Easy Company and the Bible Salesman

By John Wesley Howard

Jove, February 1983

Book 25 of the series.

During the ritual of the Sun Dance the young Northern Cheyenne braves tested their manhood. It was a sacred time, but it was also a time when the hatreds of the year could boil over into open warfare.

When a wild-eyed, Bible-thumping fanatic sets his band of two armed men and eight very disarming women right in the middle of the Cheyennes’ ceremonial grounds, trouble is certain.

Lt. Matt Kincaid has a feeling that there’s more to this “preacher” than meets the eye as he and scout Windy Mandalian move fast to head off an Indian uprising.

This book begins with a number of different story threads that gradually become linked by preacher Jeremiah Henson, the author switching between his excellent mix of characters at regular intervals ensuring I continued to read in the need to find out what happened next to each of them. In fact for the first half or so of the book Easy Company have little to do as it’s their scout who takes centre stage for this part of the very fast moving story.

John Wesley Howard is a pseudonym and this entry in the series was written by Kenneth Bjorgum, and he easily swept me up in his tale of mistrusts, lies, and broken promises, that soon become a frantic race against time to prevent an Indian war.

I’ve always enjoyed reading the Easy Company books and this story matches the quality of those before it, once again leaving me eager to read the next in the series.