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The Last Days of Wolf Garnett
Fiction, General, Historical, Westerns, Cowboys
193 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
April 22, 2024
Fast moving Western tale of revenge with a hard edge and containing elements out of a classic private eye mystery.
Former ranch owner Frank Gault is out to find the owlhoot who robbed the stage Gault’s wife was on. During the hold-up some commotion occurs causing the horses to crash the stage, killing the wife.
All Gault knows about the outlaw and his gang is that the leader is known as Wolf Garnett and that he’s holed up in New Boston, Texas.
In New Boston he’s told by everyone in town that Wolf Garnett is dead, buried for going on three weeks. The sheriff seems to be especially eager in convincing Gault that Wolf has departed this world.
Soon, Gault is aided by a range detective employed by the cattlemen’s association and an embittered former lawman, both men motivated to find Wolf Garnett for different reasons, grudges, or just curiosity.
I don’t recall how many of Clifton Adams’ books I’ve read but they’ve all been superb. He’s one of my favorites and this novel would serve as a fine introduction. I could’ve given this a 5 star rating but, you know …Western!
Former ranch owner Frank Gault is out to find the owlhoot who robbed the stage Gault’s wife was on. During the hold-up some commotion occurs causing the horses to crash the stage, killing the wife.
All Gault knows about the outlaw and his gang is that the leader is known as Wolf Garnett and that he’s holed up in New Boston, Texas.
In New Boston he’s told by everyone in town that Wolf Garnett is dead, buried for going on three weeks. The sheriff seems to be especially eager in convincing Gault that Wolf has departed this world.
Soon, Gault is aided by a range detective employed by the cattlemen’s association and an embittered former lawman, both men motivated to find Wolf Garnett for different reasons, grudges, or just curiosity.
I don’t recall how many of Clifton Adams’ books I’ve read but they’ve all been superb. He’s one of my favorites and this novel would serve as a fine introduction. I could’ve given this a 5 star rating but, you know …Western!
June 4, 2025
This is a very good western and deserves readership. However, it is surprisingly lacking in excitement.
July 11, 2020
After moving to cowboy country, I started reading some of the library's westerns, found most of them simplistic, not captivating. But some of the westerns proved to be quite well written and engaging. Came to prefer to call those exceptional stories 'historical fiction' rather than western. Adams' books among the best.
Here's a review copied from the Pulp Serenade website:
"The Last Days of Wolf Garnett was originally published in 1970, one year before Clifton Adams died all too young at the age of 52. It was Adams’ second consecutive novel to win the Spur Award for Best Western Novel from the Western Writers of America (the other was 1969’s Tragg’s Choice). It’s a doomy, atmospheric western with a grim, mysterious plot. If you’re looking for a noir western, you couldn’t ask for a much darker—or much better written—tale than this. As its title indicates, the book is preoccupied with death. This concern, however, was not new to Adams’ work; the theme had haunted his books from the very start of his career and, as this Wolf illustrates, continued right up until the end."
Here's a review copied from the Pulp Serenade website:
"The Last Days of Wolf Garnett was originally published in 1970, one year before Clifton Adams died all too young at the age of 52. It was Adams’ second consecutive novel to win the Spur Award for Best Western Novel from the Western Writers of America (the other was 1969’s Tragg’s Choice). It’s a doomy, atmospheric western with a grim, mysterious plot. If you’re looking for a noir western, you couldn’t ask for a much darker—or much better written—tale than this. As its title indicates, the book is preoccupied with death. This concern, however, was not new to Adams’ work; the theme had haunted his books from the very start of his career and, as this Wolf illustrates, continued right up until the end."
May 13, 2024
This was a corker of a paperback! A hardboiled western that won't let go.
Frank Gault comes to town, looking for Wolf Garnett, the man who heartlessly killed his wife a year ago, only to find out that the town just got done burying the murderer. Gault doesn't believe it, doesn't want to believe it, and no one in town wants to help him.
