From: russell-watson@att.net   
      
   Just wondering if anybody else has read any Ralph Compton westerns? I   
   had not read any until a couple of weeks ago, when I became intrigued   
   by the synopsis on the back cover of _Dawn of Fury_, the first book in   
   his "gunfighter trilogy" that follows the exploits of a fictitious   
   gunslinger named Nathan Stone as he wends his way through the   
   historical events of the old west. Despite the fact that Compton's   
   writing is somewhat of a throwback to the  old style of western   
   writing. Most of the folks die fairly cleanly with none of the "stench   
   filled the air as so-and-so's bowels emptied in death" that you get   
   from writers like Matt Braun and others, and even though the hero has   
   a habit of taking up with whores, the sex is only alluded to, though a   
   couple of the women die fairly gruesome deaths at the hands of outlaws   
   in them. Even though he's kind of wordy and the books weigh at over   
   400 pages each, I found the first one interesting enough to buy the   
   other two, and am now on the book that follows the trilogy, taking up   
   where the last of those books left off, with Stone's son going off to   
   take up the path started by his daddy. I was intrigued by his   
   portrayal of real life western characters, particularly his painting   
   of the Earp faction as the "bad guys" in the Tombstone fracas and his   
   view of Billy the Kid as, if not exactly a hero, not exactly an   
   outlaw, either. He also potrays Dallas Stoudenmire, who has been   
   mentioned here recently, as a rip-roaring drunk who was poor shot and   
   poor excuse for a lawman, keeping most of the constituency of El Paso,   
   both Anglo and Mexican, pissed off at him most of the time and eager   
   to can him when his term was up. Any opinions from others who have   
   read these books?   
   '97 FLSTF   
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