Red Dead Raiders (RDR3)

Author's Note

Are you ready? Are you REALLY ready? Okay then!

As I said in the description, this is a pulpy, hard boiled, Wild West shoot'em up with some Noir themes. In my finite perusal of Wattpad I didn't see any others offer such flowery descriptions of their books so if you're and feel like some people are interested in what exactly that means.

First, if you didn't read the description, I had a disclaimer warning of possible sensitive content. The Civil War to this day causes controversy and this tale, especially the flashbacks, is as much as a Wild West story as it is a Civil War story. The war was the backdrop for the Wild West era after all.

Next, pulpy refers to the old "pulp" magazines (they weren't comics they had mostly text) before TV. These magazines were best known for their lurid, exploitative, and sensational subject matter.

Lurid means: unpleasantly bright and/or vividly shocking.

Exploitative (fiction) in this sense means: simply exploiting drugs, violence and all that other X-rated stuff for sales or reads. You could have read exploitative fiction and liked it, I think it's pretty common on Wattpad. 50 Shades of Gray is probably a well known example. Back in the pulp fiction days however, publishers had to keep it "PG-13" or critics would crucify them.

Sensational simply means: causing great public interest.

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Now that's pulp, the cornerstone, mother and father of hard boiled fiction and Noir fiction.

Hard boiled literature usually: paints and exposes a backdrop of institutional social corruption. The protagonist is also a detective, seeing and uncovering this corruption. Some people think this is the "older brother" of Noir literature.

Now hard boiled and Noir are usually hard to distinguish one from another. They get confused and jumbled around a lot. The dynamic duo work hand in hand all the time. I think it's entirely possible to have a hard boiled setting but a Noir character. Watchmen, might be a good example. Whether the comic or movie, the laws making superheroes illegal presents a hard boiled setting. My favorite character, Rorschach, screams the usual Noir archetype. Another difference between Noir and Hard Boiled is that the protagonist in Noir is usually a victim to the corruption. Noir stories usually end with the protagonist dead in the street, a victim of the morally ambiguous web of consequences they made themselves. Kinda like Macbeth or Scarface. Hard Boiled still has moral absolutes, but Noir is all gray baby.

Noir literature usually focuses on the character. The plot is driven by the past or the human tendency to repeat their mistakes. Cynical heroes are common. Flashbacks, like in The Godfather 2, are common. The settings are usually dark, ultra dark.

Wild West Shoot 'em Up: is pretty dang self explanatory.

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So, now you know what I'm talking about if I say I'm breaking down and Hard Boiling the Wild West setting Noir-dark (noir means BLACK in French in fact, it's part of its etymology). I'm also going to be using a few strategies from Noir fiction i.e. flashbacks and a flawed, time period friendly, and cynical antihero & friends.

In the description, I'm also attempting to sandwich some education in here. Thus, the research I did for this lengthy lesson you just read! I fear if I talk about "Pulp's" father and mother Penny Dreadfuls and Dime Novels I may take us all the way back to the printing press and then back to the Ten Commandments. However, I digress, please enjoy! I'm going to try and walk the fine line like pulp writers of old. Getting steamy and brutal (mostly brutal) while not going overboard. Remember to vote and comment! It's lonely here in the West!