Highly-successful
western author Brad Dennison (who shares my admiration for
A.B. Guthrie’s THE BIG SKY) does have a personal favourite of his westerns.
It’s RETURN OF THE GUNHAWK, the 3rd in his McCABE series. The story follows
Johnny McCabe, the ‘gunhawk’ of the title - former Texas Ranger and gunfighter
turned cattle rancher - to California and a reunion with a brother he hasn’t
seen for 17 years.
For
images I thought of westerns based around brothers, from TV shows like BONANZA,
THE BIG VALLEY
and LANCER
to movies like THE SONS OF KATIE ELDER.
Johnny McCabe’s
role as a Texas Ranger who became a cattle baron reminded me of the legendary
CHARLES GOODNIGHT (1836-1929.)
CHARLES GOODNIGHT in 1860
Goodnight served as a ranger, helping rescue
Cynthia Ann Parker from the Comanches in 1860. Later he blazed the
Goodnight-Loving cattle trail between Texas and Colorado with his partner OLIVER
LOVING, killed by Comanches in 1867.
OLIVER LOVING
Goodnight founded the first ranch in the
Texas Panhandle, the JRA Ranch, in 1876, and is credited with inventing the
chuck wagon.
Whilst
THE LONG TRAIL (which I blogged about recently) has a mere 110 5 star reviews, the
last time I looked, RETURN OF THE GUNHAWK has 156! Reviews:
‘This
series can be compared to Lonesome Dove.’
‘Great
story-telling… hard to put down.’
‘Wonderful.’
‘This
series of books is so good I feel like I know the characters.’
‘I wanted
to turn the pages, but didn't want the story to end! … I plan to read the
series and hope all are like this story!’
‘Brad
Dennison writes the best stories. This should be a T.V. series… Characters are
so well developed.’
‘This whole series was fantastic! Brad, you
are an amazing writer. You stand with the greats, Zane Gray, Louis L'Amour.’
Find it here: https://www.amazon.com/Return-Gunhawk-McCabes-Book-3-ebook/dp/B00IHMH8EY/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
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