Fighting Breed

by David Case

The three men who came together in Cockpit could no more keep from destroying each other than could the fighting birds that the settlement was named after.First there was Boone, as ugly and mean as a man could be. Then there was Trace, a gunfighter with a lightning draw and a killer's instincts. And Tregarron, a visitor to the West, looking for a tale of adventure to tell the folks back home.Between them was a woman, and the hidden gold from a stage robbery. For these men, killing came as easily as drawing breath, and after the fight only one could walk away.

192 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1979

About the author

David Case (1937-2018) was born in upstate New York. Since the early 1960s he lived in London, as well as spending time in Greece and Spain. His acclaimed collection The Cell: Three Tales of Horror appeared in 1969, and it was followed by the novels Fengriffen: A Chilling Tale, Wolf Tracks, and The Third Grave. His other collections include Brotherly Love and Other Tales of Trust and Knowledge, Pelican Cay & Other Disquieting Tales, and an omnibus volume in the 'Masters of the Weird Tale' series from Centipede Press. In recent years, his selected short horror fiction has been reprinted by Valancourt Books as The Cell & Other Transmorphic Tales and Fengriffen & Other Gothic Tales.

A regular contributor to the legendary Pan Book of Horror Stories series during the early 1970s, as well as a handful of westerns and pseudonymous porn novels, his powerful zombie novella “Pelican Cay” in Dark Terrors 5 was nominated for a World Fantasy Award in 2001.

(Bio adapted from Valancourt Books)

Reviews

[Hugo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Case is one of my favourite horror writers, but his Westerns are something else. He has a lovely deft touch with character, knowledge of vernacular, and an easy way - despite using third-person narrative - of illustrating characters' thoughts and motivations. The Fighting Breed is no exception, and remains highly readable and pleasingly unpredictable.