Town Tamers

By David Robbins

Signet, December 2013

Ludlow, Texas, has a problem. A band of rowdy and violent cowhands from the Circle K ranch has been terrorizing the small town, drinking, smashing windows, and even shooting up innocent citizens. With the townsfolk terrified, Ludlow is on its way to falling totally under the gang’s control – unless someone does something about it.

Asa Delaware has a good reputation as a very bad man to cross. Roaming the West with his two grown children and with his gun always for hire, he’s known as the Town Tamer. For a fee, he’ll fix what – or who – is causing a ruckus. There isn’t any job he’ll walk away from or any challenge he finds too hard. But when his children start backing out of the family business, Delaware may find out what it means to be on the business end of a shotgun barrel….

If it is action you want then this story is packed with it. Told with style and visual prose that puts you right there, witnessing the Town Tamers cleaning up Ludlow in a hail of lead and blood.

It’s easy to follow Delaware’s belief that he, and his children, fight on the side of good against evil but then David Robbins throws a deadly problem into Delaware’s path when he’s called to Ordville, Colorado. A town with troubles where it isn’t clear just who are the good or the bad.

David Robbins has created a great set of characters for this stand-alone novel. The Delaware’s that soon had me wishing there were more books about them. The Gray Ghosts. The man known as The Tracker, and so the list goes on.

David Robbins often writes books with a strong family bond and this one is no different. It is beautifully crafted and will have you sharing the emotional struggle Delaware has when his son announces he wants out of the family business. A fathers’ love for his children hitting home hard during the aftermath of a lethal gunfight.

Filled with cliff-hanger situations, believable dialogue, and brutal action sequences, this is a very fast-flowing story.

Town Tamers, in my opinion, is a story that should be enjoyed by all western fans, and is truly a hard-to-put-down read.