With visions of wealth and adventure, William and Samuel Wallace board a ship sailing from New Orleans to Mexico. The Patience, a three-masted barque with a fool for a captain and an untested crew heads into the tail end of a savage squall. Battered and broken, the boat is destroyed, leaving only a handful of crewmen to arrive upon the shores of Mexico. The crisp white sands soon turn crimson as a savage band of freebooters led by the ferocious Juan Diego Guadiz sets upon the survivors. William watches in horror as his brother is among the murdered. Escaping certain death thanks to the timely arrival of the cunning old pirate "Mad Jack" Flambeau, William Wallace lives only for the feel of cold, double-edge Castilian steel slicing through the flesh of his brother's killers.

Through the sun-washed city of Vera Cruz and the dusty streets of San Antonio, from the deadly desert hills of Mexico to the mist-laden bayous of East Texas, Samuel's demise haunts William's soul. On his quest for vengeance, Wallace will dare the howling wilderness, tempt fate in the arms of a fiery senorita, and find himself embroiled in the fight for Texas independence where his wildly heroic actions are destined to transform the man into the legend known as...The Red Ripper.

"Kerry Newcomb is one of those writers who lets you know from his very first lines that you're in for a ride. And he keeps his promise. The Red Ripper bounds along with unrelenting vigor. This is historical fiction crafted by a writer who never loses his sense of pace, drama, adventure, and fun...