Magazine submissions from 1942-53, most 1949-51 glow with polishing from originals, reason enough to try for legal version. I'm not one for war books, but reading about the SAS and the men who fought in it has captured my interest. Real outlaw caught, Nat takes home to Mary the small red-spotted toad that led him to life-saving water, and explains turquoise source of his mystery wealth. Mostly written from the author's daily journal and personal notes with beautiful descriptions of the desert environment, anecdotes describing the personalities and quirks of members of the SAS team and the day to day impressions and concerns of the author.

Flashbacks reveal the killer’s motivations, as a posse follows him and civilized notions of right and wrong are left far behind. Riding On: A cowboy shoots a man in the dark who he suspects of rustling cattle, and to his horror, he finds that it is his own father. If you like your Westerns clean-cut and rich in description, I highly recommend Laws of the Desert Born.In one of these 11 stories of the collection titled Law of the Desert Born, published in 1983, a hunted man rubs the barrel of his rifle down with dirt to make sure there is no glint of shining metal that could give his location away. This is an excellent combination of special forces history and memoir written by a medical officer who was with the Special Air Services in North Africa for about 15 months. James captures the excitement of this dramatic mode of warfare and brings to life the deadly beauty of the desert, the harsh environment and the strong bonds of comradeship and interdependence which resulted. Memories of Paul's first day in town from town loafer Chicken Livers p249 leads Stretch to suggest honest Sheriff Rowsey cable for bank robbers' descriptions, and fast shootouts in town "a bullet through the teeth.

Pleydell never overstates his heroes’ bravery and although he does not trivialize the men’s dogged perseverance, he simply accepts that he and his comrades did their bit for their country. Reiterates the constant theme of Passing Through, the drifter who feels morally obligated, or inspired by clear gray eyes on a tall slim redhead, to administer deeply needed justice. After reading quite a few of L'Amour's books I have an appreciation that he insisted on accuracy in his historic tales; I know that he worked hard through both book study and personal travel all over the west to make that happen.It was a region of some ten square miles backed against an even rougher and uglier patch of waterless desert, but the basin was bad enough itself. In a familiar L'Amour trope, a young widow realizes that she has the fight of her life coming when bad men in town gang together to take her ranch from her. I enjoy how the same characters will show up at times like in this collection the second on the Tumbling K crew had a solo tale, Matt Sabre has a story and the lion hunter Jim Morton shows up in another tale.

I won’t say much else about them because I don’t want to (possibly) spoil anything for those who haven’t read this yet. The Special Air Service was formed in 1941 and quickly earned a reputation for stealth, daring, and audacity in the Western Desert Campaign. We sometimes make mistakes in our spelling, transcription or categorisation, or miss information out of our records. Marone seems to always be one step ahead, but Lopez is a good tracker and has history with Marone, which is told in flashbacks. A murder in a western town brings out a posse, but there may be more to the story than there appears.Death Song of the Sombrero: The cowboys on a secluded ranch are told by a stranger that he's killed their boss fair and square in a gunfight, and that they can work for him now or get on down the road.