S.O.B.s #02 - The Plains of Fire

According to The Internet Speculative Fiction Database, Alan Philipson has authored 15 novels in the Deathlands series as James Axler. He also wrote installments in the Destroyer, Executioner, Stony Man, and Super Bolan series. As Jack Hild, he wrote eight novels in the S.O.B.s series including The Plains of Fire, the second installment. It was published by Gold Eagle in February 1984 with another incredible painted cover by Ron Lesser.

The book begins in Iran as the main villain, heinous Captain Mohamadi Razod and his Islamic Revolutionary Guards, lead a rocket scientist to a gas soaked pyre. The heroic scientist leaked details about an Iranian quest to build four antiquated atomic bombs. In this savage opening sequence the scientist is nailed to a seat through his...thatchy area...and then mercifully cuts his own throat as the flames soar up his legs. Philipson's descriptive narrative isn't for the squeamish. 

Walker Jessup, the CIA liaison for the S.O.B.s, is fed details about the Iranian bomb program. He is instructed by the high-ranking U.S. brass that an official American military unit can't risk destroying this Iranian installation. The mission demands incursion into the country's sovereign territory and would be viewed as an act of war. Instead, the government wants Jessup to get his S.O.B.s on the job based on their triumphant success in Kaluba (the series debut). The plan is to penetrate the base and destroy it from within. Jessup gets on the horn with team lead Nile Barrabas. 

The next few chapters resembles a Sam Durell novel as Barrabas pieces together a ten-person team of specialists that can bring the military's operation to fruition. Unlike the first novel, these chapters are brief as smaller biographies are presented with highlights of the characters. Philipson is a smart writer and incorporates the character's skill-set into the main portions of the novel. For example, five pages spent on Vince Biondi informs readers he can drive a race car super fast. This will prove crucial to the novel's finale.

Philpson proves to be an excellent storyteller as the narrative spills into the final 100 pages. The scenes alternate from the perspective of a handful of Iranian scientists working under intense pressure to complete the construction of the bombs. Razod is the one you love to hate, the sadistic barbarian leader that kills his own people for the unholy crusade. Each of Barrabas' team members have important roles and pieces of the narrative are solely dedicated to their participation in the mission. Some authors create abrasion or disjoint the plot when attempting to present multiple perspectives. Philpson is a pro and seamlessly delivers a smooth prose. I also enjoyed (I'm awful!) the fact that three of the team members die in the fight. Nobody is safe in an S.O.B.s book!

The Plains of Fire is an excellent men's action-adventure with enough violence and action to saturate 200 pages. As much as I enjoyed the series debut, written by Jack Canon, David Wade, and Robin Hardy, the narrative suffered from too many pages of character development. Philpson keeps it simple stupid when entrusting readers to consume character bios. Recommended. Get it HERE.

Jon Messmann: Vengeance is Mine

The following article appears in the Afterword of the Brash Books edition of the 1973 hard-hitting vigilante novel The Revenger. I wrote this to commemorate not only this series but also Messmann's long and lasting body of work. I hope you enjoy it. - Eric Compton

"Jon Messmann: Vengeance is Mine"

It's a human flaw, either well-conceived or spontaneous, and often is devoid of any real sense of right and wrong. This reactionary process, often spawned by grief and anger, makes it a swinging pendulum that authors can use to transform characters and enthrall readers. This reliable character arc can spur a story into a tumultuous second or third act. The thrills arise from the metamorphosis as the character changes and responds to some sort of emotionally jarring or horrific event.

The concept has remained a steady, consistent staple of literature dating back to ancient Greek tragedies of the 5th century BC. It consumes the third play of the Oresteia trilogy as Clytemnestra kills her husband Agamemnon for the sacrificial murder of their daughter. This sets off a chain of events in which Clytemnestra's remaining children plot to kill her to avenge the death of their father. A compelling, awe-inspiring cycle of violence as family matters turn to splatters.

William Shakespeare's longest play, The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, is perhaps the epitome of revenge tales. Written between 1599 and 1601, the play's central theme is vengeance – served cold and calculated. Hamlet's dead father appears and explains that Claudius murdered him, thus fueling a desire for revenge. Thankfully, it became a rather complicated, emotional murder plot that propelled the play to eternal popularity.

Fast-forward to the 20th century's Western fiction and the classic revenge story becomes a familiar genre trope. Respected author Frank Gruber (1904-1969) codified the Western plots and includes revenge as one of seven basic plots. Gruber described the revenge story as the pursuit of a villain by an individual he wronged, but mentions that it also could involve elements of the classic mystery story. The protagonist's southern drawl can be heard to say something like, “you're the dirty rascal that shot my pa” or “the bastard had it coming.”

Two stellar Western novels exemplify the revenge plot. Charles Portis' 1968 novel True Grit centralizes vengeance as a 14 year old girl hunts her father's murderer with the aid of a rugged U.S. Marshall. The novel explores the price of revenge and the toll it takes on the avenger. It was adapted twice to film, the first time capturing an Academy Award for John Wayne's portrayal of Rooster Cogburn. Two years later, Clifton Adams won his second consecutive Spur Award for the gritty novel The Last Days of Wolf Garnett (published a year before his death). The plot is simplistic, but presented in an atmospheric, crime-noir way. A man is searching for his wife's killer, the despicable Wolf Garnett. But, he later learns that Garnett may already be dead and his opportunity for vengeance has been stolen. It's as dark as a mortuary drape and explores the seeded, deep longing for vengeance.

