On This Day in History 1878 ...

June 5th



Pancho Villa was Born Doroteo Arango on June 5, 1878, in Río Grande, Mexico. Villa helped out on his parents’ farm. After his father’s death, he became head of the household and shot a man who was harassing one of his sisters. He fled, but was caught and imprisoned. Villa escaped again and later became a bandit.

While living as a fugitive, Villa joined Francisco Madero’s successful uprising against the Mexican dictator, Porfirio Díaz. Because of his skills as a fighter and a leader he was made a colonel. Another rebellion removed Madero from power in 1912 and Villa was almost executed for his efforts to defend the former government. He fled to the United States for a time, but he later returned to Mexico and formed his own military force known as Division del Norte (Division of the North).

He joined forces with other revolutionaries Venustiano Carranza and Emiliano Zapata to overthrow Victoriano Huerta. The different forces were not wholly successful at working together, and Villa and Carranza became rivals. For a number of years, he was involved in a series of clashes with other Mexican military groups and even fought with U.S. troops from 1916 to 1917. In 1920, Villa reached an agreement with Adolfo de la Huerta, the Mexican leader, which pardoned him for his actions in return for Villa putting an end to his independent military activities. Three years later, he was assassinated on June 20, 1923.

In the FARGO series written by John Benteen, number 18: KILLER'S MOON the storyline features Pancho Villa.

Fargo was running Springfield rifles across the border to Pancho Villa. That meant he had to dodge the U.S. Army, the Texas Rangers, and the Mexican regulars. But for the kind of money he was getting, it was worth it. Then he got mixed up with two American sisters—Rose and Lola. Rose was a nice girl, Lola was wild and mean—and you can guess which one Fargo liked better. Especially when she was holding half a million dollars in stolen money!

Published June 01 2017
Recommended Price: $1.99/ £1.49

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Piccadilly Publishing 3 Years on....

It was on May 9th 2012 that we published our first book: Trackdown (Bodie the Stalker #1) by Neil Hunter.

Little did we know that this would blaze the trail that lead us to today (6th May 2015) where, in the UK Western charts our titles take 5 out of the 10 top positions.

 

This only strengthens what Dave and I had thought all along - the Western is far from dead. For The Ysabel Kid Amazon comments run from ...

"Loved it! It was great being able to read J T Edson on my kindle. I can't wait to receive the entire series from the civil war through to rebuilding Texas, the floating outfit series and the 'modern' law makers (descendants of Dusty, Mark and the Isobel Kid etc.). Please, please, please make them all available and very soon. I am one of Edson's most loyal fans."

to ...

"At last JT Edson released as ebooks, I hope they eventually release all of them. I have loved Dusty Fog, the Kid, Mark and all the other characters since I was a teenager. One small niggle is that someone appears to have done a bit of a hatchet job on some of less pc parts of the book, for example those who have read the original books know that the Kid's horse was not called Thunder, these were written in the 60's and certain words used then wouldn't be used now but I thought it was part of their charm."

 

The above is referring to the fact that we changed the name of the horse from Nigger to Thunder. A decision not taken lightly. We haven't gone all P.C. as characters do use the "N" word. That's how they speak, that is their chatracter. But to use it outside that context, we felt wasn't appropriate.

 

Here at Piccadilly Publishing we are proud of what we have achieved. It certainly has exceeded our original expectations. Our Western series cover various subject matters ranging from the traditional Ranch Western (Storm by Matt Chisholm); a Civil War vetern in search of his lost love (The Searcher by Len Levinson); JT Edson's oeuvre; the West through the eyes of a half-breed (Sundance by John Benteen and Cheyenne by Judd Cole); famous figures (Wild Bill by Judd Cole); turn of the century men's action (Fargo by John Benteen); adult Westerns (Gunsmith by J.R. Roberts) and here we are privileged to take over the series at #400 and print original eBooks. Plus lots more.

 

We've tried over genres: war, French Foreign Legion, science fiction and detective novels. But they've never proved as popular as our Westerns. It doesn't mean we will stop dipping our hand into other genres - you can never tell what will hit the sweet spot with readers.

 

We could never have done this without the support of you readers out there. So, we are sending out a big thank you.

 

Here's to the next three years.

 

Best

Mike

 

 

 

OCTOBER COVERS REVEAL

We are please to announce the cover launch to our October titles.

Along with continuing our established series, October sees the launch of the wartime series THE SERGEANT by Len Levinson (see other posts on the books.

Sadly, October sees the end of David Stuart Davies' Sherlock Holmes series but does end on a high note. BRAND, CROW, FARGO, REAPER and The STORM Family marches on.

Thanks for your support. Mike

HEAD OVER TO ED MARTIN'S NEW WEBSITE!!

PP's very own Ed Martin has just launched his new website, which is packed with his many stunning paintings ... including plenty of PP covers!

You can find it HERE.