Gunsmith #446 - Deadville

‘The Gunsmith’ series of adult Westerns by Robert Randisi (writing as J.R. Roberts) is the most enduring - and the last man standing - of the mega-successful adult western titles. It’s also the most consistently good, thanks to having one author and visionary at the helm rather than a rotating cast of hired guns writing under a house name. The series started in 1982 and new installments are still released on a regular schedule, so I decided to check in with a 2019 episode, “Gunsmith #446: Deadville.”

Clint Adams is The Gunsmith, a drifter hero and gunfighter who rides from town to town finding adventures and getting laid in the Old West. Over the years, Randisi has played with the idea that Adams has achieved a kind of folk hero celebrity status in the untamed American West. This has made for a fun premise in several different novels, and provides the motivation for the villains of “Deadville.”

Mayor Tom Simon of Wentworth, Nebraska has cooked up a scheme to make his crappy, dying village into an 1800s boomtown. He’s studied the success of towns like Deadwood and Tombstone and believes he’s cracked the code of their success. These towns have benefited from the violent deaths of famous gunfighters - such as Wild Bill Hickok in Deadwood. His plan is to entice the famous Clint Adams into town, have The Gunsmith killed in a dramatic fashion, change Wentworth’s name to Deadville, and a tourist Mecca is born!

A few months later, The Gunsmith is lured to Wentworth under false pretenses - stopping to get laid along the way. Now, Mayor Simon’s toadies can’t just shoot Adams in the back and expect Deadville to be the next OK Corral. The killing of Clint Adams requires some drama and theatricality to make the story go viral, so he enlists the help of a gunfighting local outlaw named Bad Tony Bacon to lay the groundwork for a staged killing within city limits.

There’s a cool vibe in “Deadville” that reminds me a bit of the movie “The Truman Show.” Many of the citizens and leaders of Wentworth understand that they are creating theater to set up the sequence of events leading to The Gunsmith’s murder. The only one without any knowledge of the gag seems to be Clint Adams himself. Randisi’s writing is forward-moving and breezy with lots of dialogue and short chapters making the pages fly by. The sex scenes are graphic and very explicit, but they can be skipped or skimmed if you’re the type to blush easily.

What we really have here is a mystery where The Gunsmith attempts to understand what Mayor Simon is planning before Adams starts catching bullets with his body. Randisi is a seasoned writer of both mysteries and Westerns, so he’s on familiar ground here - particularly after authoring over 500 adult western novels. The story was very compelling but there wasn’t a lot of action outside of the bedroom until deep into the paperback. Overall, “Deadville” is formulaic as hell and probably not a great selection for your wife’s book club, but the story is a lot of fun with tons of sex and a likable stalwart hero. What’s not to like?

This book was discussed on the fifth episode of the Paperback Warrior Podcast: Link

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Lady Gunsmith #6 - Roxy Doyle and the Desperate Housewife

Thanks to the guiding hand of creator and author Robert Randisi (writing as J.R. Roberts), the Gunsmith series of Adult Westerns has the most consistently high-quality stories of the genre. Not coincidentally, it’s also the only long-running series still around today. In 2017, Randisi launched a spin-off series starring Roxy Doyle, the ‘Lady Gunsmith’, and two years later, we are now six installments deep into the series.

Book six is playfully titled “Roxy Doyle and the Desperate Housewife,” and the plot initially leans on the series’ central thread - Roxy’s search for her missing bounty hunter father. She finds herself chasing a rumor to a small Wyoming town where dad was allegedly headed. This being an Adult Western, Roxy wastes no time getting laid as soon as she gets off the trail before settling in to wait for her father’s arrival. 

While Roxy is on the lookout for Dad, a woman named Jane arrives in town looking for Roxy. Once they meet, Jane discloses that she’s been married to Roxy’s elusive father for a few months, and they live just a short ride away. The next morning Roxy rides to the town Jane described, and no one there knows anything about Jane or Roxy’s dad. Why would this strange woman give Roxy a bum steer? Is she really Roxy’s step-mom?

The mystery moves to Idaho and is unraveled over subsequent chapters among traditional Western action. I won’t spoil the details here, but it involves a ton of cash from a bank robbery and a gang of outlaws seeking to recover the loot. There are double-crosses galore culminating in a satisfying conclusion leaving Roxy to ride another day. 

Lady Gunsmith #6 is a quick and entertaining read - short chapters, lots of dialogue, plenty of graphic sex and explosively violent action. Randisi is a seasoned literary entertainer, and he’s got the Adult Western formula down pat. His series books are crafted in such a manner that they don’t require sequential reading, so “Roxy Doyle and the Desperate Housewife” is as good an entry point as any. Recommended.

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Lady Gunsmith #01 - The Legend of Roxy Doyle

Legendary western author Robert Randisi (writing as J.R. Roberts) introduces a new series character in “Lady Gunsmith: The Legend of Roxy Doyle”. This fun, sexy novel ties in nicely to Randisi's other successful adult western series, ‘The Gunsmith’. However, you don't need to have read any of ‘The Gunsmith’ books (there are well over 400) to enjoy Lady Gunsmith's origin story. The book was released in March of 2017 by publisher Speaking Volumes.

The novel introduces us to Roxy Doyle as a child on a wagon train journey westward in 1866. Violent events transpire that culminate in a separation of Roxy from her father. Roxy's growing into adulthood and the quest to find her dad serve as the driving action propelling this story forward. Along her journey from town to town, Roxy meets wary sheriffs, bounty hunters, rapists, famous outlaws, criminals, sex partners (plenty of those, by the way), and Clint Adams, the hero of ‘The Gunsmith’ series. Roxy is a likable character who takes charge of her own sexuality and independence. She's constantly overcoming the burden of her own beautiful looks and sex appeal. There's plenty of violent gun-play and intrigue to keep the reader entertained.

Randisi wrote a short-lived series in 2012 called ‘Angel Eyes’ with a sexy female character mining much of the same territory. That series ended too soon, so we can be thankful that many of the same concepts are being explored here. There's nothing really negative to say…it's an easy read with short chapters and lots of dialogue. You'll never feel lost or confused. By now, the author has got this genre well figured out. My only caveat is that this is an adult western, so there are many scenes of graphic sex interspersed with the explosive action, mystery and gun-play. If sex scenes bug you, this book is not for you. For the rest of us, we can all celebrate the launch of this great new series. With many of the adult western series titles (‘Longarm’, ‘Trailsman’, ‘Slocum’) now cancelled, Roxy Doyle is a great new addition to the genre.