In men's action-adventure literature, the undisputed catalyst for the 1970s-1990s vigilante heyday is War Against the Mafia. It was authored by Don Pendleton and originally purchased by Bee Line, who then published the book in 1969 under a subsidiary called Pinnacle Books. In the novel, Sergeant Mack Bolan is serving as a U.S. Army sniper in the Vietnam War. With 97 confirmed kills, he earns the bleak moniker, The Executioner. Unlike the decades of vengeance tales before it, Pendleton incorporated a murder-suicide into the character arc. Bolan's sister and father became financially controlled by the Mafia. The stress and financial burdens provoked Bolan's father into killing his wife and daughter before committing suicide. Bolan learns of the deaths and flies home, never to return to the military. Instead, he becomes a one-man army to exact revenge on the Mob. In essence, it is the classic revenge story modernized.

Early editions of War Against the Mafia suggests the book was originally planned as a one-off. However, the sales solidified the idea that readers desired more of Mack Bolan's vengeance. Later printings would include the #1 to indicate that the book was a series debut. Don Pendleton authored another 36 installments before selling the series to Harlequin. Under their subsidiary, Gold Eagle, The Executioner became the most popular men's action-adventure series of all-time with an astonishing total of 464 installments through 2020.

Beginning in 1970, countless publishers wanted to create another Mack Bolan clone to capture the same success that Pinnacle was experiencing. The Executioner directly influenced countless novels, series titles and publisher demands for more revenge stories with a gritty, violent delivery. Like the pulps of the 1930s and 1940s, these titles needed a tragic origin story to propel the hero into action. Publishers, desperately wanting The Executioner readers and consumers to gravitate toward their titles, pitched their ideas and marketing designs to a revolving door of blue collar, working man authors. Along with the look and feel of a vigilante story, the publishers (including Pinnacle and Gold Eagle) created names for their heroes that sounded similar to the word “Executioner” - Butcher, Terminator, Avenger, Hawker, Dagger, Penetrator, Enforcer, Sharpshooter, Stryker, Ryker, Keller, Peacemaker, Liquidator, Inquisitor. Even Marvel Comics received permission from Pendleton to clone Bolan as The Punisher, one of their most consistently selling comic titles of the last 50 years. Obviously, the prerequisite for any proposed paperback warrior was that the title had to end in the letter R.

Or, in some cases begin and end with that letter. Like, The Revenger.

John Joseph Messmann created The Revenger series in 1973 for publisher Signet, then a division of New American Library. But, Messmann's path to vigilante fiction was the proverbial long and winding road. Born in 1920, Messmann began his artistic career by playing the violin, an extracurricular activity forced on him by his parents. By 1940, Messmann began writing for the up-and-coming comic industry, a period known as the Golden Age of Comic Books. His first gig was for Fawcett Comics, an early, successful comic book publisher of that era. His co-workers were a dream-team of comic book icons including Joe Simon, Jack Kirby, and Chic Stone. Messman wrote for a decade on titles like Captain Marvel Jr., Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, Gabby Hayes, Don Winslow of the Navy, Tex Ritter, and Nyoka: The Jungle Girl. He even created a comic strip technique as an education program conducted for the United Nations Information Office.

In 1950, Messmann, now using Jon J. Messmann, co-created Carousel, an 8-page tabloid comics section in the Pittsburg Courier. This featured many of Messmann's ideas including secret agents, historical romance, sea adventure, private-eyes, jungle girls and even fairy tales. Carousel lasted five years and was distributed by New York's Smith-Mann Syndicate. Over time, Messmann was no longer content with the comic industry.

Beginning in the 1960s, Messmann’s transition into paperback, full-length novels began with Lyle Kenyon Engel’s star franchise, Nick Carter: Killmaster. Messmann’s first contribution was the series' 37th installment, 14 Seconds to Hell, published in 1968. The series, authored by a selection of ghost writers under the name Nick Carter, was a firm stepping stone for Messmann. The series paralleled the pulp industry in terms of campy, over-the-top secret-agent action. Messmann’s experience writing comics and comic strips made him a useful workhorse for Engel to rely upon. The author contributed 14 more installments through 1970 before departing the series.

Engel, pleased with Messmann’s production, paired him with another Killmaster author named George Snyder for a series called Hot Line in 1970. The series lasted only three installments with Messmann only contributing to the debut, Our Spacecraft is Missing!. Again, this allowed Messmann to develop a modern secret-agent, in this case a President’s Man type of hero named Fowler. Also in 1970, while writing Killmaster novels and Gothic romance titles (as Claudette Nicole), Messman wrote two books starring a vagabond hero named Logan. They were inspired by John D. MacDonald’s successful character Travis McGhee.

It was just a matter of time before publishing trends would align with Messmann’s literary strengths. His experience in spy-fiction, Gothics, and action-adventure is a product of that era. Genre fiction was consistently reliable for publishers and there were plenty of ideas, authors, and healthy competition. After The Executioner began to develop banner sales numbers for Pinnacle, it was only fitting that Messmann made his own vigilante footprint. In 1973, The Revenger was born.

It’s a mystery on who originally had the idea for Ben Martin, the former military veteran turned Mafia buster. It could be that Messmann had read Don Pendleton and wanted to try his hand or Signet simply approached Messmann’s agent about the story and needed an experienced writer to tell it. By 1973, Messmann had authored books for Award, Fawcett Gold Medal, Belmont-Tower, and Pyramid. He never played hard to get and had a knack for the business dating back 30 years at that point. With the key words “personal tragedy”, “vengeance”, “hero”, “violence”, “sex”, Messmann’s typewriter lit up with possibilities.

Like any 1970s traumatized hero, Messmann’s Ben Martin is a Vietnam veteran. When the series began, it was during the end of America’s involvement in Vietnam’s affairs. Saigon fell. The world moved on. American soldiers were left to rebuild their lives, overcome emotional distress, and become domesticated. Vietnam veterans became the dominant heroes of 1970s and 1980s men's action-adventure literature in the same way that 1950s and 1960s crime-noir was dependent on WW2 veterans. The buyers and readers that were consuming these books could easily identify with these heroes because they shared the same war experience. Arguably, these books served as a type of therapy. These characters, like Ben Martin, understood the “trial by fire” awakening, just like their readers.

