While Cheryl Pierson’s contribution, “A Home for Christmas,” doesn’t exactly introduce new characters, the stars of the story have played only minor roles previously. By the time Higgins gets his Christmas wish-a miracle cure for his dying daughter-readers will be privy to the farmer’s darkest secrets, but the citizens of Kansas have no idea the kind of trouble Higgins’ mere presence could attract. In Williams’ “Sarah’s Christmas Miracle,” Wolf Creek gets another man trying to live down a shameful past in anonymity. Steel’s “Irish Christmas at Wolf Creek” introduces the sort of never-say-die character Wolf Creek needs with the body count rising as it has been lately. O’Brian, formerly a track-layer for the railroad, may become a rancher in partnership with his long-lost brother and an easterner…if the three of them survive a white-slavery ring operating way too close to Wolf Creek for comfort. Only two new characters are introduced: farmer Hutch Higgins (written by Big Jim Williams) and Irish drifter Kelly O’Brian (Charlie Steel). Thankfully, the pace of immigration seems to have slowed by O Deadly Night. Like the first collection of holiday-themed short stories ( A Wolf Creek Christmas), O Deadly Night visits some of the Kansas cattle town’s familiar denizens and introduces a few newcomers.Īt the rate newcomers were spilling from the woodwork in the previous Christmas anthology, it seemed Wolf Creek might explode before 1871 ended.

That gift is displayed right up front in Wolf Creek’s tenth overall volume and second Christmas anthology, O Deadly Night. Smith has a gift for intriguing, often pun-laden, titles.

Showdown at Demon's Drop by Ford Fargo