Bantam released the fifth 'Eagle Force' novel, “Ring of Fire”, in June, 1990. Author Dan Schmidt excavates some of the series mythology with this installment. The backstory on Eagle Force leader/founder Vic Gabriel is revealed, including that of the team's chief opponent, terrorist Michael Saunders. While these details are relevant to the overall series, I think it consumes most of the book. The subplot, terrorists occupying a French farming town, is more interesting, yet this is lost in the revelation of past events.
Saunders and his thirty-man kill squad hit a French whorehouse to capture half of Eagle Force with their pants down – Dillinger and Simms. They rape and slaughter the whores (obviously), and in one grizzly scene, shatter both Dillinger and Simms' hands with a leaded baseball bat. Saunders records the audio screams, and then leads his squad to a French farming village. They occupy the town, attempting rape of the youngest first while the villages are imprisoned at a church.
Saunders and a small team fly to Gabriel's outpost in the French mountains and present the audio tape in person. The challenge – Vic and Boolewarke have until midnight to rescue Dillinger and Simms. Saunders' 30 hardened mercenaries against two. At midnight, execution will begin. Of course, Vic accepts the challenge and we start piecing together Schmidt's backstory on the two combatants (in annoying italics print).
In the series debut we discovered that Vic and his father served as CIA assassins in Vietnam. Along the way, Saunders, a CIA operative, killed Vic's father. This book elaborates on that scenario, explaining how Saunders switched to the darker side, the Russian meddling and Vic's first fight with Saunders in a Libyan stronghold. That sets the stage for the inevitable showdown for “Ring of Fire”.
Before author Dan Schmidt's fatal stroke, he contributed heavily to the 'Executioner' line as well as creating a similar 'Eagle Force' series called 'Killsquad'. He had a tremendous talent in shaping battle scenarios and bringing it all to fruition with close quarters combat. It's something he excelled at with this series and the “two against thirty” plight of Vic and Boolewarke is especially impressive. Unfortunately, the location changes with the last 40 pages and that left something to be desired. The end result is an average book that had the potential for greatness. Next up is “Berserker”.
Crime and intrigue in American hotels was evidently such an issue during the mid-20th century that the “hotel detective” became a mainstay of crime and noir fiction and a sub-genre unto itself. Sadly, the security guards of today’s chain hotels don’t warrant a literary movement of their own, but the 1950s hotel detectives sure did.
Ed Lacy was the pen name of New York writer Leonard Zinberg, who authored many crime and mystery paperback originals - mostly in the 1950s and 1960s. He never reached the popularity of many of his contemporaries probably because his output was comprised mostly of modest stand-alone novels. Lacy’s contribution to the “house dick” sub-genre was his 1956 paperback, “The Men From The Boys” that has recently been reprinted by Black Gat Books, a Stark House imprint.
The novel stars retired hard-ass New York City cop Marty Bond, now serving as the in-house detective at the Grover Hotel. His job mostly consists of cracking the heads of drunk guests who won’t keep the noise down, and regulating the hooker traffic in and out of the fleabag inn.
Marty isn’t an immediately likable hero. He’s cynical about the law. He’s racist and misogynist (even by 1956 standards). He’s lazy and gruff. At 54, his health is declining prematurely. The novel’s central mystery begins when a rookie auxiliary police officer from his past visits Marty asking for help regarding a suspicious robbery. Could it have anything to do with the mafia unrest in the news? Marty’s reluctant assistance in the case competes for his attention with his own anxiety and depression over his deteriorating personal life.
This is one of those novels where the reader slowly sees the true humanity of a heel with a heart of gold buried under a gruff exterior. Lacy pulls it off quite well mostly because he was a damn good writer. Marty’s narration gives the reader glimpses into his worldview, and his cynical wise cracks are often laugh-out-loud funny.
The cast of characters in Marty’s life - pimps, whores, cops, and strippers - are all colorful and interesting, and the novel’s snappy dialogue keeps the pages flying by. The big problem with this short novel is that the central mystery is a bit of a muddled snooze and way less interesting than the sub-plots concerning Marty’s personal life and relations. You want to spend more time in Marty’s world, but the ex-cop and the reader just deserve a better crime to solve. Nevertheless, there’s plenty to enjoy in this one. It’s not a masterpiece of the genre, but we should all be happy to see Ed Lacy’s work being preserved for modern audiences.
You can obtain a copy of the book through Stark House or directly at Amazon.
It’s a little odd that there were so few series dealing with World War II. What could be a more natural setting for stories with action, heroism, bloodshed and explosions? And WWII-themed stories had been in seemingly every issue of the men’s adventure magazines, the predecessors of the paperbacks. Even in comic books, there were more than a dozen long-running series set during the war.
I can only think of two standout paperback series centered on WWII, and both of them were written in their entirety by Len Levinson: 'The Sergeant' (under the name Gordon Davis) and 'The Rat Bastards' (as John Mackie). Just two! But you know, maybe it’s really not so surprising that these series had so little competition. Levinson set the bar so high that few writers could hope to match them.