When Messmann introduces Martin, he is an honest living, blue-collar family man who owns a grocery store. His nights of silently awaiting targets in a muddy rice paddy are over. But after the character arc, Messmann is transformed from shop owner back into the prowling warrior. By the book’s fiery finale, he’s either alive or dead. Messmann creates this stirring character arc that feeds off of a very personal tragedy. Like Pendleton’s Mack Bolan origin story, it isn’t a straight-up, traditional “you shot up my family” vendetta. In fact, the tragedy is an accident - caused by evil men - but still an accident. Whether anyone would have died otherwise is in the eye of the beholder. But, Martin’s life is deeply affected, and revenge is the only recourse. In these novels, revenge is always the only recourse. Thus, The Revenger rises.

By the end of the bloodshed, the supposed end of Martin’s war, readers are left to arrive at their own conclusions. Why? The Revenger wasn’t planned as a series. There’s nothing to indicate that Signet had any other plans for Messmann or Ben Martin. The paperback's spine, front and back covers and last pages are devoid of anything suggesting this is a series debut. But, it was. Only Signet and Messmann didn’t know it.

At the very least, the sales must have been satisfactory to warrant a sequel. By that point, five more novels became the new goal. Messmann crafted these novels through 1975 with titles that certainly resonate 1970s men’s action-adventure flare: Fire in the Streets (1974), Vendetta Contract (1974), Stiletto Signature (1974), City for Sale (1975), Promise for Death (1975). While revenge is mostly the catalyst for the first novel, Martin’s life continued to be plagued by violence. Each novel builds to a crescendo with revenge as a silent motivator. The protagonist responds with ample destruction in this profession of violence.

As you read and enjoy The Revenger series, a clear genre standout, take note of Messmann’s special treatment of Martin’s psyche. With an uncanny awareness, he delves into Martin’s warrior soul and deciphers dark emotions for the reader. In many ways, Martin could be the most complex vigilante in terms of repressed feelings and temperament. In the second installment, Martin becomes the vigilante, but he doesn’t really want that burden. He dreams of the life that once was, an existence robbed from him by events outside of his control. The old adage “when you look back, it will be what you’ve overcome” is a staple of Martin’s forward outlook, but it’s a reminder of the scars. In reality, Martin realizes that he’s the blood-craving vampire, only it’s revenge that fuels his existence. The emotion makes him alive and whole, ultimately the reason to rise and exist each day. After nights as a sniper in Vietnam, the ongoing war with the mob, and his transformation into a family man, Martin realizes he’s destined to right the wrongs and be the killer of evil. It was the one constant in his life.

Jon Messmann created another character in 1973 as well, Jefferson Boone: Handyman. It's another series standout featuring a U.S. State Department agent extinguishing international flare-ups that could adversely affect America and its allies. It has the same action-oriented intensity as The Revenger, complete with Boone getting laid...a lot. The sexual escapades of both Ben Martin and Jefferson Boone, as well as the Nick Carter series before that, led Messmann to what would ultimately become his meal ticket.

By 1978, adult Western fiction rose to prominence and was led by a series heavyweight in Lou Cameron's Longarm. The concept was simply to incorporate two to three graphic sex scenes into a traditional western paperback. The main character fights the bad guys and pleases the bad girls. Messmann, following the trend, created The Trailsman series in 1980 for Signet. Like Don Pendleton's The Executioner, Messmann birthed an iconic hero in Skye Fargo – lake blue eyes and bed mattress Olympian – and placed him in nearly 400 total installments. Of those, Messmann wrote nearly half up until his retirement in 1998, a testament to his storytelling skills and craftsmanship.

It was rumored that Messmann had never been to the western regions of the U.S., instead writing every Trailsman novel from the comfort of his Manhattan apartment. He would later die at the age of 84 in a New York nursing home in 2004.

New York Times bestselling author Lee Goldberg and his Brash Books imprint have been doing God’s work for years by reprinting and reintroducing classic novels by forgotten talented authors for modern audiences. Thankfully, Jon Messmann’s stellar body of work has been recognized and included in the publisher’s superb lineup of novels and collections. I can’t think of a more deserving author than Jon Messmann. I also feel that if he were alive today, he would already be writing a new series of heroic fiction for Goldberg and pitching character concepts for another.

The greats like Jon Messmann never ran out of ideas — they just ran out of time.

01/29/2022
Eric Compton
Paperback Warrior

Jon Messmann - Partial Bibliography

As Nick Carter:
Nick Carter: Killmaster #39 Carnival for Killing 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #43 The Amazon 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #44 The Sea Trap 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #45 Berlin 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #48 The Living Death 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #49 Operation Che Guevara 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #50 The Doomsday Formula 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #51 Operation Snake 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #52 The Casbah Killers 1969 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #53 The Arab Plague 1970 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #54 Red Rebellion 1970 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #55 The Executioners 1970 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #57 Mind Killers 1970 (Award Books)
Nick Carter: Killmaster #60 The Death Strain 1970 (Award Books)

Nick Carter: Killmaster #37 14 Seconds to Hell 1968 (Award Books)

As Claudette Nicole:
Bloodroots Manor 1970 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
The Mistress of Orion Hall 1970 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
House at Hawk's End 1971 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
Circle of Secrets 1972 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
The Dark Mill 1972 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
The Haunted Heart 1972 (Pyramid)
The Chinese Letter 1973 (Popular Library)
The Haunting of Drumroe 1973 (Fawcett Gold Medal)
When the Wind Cries 1976 (Pyramid)

As Pamela Windsor:
Forsaking All Others 1977 (Jove)
Rebel's Rapture 1979 (Jove)
At Passion's Tide 1980 (Jove)

