Breakheart Pass

My first read of Alistair MacLeans that I found in a thrift store and had fun with this western/adventure story. It follows an Army train headed to Fort Humboldt where the soilders have been struck down with sickness. Also on board is the Governor of the state, his niece, US Marshall Pearce and his......more

Electrifying, fast-paced western thriller by a master storyteller: Mr. Alistair MacLean (1922-1987). And the movie is very good too. MacLean wrote the screenplay and the film was directed by Tom Gries with exciting action scenes (the last film of the legendary stuntman Yakima Canutt), a good score by......more

"The Long Arm of Coincidence..." Is That a Thing?! Winchester Repeaters. Train ride through a snow-filled wilderness of Nevada. A not-quite-classic Western train mystery that barrels its way down the track from start to finish. First published in 1974, it may not be old enough to be a classic yet, b......more

3.6 is the average rating and exactly right. This was fun, and I can see why it was made into a movie. The female character was less weak than MacLean's usual useless beauties and actually helped the situation. I couldn't put it down. Definitely a fun beach/pool/recuperating from back injury book.......more

Please read my complete review at Casual Debris. When I was a kid in the mid-to-late 1980s my parents were among the last in the neighbourhood, perhaps even the western hemisphere, to purchase that bulky hunk of metal known as a video cassette recorder. Popularly known at the time as a VCR, it was a......more