The Six-Gun Tarot

Summarising this book is a difficult task because there’s so much going on.

At the dawn of creation, god built the world on the bones of the defeated darkness. Step by step his angels drove it back, but there was one, the leader, the first, the source of the darkness that could not be stopped, could not be killed and instead had to be chained and buried in the Earth itself.

And now, those chains are loosening. The town of Golgotha in Nevada, a town that already attracts all things weird and bizarre, becomes the sight of the battle for the end of the world, a battle to keep the darkness chained. With powers from so many sources, under the eyes of the angel guardian and the best people Golgotha can throw against it - it's a diverse and show more powerful group, each with their own story and stake in the battle

This book is huge.

Not just in length – the world is vast and complicated with the story going back to the very creation of the universe, to a small town in Nevada where the strange and the unusual walk. There are a vast number of different powers and forces to incorporate into this small town, each of them having a massive effect of the overall story. The story itself is huge, with lots of different stories, lots of individual threads all coming together to form the whole.

And that’s told with a huge number of characters, each bringing more information, more world building, more angles and opinions and each being an essential part of the overall battle and progression. But each isn’t just a tool – they’re not just there for world building or to add their special powers or special resources or special insight – they’re all fully fledged, powerful characters in their own right. They all have histories, they all have links to other people, they all have their own wishes and desires – each of these many stories doesn’t just add to the whole, but they’re all deeply personal stories of the characters. They don’t just tell the story, they tell their stories.

The angel Biqa, at the dawn of creation conflicted and upset by God’s plan and his methods. Jim, the 15 year old boy running away from his past and that haunts him. Mutt, the Native American rejected by his people and facing resentment in the town. Maude, in an unhappy marriage for the sake of her daughter and trying to reconcile her current life with the teachings of her childhood that she intends to pass on. Mayor Harry, trying to reconcile his place as a pillar of the community and his Mormon faith with being gay and having found a man he loves. Augustus Shultz, still hurting and grieving from the death of his wife, caught between trying to hold onto her memory and finding love again. They all have their own, powerful stories to such a degree that I simply cannot pick out one protagonist because it’s all of their stories.

Even characters that are more referenced than having their own story told – like Sheriff Highfather- are still extremely rich characters with their own back stories, personalities and presence as full people in the book.

And the story itself is epic – not just a battle to face a force that can literally end the world, but the origin of it to pre-creation times, each character’s massive heroics in the face of it, their courage, their battles, their personal struggles, the ominous build up, the forces they try to bring together – it gives the whole book a grand crescendo feel. This is all helped by the writing that’s descriptive, but tight, that conveys emotion and feelings without excessive monologues, that gives us this full, glorious world without info dumping and that interspaces action and events with personal interaction and in perfect balance. It’s a beautifully written book.

This book is set back in the Old West in Nevada, just after the American civil war. Historical novels always make me cringe because they are often taken as an excuse to either erase marginalised people or treat POC, GBLT people and women extremely shoddily, often under the excuse of historical accuracy.

This book was one of the few that went a long way to do it right. It doesn’t rewrite history and pretend prejudice and bigotry didn’t exist – Mutt both has his demeaning name and is frequently racially attacked by other characters for being a Native American as are the Chinese members of the town. Maude is expected to be meek and mild and faces not just condescension but also violence from her domineering husband. Harry faces derision, contempt and the constant pressure to hide who he is.

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So much happens in this book and it's so different and creative, I couldn't put it down! Well written with fascinating characters like a sheriff that can't seem to be killed, and a deputy that is part human and part coyote, the Six-Gun Tarot is not your average fantasy-western-horror. I love the atmosphere Belcher's writing creates, and the unspoken and mysterious hints of things still to be revealed. Highly recommended!

I have this bad habit of starting a series right in the middle. Sometimes it’s an accident. I don’t bother looking at the small line under the title that says ‘Book 45 of Awesome Series You Need to Read’. Other times it’s deliberate because, for whatever reason, the library just doesn’t have books one and two.