Jefferson Boone: Handyman
The Moneta Papers 1973 (Pyramid)
The Game of Terror 1973 (Pyramid)
Murder Today, Money Tomorrow 1973 (Pyramid)
The Swiss Secret 1974 (Pyramid)
Ransom! 1975 (Pyramid)
The Inheritors 1975 (Pyramid)

Canyon 'O Grady series (as Jon Sharpe)
Dead Men's Trails 1989 (Signet)
Silver Slaughter 1989 (Signet)
Shadow Guns 1989 (Signet)

The Revenger:
The Revenger 1973 (Signet)
Fire in the Streets 1974 (Signet)
The Vendetta Contract 1974 (Signet)
The Stiletto Signature 1974 (Signet)
City for Sale 1975 (Signet)
A Promise for Death 1975 (Signet)

Hot Line (as Paul Richards):
Our Spacecraft is Missing! (with George Snyder) 1970 (Award Books)

Logan (as Alan Joseph):
Logan 1970 (Belmont)
Killers at Sea 1970 (Belmont)

Stand-Alone titles:
The Deadly Deep 1976 (New Amerian Librery)
Phone Call 1979 (Signet)
Jogger's Moon (aka To Kill a Jogger) 1980 (Penguin)
The Last Snow 1989 (Random House)
A Bullet for the Bride 1972 (Pyramid)

Non-Fiction:
Choosing a Pet 1973 Grosset & Dunlap

Comics:
Don Winslow of the Navy 1940-1951
Gabby Hayes 1940-1949
Human Torch 1943
Sub-Mariner 1943
Nyoka: The Jungle Girl #50 1945
Tex Ritter 1950

Captain Marvel Jr. 1940-1949

Forgive the Executioner

I wasn't able to determine anything about author Andrew Lane. There is another writer named Andrew Lane with titles like Young Sherlock Holmes, Crusoe, and The Six Directions Sequence, but based on his date of birth in 1963 it would make him just a high school student in 1978, the year that Forgive the Executioner was published. 

This 225-page New English Library paperback introduces readers to Alan Paine, a married man with a young son and daughter. Living in West of England, Paine's father was British and his mother American. Serving the British military, Paine became an expert marksman and explosives specialist. After serving in the Vietnam War, Paine retired to a paper-pushing clerk working for the county on the nine-to-five grind. 

As the book begins, Paine's daughter is walking through the forest on the way home. She's attacked by three men, raped, and then shot. When Paine's wife and son go searching for her they stumble on the same three men and are rewarded with fatal shots to the head. 

In the following chapters readers learn that nearly two years has passed and Paine is now working under the alias Max Case as an explosives expert and assassin for the Irish Republican Army (IRA). By working within the IRA ranks he secretly creates “accidents” that kill his fellow soldiers. However, Paine's vengeance isn't strictly reserved for the IRA. He also uses his deadly role as a way to kill the opposing Protestants that vow to keep northern Ireland within British reign.  Paine doesn't care who he murders because he feels that the whole bloody war led to his family's death. 

Other than Paine, the other main character in the book is a woman named Siobahn. She's working for the Protestants as a double agent in the IRA. Her leadership leads to many IRA soldiers perishing under “mistakes”. Paine meets Siobahn and the two develop a romantic involvement. The book's finale involves Paine being ordered to break out the three IRA men that killed his family.

Forgive the Executioner is an unusual novel. At times it works like an effectively tight counter-terrorism novel with Paine planning and performing hits on an assortment of mid-tier terrorists. These scenes are presented well and deliver just enough violence to satisfy any vigilante-fiction reader. However, the book becomes so silly in parts that I often contemplated if Lane was writing satire. 

Several times in the book Case changes his look by simply cutting and dying his hair blonde and shaving. This miracle makeover gives him the ability to weave in and out of close compatriots as a different person. Often he fools people he has closely worked with in the past, including Siobahn, who he fools into believing he's two different people. It is this sort of nonsense that makes it unbearable to even suspend disbelief for enjoyment's sake. I get the 'ole face switcharoo bit from the pulp era, but this is 1978. 

My other issue is the over-the-top graphic sex. This book reads like a porn novel with Case plowing through pus...women...on nearly every other page. I get the hyperbolic sex scenes, but the women he's with nearly gasp themselves to death when he whips the manhood. 

My guess is if you enjoy workaday action-adventure paperbacks then Forgive the Executioner shouldn't be a far cry from plain 'ole titles like The Butcher and Nick Carter: Killmaster. Tepid recommendation, but good luck finding a copy. 

Ashton Ford #01 - Ashes to Ashes

There's no doubt that Don Pendleton took readers into some unusual places after writing a decade of The Executioner. Towards the end of Pendleton's involvement with Mack Bolan, he had already dabbled in science-fiction, political intrigue, and romance. His first real effort at hard-hitting crime-fiction were six books starring Joe Copp, a private investigator in the Mike Hammer style. But, it was the Ashton Ford series that really had people talking – good, bad, and indifferent. 

Ashton Ford, the psychic detective series, was published between 1986 to 1988. This six-book series stars Ford as a former naval intelligence officer that boasts in the opening chapter of Eye to Eye, the series debut, that he possesses all the talents of a spy. He has also had the good fortune of having a psychic ability. Apparitions and future visions are unveiled in a way he can't control. It is spontaneous, which is of little help in his profession as a private investigator.

Ford's newest client is Karen Highland, a wealthy woman on the verge of inheriting the billion-dollar trust left to her by her deceased grandfather. She comes to Ford because she wants to get laid. Seriously. Ford hangs around a New Age clinic and has discovered a way to create intercourse with women through telepathy. It's the ultimate high in a horizontal position. But, as Ford is explaining his qualms with dishing out the goods to a complete stranger, Karen's bodyguard is discovered dead.

