A MAN AND HIS DOG AND A LOT OF BULLETS: PETER BRANDVOLD'S NORDIC & FINN

Peter BrandVold provided a fresh a bold voice that lead a new generation into the traditional western. He married the romance of of the earlier practitioners like L'Amour and Brand and made the protagonists more tarnished and the action much more brutal and visceral. He shows what he can mine in that balance in his latested, Nordic & Finn.

He kicks off the take in what appears to be a typical man and his dog set up. Anders Nordic, a mountain of a Scandinavian, lives a life of isolation in a line shack on the Flying W Ranch where he works. He rides into the town of Cimarron for supplies and defends a collie, he later names Finn, being pestered by a young boy. He sets the spoiled little red headed monster straight in his blunt manner that causes the father, Reginald England of The Cimarron Cattlemen's Bank, to confront him with a young deputy. When both the banker and deputy push their authority it builds to a throwdown with Nordic gunning down the young lawman who turns out to be the son of Aidan Dempsey, the biggest rancher who already has a touchy relationship with the Flying W's owner Maggie Rue.

Brandvold skillfully builds the story through the characters as more people get pulled into the fight between Nordic and the two businessmen. He uses a direct style of dialogue he tailors for each character that interacts with the action to define them. Maggie is a wonderful frontier woman, toughened by the ranch left to her after being widowed, but embracing life still. We also get a colorful cadre of gunmen the bad guys utilize. A standout character is the town marshal Bryce Adams who struggles to keep the peace and finds himself in the middle of the law and justice not being on the same side. I do wish there was more of Finn, but Brandvold builds a believable relationship between the two.

As usual Brandvold delivers the action. The visceral gun and fist fights move the story along. Sometimes you still feel the hits a few pages after words.

Nordic & Finn is Peter Brandvold and his yarn spinning beat. He puts you in the comfort of a tale of likable outsiders against evil authoritarians and delivers it with rough humor and stylized brutal violence. He writes Howard Hawks western told with Sergio Leone bite.