This is the kind of hardboiled book I love, where the hero is under the antagonist's thumb from chapter one. The whole book is Gault scraping by, uncovering the true story, but never getting ahead. Adams populates the book with a cast of stolid, silent folks, hardened by the land and the cruelty of others. They all keep their cards close to their chest, revealing them to Gault one by one, and never in a way that makes the reader or Gault trust any of them. (And they all have great names, like Grady Olson and Elbert Yorty.) And the cards they do reveal to Gault? Great, plot-thickening surprises. My only complaint would be that I'd have liked a page or two of denouement to breathe after the action ends.
It's always fun to discover a talented, new-to-me author from the paperback era. I got curious about Adams after seeing an intriguing old paperback of his on eBay. I didn't buy the book (yet), figuring I should get a taste of his stuff off of archive.org first. So glad I did. I'm looking forward to exploring more of Adams's novels.
Frank Gault comes to town, looking for Wolf Garnett, the man who heartlessly killed his wife a year ago, only to find out that the town just got done burying the murderer. Gault doesn't believe it, doesn't want to believe it, and no one in town wants to help him.
This is the kind of hardboiled book I love, where the hero is under the antagonist's thumb from chapter one. The whole book is Gault scraping by, uncovering the true story, but never getting ahead. Adams populates the book with a cast of stolid, silent folks, hardened by the land and the cruelty of others. They all keep their cards close to their chest, revealing them to Gault one by one, and never in a way that makes the reader or Gault trust any of them. (And they all have great names, like Grady Olson and Elbert Yorty.) And the cards they do reveal to Gault? Great, plot-thickening surprises. My only complaint would be that I'd have liked a page or two of denouement to breathe after the action ends.
It's always fun to discover a talented, new-to-me author from the paperback era. I got curious about Adams after seeing an intriguing old paperback of his on eBay. I didn't buy the book (yet), figuring I should get a taste of his stuff off of archive.org first. So glad I did. I'm looking forward to exploring more of Adams's novels.
March 16, 2025
More a 3.75
Just a fine western read :)
Just a fine western read :)
January 17, 2018
A man seeks revenge for the murder of his wife. A satisfying western that reads like a crime novel. Adams gives his main character a clear goal and we are with him all the way through to the convincing climax. Adams' style is easy and fast-paced and never strays from the subject matter. The "cowboy" prose feels authentic and never overdone. Well deserving of the 1970 Spur award.
June 15, 2012
Another hardboiled western by Adams. Good pacing and a weird brother/sister thing going on in this one. Vengeance and bullits.
May 2, 2024
“Fast moving Western tale of revenge with a hard edge and containing elements out of a classic private eye mystery,” Is what I read in a review and was immediately intrigued and checked it out from the public library.
This was the first of Clifton Adams' books that I’ve read and I gotta say it was a pleasant introduction and I’m glad I went with my instincts. I will be checking out more of his books considering it was insured fast paced and also entertaining.
Good book, neat book.
Cya.
This was the first of Clifton Adams' books that I’ve read and I gotta say it was a pleasant introduction and I’m glad I went with my instincts. I will be checking out more of his books considering it was insured fast paced and also entertaining.
Good book, neat book.
Cya.
February 14, 2019
a very good novel . a surprise to find a western written in 1970 that could be G rated. Held my complete attention right up to last page. Sorry to learn the author died shortly after writing this work.
December 24, 2022
Really just your average revenge plot with extremely predictable turns.
June 6, 2012
Frank Gault arrived in New Boston just a bit late. His horse had come up lame in his efforts to get there and he got off the stage with his saddle rig slung over one shoulder.
Wolf Garnett had been buried that morning.
His year long hunt was over and he wasn't sure how he felt about that. Garnett was an outlaw whose gang had held up a stage last year and Garnett had viciously whipped the horses and sent the driver-less stage on a wild race such that it ran off the trail. His wife had still been aboard and had died in the tumble down the mountain.
A year of pursuit was over and Gault wasn't satisfied. He wanted to see the body to be sure. Because he had seen Garnett just five days before that in the Nations and lost him, only to hear a few days later about the dead body found by the Sheriff.
