Crossfire Trail [Mass Market Paperback]

Louis L'Amour (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 12, 1983

Rafe Caradec—gambler, wanderer, soldier of fortune—was as hard a man as the battlefields and waterfronts of Latin America could fashion, but he was as good as his word. As Charles Rodney lay dying in a dank ship’s fo’c’sle, Rafe swore to make sure that Rodney’s Wyoming ranch went to his daughter, Ann. In Painted Rock, Wyoming, Caradec found land for a man to love, miles of rolling grasslands and towering mountains. He also found that one of the most ruthless men in the territory had set his sights on both Rodney’s ranch and his daughter. But Rafe Caradec had given his word, and once he’d looked deep into Ann Rodney’s eyes, nothing short of death would stop him from keeping the promise he’d made.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Rafe Caradec was a man who always rode at the ready, hardened by a life spent among ruthless men who played for the highest stakes. The only thing Rafe held sacred was his word--and now he had sworn to a dying man that he would save his Long Valley ranch for his wife and daughter, Ann. But Ann thought Rafe was moving in for his own crooked gain, and played right into the deadly hands of the greedy ranchers plotting to destroy her. Then Rafe figured a way to save Ann and the land. It would be dangerous--but that was the only way Rafe Caradec knew. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From the Inside Flap

Rafe Caradec was a man who always rode at the ready, hardened by a life spent among ruthless men who played for the highest stakes.  The only thing Rafe held sacred was his word--and now he had sworn to a dying man that he would save his Long Valley ranch for his wife and daughter, Ann.  But Ann thought Rafe was moving in for his own crooked gain, and played right into the deadly hands of the greedy ranchers plotting to destroy her.  Then Rafe figured a way to save Ann and the land.  It would be dangerous--but that was the only way Rafe Caradec knew.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback
• Publisher: Fawcett (April 12, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0449125718
• ISBN-13: 978-0449125717
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,474,515 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

"I think of myself in the oral tradition--as a troubadour, a village tale-teller, the man in the shadows of a campfire. That's the way I'd like to be remembered--as a storyteller. A good storyteller."

It is doubtful that any author could be as at home in the world re-created in his novels as Louis Dearborn L'Amour. Not only could he physically fill the boots of the rugged characters he wrote about, but he literally "walked the land my characters walk." His personal experiences as well as his lifelong devotion to historical research combined to give Mr. L'Amour the unique knowledge and understanding of people, events, and the challenge of the American frontier that became the hallmarks of his popularity.

Of French-Irish descent, Mr. L'Amour could trace his own in North America back to the early 1600s and follow their steady progression westward, "always on the frontier." As a boy growing up in Jamestown, North Dakota, he absorbed all he could about his family's frontier heritage, including the story of his great-grandfather who was scalped by Sioux warriors.

Spurred by an eager curiosity and desire to broaden his horizons, Mr. L'Amour left home at the age of fifteen and enjoyed a wide variety of jobs, including seaman, lumberjack, elephant handler, skinner of dead cattle, and miner, and was an officer in the transportation corps during World War II. During his "yondering" days he also circled the world on a freighter, sailed a dhow on the Red Sea, was shipwrecked in the West Indies and stranded in the Mojave Desert. He won fifty-one of fifty-nine fights as a professional boxer and worked as a journalist and lecturer. He was a voracious reader and collector of rare books. His personal library contained 17,000 volumes.

Mr. L'Amour "wanted to write almost from the time I could talk." After developing a widespread following for his many frontiers and adventure stories written for fiction magazines, Mr. L'Amour published his first full length novel, Hondo, in the United States in 1953. Every one of his more than 120 books is in print; there are more than 300 million copies of his books in print worldwide, making him one of the bestselling authors in modern literary history. His books have been translated into twenty languages, and more than forty-five of his novels and stories have been made into feature films and television movies.

The recipient of many great honor and awards, in 1983 Mr. L'Amour became the first novelist to ever to be awarded the Congressional Gold Medal by the United States Congress in honor of his life's work. In 1984 he was also awarded the Medal of Freedom by President Reagan.

Louis L'Amour died on June 10, 1988. His wife, Kathy, and their two children, Beau and Angelique, carry the L'Amour publishing tradition forward with new books written by the author during his lifetime to be published by Bantam.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Patience was the key!, February 5, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Crossfire Trail (Paperback)

A RICH, AND SPLENDID STORY! It all started with a man's death. Loving to stay faithful and loyal to his partner, Rafe promises to take care of things! With the company of only one of his friends, he arrives to the certain town and have a talk with Anne, the only daughter the dead man had and tells her that her father wanted him to take care of everything among other things which included her but, she disbelieves him and turn to a handsome but evil man whom she thinks is in love with only her not in whatever her pop left for her! And so problems begin right from there! How can our hero, Rafe make Anne believe the story of her father's death, and in what he told him to do? And if she did believe him, how will he keep the big-headed man and his salty men away from her? And most of all, Will he succeed in doing all that? If you're not interested enough, I'll be happy to say that that ain't all what's in store. Louis L'Amour always finish it with a handful of spice on each story he writes! Go get it, and you won't regret it!..

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars SUBTLY DIFFERENT FROM SELLECK'S MOVIE OFFERING, January 26, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Crossfire Trail (Paperback)

When it comes to reading Louis L'Amour the modern western fan is faced with having to take things in context. Remember that L'Amour's works were primarily written in the fifties and sixties and, as a result, have a certain "dignity" about them that no longer applies with the westerns of today, especially those on the big screen.

