BLOOD MOON

THE TEXIANS
Book 4 of 5
BLOOD MOON
By Zach Wyatt
Cover art by Bruce Minney
Pinnacle Books, April 1985

While Josh Sands has been eating dust on a wild horse round-up, Comanche raiders have cut a bloody trail as far south as San Antonio. With the Texas Rangers depleted, the Indians are growing in boldness and power. Now it’s up to Sands and his rag-tag bunch to come to the aid of the republic. Along with the undermanned Rangers, they’re going to make a daring foray into the heart of Comanche territory – to stem the tide of terror and destruction – and give the Texians back their future.

Whilst the previous three Texians books have revolved around documented missions that really happened, this story is much more loosely based on historical events. With no funding to support them, the Texas Rangers have virtually disbanded, with many of the men let go. Josh Sands is one of those men. The Comanche take advantage of this situation and pretty much raid and pillage unchecked. Blood Moon tells of the struggle of the small band of Texas Rangers and volunteers to stop the raids whilst facing much larger odds. 

A lot of the early part of the book follows Sands and his friends during their attempt to set up a horse ranch and round up wild horses, including a stallion, to start this project. Whilst doing this Sands has to deal with a couple of Comanche raids and his frustration at being let go from the Rangers. His heart isn’t in the ranch, or horses, but belongs to the Rangers. During this part of the story, we meet some characters that first appeared in the previous book, War Devils. 

As you’d imagine, stories that are based on real events include real people too. Sands is fictional, but he’s friends with Captain John Coffee Hays and will eventually team up with Hays and his remaining rangers to track down and stop a much larger band of Comanches. They are joined by another real person in the Lipan Apache chief Flacco and a small number of his braves. The final battle features a charge into the enemy lines by Hays and Flacco that becomes legendary and the author explains why this happened in a humorous way. This final battle makes for an exciting conclusion to this fast-moving tale.

Blood Moon isn’t quite as good as the previous three books but it is still a very entertaining read and left me looking forward to reading the next book very soon. 

Zach Wyatt is a pseudonym used by George W. Proctor.