This was an excellent book. Great character development, lots of action. The book grabbed me from the first page and held my interest all the way through. I've read and enjoyed a lot of Elmore Leonard's books, but this is the first western of his I've read, and I've never been a fan of westerns but this book has created a desire in me to read some more from that genre. The motivations of the book's characters were believable and I found myself caring about what happened to them. That's something that's hard to find with most books. For anyone else who enjoys this type of book (adventure, one man against overwhelming odds), I would recommend Last of the Breed by Louis L'Amour, and Winter of Frankie Machine by Don Winslow. ( )

Probably the best western novel I’ve ever read. And, I’ve read a lot of them.
Leonard takes us to 1894 Arizona, and tells us the story of one of his most fascinating characters, Roberto (Bob) Valdez, a part-time constable who finds himself at odds with a truly despicable outlaw named Tanner. Tanner has a small army of about 25 men, but little does he know or care about the quality of man he’s wronged in Valdez. He will, because “Valdez is coming”.
What I enjoy so much about Leonard’s writing is how he can tell such a good, thought-provoking, action story in so little words. I breezed through the 136 pages of this edition. I didn’t want to put it down, and didn’t have to.
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Read this following Hombre. Recommended by A2J. Has the classic story of the hidden tough guy. Would be fun to see if you could find a single "extra" word in it.

Hidden tough guy stories that come to mind:
Superman - Clark Kent
Lamb in Joe Abercrombie's Red Country
Many martial arts movies, e.g. Yip Man and David Carradine's Kung Fu TV series
Ryan Gosling in Drive
Some Clint Eastwood movies, Gary Cooper in High Noon, Shane - but in these you are not surprised (you are never really surprised) ( )

Bob Valdez a part-time town constable, accidentally kills a man, and when he tries to get compensation paid to the dead man's pregnant wife, he is beaten and left for dead. But he didn't die. And Mr. Tanner and his men are sure gonna wish they had given him the $500... “It wouldn’t have cost you so much.” Said Valdez. And like the title reads, he's coming...

A good tight story, with an excellent main character and a darn good ending! I love guys like Valdez!

I picked this up at our local used book store for 50 cents, and I gotta say, it may be the best 50 cents I've spent in a long, long time! ( )

They laughed at Roberto Valdez and then ignored him. But when a dark-skinned man was holed up in a shack with a gun, they sent the part-time town constable to deal with the problem -- and made sure he had no choice but to gun the fugitive down. Trouble was, Valdez killed an innocent man. And when he asked for justice -- and some money for the dead man's woman -- they beat Valdez and tied him to a cross. They were still laughing when Valdez came back. And then they began to die...