By James Reasoner
Harper, June 1994
Buffalo hunter Cole Tyler used to ride with Jeb Stuart
leading wagon trains across the West. Now he’s riding the very first train into
Wind River, its cars packed with saloonkeepers and swampers eager to make a
killing. It is a historical occasion, but no sooner does the train roll into
town than mayhem erupts.
Within minutes, a prominent citizen lies dead on the
platform. Within hours, Cole Tyler is buffaloed into wearing the marshal’s
star. And within days, he is facing down thundering stampedes and a ruthless
killer, as Wind River becomes a town with its own brand of justice.
This is the first in a series that ran for six books. They
may carry a single author’s name on the cover but were actually written by
James and his wife, Livia Washburn (who does get mentioned on the copyright
page).
As Cole Tyler gets to grips with the idea of being a lawman,
and being tied down to one town, so his life becomes more complicated, each
bout of trouble leading to new challenges, each new arrival seeming to bring
more problems with them, for instance cattle baron Kermit Sawyer and the young
woman setting up a new cafe, Rose Foster.
The book is filled with colourful characters, many of who
may be hiding something from their past or their real agenda. It’s these
mysteries that drew me into the story and refused to let go until the end was
reached. The story is well crafted and superbly paced, chapters often ending
with a cliff-hanger or question that made it extremely difficult to put the
book down before I discovered how things were resolved.
The main story thread of murder, and a couple of sub-plots
are cleared up by books end, but one or two questions remain about certain
characters that will have me reaching for the next book, Thunder Wagon, very
soon as I’m eager to see what happens next.
Footnote: All six books in the Wind River series have
just been released as ebooks.
