Customer Reviews

Showdown at Yellow Butte

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4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

JUST LOVED THIS BOOK , MR LAMOUR LETS US DELVE INTO THE MIND OF HIRED GUNS AND THE DECISIONS THEY HAD TO MAKE. ALSO THERE IS A BIT OF MYSTERY IN THE STORY LINE. IN FACT IT HAS EVERY INGREDIENT ROMANCE, ADVENTURE, ACTION AND TRAGEDY WHAT MORE CAN YOU ASK. READ IT AND ENJOY

This Louis L'Amour novel is another variation of the familiar plot of land ownership vs. squatters but with a different twist. A ruthless speculator wants to wrest control of an area where a great cache of Spanish gold may be hidden and hires an outfit of hard cases to get rid of the settlers and their town of Yellow Butte. The story is similar to L'Amour's "The Tall Stranger", with the same elements of a super cowboy, murdering gunslingers and romance in place. A mysterious grulla, a mouse-colored pony, seems to be the key to the puzzle and points the hero straight to the source of all the mayhem and murder. A nice story in the L'Amour tradition of justice and fair play.

This is one of the early books written by Louis L'Amour, dating from a 1953 ACE paperback book released under the 'Jim Mayo' name he was using at the time. While the manuscript was first published as a short story under the title "Showdown On The Hogback".

The story is pretty straight forward with a man, Tom Kedrick, being hired in New Orleans by an organization named Burwick, Keith, and Gunter, trying to gain money from the government by evicting the "squatters, outlaws, renegades, and wasters", from certain lands in the area of Mustang and Yellow Butte. Kedrick quickly finds out in the town of Yellow Butte that the people on the land have been there some as long as ten years with many others at least a couple years. They are honest, hardworking people and they are about to be swindled by the Burwick, Keith, and Gunter 'land combine'.

Also, the organization is aware, as the settlers are not, that all this land will soon be set aside by the U.S. Government as a preserve and reservation as areas for the Navajho and Ute Indian tribes. Now that Tom Kendrick realizes what is about to happen he finds himself smack-dab in the middle of a shooting war with lead throwing gunhands on each side. Through the pages that follow events transpire quickly leading to a final, deadly showdown at Yellow Butte.

An early story from the pen of Louis L'Amour from the days of pulp westerns and later as a best selling ACE and Bantam softcover western.

Semper Fi.

This book, though a classic regular western as any of the other L'amours is not what you could call the best, like Daybreakers, or Last stand at Papago wells. The action part is not as fast paced as usual, with less emotions emanating in you. Moreover, the courting and love part is also desultry. If you generally like the westerns of L'amour, you can read it in one go, but the high points are few and far apart.