Kilkenny

This isn't four-star writing by any means. I spent a lot of inward sighs on the adverb mania, the head-hopping, the uncertain antecedents ... I could go on, but I don't even want to, because Kilkenny's back, and apparently that's all this Western-loving girl needs to give a book four stars.

Happily (the adverbs are contagious), this trilogy has actually (oh my) grown the characters from the first book to this one--or more accurately, grown their circumstances around them so that each book isn't a repeat of the last. Well, other than the Range War Drags Kilkenny Into Trouble trope, and the Why Can't Everyone Let The Tired Gunfighter Live His Life Peacefully trope. Ah, contented reader sigh. These stories are my brain candy, and they hold show more my heart by default. L'Amour would have to work hard to dissatisfy me. I love the love he had for the great old American West, and I love the love between Kilkenny and Nita. I love the steel-nerved gunfighter claiming himself a home at last and giving it a (halfway sentimental) name.

Now I'm off to watch some Gunsmoke (and you think I'm kidding). show less

Kilkenny doesn't want to fight. He is trying to find a remote location to settle so people will leave him alone. He just cannot seem to find that place. He's minding his own business and get a meal when he is challenged to a gunfight. He wins. He finds the solitude that he's craving and then finds the father of the young man he killed has come to the area he's chosen. And of course starts a range war, which Kilkenny must win to be left alone.

I've read this book before, it is one of my top twenty L'Amour's.

This is the third and final book in an entertaining series about a character I have come to know and appreciate. Lance is looking for a place to finally settle down, to be left alone, but another cattle baron with delusions of grandeur forces Kilkenny take up his guns for the defense of settlers. It sounds corny, but it's not, and the author makes the familiar plot less monotonous, more absorbing.

The quality of the prose is quite bad. For the first chapter or two, it's so terrible that you can hardly tell what's going on, and if it didn't rely so heavily on predictable western tropes, it would be incomprehensible. The writing smooths out pretty soon, though, and although it's always bad, it's at least readable. The plot, on the other hand, is good, with a fair amount of excitement and a handful of very cool scenes. Unfortunately the ending is not one of those scenes; it's just a standard shootout like you'd expect from a B movie - pretty disappointing. This is only the second Louis L'Amour book (and the second western) I've read. The other, Last Stand at Papago Wells, is a much better book, so much so that I have a hard time show more believing they were both written by the same person. show less

B

A competent gunman who desires to live in peace has a difficult goal, since he is naturally inclined to stand up for the weak, and has the skill and leadership ability to do so. Kilkenny is educated and kind, respectful toward women and those in authority. Does Kilkenny have any faults? Maybe too eager to kill when provoked, but I think a weakness of the Kilkenny series that this man is fairly one dimensional. On the other hand, the story line is good: the bad guys are strong, but the good guys are stronger. Not a bad one for teenagers.

Terrific western that walks through northern NM, near the Philmont Scout Ranch. Fast pace, typical for this wonderful author.