Book Review – Dead Man’s Badge by Robert E. Dunn

I just finished Dead Man’s Badge by Robert E. Dunn and wow…what a ride!

Dunn hooked me right from the opening paragraph – “Nothing is easy—not even dying. At least for me it wasn’t. The half hour spent digging my own grave in the glare of headlights and the cold of a desert night was literally the hardest work of my life.”

Dunn’s novel follows Longview Moody, a money runner for a Mexican drug cartel, who ends up on the wrong end of a shovel. Though Moody is career criminal, Dunn crafts his character well and you can’t help but like the guy. While running from those who forced him to dig his own shallow grave, Moody assumes his murdered twin brother’s identity and ends up as the Chief of Police in a middle-of-nowhere Texas town terrorized by the Mexican cartels. Those in the town, including our own government agents, don’t expect their new arrival to rock the boat, but Moody has other plans.

The book is well-paced and evolves into quite a page turner in the second half. The characters are rich and their web of loyalties complex. Who are the good guys and will Moody figure it out before it’s too late? You’ll have to read this excellent book to find out.