"It was the classic challenge, the meeting of two famous guns ... an incident rare in the West and seen by few men. They met in the lamplight of old Laredo Tow, each man pacing slowly in the face of death. Only one would walk away ..."Even the Texas Rangers and the local law held back from the two powerful, land-hungry millionaires. Joe Blade was the only man left to challenge them. They ambushed him, bushwhacked him and tried to run him out of town, but he survived. Meeting violence with violence, Blade would never surrender until he had concluded the Laredo Assigment. Peter Christopher Watts was born in London, England in 1919 and died on Nov. 30, 1983. He was educated in art schools in England, then served with the British Amy in Burma from 1940 to 1946.Peter Watts, the author of more than 150 novels, is better known by his pen names of "Matt Chisholm" and "Cy James". He published his first western novel under the Matt Chisholm name in 1958 (Halfbreed). He began writing the "McAllister" series in 1963 with The Hard Men, and that series ran to 35 novels. He followed that up with the "Storm" series. And used the Cy James name for his "Spur" series.Under his own name, Peter Watts wrote Out of Yesterday, The Long Night Through, and Scream and Shout. He wrote both fiction and nonfiction books, including the very useful nonfiction reference work, A Dictionary of the Old West (Knopf, 1977). Joe Blade is tough, tender and temperamental. Slow to anger, fast with a gun an slouch with women. A man tempered by the West, dangerous living and a perpetual gamble with death.