I was actually more intrigued by The Shotgun Arcana by R. S. Belcher than I was by the synopsis of The Six Gun Tarot . But I was good this time and started at the very beginning of the Golgotha series instead of with book two like I normally would.

And I am very happy I did.

The Six Gun Tarot is the debut novel of R. S. Belcher, and it is one hell of a wild ride through the Weird West. The book is gritty, filled with show more myth, cults, fantasy, horror, and characters that stick with you long after the last page. If you want to know what Weird Westerns are, this is a prime example and a great place to delve into the genre for the first time.

The plot is centered around Golgotha, a small town in the Midwest during the late 1800s. It was a mining town once, but now the silver’s mostly been dug out and gone, a fact the new owners of the mine seem to be ignoring. The only thing that prevents the town from emptying out and turning into one of the many ghost towns peppering the west is its location. They sit on the very edge of the 40-Mile, a long stretch of inhospitable desert that’s claimed many a man, with Golgotha being the last stop for water and food. Golgotha’s a strange place, though, attracting the lost, the forsaken, and the not quite human. So when Jim Negry shows up just outside of town, half dead, with a mysterious jade eye in his pocket carved with symbols he can’t read, everyone knows he’s just found home. But there are other things in Golgotha, too. Things that should never have woken. Things that threaten not only the town, but the universe itself.

There is a lot held within these 361 pages. The story is told in the third person, the viewpoint switching to many, if not most, of the towns inhabitants at one point or another. If you don’t like omniscient or semi-omniscient point of view, be warned.

The cast is a very varied, rather all-inclusive one. Jim is a boy on the run, having committed a crime back home in West Virginia. Mutt, the deputy, is half-human. The sheriff himself is a man who can’t die; he has the scars to prove it, too. The mayor, one of the most prominent citizens in town and a respected elder of the Mormon community, is very much in love with Ringo, the man who plays the piano down at one of the bars. Maude is part of the Cult of Lilith, a long line of women who were pirates and warriors, now settled down with a banker and a daughter of her own. And that’s only the beginning.

While I honestly loved all of the characters, there were times where it felt as if there were too many competing points of view. Some of the characters never quite crossed paths, their stories never really overlapping in any significant way and had little to do with the majority of the real plot. There were times where I wished the plot would go back to other things – the main plot of the town being consumed by an evil darkness and the thing hidden away in the old silver mine, and what happened to make Jim run from home. Still, the tales involving characters like Gillian and Auggie, were wonderful. They added depth to the town, made it fuller, more alive, and showed what sort of a place Golgotha really is and the sort of people who stumble their way there and call it home.

Though the plot is interesting and exciting, The Six-Gun Tarot can feel very slow. We are bombarded with flashbacks quite often. For the most part, they do a wonderful job of providing the insight and knowledge we need. Every character is interesting, and every background fleshed out, or at least fleshed out enough to make their actions feel real and believable. However, flashbacks are plentiful, and sometimes go one for pages and pages at a time. I found myself snapped out of the action rather abruptly several times. Most distracting was the flashback in the middle of the story’s climax. Being taken out of the action and then dropped back into the middle of it so abruptly was jarring to the extreme.

Despite this, every scene is very deliberate. The actions of characters, their small movements as they speak add great depth to these scenes. The book is written in a very captivating manner. I wanted to linger on the page, really soak it in, before moving on. The places where characters who, though living in the same small town, never seem to meet are usually very, very good. So much so that I am very willing to forgive most of the issues I had with pacing. The scene between Jim and Ringo isn't very long and its the only time they meet in the book. Neither really knows the other to any extent, but Ringo is willing to listen and give advice even as the whole world is falling apart. We learn a lot about both characters in a short amount of time.

Do be warned that this book is dark. Things start out a bit raw and gritty. The setting and characters are all about what you’d expect at the beginning of the story. As the tale progresses the stakes rise to the point where the universe as we know it is in danger. At the same time the story grows exponentially darker both literally (as Golgotha is shrouded in starless, perpetual night) and in a more metaphorical sense. There is a very real sense of horror here, and I think fans of that genre would find a lot to like in this book.

