Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
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"The Justice Riders," by Chuck Norris, Ken Abraham, Aaron Norris, Tim Grayem; Broadman & Holman Publishers ($24.99)
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He definitely can fight, and some say he can act, too. But can he write? Or does the title, Chuck Norris, novelist, sound almost as preposterous as Andy Richter, bodybuilder?
"The Justice Riders," a Civil War era action yarn, has Norris' name branded on it in big, bold letters. But he gets help - and who knows how much - from three co-authors, including his younger brother, Aaron. Together they've penned a blood-soaked proselytizer that's heavy with references to God, country and God.
The book's lead character, sturdy, saintly Ezra Justice, could just as easily be named Newt Testament or Angus Gabriel. Otherwise, pray tell, there are no signs of subtlety in a book where even the most onerous of bad guys takes his final fall after first being urged to "get right with Jesus."
Norris, who owes his latter-day fame to TV's "Walker, Texas Ranger," has lent his likeness to the cover illustration of stern-visaged Ezra Justice. Unlike Ranger Cordell Walker or Norris himself, though, Ezra sometimes is a man of quite a few words. Alas, they're often spoken in a way in which no one really speaks. As in this laborious discourse on the horrors of war:
"I'd never before experienced such vicious hand-to-hand combat as we engaged in that day. I can still picture it in my mind. I don't think I'll ever be able to forget those awful sights of human bodies being torn apart by close-range musket shots, the thunderous roar of so many cannons, and the smells - the awful stench of blood and death all around us; wave after wave of the Rebels pouring over those breastworks at the Carter's place, and men dying on top of one another, both blue and gray uniforms."
Yes, Ezra sometimes has a heavy heart, which Norris and company document with a heavy hand. Weighing in at 295 pages of big print and short chapters, "Justice Riders" at best is a quick, simple read. But so is "See Dick Run," so don't necessarily take that as a recommendation.
Our hero is aided by a band of six broadly drawn allies who are enlisted to "wreak havoc" with Confederate troops in the closing days of the Civil War.
Each has a specialty and one of them is ill-fated. Might that be "strapping Irishman" Shaun O'Banyon or devout Christian Nathaniel York, formerly a slave on the Justice family plantation until Ezra freed him? Or perhaps one of those rascally "Gypsy-blooded" twin brothers, Carlos and Roberto Hawkins, will meet an untimely end. The other candidates are red-blooded Englishman Reginald Bonesteel and ace Indian tracker and apprentice medicine man Harry Whitecloud.
Their nemesis, besides the book's clunky dialogue, is thoroughly rotten Mordecai Slate, whose band of Death Raiders sits at the opposite end of the moral teeter-totter from Ezra's Justice Riders. Justice Riders means well. Boy, does it ever. And a sequel is set in motion with Ezra's closing pledge to journey "wherever God leads me." He'll likely have company, of course, because "the Justice Riders realized that whatever they would do or become they would not tolerate evil, oppression, or injustice."
Good Lord. Let peace reign.
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(c) 2006, The Dallas Morning News. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service.
