Ambush Valley (35 page)

Thunder boomed and they hurried the last fifty feet. Another shower was going to baptize the land and them if they didn't hurry. Whew, those big raindrops were like ice on his bare skin.

I want to assure the fans of the Byrnes Family Ranch series that according to my publisher, we have two more books to go, at least, after this one. Book Two,
Between Hell and Texas
, sold well and several fans wrote me asking about the future of the books. The Spur Awards judges made Book Two a finalist in the 2012 contest; that meant one of the top three books in the category. The Fictioneer Award's judges also chose it as a finalist in their contest. By the time this one is published we will know of any other awards.

I write books for readers, not for judges or awards. And I am as proud of my fans as I am of any awards, but it is nice to get recognition from my peers. As a young man growing up, I read every western book I could get anywhere. I could consume a paperback western in one night in high school and college. I've walked and ridden over lots of the land in these novels. My wife and I dragged an RV around the West to lots of these places for almost twenty years.

I walked the streets of Tombstone in the predawn and thought I heard Doc and Wyatt talking to me. Been to the Chiricahuas and know why the Apaches loved those mountains. Swam, fished, and floated the Verde River in a truck-tire inner tube near Fort McDowell. Looked all over the Superstition Mountains for the Lost Dutch Mine as a young man. I am not the guy that did everything, but I've seen and researched lots of old newspapers and try to keep things in place.

Gary Goldstein, my editor, and I go way back. Years ago I introduced him at a writer's conference and then had to leave the room. My friends told me when I left the room, Gary said, “There goes the next Zane Grey. I mean it. He will be that and more.”

Thanks, Gary. Thanks, too, to my lovely agent, Cherry Weiner, who never takes no for an answer. And all the folks that voted for me in True West's poll, when they announced in 2011 that I was the greatest living western fiction writer
. I liked the “living” part.

To my wife, Pat, and my grown daughters Anna and Rhonda, who pushed me in this western writing business, thanks too. I really enjoy it.

I don't have a secretary, but I do answer e-mails. My webmaster, Duke Pennel, keeps a schedule up on dustyrichards.com. You can e-mail me at [email protected] or write me at P.O. Box 6460, Springdale, AR 72766.

Thanks, folks. May God bless you, and all of America.

 

—Dusty Richards

PINNACLE BOOKS are published by

Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018

Copyright © 2014 Dusty Richards

 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

 

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ISBN: 978-0-7860-3197-9

 

 

First electronic edition: March 2014

ISBN-13: 978-0-7860-3198-6
ISBN-10: 0-7860-3198-0