Louis L’Amour. Guns of the Timberlands (1955) Jud Devitt, a man used to getting what he wants, arrives at Tinkerville. He aims to get at the timber upstream of Clay Bell’s ranch. The plot is complicated by a local man with a hidden agenda, Devitt’s fiancee Colleen Riley, and a motley crew of lumberjacks, outlaws, upstanding citizens, cowhands with dubious pasts, and so on. L’Amour allows himself editorial comments on the need for law, order, and fair dealing. Bell is good with his fists as well as his guns. He wins, of course, and gets the girl, too. A good entertainment, made into a movie in 1960. **½
Louis L’Amour. The Quick and the Dead. (1975). Duncan McKaskel and his family are travelling west. A passel of bandits want the loot in McKaskel’s wagon, and his wife Susanna. Con Valian meets up with them, tells them they will need to fight to preserve their lives and their possessions. McKaskel believes in negotiations with reasonable people. He’s wrong, and the story tells of his unwilling acceptance of the facts of life on the lawless frontier. Valian sticks around, despite himself.
The reluctant knight in tarnished armour is a common figure in L’Amour’s novels, as is the Easterner endangered by his blithe assumptions of safety. L’Amour’s great skill is varying the stories, enough that I’m never bored reading them. This was also made into a movie, starring Sam Elliot. I’ve watched it, see my review elsewhere on this blog. ***
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