Showing results by author "Ralph Compton" in All Categories

Waylaid by a pack of murdering outlaws, Daniel Strange's lifeless body is left dangling at the end of a rope. Now, a mysterious gunslinger is on the vengeance trail, packing Strange's trademark twin Colts, and answering to the same name. With fiery green eyes and a temper to match, he won't stop until every last man who killed Strange shares the same fate. And as each bullet finds its mark, his victims will die never knowing the truth: that Daniel Strange may be dead and buried, but his daughter is alive - and killing....

Armed with only a Colt rifle, a Bowie knife, and courage as big as the West, Ten Chisholm—the bold, illegitimate son of frontier scout and plains ambassador Jesse Chisholm and a Cherokee woman—arrives in the heart of Comanche country with a price on his head. His only crime: loving the beautiful daughter of a powerful New Orleans gambler who has promised her to a wealthy man she hates.

It's in the lawless Indian Territory that Daniel Strange meets his demise. Riding his chestnut mare to Texas to buy himself some cattle, the best gunsmith in St. Joseph, Missouri gets waylaid by a pack of murdering outlaws. His lifeless body is left dangling at the end of a rope - robbing his family of a loving husband and father.

Marshal John Beck was the law in the dangerous town of Mother Lode, Arizona. On his own, he'd managed to keep bandits, rustlers, and desperados at bay. It was a tough job for one man to handle, but he made it work...until the day Bram Hogan and his Brickhouse Gang got the drop on the lawman. They beat Beck to within an inch of his life and dropped him in the desert, where nothing but a slow, painful death awaited him. But the gang underestimated Beck. Even at his lowest point, he found a way to survive.

In the 1870s, as the country recovered from the War Between the States, the expansion of railroads and the discovery of gold opened the American west to both civilization and savagery. Men and women on both sides of the law were drawn by the chance to make a fortune, and there was often a big difference between Law and Justice.

Wes Stone was once a lawman. Then the Sandlin Gang shot down his father, known as The Gunfighter. Swearing vengeance, he takes up his father's guns. But little does he know that the odds are even more against him than he thinks - and that to get revenge for a dead man, he might have to die himself....

Former Texas Rangers Benton McCaleb, Will Elliot, and Brazos Gifford ride with Charles Goodnight as he rounds up thousands of ornery, unbranded cattle for the long drive to Colorado. From the Trinity River brakes to Denver, they’ll battle endless miles of flooded rivers, parched desert, and whiskey-crazed Comanches. And come face-to-face with Judge Roy Bean and legendary gunslingers like Clay Allison. For McCaleb and his hard-riding crew, the drive is a fierce struggle against the perils of an untamed land. A fight to the finish where the brave reach glory - or die hard.

Benton McCaleb and his band of bold-spirited cowboys traveled long and hard to drive thousands of ornery cattle into Wyoming's Sweetwater Valley. They're in the midst of setting up a ranch just north of Cheyenne when a ruthless railroad baron and his hired killers try to force them off the land. Now, with the help of the Shoshoni Indian tribe and a man named Buffalo Bill Cody, McCaleb and his men must vow to stand and fight. Outgunned and outmanned, they will wage the most ferocious battle of their lives—to win the right to call the land their own.

Taking up the mantle from legendary Western author Ralph Compton, Matthew P. Mayo delivers a searing adventure that rockets along like a runaway stagecoach. In Tucker’s Reckoning, Samuel Tucker suffers the deaths of his wife and daughter, then takes to the bottle in paroxysms of grief. After drifting from his native Texas to Oregon, Tucker witnesses a murder, little knowing that the aftermath might give him a new reason to hope - if it doesn’t spell his doom.

Big Charlie Chilton knows better than to lose his temper, but when a loudmouth threatens to expose his long-buried secrets, he can't help but teach the man a lesson about being quiet. Unfortunately it turns out the man was about to make an important supply run for the town's marshal, and Marshal Watt knows just enough about Shotgun Charlie's past to draft him into service in his stead.

George Kingsley has more money than sense, and when he’s in trouble, he turns to the infamous gunslinger Dan Karr for protection. Dan reluctantly accepts, and he kills every would-be assassin without hesitation or remorse. He’s superstitious, not sentimental, but Kingsley has kids, and Dan doesn’t want to see any child grow up without a father. As the killers keep coming and the bodies stack up, it becomes clear that something is very wrong. Luck favors the prepared, and Dan starts to realize just how little he knows about the family he’s risking his neck for.