Apparently, the dead bodyguard gets Ashford involved with the police and of course he needs to be better than they are in solving this murder. But, as he is introduced to Karen's suspicious doctor and trustees, there's another body – this one floating face down in the family's lavish pool. What's going on?

Ashes to Ashes is terrible. Don Pendleton can write a bad book and he proves it with this mediocre recycled private-eye plot. My issue isn't the recycling – God knows I read enough carbon copy gothic-romance novels – but it is the ridiculous pages and pages of New Age nonsense complete with detailed explanations of pseudoscience and the eternal struggle between God and the Devil. The character Ford is your typical West Coast private-eye. He drives a sports car, has a boatload of money, and women wanna screw him. Par for the course. The psychic thing comes into play twice, both of which are central to the resolution.

I can't recommend this book to anyone, but I'm sure it has a fair share of fans that are pleased with Pendleton's stark contrast between Bolan and Ford. I love horror novels, action-adventure, and crime-fiction, but the trio of sub-genres combined into this weird occult detective thing just didn't work for me. If you want to try it, get it HERE.

Paperback Warrior Primer - Jon Messmann

Whether you enjoy men's action-adventure, adult westerns, comics, mysteries, vigilante sagas, or gothic romance, there's something for everyone when it comes to author Jon Messmann (1920-2004). We have covered so many of his books and titles thanks to publishers like Cutting Edge Books reprinting his work for modern readers. Hopefully, today's primer will shine a light on his life and literary work.

Jon Messmann was born in 1920. His parents forced him to play violin and some sources stated he really disliked playing music and preferred writing. In 1940, he began writing for the up-and-coming comic industry, a period known as the Golden Age of Comic Books. His first gig was for Fawcett Comics, an early, successful comic book publisher of that era. His co-workers were a dream-team of comic book icons such as Joe Simon, Jack Kirby, and Chic Stone. Messmann wrote for a decade on titles like Captain Marvel Jr., Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, Gabby Hayes, Don Winslow of the Navy, Tex Ritter, and Nyoka: The Jungle Girl.

In 1950, Messmann, co-created Carousel, an 8-page tabloid comics section in the Pittsburg Courier. This featured many of Messmann's comic ideas like secret agents, historical romance, sea adventure, private-eyes, jungle girls and even fairy tales. Carousel lasted five years and was distributed by New York's Smith-Mann Syndicate. But, Messmann wanted to get into writing full-length, paperback originals.

Beginning in the 1960s, Messmann’s transition into paperback full-length novels began with Lyle KenyonEngel’s star franchise, Nick Carter: Killmaster. Messmann’s first contribution to that series was it's 37th installment, 14 Seconds to Hell, published in 1968. The series, authored by a selection of ghost writers under the name Nick Carter, was a firm stepping stone for Messmann. The series paralleled the pulp industry in terms of campy, over-the-top secret-agent action. Messmann’s experience writing comics and comic strips made him a viable workhorse for Engel to rely on. The author contributed 14 more installments through 1970 before departing the series. Most Nick Carter fans will list Messmann in the highest tier of series contributors.

Engel, pleased with Messmann’s production, paired him with another Killmaster author named George Snyder for a series called Hot Line in 1970. The series lasted only three installments with Messmann only contributing to the debut, Our Spacecraft is Missing!. Again, this allowed Messmann to develop a modern secret-agent, in this case a President’s Man type of hero named Fowler.

Also in 1970, while writing Killmaster novels Messman wrote two books starring a vagabond hero named Logan. They were inspired by John D. MacDonald’s successful character Travis McGee. The books are Logan and Killers at Sea and were authored under the pseudonym Alan Joseph. Both books have been reprinted as new editions under Messmann's name. You can obtain them HERE.

Just like Gil Brewer, Dean R. Koontz, Hillary Waugh, and Gardner F. Fox, Jon Messmann also authored gothic romance paperbacks. The pseudonyms he used for these novels was Claudette Nicole and Claud Nicole.

After Mack Bolan's saga was unveiled in the hit series The Executioner in the late 1960s and early 70s, publishers began searching for vigilante fiction. In 1973, Signet began publishing a vigilante series called The Revenger, written by Jon Messmann. He crafted these novels through 1975 while also creating and writing another character, Jefferson Boone: Handyman. The sexual escapades of The Revenger's Ben Martin, Jefferson Boone: Handyman, and the Nick Carter series before that, led Messmann to what would ultimately become his meal ticket – Skye Fargo.

By 1978, adult western fiction rose to prominence and was led by a series heavyweight in Lou Cameron's Longarm. The concept was simply to incorporate two to three graphic sex scenes into a traditional western. The main character fights the bad guys and pleases the bad girls. Messmann, following the trend, created The Trailsman series in 1980 for Signet. Like Don Pendleton's The Executioner, Messmann had created an iconic hero in Skye Fargo – lake blue eyes/bed mattress Olympian – and placed him in nearly 400 total installments. Of those, Messmann wrote nearly half up until his retirement using the pseudonym Jon Sharpe. The publisher then handed the series over to a rotation of ghost writers using the Sharpe house name.

Messmann also created the short-lived Canyon 'O Grady western series in 1989 and authored three installments. It was rumored that Messmann had never been to the western regions of the U.S., instead writing every Trailsman and Canyon 'O Grady novel from the comfort of his Manhattan apartment.

Messmann even dipped his typewriter in the romance waters. Using the pseudonym Pamela Windsor, he wrote three romance novels for Jove from 1977 through 1980. He also authored a horror novel called The Deadly Deep in 1976 for New American Library, and thrillers like Phone Call for Signet in 1979, Jogger's Moon in 1980 for Penguin, and the western The Last Snow in 1989 for Random House. He also authored the stand-alone crime-fiction mystery novel A Bullet for the Bride in 1972 for Pyramid.