Olsen refused to dig up the body, he was filling out papers to file for the thousand dollar bounty when Gault approached him. The body had been identified by Garnett's sister and two childhood friends on a trail drive through the area who'd heard about and came in to see.
The whole thing smelled to Gault so he decided to dig it up himself. He was almost there when the Olsen appeared with a shotgun, encouraging him to finish and satisfy his curiosity. The body was in an advanced state of decay and he couldn't tell anything.
Olsen was almost friendly after that, though he did want to know when he was leaving town. There was a stage due in in a couple of days.
When Gault decides to leave before then, buying a buckskin from the hostler, things take a turn. Gault asks for his sidearm, there's a law against wearing one in town, the Sheriff swears he doesn't know anything about it. "I just asked you not to wear it." The deputy had taken it. "He's out of town on business for a few days and I don't know where he put it." It was a cheap sidearm anyway and Gault put more reliance in his Winchester.
Riding out of townm he found a couple of more things. Someone had filed down the firing pin on his rifle. He was effectively unarmed. And he was being followed.
A pair of them and they made little effort to hide.
Gault was headed for the Garnett place where the sister lived. he wanted to talk to her.
That gets him shot and begins a series of strange events. The sister saves him, he meets a range detective while recovering, a matter comes to light when he finds, on the body of a deputy that tries to kill him(he tramples him with his horse), the plain wedding band he'd bought his wife, a set of pearls that was taken in the robbery, and a fancy gold watch that belonged to a Confederate officer that had been murdered during the war, along with all the escort accompanying $200,000 in gold coin.
Which was missing and had been for years.
A nice novel, which won the Spur award for Best Western Novel in 1970.
Wolf Garnett had been buried that morning.
His year long hunt was over and he wasn't sure how he felt about that. Garnett was an outlaw whose gang had held up a stage last year and Garnett had viciously whipped the horses and sent the driver-less stage on a wild race such that it ran off the trail. His wife had still been aboard and had died in the tumble down the mountain.
A year of pursuit was over and Gault wasn't satisfied. He wanted to see the body to be sure. Because he had seen Garnett just five days before that in the Nations and lost him, only to hear a few days later about the dead body found by the Sheriff.
Olsen refused to dig up the body, he was filling out papers to file for the thousand dollar bounty when Gault approached him. The body had been identified by Garnett's sister and two childhood friends on a trail drive through the area who'd heard about and came in to see.
The whole thing smelled to Gault so he decided to dig it up himself. He was almost there when the Olsen appeared with a shotgun, encouraging him to finish and satisfy his curiosity. The body was in an advanced state of decay and he couldn't tell anything.
Olsen was almost friendly after that, though he did want to know when he was leaving town. There was a stage due in in a couple of days.
When Gault decides to leave before then, buying a buckskin from the hostler, things take a turn. Gault asks for his sidearm, there's a law against wearing one in town, the Sheriff swears he doesn't know anything about it. "I just asked you not to wear it." The deputy had taken it. "He's out of town on business for a few days and I don't know where he put it." It was a cheap sidearm anyway and Gault put more reliance in his Winchester.
Riding out of townm he found a couple of more things. Someone had filed down the firing pin on his rifle. He was effectively unarmed. And he was being followed.
A pair of them and they made little effort to hide.
Gault was headed for the Garnett place where the sister lived. he wanted to talk to her.
That gets him shot and begins a series of strange events. The sister saves him, he meets a range detective while recovering, a matter comes to light when he finds, on the body of a deputy that tries to kill him(he tramples him with his horse), the plain wedding band he'd bought his wife, a set of pearls that was taken in the robbery, and a fancy gold watch that belonged to a Confederate officer that had been murdered during the war, along with all the escort accompanying $200,000 in gold coin.
Which was missing and had been for years.
A nice novel, which won the Spur award for Best Western Novel in 1970.
August 24, 2010
I don't read many westerns, but I liked this one.
April 6, 2016
Wonderful book!!
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews