Devil make a third

Douglas Bailey tells a tale of a small southern town's growth that's nurtured and poisoned by the virtues and vices of one of its own strong men, Buck Bannon.

At 18, Buck leaves his farm-dwelling family to seek out what opportunities await him in nearby Aven. With nothing but a shirt on his back and the will to never plow land again, Buck wheels and deals his way into the upper echelons this new town.

The story is fictional, but seems to have some basis in fact. For example, Aven is really Dothan, Alabama -- Douglas Bailey's hometown.

Also, one of the secondary characters, Tobe Parody, one of Buck's law officers, is certainly a "parody" of Tobe Domingus, a tax-enforcing, gun-slinging marshal who ruled Dothan in the late 1800s.

I enjoyed this book on many levels and especially liked the colorful colloquialisms that I'd never heard, growing up in the south myself.

I also liked the way Buck made his own way and lived by his own rules without excuses or remorse while simultaneously questioning his own motives and treatment of others.

The only part of the story I didn't like was the fact that Buck's selfishness kept him from meeting his only son. But Buck was not perfect, far from it in fact, and didn't claim or try to be anyone but himself -- human.