The Vengeance Trail

C. Courtney Joyner’s Shotgun: The Bleeding Ground (Pinnacle Books, $6.99) is the follow up to Joyner’s Shotgun, the novel that introduced us to Dr. John Bishop, who lost his wife, son and most of an arm to vicious outlaws. Now, outfitted with an ingenious rig that makes the missing part of his arm a lethal shotgun, Bishop rides the vengeance trail.

The Bleeding Ground is a spaghetti Western of a novel that mixes colorful and bizarre characters (red-hooded Fire Riders, a dandy of an assassin, Bishop himself) with historic figures (John Chisum, Pat Garrett, Billy the Kid) and enough death-dealing action for a half-dozen ripsnorter Westerns. In this novel, the echoes of the last gun battle barely fade before the next one erupts.

—Ollie Reed Jr., an editor of and a contributor to Max Evans & a Few Friends