Jon Messmann died in 2004 at the age of 84 in a New York nursing home. His books are widely circulated and can often be found in just about any used bookstore across America. The fact that fans like myself are still discussing his literature is a true testament of his storytelling talent. Get many of his books and titles right HERE.

Hangman's Territory

Jack M. Bickham (1930-1997) wrote predominantly westerns during his career while also teaching writing at the University of Oklahoma. Hangman’s Territory was half of a 1961 Ace Double later reprinted as a stand-alone paperback.

Our hero is Eck Jackson and he’s on his way to Rimrock, Montana at the request of a friend. The town has been taken over by Ebeneezer Taunt, who is acting as a self-appointed judge, jury and executioner along with a phalanx of gunmen. Taunt has a hard-on for hanging and has erected a six-rope gallows in the center of town to kill a half-dozen men with one lever pull. To bolster the credibility of his fiefdom, Taunt is importing an Ohio lawyer named John Powers to be his public prosecutor.

When we meet Powers, he’s actually an honest and earnest lawyer who accepts the job remotely with a legitimate interest in bringing law and order to a western town. He packs up his wife and heads west to become a public servant to the people of Rimrock. Will he buy-into Taunt’s perverted version of justice or will he stand up for what is right?

Bubbling under the surface of the tensions is a conflict between sheep herders and cattle farmers. Both groups want to use the same public lands for grazing, but the valley upon which the town sits just isn’t big enough to accommodate both the cattle people and the sheep people. In the world of western fiction, this is what is known as a “range war” when things turn violent. For his part, Judge Taunt, his lawman, and his hangman are all siding with the cattlemen.

The comic relief of the novel lies in the character of Boom Boom O’Malley, a redheaded ruffian explosives man who dresses in crazy outfits and is always looking for a fight. The author renamed and rebranded the character later in his career for his Wildcat O’Shea successful series of westerns written under the name Jeff Clinton (Hat Tip to the Six-Gun Justice website for also noticing the same thing).

The author brings all the characters together for an actioned-packed conflict that’s both exciting and violent. Overall, this was a very satisfying, quick-read western and an easy recommendation to fans of the genre. Bickham was a pro whose books deserve to be reprinted and remembered.

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Blood Red Sun

Stephen Mertz cut his teeth writing hard-nosed action-adventure fiction set in Don Pendleton's Mack Bolan literary universe. In the 1980s, while penning some of the very best Executioner novels, Mertz expanded the scope of his writing by elevating genre fiction into a much broader scale. That successful experiment was Blood Red Sun, a novel first published in 1989 by independent publisher Diamond Books, a company funded by The Destroyer author Warren Murphy. The book was later reprinted by Crossroad Press in 2012, and is now available in a sleek, revised new edition from Wolfpack Publishing.

Unlike many WWII military-fiction novels, Blood Red Sun is unique in its premise and timeline. The narrative takes place in September, 1945, after Japan's formal surrender to the Allied forces following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The book's protagonist is savvy Sergeant John Ballard, a thirty-five year-old fighting man who has spent the majority of the war engaged in combat in the Pacific Theater. What's left of his unit is ultimately just two men, Tex Hanklin and Wilbur Mischkie, both of which play important roles in Ballard's next assignment – preventing the assassination of U.S. General Douglas MacArthur.

In the book, Japan's surrender leads to a fragmented state of affairs for the country's military leadership. Within the ranks of the upper echelon, conspirators exist to prevent Japan's formal surrender to MacArthur. These conspirators refuse to accept defeat and feel that Japan's Emperor, Hirohito, is doing an injustice and disservice to the proud Japanese people. The schemers, all defined as opposing forces of Hirohito, are secretly building their own alliances to counter each other. It's essentially a den of snakes that also involves a proud Japanese flying Ace named Baron Tamura. The Baron's portion of the narrative involves his niece Keiko, a twenty-four year-old woman sympathetic to the Allied force initiative. Keiko also plays a prominent role as a potential love interest for Ballard. 

As a fan of Stephen Mertz's pulpy writing style, and his masterful grip on men's action-adventure writing, I was savoring the opportunity to read Blood Red Sun. Mertz draws on his prior experiences and strengths to create the story. As a fan of his M.I.A. Hunter series, I could see some similarities. 

The characters Ballard, Hanklin, and Mischkie reminded me of M.I.A. Hunter trio of Stone, Wiley, and Loughlin. Like a great M.I.A. Hunter novel, the same type of setup presents itself here when Ballard's team enters the Japanese jungle to retrieve a military leader. They rely on a small band of Filipino guerrillas to help them with the mission. This same sort of scenario was often used as Stone's team entered Asian jungles with an assist from Laos, Cambodian, or “South Vietnamese” guerrillas. Mertz even introduces ninjas into the story, an element that M.I.A. Hunter co-writer Joe Lansdale seemed to fixate on, shown in the series' fourth installment, Mountain Massacre. Additionally, the characteristics of Tex Hanklin was similar to Stone's Texan teammate Hog Wiley. 

These similarities to other Mertz creations doesn't make Blood Red Sun unoriginal or any less enjoyable. Quite the contrary. In fact, it illustrates how Mertz is cohesive and continuous, using his strengths and experiences as a genre storyteller to broaden the narrative. In fact, this is Mertz's most ambitious novel as it incorporates a lot of fine details surrounding WWII, the political landscape of Japan and the U.S. during that era, and famous, historical figures that are featured as characters in the story. Mertz takes some liberty with these characters, but left me feeling as though what he presented in terms of command, dialogue, and behavior, was probably art imitating real life.

In terms of action-adventure, Blood Red Sun has it all. The white-knuckled scenes of Ballard storming a landing strip with all guns blazin' was ripped right out of the pages of a vibrant Men's Action-Adventure Magazine. Mertz's descriptions of walls descending in bullet-hail, prison breaks, Kamikaze dives, ninja attacks and jungle warfare are balanced well with the political, backroom brawling conducted by various Japanese and American military leaders. 

