Showing results by narrator "Richard James" in All Categories

Wayne D. Overholser, winner of three Spur Awards from the Western Writers of America, weaves a magic spell in this story with his consistent skill in presenting vibrant characters and his uncommon sensitivity to the depths of human personality.

Julia's daddy was the judge in town. He used to be fair, but recently it seemed that had changed. What cost to regular folks would there be?

When a notorious gangster threatens the Station House, it falls to the one person who knows its systems inside out to save the day: Slomo! Hundreds of people gather for the grand opening of a new orbiting shopping mall - only to find themselves held hostage by a gang of Human Future activists. A mayoral candidate is gunned down in broad daylight. A gun is found with no prints or DNA evidence. Can Brogan and Haldane find the killer before they strike again? Following a routine drugs bust, Officer Castle starts to behave very strangely, indeed.

When a veteran New York cop transfers to a new precinct—the Demeter City Police Department on the planet Altor—he discovers the hard way that a life of crime is not a purely human pursuit! Lieutenant Patrick Brogan, Rob Youngblood and Simone Bendix try their best to maintain law and order amongst the melting pot of different alien races. Lieutenant Patrick Brogan, a cop with the NYPD, needs a change.

The British, it is often said, have a stiff upper lip and a dry sense of humour. It's true, we usually do, and in the case of this perfect compendium of short stories we absolutely do. Listen to our Scottish raconteur J. M. Barrie and English wits Jerome K. Jerome and Edward Lear for perfect proof of that. But humour is many things and from many places, so we also feature Mark Twain, our very talented American friend, to complete this rather witty and clever volume of short stories.

A bitter, driven Billy Bane and his dysfunctional, thrown-together family of adventurers pinball their way through spatial anomalies and galactic raiders to find the long-forgotten planet Earth, in order to take down the sadistic celestial being called The Creator who supposedly resides there. Dysfunction leads to heartbreak and alienation, strange new allies & enemies and catastrophic galactic war. But hey, it’s a comedy!

It has been 10 years since Quentin helped Eskevar, the Dragon King, battle the monstrous sorcerer Nimrood. Since that time, there has been peace in the land of Mensandor. But everything is about to change. An urgent message summons Quentin to Castle Askelon. The king, who is dying, wishes to name the brave young man his successor. But first, he sends him on an unfathomable mission.

The Dragon King who rules the land of Mensandor is none other than Quentin, whose courage and heroism have slowly transformed him from an orphaned servant into a war hero, respected leader and a fierce man of faith. But even the powerful can fall prey to weakness. The world is turned upside-down when the dark sorcerer Nimrood - long thought dead after a battle with the previous Dragon King - returns with a fearsome plan.

The year is 2089.... America and much of the world is a post-apocalyptic nightmare.... Ted Rockson and his small band of soldiers fight to rid the land of a Soviet occupational force bent on world domination. But Rockson not only has the enemy to contend with, for out of the ashes of the nuclear devastation of World War III, the Earth has become one large death zone. Mutated animals, destructive storms, and barbaric humans now roam the land. Death seems to be everywhere. Hope seems fleeting. But Rockson will not give up.

Following Russia’s thermonuclear first strike, America is a shattered wasteland, its survivors crushed under the iron fist of the brutal Soviet invader. But some have chosen to continue the fight for freedom’s cause under Ted Rockson, the ultimate soldier of survival. And when Rockson receives a strange visitor who is near death, a long-rumored legend suddenly comes alive.

Ravaged by WWlll, America is now a brutalized Russian colony, but a loose and secret federation of Free Cities rises up to fight the hated oppressors! Rockson, the Doomsday Warrior, leads the American Rebels against the Russian occupation in their most desperate hour and is captured and tortured by the KGB.

A surprise Russian thermonuclear first strike nearly a century earlier had transformed the United States into a decimated wasteland, its people enslaved by rampaging hordes of brutal Soviet invaders. But one man has refused to allow the flames of freedom to flicker out. The ultimate champion of a lost democracy, he is Ted Rockson - the Doomsday Warrior!

Virginia Collins is not what she appears to be. By all outward appearances the successful uptown psychiatrist is just another beautiful dame who hires a private investigator to find her missing husband: a weird little man who makes fancy umbrella drinks and dresses like something out of an old gangster movie. Collins hides her real motives, along with her tragic past, in order to win the affections of Raffy Rheinhardt, a cynical PI with an equally tragic history; a long forgotten shared incident resulting in damaged psyches and dead bodies.

With Tyvian Reldamar feigning his death, the forces that still carry his banner are left to fight a vicious battle against the warlord Banric Sahand and the noble houses that flock to his side. Led by Myreon and Artus, this band of freedom fighters and angry rebels is faced with an enemy the likes of which they’ve never faced before: one who will do anything, no matter how brutal, to secure victory.

Original story published in Lariat story magazine - July 1947.

Premier Vassily, supreme leader of a Soviet-dominated world, lays dying, the result of a conspiracy plot lead by Colonel Killov, head of the USSA KGB, who sees himself as the next in line to rule the Empire. But Killov has his enemies. General Zhabnov, head of the United Socialist States of America, has his own eyes on the premiership. But first, Zhabnov must take care of the continuing freefighter rebel problem within his borders. And his answer is ingenious. He will brainwash and mind control tens of thousands of his American slave laborers and turn them into soldiers.

With Tyvian Reldamar feigning his death, the forces that still carry his banner are left to fight a vicious battle against the warlord Banric Sahand and the noble houses that flock to his side. Led by Myreon and Artus, this band of freedom fighters and angry rebels is faced with an enemy the likes of which they’ve never faced before: one who will do anything, no matter how brutal, to secure victory.

Honest presentation is only one characteristic of Frazee’s well-crafted tales. He tells a convincing, satisfying, and unusual story even when employing stock Western situations. A major strength is his understanding of the nuances of character, of how people are motivated, of the good and bad within each person, and of the conflicts between man and his environment. Drawing upon his years in the mountains of Colorado, he can vividly and realistically depict a variety of Western settings and do so in such a way that the settings assume a character of their own.

Nearly three years have passed since we last saw Ted Rockson. In that time America has finally become free of Soviet Occupation. The war has been won, and Rockson can finally live the life that he has only dreamed of. However, that serenity is quickly shattered by one of Rockson's oldest and most feared enemies, General Zhabnov. On a quest for revenge, Zhabnov traps Rockson in a mysterious device know only as the "Dream Machine". Now Rockson must fight to regain his freedom once again, only this time the enemies he battles are his very nightmares themselves.

Nearly 100 years ago, a Russian thermonuclear device transformed America’s amber waves of grain into a sea of nuclear waste. The land of the free has been reduced to a Soviet slave state, repeatedly raped and plundered by its Red overlords. One man has led the desperate fight to free the once-great nation. He is Ted Rockson, the ultimate soldier of survival.