Dinca’s review of Diablo (The Texans Series, Book 1) by Georgina Gentry
Historical Western Romance published by Zebra 1 Feb 10
To read or not to read… that is the question. Here I find an above average hero and a wimpy heroine with a disgusting villain and a whole ranch of spineless followers.
Diablo aka “He Not Worthy of a Name” was a Santee Sioux slave after his father was hanged. His mother was a white woman raped during an Indian raid. The young boy who had been disfigured, spent a tortured deprived life until Trace Durango found him starving and he and his wife took him in and nursed him back to health. They also schooled him and taught him to use a gun.
After a time he left the Durango Ranch and turned into Diablo the feared gunfighter. On the pretense of returning to Wyoming 15 years later as a hired gun for the range war, he sets his long-awaited revenge in motion.
Sunny is an obedient, beautiful daughter without a thought in her head that is not put there by someone else. I have a hard time with heroines like this. She has turned 18 and her father wants to send her back east to school? I found this a little late and unlikely. It is also unlikely to live near someone all your life and not know he has a volatile temper. Sunny did finally grow into a woman with a mind of her own, but it’s a long time in coming. When she is held captive and having no clue where she is, she manages to escape, and after she gets back she manages to make a pharmacy run when Diablo gets hurts. Hello, the men hunting her get hurt trying to navigate the trail and she gets away and returns? I find this lame.
I also find the story long and drawn out with a lot of dry spells. The antagonist/villain, Hurd Kruger, is so obnoxious I would have done him in before the next chapter. As the story goes on, I find so much that needs to be said could have been left out. I started to put the book down at that point. I must say, I got a lot done on my “to do” list because of that, including my tax prep. That in itself does not say a lot for the book. Ah, back to Hurd the villain. Throughout the story everyone commented on his dying his mustache and hair. No one mentioned his gray should have been showing during his crazy loco obsession with getting Sunny back. Another character is Swen, Sunny’s father. No wonder she is a spineless shadow with her wimpy father as an example to follow.
At the end of the book is a list of references and notes about the Wyoming Ranch Association and the Sioux Indian rebellion. I wish these facts are embellished within the story. I’m not sure I’ll be reading anything else in the series after this.
Grade: C
Summary: Diablo
They call him “Devil,” and with good reason. The half-breed Santee Sioux bears the twisted scars that made him the fastest, deadliest gunfighter in Texas. Diablo will never forget the kind cattleman who once took him in, but it is his torturer who haunts his every thought. And when some powerful Wyoming ranchers come looking to hire ruthless men for a wicked job, Diablo seizes the opportunity to settle a score…
Her name is Sunny, and she more than lives up to it. She’s a dazzling ray of light—and the bride-to-be of Hurd Kruger, the man who scarred Diablo. What better way to destroy Kruger than to capture, dishonor, and dump his greatest prize? It’s a perfect plan, except for the one thing Diablo never counted on…the only thing that could turn him away from the dark side, the angel who could save his bedeviled soul…
Read an excerpt.
Other books in this series:
