The Gunsmith #330

THE DEAD TOWN

as by J.R. Roberts

Jove, June 2009

In the middle of a hellish dust storm, Clint Adams is glad to stumble into Jasper, Kansas. But the town is deserted, except for one stubborn spitfire of a woman. She tells Clint about Jasper’s past, about the fatal mistake they made in hanging an innocent man – and about those who came for vengeance. And now the Gunsmith is going to bury the sins of the past once and for all…

The dead town of the title only plays a small part in this fast moving book, and has some very memorable scenes involving missing bacon. Once this mystery has been solved Adams finds himself helping out a woman – in fact he helps more than one woman in different ways as the tale progresses.

The story soon becomes a chase tale. The hunt sees Adams riding through various towns and meeting a variety of lawmen along the way. One of these has stuck in my mind, not least because he rides alongside Adams for much of the book, and sides him in the final gunfight, but for his name. J.R. Roberts (Robert J. Randisi) must have had fun creating this character, for this lawman has another job too, that of the undertaker, and his name is Deadly.

This book, like the majority of The Gunsmith books I’ve read, soon sweeps you up in the story with is easy style and dialogue driven prose, which once again proves why this series is so popular.