Showing posts with label Milo Sinovcic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Milo Sinovcic. Show all posts

Thursday, 24 July 2025

LONGARM AND SEÑORITA REVENGE

 

LONGARM AND SEÑORITA REVENGE
Book 415 of 436 + 29 Giant Editions
By Tabor Evans
Cover illustration by Milo Sinovcic
Jove, June 2013

The name makes cavalrymen cower, hard cases head for the hills, and bandidos cry, “Vámones!” They call her Señorita Revenge. Savage and merciless, she and her band of kill-crazy Kiowa have been cutting down soldiers like blades of grass in the Texas Big Bend country north of the Rio Grande.

If any man can declaw this homicidal hellcat, it’s Deputy U.S. Marshal Custis Long.

But when Longarm arrives at the cavalry outpost, he finds a half-mad major, his batty, blond daughter, a horribly scarred captain, and a mouth-watering but mysterious maiden – each of whom is hiding a secret. As Longarm puts the pieces together, he draws ever closer to ending this beautiful buckskin-clad butcher’s reign of vengeance… 

Harsh landscapes and tougher characters – brutal characters in many cases. Seductive, stunningly beautiful women who can be as savage as any man should the need arise, and it does, often. Vicious action scenes. Plot twists that took me by surprise. A breath-taking stagecoach ride. This book has them all, and more. Longarm sure has to keep his wits about him or he’ll end up as one of the deceased. 

The story moves along at terrific speed. Chapters ending on cliff-hangers ensuring I’d keep turning the pages. Great characters, especially Señorita Revenge. Mystery behind her true identity – I had my ideas but I wasn’t quite right. Hard-hitting fairly graphic violence and a couple of descriptive sex scenes – the latter to be expected as the Longarm books are billed as adult westerns, but don’t let them put you off reading this book or you’ll be missing out on a great tale.

I’m being purposefully vague on the plot, and naming characters and their relationships to each other as I don’t want to spoil any part of this book for anyone who has yet to read it. 

The author behind the pseudonym of Tabor Evans this time around is Peter Brandvold and his take on Longarm has always been grittier than most of the other authors who wrote for this series. Think spaghetti rather than Hollywood western. 

After finishing Longarm and Señorita Revenge I was left eagerly wanting to hunt through my collection to dig out another of Peter Brandvold’s entries into this series and start reading it straightaway. Recommended. 

American readers can get a copy here
British readers can get a copy here

Monday, 11 October 2021

LONGARM AND THE ROCK SPRINGS RECKONING


Number 434 of 436 + 29 Giant Editions
By Tabor Evans
Cover illustration by Milo Sinovcic
Jove, January 2015

After saving soiled dove Lucy Potter from two attackers, Longarm takes pity on the young woman. He buys her a new dress, gets her cleaned up, and takes her out for a fancy steak dinner. Lucy’s got a good heart, and Longarm hopes his kindness might encourage the jaded prostitute to try another line of work.

But before Lucy can begin her new life, she’s killed by the same men who attacked her. Blinded by rage, Longarm can no longer see the line between justice and revenge. He turns in his badge and rides off after the killers. But as he trails them to Rock Springs, her learns the killing was premeditated – and greed was the motive. . . 

What at first seems like a straight-forward revenge tale slowly takes on a few twists as Lucy Potter’s family become involved and Longarm finds he has a puzzle to solve. Were any of Lucy’s family responsible for her death? Most of Longarm’s investigation takes place in the last quarter of the story, the earlier chapters used for introducing various characters and Longarm forming a plan to track down Lucy’s killers. The author also follows the murderers flight for a couple of chapters which helps make the reader wonder how Longarm will ever catch up to them.

The author paces the book well and kept me turning the pages as I wanted to discover whether Longarm would just kill those he hunted to satisfy his need for vengeance, or would he control that urge and attempt to arrest them? 

There’s not a lot of gunplay in this story which may disappoint some. The Longarm books are an adult series but sex is kept to a bare minimum, just a couple of pages in total. This tale is more a murder mystery with Longarm just asking questions, listening and watching to find out who was behind Lucy’s killing.

For me, I wouldn’t place this Longarm book up there with the best the series has to offer, but it did keep me entertained. The final scenes offering some surprises into the fate of a couple of the characters that tied the story up neatly.  

An observation on the book itself. The Longarm books are around 180 pages long, but this one has blank pages so all chapters can start on a right-hand page and those chapters start about half-way down the page. All that means is that the story is 30 pages shorter than the overall count.