Ranger's Law: A Lone Star Saga, Paperback

Ranger's Law brings together the fourth, fifth, and sixth of Elmer Kelton's novels on the formative years of the Texas Rangers. Kelton's young heroes, Rusty Shannon, and one-time Comanche captive, Andy Pickard, fight Indians, outlaws, feuding ranchers, smugglers, and all manner of lawbreakers while trying to make lives for themselves in the tumult of post-Civil War Texas.

In Ranger's Trail it is 1874 and retired Texas Ranger Rusty Shannon is urged to rejoin the force to assist in protecting settlers from Indian raids and outlaw bands. After the girl he loves dies, Rusty goes on a vengeance trail, determined to find and kill the man who has ruined his life. But the trail Rusty is following may lead him to an innocent man.

Texas Vendetta takes the young ranger Andy Pickard into the midst of a hate-filled and bloody post-Civil War feud between two Texas families. Pickard, who survived a childhood as a Comanche captive called "Badger Boy," also becomes involved with the young son of an outlaw, a boy who has been "adopted" by the rangers at their San Saba River camp, earning his way as a cook's helper. The boy's father, now released from prison, comes to take his son back, and into a life on the run.

In Jericho's Road, Andy Pickard is assigned to the Texas-Mexico border and finds an ominous notice on the edge of a great tract of ranch land above the Rio Grande: "This is Jericho's Road. Take the Other." The sign signifies Jericho Jackson's land and Jackson is at war with a similarly ruthless cattle baron on the Mexican side of the river, Guadalupe Chavez. The two rustle each others' cattle, raiding and killing on both sides of the border, heading for a bloody showdown -- with the Texas Rangers standing between them.

Elmer Kelton (1926-2009) was the award-winning author of more than forty novels, including The Time It Never Rained, Other Men's Horses, Texas Standoff and Hard Trail to Follow. He grew up on a ranch near Crane, Texas, and earned a journalism degree from the University of Texas. His first novel, Hot Iron, was published in 1956. Among his awards have been seven Spurs from Western Writers of America and four Western Heritage awards from the National Cowboy Hall of Fame. His novel The Good Old Boys was made into a television film starring Tommy Lee Jones. In addition to his novels, Kelton worked as an agricultural journalist for 42 years, and served in the infantry in World War II. He died in 2009.