Mertz's novels like Blood Red Sun are positioned on a grander international scale like The Castro Directive (Cuba) and The Korean Intercept (Asia), but still possess the men's action-adventure tropes that make the books way more enjoyable than a bestselling Tom Clancy ghostwritten tech-thriller. Mertz's literary mojo is authentic, extremely enjoyable, and saturated with human emotion that easily conveys to his readers. Blood Red Sun is a scorching red-hot read and I highly recommend it. 

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The Daring Daylight Raid on Germany's Mile-High Fortress

When I was a kid, a film my father seemed to always have on was The Devil's Brigade. It was originally released in 1968, but played consistently on cable television in the 1980s. The movie starred William Holden, Cliff Robertson, and Andrew Prine as rugged Canadian-American commandos ascending a “mile-high” fortress occupied by the Nazis during WW2. 

Surprisingly, I was thumbing through the December, 1960 issue of Male and stumbled on a story titled, “The Daring Daylight Raid on Germany's Mile-High Fortress”. The title connected me to the movie, and after diving into the story, I realized it was the same real-life account of “the devil's brigade”, complete with artwork by the legendary Gil Cohen (The Executioner). The author is Martin Luray, a name that I'm not familiar with.

Luray's story is more like a traditional MAM informative piece detailing the true story of Major General Robert Tryon Frederick and his leadership of the hybrid Canadian-American military force known as 1st Special Service Force. The team was comprised of 2,400 men culled from prior-military professions like loggers, forest rangers, woodsmen, game wardens, and prospectors. The recruitment for the U.S. volunteers took place in the American Southwest and on the Pacific Coast. 

At 3,000 feet high, Monte La Difensa (known as Hill 960) was a strong-point in the defensive German line strung across the high peaks of Italy. To train for the extraordinary climb and fight, the 1st Special Service Force trained in Helena, Montana, Camp Bradford, Virginia, and Forth Ethan Allen in Vermont. 

In December 1943 and January 1944, the 1st Special Service Force conducted a series of operations at Monte la Difensa, Monte la Remetanea, Monte Sammucro (Hill 720) and Monte Vischiataro. The 1st Special Service Force attacked and captured the enemy forces at the impregnable Monte la Difensa. 

This informative piece authored by Luray inserts various quotes from infantrymen and leaders, including Major General Frederick. While not a stirring, action-adventure narrative, the short story provided an education on this chapter of American-Canadian history while provoking me to read more high-adventure literature. 

Brother and Sister

Do you remember the Don Pendleton series The Executioner? Of course you do, don't be ridiculous. Even a perfect stranger completely alienated from men's action-adventure literature will know who Mack Bolan is. Probably. Anyhow, in the debut of that series, War Against the Mafia, Mack Bolan is in the U.S. military and serving in Vietnam. He receives a letter from home advising him that his parents are dead. So, he comes home and starts banging on mobsters. 

But, if there was a PornHub take on War Against the Mafia, say 17 years before Mack Bolan and 30 years before the internet, it could have a U.S. military serviceman receiving a letter from home telling him that his parents are dead. So, he goes home and starts banging his sister. That's the introduction of Brother and Sister, a Monarch paperback original from 1961 authored by Edwin West, who is none other than the famous Donald Westlake who uses the name Richard Stark to pen the Parker series, the best heist books of all-time. 

Seventeen year old Angie's child-body has developed into voluptuous womanhood. So, she's consistently fighting off the sex-starved Bob by the dim light of the dashboard radio every Friday night. But, she's finally had enough lip-puckering and wants to totally take a low blow. So, she informs heavy-handed Bob that her parents are gone and if he can slip in and out really fast, they can successfully liberate her body from its virgin prison. But, when Bob pulls into Angie's driveway, all of the house lights are on and an old aunt is in the doorway. Angie learns that her parents have both died in a horrible car wreck. Bob's receipt of the news is equally devastating, but in a different way. 

Paul is twenty-one and an Airman Second Class in the United States Air Force. After bedding down a young woman in Germany, he marries her and they both live happily ever after for four consecutive months. But, one day Paul arrives home early and finds his wife serving as a blow-up doll for a another hump-happy Airman (see what I did there?). Paul divorces his slut of a wife, and after a few months receives the devastating news that his parents have died in a car wreck. The only thing he can think of is his little sister Angie. He has to come home quick.

After the funeral, Paul and Angie decide to just live together in their childhood suburban home. When Bob comes over to provide Angie physical therapy to mourn, Paul punches his lights out and sends him packing. After a few days, Paul begins to think of Angie in a different way. Angie begins to substitute Paul for Bob in her own mind. Before you know it, Paul and Angie are doing the nasty and pretending like they are married. It's a lot of incest. I mean a lot.

Thankfully, Westlake throws in a bit of crime-fiction when Paul and Angie's devious uncle appears to claim the house as his through a series of neglected loan payments. Apparently holing up in your dead parents' house committing acts of incest does come with a price. There's a mortgage payment and bills to screw with too. Ultimately, the book's second-half is like a countdown to madness as Paul and Angie begin to question their own sanity. The book's closing pages will be stuck in my mind forever. It was such a wild, crazy romp to the finish with a climax that borders on dark psychological horror. 

Despite how you feel about incest (hopefully we aren't bipartisan on this), Brother and Sister was a thrill to read. Westlake is a masterful storyteller, and even when he wasn't writing crime-fiction, he could stir the emotional suspense. If you love Westlake, this is an easy recommendation. But, if you just want a wild and crazy leap into a PG-13 level sexcapade (nothing graphic here), Brother and Sister is the way to do it.

