The Legend of Caleb York

Struggling to keep his ranch—and his daughter—out of corrupt sheriff Harry Gauge's hands, blind George Cullen seeks to hire a gunslinger who will plant the lawman in Trinidad, New Mexico's Boot Hill. An expert with a gun, Gauge shows no fear but dispatches his men to keep a lookout for any contenders. The exposition plods along like an old plow horse, not picking up its gait until a stranger decked out in black apparel with pearl buttons prances into town five chapters in. Without too much effort, he puts away Gauge's "deputies," one after another, until the final showdown with the sheriff. The authors have created a protagonist larger than life—he usually comes through each conflict without a scratch—who delivers all the cheeky dialog and comebacks. While the identity of the stranger is not revealed until near the end, it comes as no surprise. An introductory note from Collins (Road to Perdition), Spillane's literary partner and executor, explains that the book was developed from an unproduced screenplay the hard-boiled author of I, the Jury, had intended for John Wayne.