Have Gun, Will Play

By Camille LaGuire

ebook, June 2010

Two gunslingers, one little girl, a big bag of toys... and murder.

Mick and Casey McKee aren't exactly your average gunslingers. He's young and inexperienced, and has much too sunny a disposition for a gunman. She's younger, meaner, less experienced, but a much better shot.

When they get a job protecting the daughter of a stagecoach king--and her grand collection of toys--it seems like an opportunity to go someplace new. But after the wrong kidnapping, a murder, another wrong kidnapping, a couple of jewel heists and a few knocks to the head, Mick and Casey are left holding the bag of toys. Mick, however, is not as dumb as he seems, and as for Casey...nobody steals her gun and gets away with it.

This book is a little different from the type of westerns I usually read in so much as it is more a mystery novel. Mick and Casey are hired, as it seems they are far too inexperienced and dumb to carry out the job, which the bad-guys are counting on, and of course they under-estimate them…

Told in the first person through Mick the reader is treated to a twisting plot filled with engaging characters, particularly Mick, Casey and the little girl, Laurie. The kidnapping of Laurie seems to be the cloak to hide the main plot of stealing her family’s fortune in jewels and the question of where they are hidden becomes the major mystery thread of the story along with who cut Tyson’s throat.

The story involves secret lovers, double-crossing family members, the innocence of the young, lawmen, puppeteers, and a whole host of treasured toys. All have their part to play in the mystery of the missing jewels.

Mick and Casey’s history is slowly revealed as the story progresses. The reader finding that they are married – even though they don’t much act like a married couple. The reason for this is explained but I’m not going to spoil the why here. Being so young themselves they constantly bicker like children and that I found added to the humour of the many situations they find themselves in, a number of which are resolved through gunplay.

I found this to be an enjoyable read that has a light-hearted tone throughout and was left looking forward to the next Mick and Casey story that the back of the book says Camille LaGuire is set to write. In the meantime I’ll just have to settle for the short story, The Curse of Scattershale Gulch, that is available now.

Have Gun, Will Play is available as both a paper book and an ebook.