Take CROSSFIRE TRAIL for example. There is plenty of action here but it is painted much more subtly on L'Amour's canvass than, let's say, on those of Larry McMurtry or on Clint Eastwood's or Kevin Costner's movie screens. Frankly L'Amour or his readers would not have tolerated the raw, often harsh violence of today's western s offerings.

L'Amour wrote with a clear sense of nostalgia and romance about the west. He was much for the kindred spirit of John Wayne and John Ford than of McMurtry, Eastwood or Costner.

I thoroughly enjoyed CROSSFIRE TRAIL, a tale of revenge, deceit and, as is the case with all L'Amour tales, of ultimate white-hatted triumph and justice. The fan of the movie of the same title, starring Tom Selleck, should note that there are some differences between the screenplay and the book. But all in all the story is the same and is just as enjoyable in print as the story told on the big screen. Read it in the correct mindset and you have a masterpiece.

Douglas McAllister

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Rafe Caradec stool tall in the middle of the gunman's walk...", April 4, 2009

By 

H. Bala "Me Too Can Read" (Just moved to posh Marina Del Rey, CA - where if you drop a quarter, why, you just keep on walking) - See all my reviews
(TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Crossfire Trail (Paperback)

Louis L'Amour may not have had the prettiest writing style but his westerns had such an easy and relatable accessability to them that readers readily snapped them up. And, actually, L'Amour's love of the wild west and the old frontier was so palpable that many passages of his novels did end up reading like poetry. I've read most of his stuff and, bar none, this guy is my favorite writer of westerns (well, okay, Zane Grey, as well). CROSSFIRE TRAIL is just one sample of L'Amour's ability to transport the reader back to the old west, when your word meant a whole lot more, when men were hardy (and probably very dusty) and a trusty horse and a well-oiled pistol determined life or death. I'm sure things weren't so black and white back then or that simple, but L'Amour drew a clear line between the dastardly and the heroic. And, always, always, he told an exciting story.

L'Amour's protagonists are basically all cut from the same mold. Much like how one takes it for granted that mystery author Dick Francis's heroes are inevitably urbane, unassuming, and grittily resolute in the face of adversity, Louis L'Amour almost without exception writes his leading men as lean, tall, strong, upright and very capable. They're all heller with a gun, peerless in a brawl and savvy in the ways of the west. Rafe Caradec, the central character of CROSSFIRE TRAIL, fits all this to a T. In the parlance of his time, Caradec is a man to ride the river with.

CROSSFIRE TRAIL was published in 1954, and it's a testament to L'Amour's skills and timeless appeal that this story doesn't at all read as dated. It's a fast-paced story of survival in the wilderness and a reckoning in Wyoming. Rafe Caradec, on the surface, is a rough sort, skilled with a gun and with his fists. A man of commanding presence, he escapes from forced shipboard labor, vowing to keep a promise he made to Charles Rodney, a dead friend left behind. Rafe makes his way to Wyoming, set on looking up and protecting Rodney's family and wresting back Rodney's ranch, of which ownership is currently in question. In the tiny cowtown of Painted Rock, Rafe Caradec runs into a world of trouble.

He learns quickly that Painted Rock is controlled by a gang of scoundrels and stone cold killers. Worse, the gang's conniving head honcho, Bruce Barkow, is engaged to Rodney's beautiful daughter, Ann. Worse than that? Ann doesn't at all believe Rafe's story and instead suspects that Rafe is out to get the ranch for himself. But Rafe is not without unexpected facets. He's able to buffalo the thugs with mere talk (even if it's talk bolstered by the threat of imminent violence). In a courtroom scene, he smoothly acquits himself from a charge of murder. Gradually, Rafe begins to turn the tide. And, naturally, Bruce Barkow, slated initially as the book's prohibitive Big Bad, persists in resorting to underhanded means. But someone lurks in the wings and, as it turns out, this hombre is a lot worse and far more frightening than Barkow.

To add more texture to the thing, the Sioux hover somewhere in the backdrop and there's the mystery of why Barkow so covets Rodney's land. CROSSFIRE TRAIL, like most of L'Amour's novels, reads like a bullet and offers plenty of Rafe Caradec bracing his enemies, resulting in blazing gunplay and a hellacious brawl or two or three. And while L'Amour never was one to get muddied too much in epic love story, he does throw in the occasional romantic spark. Let's just say, it's not too long before Ann Rodney begins to have serious misgivings about her shifty fiance.

No surprises in this book, as CROSSFIRE TRAIL isn't really Louis L'Amour at his tiptop best. But nonetheless this is a pretty riveting no-frills read, and it's a lot of fun watching the dangerous Rafe Caradec outtalking, outthinking, and outfighting those what done him and his friends wrong. Reading Louis L'Amour's vivid descriptions of the lay of the land and the people inhabiting it, you can't help but soak in the old west atmosphere and the rugged culture. As usual, L'Amour tacks descriptive sobriquets onto several of his characters (Texas Brisco, Bully Borger, Gee Bonaro, Trigger Boyne), catchy nicknames being an element prevalent in the western mythos. And, as well, the occasional homespun vernacular lends one more touch of authenticity. I've said this elsewhere, there's Zane Grey and there's Louis L'Amour. In my eyes, every other western writer takes a back seat.