four short stories:

"Two Kinds of Guns", Bart Morgan

"Bandit Breed", T.V. Olsen

"The Fugitive", Philip Morgan

"Trouble Wanted", Lucas Todd

Surprisingly, all of the short stories are pretty good. I expected that from Olsen, but I'd never heard of any of the other authors. "The Fugitive" is a simple but well-written story about a lawman's long pursuit of an outlaw, while "Trouble Wanted" concerns a rancher's efforts to keep his younger brother from being hanged for a murder he didn't commit. In both cases, old plots but handled very well.

All in all, this issue is a case of saving one of the best for last.

Another New Book: Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles are Back!

I haven't read this one (yet), but you can't go wrong with this series and Nik Morton is a fine writer. Check it out!

The New Rancho Diablo Book is Out, Yuh Whippersnappers!

The new Rancho Diablo book, GABBY DARBINS AND THE SLIDE-ROCK BOLTER, is now available from Amazon. Bill Crider, writing as Colby Jackson, is the author of this entry, which focuses on Gabby Darbins, the colorful ranch hand. It's full of action and humor, and if you love tall tales, you've got to read this one. Check it out!

Forgotten Books: Bowie Knife - H. Bedford-Jones

The next couple of weeks I'm going to be taking a look at a couple of historical novels by one of my favorite pulp authors, H. Bedford-Jones, that were serialized in the pulp ARGOSY but never reprinted in book form, as far as I know. This is something that should be remedied.

Growing up in Texas as I did, I was also steeped in Texas history, including all the lore and legends. I've always been particularly fond of reading about the period during the 1830s in which Texas won its independence from Mexico and especially interested in the siege and battle of the Alamo. I've been to the Alamo many times, have seen the bullet-pocked walls of the famous chapel, walked through the hushed hallway of the long barracks. What's left is surprisingly small, but the feeling one gets from a visit there is still quite powerful.

So when I ran across this serial by H. Bedford-Jones called "Bowie Knife", proclaimed on the cover as "a Texas Centennial novel of Bowie and the Alamo", I knew this was my meat. I wasn't disappointed.

The hero of "Bowie Knife" is Hugh Kenly, a former riverboatman who is in disgrace because the boat he was piloting hit a snag in the Mississippi and sank when its boiler exploded. In New Orleans, Kenly is trying to decide what to do with the rest of his life when he meets Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie, who are gathering up men to go with them to the Mexican state of Texas, which is in turmoil because of the heavy-handed policies of Mexico's dictator, General Santa Anna. Kenly tentatively decides to accompany them, but before that can happen, he gets embroiled with a couple of Mexicans who are also in New Orleans recruiting men for Santa Anna's government, to help put down what seems to be a brewing revolution. These two are Don Rodrigo and the beautiful Senorita Conchita. When Kenly rescues Conchita from some men who are attacking her, he accidentally kills a bystander who rushes up. This bystander is the famous Jim Bowie, and Kenly winds up with Bowie's equally famous knife.

About now the reader is thinking that Bedford-Jones is really taking some liberties with history, but not to worry. It quickly becomes obvious that Kenly only believes Bowie to be dead. He's really still alive, of course. But in fleeing from what he thinks is a murder charge, Kenly winds up going to Texas with Don Rodrigo and Senorita Conchita, who is really a noblewoman named Dona Maria. The year is 1835, and the town of San Antonio de Bexar is full of intrigue, political maneuvering, and double-crosses. Kenly is in the thick of it, important to more than one faction because he has a map that supposedly leads to the lost San Saba silver mines of Jim Bowie. There is a short-lived romantic triangle between Kenly, Dona Maria, and Josefa, the sister of Kenly's friend Pablo. Bedford-Jones sends his characters on an expedition to the San Saba mines, which leads to a battle with the Comanches and their war chief El Lobo Rojo, or Red Wolf. Back in San Antonio, Kenly crosses paths with Santa Anna and his brother-in-law General Cos, the commander of the Mexican military garrison there. Ultimately, in what comes as no surprise to the reader, Kenly winds up on the side of the Texans and warns them to retreat to the Alamo as Santa Anna approaches the city with a large army. Kenly goes with them, and so does Josefa.

Part of the problem with writing historical fiction about well-known events is that the reader is often all too aware of the outcome. We know that the Alamo is going to fall and that its defenders will be killed to the last man. Bedford-Jones, though, so skillfully manipulates the reader's hopes and feelings that we experience the same air of uncertainty that must have gripped the men inside the Alamo. He paints vivid pictures of the historical characters, especially Crockett, who rings true in every scene. Jim Bowie is a bit less sympathetic than we've come to expect from other portrayals over the years but still fully believable. In fact, Bedford-Jones stays pretty close to the facts as we know them, omitting the famous "line in the sand" incident (which may or may not have really happened) and dodging the question of whether Crockett surrendered and was later executed or died fighting (which is the version I believe; I don't care what the historical revisionists say).

As always in Bedford-Jones' work, the style is clean and sparsely worded, though with plenty of action and deftly sketched characterization. I've heard his writing described as "cool intellectualism", and that's pretty close to accurate as far as I'm concerned. People who think of all pulp writing as melodramatic and wildly overblown have never read Bedford-Jones. Maybe it's because the subject matter is close to my heart, but I think this is one of his best novels.