The Six-Gun Tarot is an incredible first novel that has me clamoring for more. Despite any issues I had with it, I found myself really enjoying the book, fully invested in the characters, and surprised at every turn. I already have the second book in the series, The Shotgun Arcana, sitting on my shelf, and definitely plan on reading it. If you like Weird Westerns or dark fantasy this is a book you need to read. If you don’t like slower pacing or dark, sometimes graphic imagery, this one may not be for you. show less

This novel feels like it was distilled from an epic campaign from a role-playing game where the game master let the players come up with the mythological backgrounds for their characters and then had to weave a world around them. It’s clearly stitched together, and the seams show in places, but it’s done with great creativity that makes it well worth the read. Some of the exposition is a little lumpy, and the bang from the various Chekhov guns isn’t always as spectacular as the buildup demands, but I expect Belcher’s craft will improve with more novels.

The only appearance of the tarot is in the chapter headings; if you’re explicitly looking for the tarot as a plot element, try Tim Powers’ Last Call.

Start with a western. Add some steampunk and some classic horror mythos. Have stories of Lucifer's Fall meet Native American Trickster legends meet Chinese creation myths of Pangu. Add the Divine Feminine plus Joseph Smith's Golden Plates. Stir it together with a wide assortment of other eerie and weird and you have the town of Golgotha, Nevada.

This book had been getting some minor buzz on some blogs I read and Library Journal gave it a starred review, so I thought it might provide a little escapist diversion.

Wow! It certainly was a wild ride. Belcher has populated this book with one of the most colorful and entertaining cast of characters I've seen in a while, and they rollick through a plot that doesn't really let up for a second. It show more kinda works.

However, 'kinda' is not 'totally'. The flaw in this book is that it's simply too much for its 364 pages. Even though Belcher has reserved a good chunk of the things you encounter as stories for another day, there's still so much in this one that it seems a bit cluttered and choppy. It might have been better had the order of assassins dedicated to Lilith or the local alchemist resurrecting the dead also been left for another day when we could get a truly satisfying bite out of them. The time regained could have been spent on this story's main arc of a Lovecraftian horror and its ancient guardian.

It was fun. It was certainly escapist. If you enjoy this whole strange olio of genres then, by all means, give this a try. I hope Mr. Belcher returns to this well. If he does, I hope he pulls in the reins a bit, focuses on one or two of the many intriguing characters, secure that there's plenty of time to tell all the tales. show less

There is a LOT going on in this book. It takes a while to really come together, but by the end it's a compelling story. Maude Stapleton is my favorite character, and I wish there was more of her story here. The mishmash of a bunch of weird supernatural things mostly works, although the Lovecraftian cult is a bit gruesome for my taste.

My biggest reservation about recommending this book is the bizzare treatment of the Chinese community. They're constantly mentioned (using archaic, now-racist terminology), but never quite treated as actual people, and have little interaction with any of the plot. I wish the writer had either included a Chinese viewpoint character, or skipped the orientalism entirely.

I have this bad habit of starting a series right in the middle. Sometimes it’s an accident. I don’t bother looking at the small line under the title that says ‘Book 45 of Awesome Series You Need to Read’. Other times it’s deliberate because, for whatever reason, the library just doesn’t have books one and two.

I was actually more intrigued by The Shotgun Arcana by R. S. Belcher than I was by the synopsis of The Six Gun Tarot . But I was good this time and started at the very beginning of the Golgotha series instead of with book two like I normally would.

And I am very happy I did.

The Six Gun Tarot is the debut novel of R. S. Belcher, and it is one hell of a wild ride through the Weird West. The book is gritty, filled with show more myth, cults, fantasy, horror, and characters that stick with you long after the last page. If you want to know what Weird Westerns are, this is a prime example and a great place to delve into the genre for the first time.

