by Paul Bagdon Leisure, Nov. 2006
Gettysburg was the end for Jake Sinclair. When the blood-drenched battle ended, the Confederate sharpshooter looked over the field of the dead and dying and decided he’d had his fill of war. He didn’t get far before a battlefield scavenger tried to kill him for his horse. Jake ended up on the winning side of that skirmish and took the thief’s guns and saddle for himself. But fate isn’t through with Jake yet. A corrupt sheriff will see to that and Jake will find himself on the run for murder!
Paul Bagdon is a new writer to me. His story starts out with a lot of promise, full of horrific imagery of war, written in all its explicit gory detail. If it’s blood and guts you’re after then this should satisfy.
But it’s during the battle for Cemetery Ridge that I began to notice the typos; the mis-spellings, and that began to annoy me. Even worse was to come as a rifle went from being a Henry to a Winchester and back. Sinclair’s handgun was to suffer changes too, first it was a Colt .44 then magically became a Smith and Wesson .22.
I soon found myself looking for mistakes instead of concentrating on the story which was a shame as the first two thirds of the story was good although I felt there were a few too many flashbacks to Jake’s childhood.
The final part of the book, when Jake gets involved with the Night Riders, turned what had been a promising start into a traditional western plot that left me feeling somewhat let down.
Maybe it was the typos that really spoiled it for me, and it made me wonder if the author bothered proof reading.