Jasper Duncan’s stagecoach is the fastest one in California; at least that’s what he tells folks looking for a ride between the Stanislaus mines and Sonora. But he needs a windfall of cash to stay in business, and he needs to stay in business to continue his hunt for the outlaw Alec Casey, who murdered Jasper’s father. He’s learned Casey has a base of operations in the Stanislaus woods and he’s determined to find it. An unexpected solution presents itself: a lucrative job transporting three passengers and “dangerous cargo.”

The Border Empire trilogy concludes, as Wes Stone’s quest for revenge leads him to destroy the plot by the Golden Dragon gang to endanger US currency by switching counterfeit coins for real ones within the walls of four different mints in the southwest. Battling long odds and high stakes, Stone and his friends El Lobo and Byron Silver must solve a double kidnapping, face a mercenary army of renegades from the Sandlin gang who are assembling in Durango, and avoid the many young hotheads who seek to add to their own reputations by challenging Wes’s skill with a gun.

The life of a cowboy suits Thalis Christie just fine. A puncher for the Crescent H in Texas, he loves what he does and is damn good at it too. He doesn't even mind being away from his family - he's got good friends to keep him from getting too homesick. That is, until his folks write, imploring him to hunt down his brother, Myles, who's been shot while prospecting in the Black Hills. Thalis sets out to do his family duty and find his little brother - still alive, he hopes.

Parker Stanley's family had a dream: to start a new life in the Far West. But en route, a Cheyenne band slaughters his parents and abducts his sister. Then cowboy Clay Springer rides to the rescue - and comes up with an idea. He's got a team ready to deliver goods to the Mormons in Utah, but he's short on funds for supplies. He knows that Parker managed to hold on to his family's savings, so he suggests a 50-50 partnership. With a three-wagon, seven-man team, Parker and Clay will traverse the barren land, but out in the wilderness, Parker's sister needs saving - and he has vowed to find her.

Eight years ago, vicious bandits killed Marshal Tobias Cassidy and left his daughter for dead. They thought they got away clean. Now a contest to determine the top shootist in the Wild West is set to take place in Fortune’s Cross and lady gunslinger Hope Cassidy has come to town…only it’s not for glory, it’s for vengeance. After gunning down one of the men who murdered her father, Hope is given a stark choice: swing from a rope, or take the dead man’s place in the contest.

Rancher Ty Farraday's hunt for stray cattle takes a turn for the worse when he discovers a shallow grave and the body of wealthy Alton Winstead, the owner of the Double-Cross Ranch. Ty's first frantic thoughts are of Winstead's widow, Sue-Ellen, who picked Alton over him. Unfortunately, she chose poorly. Alton masterminded a crime and left his helpers to swing for it. Hungry for revenge, the murderous headcases have overrun the Double-Cross and are holding Sue-Ellen prisoner.

In her guise as "Danny Duggin", Danielle Strange has spent the past two years hunting down the outlaws who murdered her father. Reunited with her brothers, the twins Tim and Jed, she plans to take her war across the border into Mexico - unaware she's being pursued by a US federal marshall. Saul Delmano comes from a powerful family of cattlemen whose business stretches from the Southwestern territories into Mexico. He's put a $2,000 reward on "Danny Duggin's" head, tempting every outlaw and bounty hunter across the West to try to collect it.

Deadwood Gulch stars bounty hunter Cas Everett, lightning fast on the draw and deadly as a nest of rattlers. When Cas returns home and finds his ma, pa, and siblings planted in fresh graves, he vows to call down the thunder on all those responsible.

A deeply divided nation. A shamelessly partisan media. A president loathed by half the populace. Smuggling and gang warfare along the Mexican border. Armed citizens willing to stand their ground and take law into their own hands.... That was America in 1881. All those forces came to bear on the afternoon of October 26 when Doc Holliday and the Earp brothers faced off against the Clantons and the McLaurys in Tombstone, Arizona. It should have been a simple misdemeanor arrest. Thirty seconds and 30 bullets later, three officers were wounded, and three citizens lay dead in the dirt.