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King of the Range
Carrick Dunmore seemed to be nothing more than a happy-go-lucky cowboy whose main pastimes were drinking and sleeping. He wasn't the kind of man who could challenge Jim Tankerton, the outlaw chief whose cruel violence terrorized the countryside. But Dunmore had a few tricks to outwit old Jim...
226 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 2, 1982
About the author
Max Brand
1,861 books140 followersFrederick 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.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 29, 2017
I think I am done with Max Brand for a while. I like his vigorous prose, his love of animals (the horse in this one seems prettier than the female object of desire, and certainly loves our hero more). I also like his plotting, once the story gets rolling.
But this tale, like most of the other Max Brands that came to me through a paperback lot off of ebay, begins with a heavy duty credibility problem. In this one, our strong, clever, nearly superhuman layabout gets transmuted into a western action hero through a patently bogus appeal by a farmer's life who wants her son rescued from the pernicious effect of some local villain. How? Our clever Momma convinces our hero that he is the decedent of some Scottish knight of great courage, by showing him a picture of said knight that resembles our hero. Um, OK. Make your hero an idiot, and see if I want to follow him on his quest...Well, I do, because I like to finish the books I start.
This one also has abrupt shifts in tone, starting first as a comedy, and then changing into standard pulp adventure. I will say that the hero's jeopardy feels more real than in most pulps, even though he is just as indestructible as any other firm jawed galoot of the West. This is a testament to Brand's ability to convey action, motion, and pain. At his best, he is a very visual writer, and he is in good form once the shift out of comedy is complete.
But this tale, like most of the other Max Brands that came to me through a paperback lot off of ebay, begins with a heavy duty credibility problem. In this one, our strong, clever, nearly superhuman layabout gets transmuted into a western action hero through a patently bogus appeal by a farmer's life who wants her son rescued from the pernicious effect of some local villain. How? Our clever Momma convinces our hero that he is the decedent of some Scottish knight of great courage, by showing him a picture of said knight that resembles our hero. Um, OK. Make your hero an idiot, and see if I want to follow him on his quest...Well, I do, because I like to finish the books I start.
This one also has abrupt shifts in tone, starting first as a comedy, and then changing into standard pulp adventure. I will say that the hero's jeopardy feels more real than in most pulps, even though he is just as indestructible as any other firm jawed galoot of the West. This is a testament to Brand's ability to convey action, motion, and pain. At his best, he is a very visual writer, and he is in good form once the shift out of comedy is complete.
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January 23, 2020horrible
August 4, 2024
Read a 1935 unabridged version the library was getting rid of
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews