The Devil You Know is a great addition to the Stoneface Finnegan series. it will be getting five stars from me. I loved it. .

True lovers of Westerns know that any book written by a Johnstone will be a good read. The many different "families" in their books are all unique characters who protect their own by any means. While their methods may sometimes skirt the edges of the law, their actions always bring results. These books take the reader into the old west, telling the stories as they would have happened then. True Westerns.
The Devil You Know is the second book in the series centered around Stoneface Finnegan. A former Pinkerton aganet, he knows how the law works. Now he owns and operates a saloon, his customers come from every walk of life. Now a new, bigger than life customer has shown up at the bar. Stoneface gets the feeling that this customer just may be trouble looking him.
This is an excellent follow up to the first book in the series, By The Neck. I'm looking forward to the next book in this series.

Second in series, it was fun catching up with Stoneface and Pops. This time, the bad guy was truly demented and evil.

I enjoyed the first book and found myself struggling more with the gory evilness.

3☆

The Devil You Know is the new adventure with Stoneface Finnegan from William W. Johnstone and J.A. Johnstone. The town of Boar Gulch is booming and the building and rebuilding continues after the attack in the last book. But someone is stirring up trouble, who is robbing the miners? Will the mayor get money enough to build his hotel? Will the crazy man murdering women find Boar Gulch? For those that read the book, you will get some of the answers. This is as usual a good western from a dead man! I must thank @kensingtonbooks @netgalley and @pinnaclepublishers for giving me this advance copy and @williamw.j.a.johnstone for writing it.

The READER knows who the “devil” is from the get go; there is definitely a very EVIL man whose behavior is devilish (I’d say more like a homicidal maniac..... western Jack the Ripper style). No one else in the story figures it out until nearly the end, when said “devil” comes to and stays in Boar Gulch, with his main sights on ex-Pinkerton agent, Stoneface Finnagan. Seems the devil, comes to finish what others didn’t successfully accomplish before, that is, kill Stoneface Finnagan. This evil has money, charm, looks, and can play any role he desires, but he aims to settle a score and murder any and all he wants to, of course with his particular brand of flair. Evil, yes, he is the devil in the flesh, and Giacomo Valucci leaves a copious amount of dead bodies behind, before and during his visit to the quaint little mining town of Boar Gulch.

Hard for me to say I really “enjoyed” this one because of the graphic violent scenes, however, the violence falls in line with the plot, the evil character, the overall storyline. Valucci, (the Devil referred to in the book’s title) is a sort of a chameleon, and fancies himself the greatest actor in the world, producing the most glorious of “plays” displaying his handiwork for everyone to admire.

Well, the town of Boar Gulch, Rollie Finnagan, Finnagan’s partners, and yes, the reader, are about to experience a theatrical performance not soon forgotten.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC, in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

“The Devil You Know,” by the Johnstone conglomerate of William and J. A. Johnstone, is an intriguing story set in Boar Gulch. The main protagonist is a retired Pinkerton named Stoneface Finnegan. He is so named because he is so inscrutable.

Having left the Pinks, he is trying to settle down and live peacefully, opening a bar with several of his buddies. Life is not to allow the peaceful part. A former person with whom he came into contact during his law enforcement career is bound that he will die – hopefully by the hands of killers looking to redeem the bounty on his head.

This is novel #2 in this series and several have tried to collect the bounty money but ended up dead in the process. As you might guess there are others in the wings waiting to try for the bounty on Finnegan’s head.
Whether they are successful remains in doubt and the story goes down to the wire on who will win. The interesting thing is that Stoneface does not know who has put out the reward for his death. Not knowing this means every stranger coming into the boomtown is suspect. This also creates some issues.

All that can be said is that everything is not what it seems to be. You will have to read to find out who survives.