Thursday 17 August 2017

The Ponderosa War

THE GUNSMITH #30
By J.R. Roberts
Charter Books, July 1984

They called it Battles Mountain, but it belonged more to the bank than to the Battles family. Now, they have to get their timber down the mountain fast enough to stop the bank from reclaiming the land.

Clint Adams is just passing through North Dakota, but when the Battles brothers help him out in a fight, the Gunsmith feels obliged to return the favour – especially since they have a big, good-looking sister. Helping to fend off the unscrupulous “banker,” Clint comes head to head with a gunslinger out to make his reputation – over Clint’s dead body!

Like all Gunsmith books this is a fast paced tale that is dialogue driven. There’s plenty of action but it’s the showdown between Adams and the gunslinger, Wallmann, that provides the tension and anticipation that kept me turning the pages.

The author also manages to include a lot of information about the timber business and the various jobs that have to be done to get the trees down the mountain. None of this comes over as if you’re reading a how-to manual but as a natural part of the story that provides knowledge to the inquisitive Clint Adams.

With this book being part of an adult series there are a few explicit sexual encounters, but these are easily skipped if you don’t like to read this kind of thing and doing so won’t ruin the story. And this is certainly a very enjoyable tale that finishes with a neat ending as Wallmann and Adams come face-to-face.


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