The plot is centered around Golgotha, a small town in the Midwest during the late 1800s. It was a mining town once, but now the silver’s mostly been dug out and gone, a fact the new owners of the mine seem to be ignoring. The only thing that prevents the town from emptying out and turning into one of the many ghost towns peppering the west is its location. They sit on the very edge of the 40-Mile, a long stretch of inhospitable desert that’s claimed many a man, with Golgotha being the last stop for water and food. Golgotha’s a strange place, though, attracting the lost, the forsaken, and the not quite human. So when Jim Negry shows up just outside of town, half dead, with a mysterious jade eye in his pocket carved with symbols he can’t read, everyone knows he’s just found home. But there are other things in Golgotha, too. Things that should never have woken. Things that threaten not only the town, but the universe itself.

There is a lot held within these 361 pages. The story is told in the third person, the viewpoint switching to many, if not most, of the towns inhabitants at one point or another. If you don’t like omniscient or semi-omniscient point of view, be warned.

The cast is a very varied, rather all-inclusive one. Jim is a boy on the run, having committed a crime back home in West Virginia. Mutt, the deputy, is half-human. The sheriff himself is a man who can’t die; he has the scars to prove it, too. The mayor, one of the most prominent citizens in town and a respected elder of the Mormon community, is very much in love with Ringo, the man who plays the piano down at one of the bars. Maude is part of the Cult of Lilith, a long line of women who were pirates and warriors, now settled down with a banker and a daughter of her own. And that’s only the beginning.

While I honestly loved all of the characters, there were times where it felt as if there were too many competing points of view. Some of the characters never quite crossed paths, their stories never really overlapping in any significant way and had little to do with the majority of the real plot. There were times where I wished the plot would go back to other things – the main plot of the town being consumed by an evil darkness and the thing hidden away in the old silver mine, and what happened to make Jim run from home. Still, the tales involving characters like Gillian and Auggie, were wonderful. They added depth to the town, made it fuller, more alive, and showed what sort of a place Golgotha really is and the sort of people who stumble their way there and call it home.

Though the plot is interesting and exciting, The Six-Gun Tarot can feel very slow. We are bombarded with flashbacks quite often. For the most part, they do a wonderful job of providing the insight and knowledge we need. Every character is interesting, and every background fleshed out, or at least fleshed out enough to make their actions feel real and believable. However, flashbacks are plentiful, and sometimes go one for pages and pages at a time. I found myself snapped out of the action rather abruptly several times. Most distracting was the flashback in the middle of the story’s climax. Being taken out of the action and then dropped back into the middle of it so abruptly was jarring to the extreme.

Despite this, every scene is very deliberate. The actions of characters, their small movements as they speak add great depth to these scenes. The book is written in a very captivating manner. I wanted to linger on the page, really soak it in, before moving on. The places where characters who, though living in the same small town, never seem to meet are usually very, very good. So much so that I am very willing to forgive most of the issues I had with pacing. The scene between Jim and Ringo isn't very long and its the only time they meet in the book. Neither really knows the other to any extent, but Ringo is willing to listen and give advice even as the whole world is falling apart. We learn a lot about both characters in a short amount of time.

Do be warned that this book is dark. Things start out a bit raw and gritty. The setting and characters are all about what you’d expect at the beginning of the story. As the tale progresses the stakes rise to the point where the universe as we know it is in danger. At the same time the story grows exponentially darker both literally (as Golgotha is shrouded in starless, perpetual night) and in a more metaphorical sense. There is a very real sense of horror here, and I think fans of that genre would find a lot to like in this book.

The Six-Gun Tarot is an incredible first novel that has me clamoring for more. Despite any issues I had with it, I found myself really enjoying the book, fully invested in the characters, and surprised at every turn. I already have the second book in the series, The Shotgun Arcana, sitting on my shelf, and definitely plan on reading it. If you like Weird Westerns or dark fantasy this is a book you need to read. If you don’t like slower pacing or dark, sometimes graphic imagery, this one may not be for you.

Review originally found on Looking Glass Reads. show less