Alamosa

Judge Stone #1

by David Edward

Sometimes, justice and the law don't see eye-to-eye. Post-Civil War Colorado Territory, 1870's. When a Denver City lawyer is murdered, the town of Alamosa erupts in violence. The trial, lead by the conflicted Judge Stone, ignites a series of events that threaten a second civil war between east and west. A vast conspiracy is exposed in both this world and the next. It all hinges on the guilt or innocence of one woman. But she is already dead. Set in the richly described post-Civil War America, Alamosa is both a classic western and an anti-western. It calls into question many norms of the genre while providing clever insight into the human what it means to bring justice, and how justice by itself might not be enough.

Genres: Fiction

Kindle Edition

Published November 1, 2021

About the author

D. Edward served as a Special Agent in the US Army in the 1980's and 1990's and is a veteran of multiple overseas combat tours. He was the Special Agent in Charge of the 1990 Panama Canal counter-terrorism threat assessment report to the US Congress.

Edward is a graduate of the United States Army Intelligence School where he studied advanced HUMINT (Human Intelligence) and battlefield counterintelligence; also completing training at the Jungle Operations Training Center in Panama, Central America. He holds advanced degrees in engineering including a Ph.D. from NCU, three related M.Sc. degrees (MBA, MSIT, MSIM), and has an undergraduate degree in business (BSBA).

His books typically reach the Amazon Kindle top 10 upon release in their genre. 'End of Reason' was his first work to reach #1 on Amazon in its category, on June 22, 2021. 'Unreasonable' reached #1 as a pre-order and held the spot for over a month upon release.

You can follow his publication schedule here: https://d-edward.com or email him at his first name, the at sign, the first three letters of the word Florida, a dot, and the word cloud.

He did have a twitter account but then he thought it was stupid so he canceled it.

Reviews

[Alicia Marsland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful wonderful story!

Needs a few commas here and there, but great stuff! Better than some of the lit they made us read in high school back in the 60's...

[LaSheba Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very Good! Judge Stone presides over a scandalous court case that consumes the "hard-luck crossroads town" of Alamosa. This Western takes twists and turns on the crossroads of good and evil. There are philosophical musings about justice, power, law, and other worldly entities. But with real consequences in this world and the next. An enjoyable read!

💫Book Quotes:

"To be a God, not to serve one" (kindle p.21).

"Justice never ends anything. It is always a new beginning..." (kindle p. 25).

"...whenever I can, I apply man's law. Whenever I cannot, I apply divine chastisement...If they sinned against man, we deal with it. If they sinned against God, well, they bring about their own judgment" (kindle p. 58).

💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫💫

[Kevin Bowser · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a quick read. And I enjoyed it. I liked the inclusion of the “Maggie” visage or character throughout the story. I liked how it both drove and followed Judge Stone. I liked the rapid internal and external dialog. But, I was confused by the grammatical use of opening quote marks for each piece of dialog. But often the closing quote mark was not included. I have not ever noticed that in other books. But, maybe it has been and I missed it.

[Nita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even though I felt it was not proof read well, showing misspelled words n grammatical errors, I enjoyed the story line. Maggie especially was interesting. This is not the genre I normally read. Interesting story line.

[Michele Rice Carpenter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fast Read

This book is old west meets supernatural. The punctuation got to me so much that I stopped reading before the midway point. The story idea is good, so give this book a chance if you like the genre.

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway.

[Lark Dunton · Rating 5 out of 5]

fun, quick read of the old west

Liked the plot, exploration of law vs justice and of time as a construct outside of place. This book was an interesting mix of old and older- old west storytelling mixed with paranormal bits as well.

[Lynn Rowe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is very different. It is about the old West town of Alamosa, Colorado and a bunch of ghosts. All this is happening in 1870's when a massacre took place in the coal-mining town of Alamosa. It's about good vs evil. It took me a while to buy the concept, but I found it a "goodread".

[Leslie Benvenuti · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think the first few chapters could use a bit of cleaning up for continuity sake. There were also some grammatical and formatting issues that kind of drove me crazy.
I did give the 3 star rating though for the story. Tons of potential!

[William Ringold · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cerebral and really interesting. Its been a while since I read a book cleverly crafted to work on two or three levels.

[Cami Eslick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Old west justice meets the supernatural. Great scenery descriptions. I look forward to 2.0.

[Joseph K · Rating 1 out of 5]

did not enjoy

The book was not very interesting, it was a hard read. It took all I had to keep picking this up.

[Christopher Galvez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good read

I enjoyed the author’s description of the time period. I felt like I was in the 19th century in Colorado. The characters were well developed and the story flowed well. I was drawn in and my attention was kept throughout.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a delight to read this book. It's a very inventive Western with some modern twists told by an up and coming author. It's a refreshing and stimulative look at some basic tenets as told in the post Civil War period that carry through to the present day. I can't wait for the sequel. Mr. Edward, please write as fast as you can.