Liberty and a Law Badge by Chap O'Keefe

The second book from new paperback original house, BHE Books and it's another cracking adult flavoured western.

Crazy Bob McGill played Peeping Tom at Devil's Lake and his
old heart was pierced. The young woman Sheriff Dan Vickers
had brought to share the isolation of his fishing retreat was
McGill's sweet daughter, Liberty. What McGill didn't learn was
that Liberty had been blackmailed. Her self-sacrifice was to
preserve the dubious security of marriage to spineless rancher
Tom Tolliver, caught changing a cattle brand with a running-iron.

The novel starts out with Crazy Bob spying on Sheriff Vickers but the old man is horrified to discover the woman with the sheriff is none other than his daughter, Liberty. This is a powerful opening in which the author seamlessly weaves the history of the Comstock Laws into the narrative while keeping the story moving forward. The old man is discovered and struck from behind and later he is taken back to the town of Redstone Gulch and beaten. However this is witnessed by disgraced Pinkerton Joshua Dillard who intervenes and chases the man who administered the beating into the night. However things get complicated when Dillard clashes with the sheriff since he is working for cattle baron Barnaby Lent who controls Sheriff Vickers and would prefer to maintain the status quo.


You can read an excerpt from the novel HERE

I found the book a thrilling read,slightly more explicit that O'Keefe's Black Horse Western books but just as compelling. The narrative displays a visual flair making it easy for the reader to get sucked into the well realised world and a grind to leave it behind when you turn the final page. The book is available from LULU.COM as well as Amazon and all the usual retailers. And will delight fans of Chap O'Keefe and western fans in general.