Battle Mountain

By Matt Cole

The Crowood Press, March 2018

Clay Parker and his cohorts are what is left of the once-infamous Tulley gang. They have waited five years to get the money they stole from a bank, which they believe has been hidden by one of their own – and he has just been released from prison. Now Hugh Donahoe is meeting up with his daughter Mena in the town of Battle Mountain. When his old gang mates confront him, he is killed. The money is not found, however, and the gang suspects that Mena has hidden it in a trunk, which is being carried across the Nevada plains and on its way to Oregon. Parker devises a plan to attack the mule train to get to the stolen money. But Parker is unprepared for the grit of Glen Maddox and his freighters. 

Filled with colourful and strong characters of both sexes, this tale gallops along. The author regularly switches between the different groups of people before bringing most of them together for a tense final fight that involves some blood and whiskey thirsty Paiute warriors too.

Maddox and his crew, along with Mena Donahoe and some of her fellow travellers have no idea there might be money hidden amongst the freight. The author doesn’t reveal its whereabouts until near the end, but for the reader it doesn’t take much working out as to where it is hidden. This doesn’t lessen the enjoyment of this fast-paced tale and I’m now looking forward to picking up another of Matt Cole’s books soon.

As he does in some of his other books, Matt Cole begins this one with a poem. This time he’s chosen Dreams by Helen Hunt Jackson from 1886. You can easily find this and in-depth analysis of it on the internet. Beginning his westerns this way makes them somewhat unique in the Black Horse Western line as I can’t think of any others that begin in this way.

The Trail to Devil's Canyon

By Cole Matthews

The Crowood Press, June 2018

Anton Kozlov, a mountain man who wanted no part of trouble, had escaped Russia and made a life for himself living on and near Battle Mountain in Nevada.

Anton is asked to do a ‘favour’ for a US Cavalry officer – to retrieve a mail-order bride from a stage station and return her to the cavalryman. It sounds easy enough until Anton learns that the stage has broken down near a notorious nest of outlaws. Anton manages to rescue Lucy, the cavalry officer’s bride, and they slowly make their way back to his cabin in Devil’s Canyon.

However, the journey is fraught with danger, and their arrival at the stockade spells future trouble when it becomes apparent that Lucy’s husband-to-be has endangered them all by committing atrocities against the local Paiute tribe.

Will this be the last chance or the end of the line for Anton Kozlov?

This is the first Black Horse Western to carry the author name of Cole Matthews but it is not the first western from this writer as he has had six published under the name of Matt Cole, one of which I have read and enjoyed. Like that book, this one also begins with a poem.

Once again the author has created a terrific cast of characters and a twisting storyline that will have you guessing as to the outcome, such as how anyone can possibly escape the stockade when it’s completely surrounded by vengeance seeking Paiutes. There’s plenty of action, some of which is quite brutal. The pace of the book is excellent and the ending ties everything up neatly.

There is one thing that I wondered about though, and that was that the author has Kozlov armed with a Hawken rifle – a single-shot weapon I believe – and Kozlov fires at will with this gun without pausing to reload. Still this error is easy to overlook and it didn’t spoil my enjoyment of the story and it hasn’t put me off wanting to read more by this author.

Gunpowder Empire

By Matt Cole

The Crowood Press, July 2017

Raw hatred ravaged the range land!

Luke Bragg – a man with a dark past – has come to claim the sheep ranch his uncle left for him. Only once he arrives in Preston Gulch, Bragg soon finds himself in the middle of a range war with the valley’s two biggest cattle ranchers. This clash of interests, which Bragg tries to avoid, just escalates and he is the one the town thinks is the reason why. The cattlemen try to bolster their position by claiming that his sheep kill the grass by nibbling it too close and trampling the roots with their sharp hoofs. Then when the daughter of another rancher comes to town after the murder of her father, the truth about his murder sends the valley into chaos and threatens the empires that they had established with gunpowder.

This is Matt Cole’s third Black Horse Western and the first I have read. It is also the first BHW that I have read that begins with two poems. These are both about sheep and written by Arthur Chapman (June 25, 1873 – December 4, 1935). They set the mood for the book perfectly.

Matt Cole has created a great set of characters and surrounds them with mystery, the main one being who killed the rancher Flynn and why. There is also some mystery as to Luke Bragg’s past. All this grabbed my attention and encouraged me to read more.

There is plenty of action, and Bragg soon proves he’s a capable man when it comes to gunplay. Slowly the truth behind the murder is revealed and desperate men take drastic measures to keep their part in the killing hidden. Bragg has to be silenced, permanently, and a hired gun is brought in to do this which leads to an interesting proposition.

The story builds well to its violent final showdown where the truths are exposed and western justice is served, and all the story threads are tied up neatly. The final lines leaving me grinning and thinking it’s about time I caught up with Matt Cole’s two previous books.