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Children of the Dragon

From my research, author Frank Robinson is a retired New York judge and an expert on coin values and collecting. He only authored one work of fiction in his short writing career. The book is Children of the Dragon, published in 1978 by Avon. Admittedly, a 450 page paperback isn't normally something I'm interested in reading, but the novel's cover art is extraordinary. It was painted by popular Spanish artist Manuel Perez Clemente, referred to as Sanjulian. His career work includes characters like Conan, Vampirella and magazines like Eerie, Creepy, and Famous Monsters of Filmland. In stereotypical fashion, I was totally prepared to judge a book by its cover. 

As a long fantasy novel, Robinson spends some time building the world the story exists in. It's a fictional place called Bergharran, similar to Robert E. Howard's Hyborian Age. There are regions (countries), dialects, languages, cultures, and so forth that are explained in great detail. But, overall I speculate that Robinson mirrored parts of the book after the Timurid Empire of the 15th century, what is known now as modern Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and portions of North India and Turkey. Bergharran is experiencing an age similar to a post-Civil War. The Tnemghadi (the North) defeated the Urhemmedhi (the South) and they now rule with an iron fist as a tyrannical empire. The book's sprawling landscape fits the book's narrative, a storyline that encompasses 20ish years of Bergharran history. 

Over the course of time, the book examines several characters and their growth from poverty to royalty, most playing a supporting role to the chief protagonist, a man named Jehan Henghmani. He's married with two daughters, and in the opening pages it is explained that he had been captured by the Emperor of Tnemghadi. Jehan, a bandit by trade, is able to break his bonds and kill the executioner assigned to behead him. Because of this, and his inability to escape the dungeon, the Emperor imposes a strict punishment. He is to be tortured each day for the rest of his life. Any dungeon master that allows this prisoner to die under torture will receive the same punishment as Jehan. Further, he is fed only human flesh. These torture scenes, which is sometimes described in great detail, were extremely vile and disturbing. After years of abuse, Jehan's wife and kids are brought in and raped repeatedly in front of him. 

Eventually, Jehan is able to escape his Hell and begins to create a new group of roving bandits. But, instead of stealing from the Tnemghadi, he wants to destroy them. The next 300 pages are saturated with Jehan's creation of a large military force that collides with Tnemghadi's reign. There are large swaths of land and regions that are slowly devoured through calculated battles. In essence, Jehan rises to become a new leader through military tactics. This is where the problem lies - the book's focus on continental reformation.

Robinson's book is captivating at times, and feels epic – as it should. But, the narrative is bogged down with so much political strife and turmoil that I became exhausted. This isn't a fantasy novel, nor is it science-fiction or sword and sorcery. There is no dragons or magic and there isn't anything cosmic. This is purely a fictional middle-ages type of story with normal people displaying acts of barbarism, brutality, and violence on one another. At times, the torture sequences rivaled one of the most graphic novels I've ever read, Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door. This isn't for the squeamish. 

If political intrigue, royalty chess games, and the pursuit of power by ruthless, self-absorbed characters is your thing, then by all means reading this book should be a pleasant experience. Robinson is a great writer and the overall storyline is superb. But, at the end of the day, it's a lengthy book and requires some patience, and I simply don't have it.

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M.I.A. Hunter #10 - Miami Warzone

M.I.A. Hunter was a series of men's action-adventure novels published by Jove in the 1980s and early 1990s. The series was created by Stephen Mertz (Cody's War, Kilroy) and featured his outlines and editing with a revolving door of authors including Joe Lansdale, Arthur Moore, and Mike Newton. Crime-fiction author and popular blogger Bill Crider (1941-2018) contributed as well with his series debut, Miami Warzone. It is the 10th installment, originally published in 1988 and existing today in digital format through Wolfpack Publishing. 

Miami Warzone is the first domestic appearance of Mark Stone, Terrence Loughlin, and Hog Wiley, the three-man retrieval team effectively known as “M.I.A. Hunter”. The series began with dangerous missions into Southeast Asia to rescue American prisoners held captive from the Vietnam War. Stone's team was working without permission from the U.S. Government, therefore their activities were highly illegal and placed them on a C.I.A. hitlist. But, the American government caught on to Stone's skills in the same way that they caught on to The Executioner. If you can't beat them, join them. So, a U.S. Senator (Harler I think?) in book seven liberates the three hunters and places them on the federal payroll working out of Fort Bragg. You're all caught up now.

In this 10th installment, Crider introduces readers to Jack Wofford, a former teammate of Stone's during the Vietnam War. He even helped to save Stone's life during a nasty firefight at a seemingly abandoned village. In a terrific backstory, Crider tells of how Wofford's brother succumbed to drug addiction and eventually died. To avenge his brother's loss, Wofford went vigilante and began running his own one-man vice-squad. Eventually, he had enough intel and dirt on some of America's most powerful drug dealers. The D.E.A. were impressed with Wofford's talents and placed him on the payroll, similar to what happened with Stone and the C.I.A. But, on a recent undercover buy, Wofford is caught and becomes imprisoned as collateral during a Cuban and Columbian drug war. 

Stone receives a call from Wofford's wife stating that the D.E.A. isn't doing enough to free her husband. The trio takes the job to track down Wofford's whereabouts while also attempting to destroy the drug importing operation devouring Miami. The narrative has a tremendously high body count as the locations include park battlefields, a wild Everglades romp, the ultimate barfight, a mansion blowout, and even a shootout at an airport. 

M.I.A. Hunter isn't Hemingway and never professed to be. Instead, it's a rip-roar, ass-kicking team commando series with explosive action and a slight dose of testosterone humor (Hog is a riot!). As much as I loved the old fashioned “bring 'em back alive” Vietnam rescue missions, the idea of Stone and company working domestically is a nice change of pace. The last two novel locations, the Soviet Union and Nicaragua, were both excellent choices to move this series into another dynamic. Crider's writing style is ultra-violent, but also balances out with a quality story laced with crime-fiction elements, sex, and a buddy cop camaraderie. In other words, this one is a series standout. 

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