May 15, 2015
Spillane, who died in 2006, left behind a number of manuscripts for Collins to completemostly novels, but in this case a screenplay Spillane wrote for his friend John Wayne. Presumably, Wayne would have played the larger-than-life, somewhat mysterious Caleb York, a former Pinkerton agent and gunslinger sent for by George Cullen, a blind rancher who is the only man courageous enough to stand up to the villainous Henry Gauge. Gauge is a brutal, gunslinging crook who cleaned up the town of Trinidad but then proceeded to terrorize it. York arrives without knowing he's been sent for, and might ride on with indifference. But he dislikes men such as Gauge and sympathizes with Willa Cullen, daughter of George. When Gauge schemes to sell cattle infected with cowpox, the town, with York leading the way, finally stands up to the outsize bully. This is a predictable western, populated with stock characters, and it seems doubtful that Wayne would have been interested. But Collins, always a solid craftsman, has done his research, and he never lets up on the suspense.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)