Just read two great stories by the guy pictured above, Mr. Nik Morton. The first was his brand new cautionary sci-fi tale, "Don't Drink and Drive," featured as this week's Punch over at BEAT to a PULP. I'd sampled Nik's western and mystery writing, but this was my first trip with him into the future. Yikes. One of Nik's strengths is providing the sensory details to put you right in the middle of his story - and in this case, right in the driver's seat of a hover car. The hero/victim of this yarn is a guy with huge appetite for sex, speed and alcohol who gets his comeuppance in a snap ending worthy of William M. Gaines and Al Feldstein. Check it out!
That BEAT to a PULP story reminded me I still hadn't read Nik's entry in the western anthology A Fistful of Legends (a collection he also edited) so I hopped right to it. "Visitors" finds a pioneer woman and her three young teenagers home alone when a group of renegade Apaches come calling. This story is packed with action, courage, violence and sudden death. At it's climax, Nik cranks the suspense to the max with hostiles on the porch and hostiles on the roof with the family seemingly at their mercy. What happens next? I'm not telling. Lucky for you, A Fistful of Legends is still available from Amazon and other fine booksellers.
For the Almanack's review of Death at Bethesda Falls, one of Nik's Black Horse Western novels, click HERE.
For details on Nik's ebook Spanish Eye, a collection of stories about a half-English, half-Spanish private investigator, click HERE.
And while you're at it, you should pay a visit to Nik's blog WRITEALOT, right HERE.