Wraiths of the Broken Land

Soon to be a major motion picture...the horror western that was considered too epic for the big screen!A brutal and unflinching tale that takes many of its cues from both cinema and pulp horror, Wraiths of the Broken Land is like no Western you’ve ever seen or read. Desperate to reclaim two kidnapped sisters who were forced into prostitution, the Plugfords storm across the badlands and blast their way through Hell. This gritty, character-driven piece will have you by the throat from the very first page and drag you across sharp rocks for its unrelenting duration. Prepare yourself for a savage Western experience that combines elements of Horror, Noir and Asian ultra-violence.You’ve been warned.Zahler’s debut western novel, A Congregation of Jackals, was nominated for both The Peacemaker award by the Western Fictioneers and The Spur award by the Western Writers of America. Wraiths of the Broken Land promises to be the benchmark for gritty westerns. Zahler has been spearheading the genre's recent surge of popularity, but others quickly joined in to push mainstream penetration for dark westerns.

From Booklist

This review contains spoilers Down in Mexico around 1900, two sisters are forced into prostitution at a gentlemen’s club. The sisters have two brothers and a father, making up the Plugfords, an outlaw gang that also includes a former slave, an Indian who eats bird brains, and the tactical leader, a brutal, hollowed-out gunman, or “wraith.” They’re too rough a bunch to go after Mexican gentlemen head-on, so they hire a “dandy,” the penniless Nathaniel Stromler, to find the fancy brothel and ascertain if the sisters are alive. Bloody mayhem ensues, though it’s clever mayhem, narrated with Zahler’s self-conscious, pedantic, but ultimately irresistible style, and it leads to a riveting climax. Zahler’s style is most of the tale; the Indian and the gunman, for instance, are stock characters but rendered with a wild flourish. Stromler and the hapless Samuel Upfield, who sold the sisters into slavery, receive fuller treatment, but really this is a compulsively readable dime novel—or its evil twin. Fans of Zahler’s A Congregation of Jackals (2010) will be satisfied; think Quentin Tarentino’s Django Unchained. --John Mort

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