The Sonora Noose by Jackson Lowry

The Sonora Noose by Jackson Lowry is a recent (February 2011) western novel published by Berkley. If the author’s name doesn’t sound familiar, it is a pseudonym of well-established writer Robert Vardeman, a name I’m more familiar with in the mystery and science fiction fields. But Vardeman is well at home in the western genre, having written a number of books with western settings under the name Karl Lassiter.

I actually like the name Jackson Lowry — it has a pulp-western author sound to it, a ring of authenticity. (That’s just my ears. Your ears may ring differently.)

Deputy Marshal Mason Barker is a worn out lawman — his body is starting to become a bit unreliable, but his passion for justice remains strong. He also is a loyal family man, and he knows that his feet are solidly planted on the right side of most moral arguments.

But like every other human being, he has weaknesses and faults.

To fight the pain continually aggravating and increasing in his back, Barker begins to rely on the comforts of laudanum. He also remains overly optimistic about bringing into line his son, a rebellious and mean-natured young man who refuses to conform to his parents’ expectations.

Barker’s real troubles begin with the eruption of a minor reign of terror instigated by a band of outlaws led by a vicious badman who calls himself the Sonora Kid. What begins as a series of robberies quickly escalates into a series of murders and massacres. Each event ends with the gang escaping into the twisty mazes of the canyons in the New Mexico mountain ranges.

Barker takes his work seriously, but he also sees the humor in situations. In some ways he reminds me of R.C. House’s fictional lawman, Cole Ryerson. (Unfortunately, House doesn't even rate an entry at Wikipedia.) Lowry does a fine job depicting Barker’s interactions with the townspeople of Mesilla, which Barker calls home, including the newly appointed sheriff, Dravecky. Particularly fine is Lowry’s handling of the relationship between Barker and the non-com for a company of Buffalo Soldiers, Sergeant Sturgeon.

All together, Lowry does a great job combining action, humor, pathos, pacing, and character into a nicely entertaining mix. The Sonora Noose is certainly worth checking out. And you can find a short western story by Lowry posted online at the Jackson Lowry site. It's titled "Fifteen Dollars." Just click here.

Stouthearted Men by R.C. House

New York: Pocket Books, 1995.

Finding on a used bookstore’s shelves a western by R.C. House that I haven’t yet read is a pleasure. I rather broadly categorize westerns into those focused on action and those focused on storytelling. The two categories don’t have to be mutually exclusive, but House’s novels I usually place in the Storytelling bucket.

There can be plenty of action in a Storytelling-focused western. For example, I’d place the O. Henry story about the Cisco Kid, “The Caballero’s Way,” in the Storytelling category, but while the yarn-spinning and attention to language is an important part of the tale, there’s plenty of murderous action in the story.

There’s action in Stouthearted Men, but clearly House loves the play with words, just as I note in my post about O. Henry’s story. The roll out of of the plot and action is far more leisurely than one would encounter in a paperback original from the Gold Medal, Ace, and Signet era of the late 1950s up through the '60s. House focuses on characters, their quirks, their ways of speech, and brings a smile or a frown as appropriate. The opening paragraph of Stouthearted Men:

"A killer and pillager deluxe named Bad-Face Ike Bodene broke jail for the second time and is on the prod. That's why I called together this posse commitatus of stout-hearted men. There'll be six of us against about three to one odds."

House can demonstrate a bit of the poet's DNA as well:

With dawn, night clouds turned themselves into glorious smears of rose paint against a gray sky fast ripening to a rich blue along the eastern horizon. Close to the still-dark land, silhouetted forms of six mounted figures loomed black as paper cutouts against the dim of daybreak, their heads bobbing sleepily on the trail out of Fort Walker.

I had the pleasure of making R.C.'s acquaintance through the miracle of e-mail, thanks to a virtual introduction by Robert Randisi. We corresponded a few months before he died. It was a pleasure to know him slightly before his death. It's a pleasure to read one of his books for the first time.