The Legend of Shamus McGinty's Gold on Kindle

The first Fergal O’Brien novel The Legend of Shamus McGinty’s Gold is now available on Kindle, meaning the entire six book series has been published in e-book format.

 

When Amazon bought Thomas Bouregy, the publisher of the Fergal O’Brien series, they acquired the rights to books 2 to 6, but the first book came out before anyone had thought of adding e-books to the contract. So I kept the e-rights to that one with the intention of self-publishing.

It’s taken a while, but I’ve finally published the title. It sure was a fun task typing the entire novel out again using my only remaining copy of the original hardback, while all the time forcing myself to resist the temptation to rewrite the story. Anyhow, the book is now available on amazon at a bargain price of £0.99 or $1.49, and next year I’ll publish the 7th book in the series.

There's enough gold to make you think you can live forever, but Shamus McGinty has hidden it where no one can ever find it. The only way to find the gold is to stop looking, but once you find it, you won't even realize it. So goes the legend of Shamus McGinty's gold.

After forty years, Morgan Armstrong thinks he's close to solving the legend, but he's at death's door. He offers a share of the gold to the ruthless outlaw Quinn Rogers in return for finding a cure to save his life. Quinn looks no farther than Fergal O'Brien, purveyor of a “universal remedy” he claims will cure anything and everything.

Too bad for Morgan that it hasn't cured anyone yet, and too bad for Fergal when Quinn finds that out. His ultimatum to Fergal is simple: cure Morgan or die. To avoid the wrong end of Quinn's gun, Fergal and his trusty bodyguard, Randolph, must find a way to help Morgan. Their treatment just might be the key to solving the legend of Shamus McGinty's gold.

Available from Amazon.

Sheriff without a Star in Large Print

I've just received my complimentary copies of the large print paperback version of Sheriff Without a Star. The bloke in the picture looks tough enough, although I was amused by the decision to advertise a book called Sheriff Without a Star by depicting a sheriff with a star. The book is my 18th Linford Western and it'll be available in all good libraries from the end of the July.

Cassidy Yates had been stripped of his Sheriff's star by the townsfolk of Monotony. Leland Matlock's son had died, due to his error of judgement. Then Leland, ready to reveal information that could have shed new light on the sheriff's downfall, was shot. Cassidy believed that Leland's shooting was connected to the death of his son. So, rising to the challenge to uncover the link, Cassidy endeavoured to get that star pinned back on his chest where it belonged.

Cover for The Devil's Marshal

I see that the cover for my next Black Horse Western has now been posted on amazon. The depicted character doesn't look particularly devily or marshaly, but as I'm fairly sure there's a scene somewhere in the story featuring a hat-wearing bloke with a gun standing outside a saloon, I'm happy. The book will be out in October.

In a travesty of justice, bounty hunter Brodie Latimer's sister Lucinda is found guilty of murder. Thwarted, when a witness is killed, but convinced of her innocence, he vows to find the real killer and, as more of Hamilton's leading figures die in mysterious circumstances, the clues lead him to Derrick Shelby, a man known as the Devil's marshal. The only trouble is, Derrick died a year ago.

How can Brodie clear his sister's name and bring the guilty to justice when the killer appears to be the spectre of a long dead lawman?

Beyond Redemption in Large Print

I was pleased to get the news that Beyond Redemption will be published as a Large Print paperback. It should come out around the summer of 2014 and it'll be my 20th Linford Western.

As a child Jeff Dale witnessed the terrible aftermath of an atrocity. Elmer Drake killed three members of a family and when the surviving girl Cynthia went missing, Jeff vowed that one day he'd find her, no matter how long it took.

Ten years later, after finding a clue about Cynthia's fate, Jeff becomes a bounty hunter and follows the trail to the frontier town of Redemption. And in Redemption stalks a gunslinger who carries a gun in one hand and a cross in the other. A man with a rope-burn around his neck, called Elmer Drake...

R.I.P. Tom Sharpe

I'd missed noticing that the author Tom Sharpe died last week. He was another author of whom I can say I've read everything he ever wrote. In truth his recent comeback produced several not particularly funny books, but that only accentuated just how hilarious his early books were.

His comic novels in the 70s and 80s were a delight as they came before the need to be politically correct sapped humour of its bite. His tales featured inadequate buffoons and fat nymphomaniacs in crude and outlandish stories filled with the comic mayhem that would inevitably result when condoms are filled with helium or mountaineers buy tampons instead of crampons. The above cover depicts some typical scenes from an early Sharpe novel and to avoid the risk of offending anyone I probably shouldn't describe what they depict other than to say political correctness would deem these tales to be sexist, racist and homophobic and miss the point that they were of course poking satirical fun at the idiots who hold such views.

Even if comedy tastes have changed and his brand of humour stopped being fashionable, it'll never change the simple fact that Tom Sharpe was a very funny writer, in a snorting coffee out your nose and having a choking fit sort of way.

R.I.P. Iain Banks

I've just heard the sad news that the author Iain Banks has died, only a few months after announcing he was officially very poorly. He was one of my favourite authors and I've read all but his last few novels, as I tend to be a few years behind.

I started reading him before he turned to science fiction with Espedair Street, which was my favourite of his non-sf novels. His science fiction mainly featured the loosely connected universe of the Culture that, unusually for space opera, was a utopian vision of the far-future. My favourite of those was Consider Phlebas. I remember at the time I'd gone off science fiction as most new books tended to be depressing dystopian cyberpunk where I never had a clue what was going on or what half the words meant. Then along came the Culture featuring fast-paced, lively, grand old-fashioned space opera that was above all else fun.

For the last 25 years, whenever I'm seeking out a new science fiction novel to read, my definition of good science fiction has been stories that are a bit like Iain Banks. I can’t see me changing that definition.

Amazon's Fathers' Day promotion - Kindle westerns for $2.99 or less

Amazon.com are running a promotion for selected western titles. It's already started and runs through to June 16, which is Fathers' Day in the U.S.

There's 175 Kindle titles to choose from and I'm happy to report that several of mine are in there, and I'm even happier to report that for a whole hour yesterday Miss Dempsey's School for Gunslingers was outselling several books by two up and coming authors Max Brand and Louis L'Amour. Although I was less happy to note that The Miracle of Santa Maria was the 171st bestselling title in the promotion.

Anyhow, all the books in the promotion can be found here.