Eli Gault was raised by a merciless, drunken fire-and-brimstone preacher-until he avenged himself upon his pious father. And that was only the beginning of his rage.
Because when Eli meets Cutter Sharpe-a legendary mankiller and expert gunhand-the pair starts shooting their way across Texas, leaving a trail of blood and bodies behind them. But Eli is about to learn that there's a line a man shouldn't cross, because there's no going back-there's only hell to pay.
Damn. Sure took me longer to finish this enjoyable enough Western than I thought.
This is one action packed, gore slinging number. Told in first person by a guy who reads like he’s Festus from the old TV series Gunsmoke, there’s little of a real plot here. It’s basically a series of misadventures that end in gunfire - with enough descriptions of gore that approach the “Edge” series by George G. Gilman levels.
Many brutal fistfights, many more gunfights. I enjoyed reading this.
A rough abuse non childhood was all that Eli Gault really cares to remember. His father blamed him for his mother's death, from that a point on his father a traveling fire and brimstone evangelist who dipped into the ugly sins he preached against to the so called poor sinners during his travels around Texas. The man was an abusive raging alcoholic who beat his son Eli constantly and indulged in flings with doxies and awe struck widowed women he seduced after his revivals. The minister/father preached to the pitiful downtrodden of dancing with the Devil and himself holier than thou and them some,very sad. Eli's life led into gambling, killing, drinking and womanizing and anything else he felt like doing. Texas Ranger Tiger Jim Baker and the accusing murdered family, as usual, bribes were paid to the presiding judge and prosecutor to fix the trial for poor Eli Gault aka Henry Moon. One could say, his goose is cooked!!
Interesting novel. The is the first book by Butts for me amd I liked it quite fine. Told in the first person, we find Eli Gault sitting in jail awaiting the hangman for a murder he didn't commit, which should have been a justifiable killing at any rate but for the wealth and power of the dead man's family. Gault tells the tale of how he went from the young son of an itinerant preacher to a killer awaiting death. How he'd learned gambling from one man and how to use a gun from another, as well as his treatment as boy at the hand of his father, all contributing no small part to his ending.