Marbleface

by Max Brand

Involuntarily relinquishing his title as middleweight champion after a heart attack, a solitary man begins a new life of poker and gunfighting and quickly establishes himself as an unbeatable figure.

Genres: Westerns

243 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 1, 1977

About the author

Frederick Schiller Faust (see also Frederick Faust), aka Frank Austin, George Owen Baxter, Walter C. Butler, George Challis, Evin Evan, Evan Evans, Frederick Faust, John Frederick, Frederick Frost, David Manning, Peter Henry Morland, Lee Bolt, Peter Dawson, Martin Dexter, Dennis Lawson, M.B., Hugh Owen, Nicholas Silver

Max Brand, one of America's most popular and prolific novelists and author of such enduring works as Destry Rides Again and the Doctor Kildare stories, died on the Italian front in 1944.

Reviews

[Debbie Zapata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another of my November In Arizona books, this one tells the unusual story of a boxer who has to retire because of a bad heart. He is supposed to keep calm and quiet, so what does he do? He becomes a professional poker player and gunman, of course! Silly question!

It sounds weird, but the story worked and was very entertaining. Jerry Ash became known as 'Pokerface' because he never showed any emotion: he was cool and calm no matter what happened. At least on the outside. There were many times when he was sure he was about to die and was desperately trying to get his heart to settle down, but no one ever realized that he was not actually the man he seemed to be.

But for someone who was supposed to stay calm, he found himself in a lot of frantic situations. There was a little bit of 'innocent bystander finds himself in the middle of everything' going on here, and at times it was funny to see how differently Jerry viewed events compared with the way other people saw them. Not exactly your basic formula Western!

I still don't know why the title of the book is Marbleface. The only time that word is used is on the front cover and the title page. Weird, isn't it?

And this book was an example of the problems there can sometimes be with borrowing from the library. It reeked of some horrid perfume that made me sneeze. That did not keep me from finding out whether or not Marble/Pokerface ever died because of his dodgy heart, though!

[Steve Booth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good Standard Max Brand Western

Why the three stars? Because this book was scanned in and not read by the editors. I literally had to stop and highlight al of the typos. Typical typos were: fee for the, wife instead of with. Incredibly distracting.

[Peter Pactor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great story, well presented, by Max Brand.

[Kent · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my all time favorite books by Max Brand. This transcription has some editing errors that need to be fixed, but it's still worth the read

[Lisa Wells · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had to quit after two discs of audio. i cant tell if its the narrator, the writing, or the story that is boring me.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very entertaining