The Sergeant’s debut novel, “Death Train”, recounts a couple of episodes in the combat career of Sgt. C.J. Mahoney. Gruff, pugnacious and snarky, he’s not your traditional lantern-jawed hero, but he sure gets the job done. The title refers to the first of these episodes, in which Mahoney is tasked with disrupting German supply lines by sabotaging the rail network of occupied France. The second episode finds him with some resistance fighters, holed up in a French village suddenly overrun by German tanks. I thought the first story was a little more effective than the second, but they were both superb.
The next novel is even better, presenting a handful of wartime episodes of varying lengths. In “Hell Harbor: The Battle for Cherbourg”, Mahoney is a much more fully-developed character. He’s still a grizzled war dog, chomping his cigar and addressing friend and foe alike as “Asshole,” but in one remarkable extended episode, we discover there’s far more to him than that. The context of how that happens is the last thing you’d expect. Mahoney’s recovering in a London hospital but manages to steal an officer’s uniform one night, and sneak out of the building in hopes of visiting a popular brothel. I can’t say anything more without giving away too much, but trust me--- this is the episode that will linger with you the longest. And there’s not a shot fired in it!
There’s certainly plenty of combat action in the other episodes, and the book’s title refers to the last of them. Based in an impregnable fortress, the Germans are going to blow up the harbor at Cherbourg by remote control, just to keep it out of the hands of the Americans, who need it to land critical supplies and reinforcements. Mahoney and a squad are assigned the seemingly impossible task of preventing the harbor’s destruction. A lesser author would turn Mahoney into a combat Superman, storming the fortress and drilling every German in sight, emerging triumphant. What happens instead is unexpected, harrowing and even a little disgusting, but it’s also pulp action at its best.
It’s also believable, and that’s important. Of course it’s fiction, but everything in the novel happens in the real world, not in the Mack Bolan fantasyland of invulnerable action heroes with unlimited heavy ammunition. Sometimes I’m in the mood for that stuff, and it’s fine as far as it goes. But what’s more compelling, more memorable and more rewarding is what Len Levinson serves up in “Hell Harbor”. Put this one on your shopping list.
Author Ben Haas used over a dozen pseudonyms throughout his career, including John Benteen. It's this name behind the long-running 'Fargo' series. There were 23 books total, three of which written by the fictional name of John W. Hardin, who most likely was Haas colleague Norman Rubington. Sky-level, the series can easily identify with the western genre. However, the weeds-level view showcases non-traditional elements that skirt the rigid boundaries of western fiction. It's pulpy at times, often placing the action in South American locales with more modern components – soldier for hire, paid man-killing and machine guns. There's a devout fan following for 'Fargo', and after reading the first installment, I can certainly see why.
The debut, “Fargo”, was released in 1969 and introduces us to the character. Fargo is an ex-Cavalry fighting man that served in Roosevelt's Rough Riders regiment. The author details that he took a bullet in the shoulder on the charge up Kettle Hill, has scar tissue from both a career in boxing and a mining scuffle. We learn that by 1910, Fargo has lived a dogged existence fighting for money. He's now a “specialist in sudden death” and arrives in El Paso looking for work.
The novel really runs the gambit of one adventure to another, setting the locale in old Mexico. I'd suspect that the pacing is one of the book's most cherished aspects, contributing to it's collector's fellowship and fandom. Here, Fargo is Hell-bent for leather, escorting a rugged, shady businessman back to a Mexican mine through bandits and Mexican guerrillas. Benteen puts us inside a fort fighting off waves of horse-soldiers before scooting us into rough riding through gangs and mountain passes (the atmosphere is dusty and sun-baked). The fighting is intense, made more identifiable with Fargo's trademark weapons – Colt Army .38, Winchester 30-30, Batangas knife and the overly utilized Fox ten-gauge shotgun.
Conclusively, this is an action-packed novel written by a genre fan for genre fans. It's simple, entertaining and introduces a lovable character. While influenced by the pulps, as Fargo is amazing at everything, it's more gritty and convincing. Benteen's smooth delivery is never bogged down with details. It's Fargo – in it for the money, adventure and tits. Who can't be a fan of that? For more background on this character and series, read author Paul Bishop's insightful write-up here.
After the commercially successful 1966 “Man From Uncle” novel generated practically no money in his pocket, Harry Whittington went to work as an editor in the US Department of Agriculture, working for the Rural Electrification Administration. "I'd reached the low place where writing lost its delight.” (quote from author Ben Bridges blog).
In 1974, at age 59, Whittington quit his government job and went back to writing full-time. From his small but elegant house overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, he wrote his comeback novel, “Master of Blackoaks” (1976), a Deep-South 'slave gothic' written as Ashley Carter (Whittington's own name appears on the copyright page).
“Master of Blackoaks” was a hit. It's also an awesome book. Family drama, intrigue, violence, mucho sex and social commentary abound as the drama unfolds among members of the Baynard Family and their slaves on the struggling Alabama plantation known as Blackoaks.
The book reminded me of Ken Follett's “Pillars of the Earth” with all the characters jockeying for position to achieve divergent goals. The plantation violence is raw and in-your-face. The sex scenes are well executed. The slaves, masters and interlopers are vivid characters.
The book tackles difficult questions about race and culture without ever being racist or showing a lack of compassion for those swept up in the morally repugnant culture of slavery. The economic realities of the plantation life were explained well in the story as the masters of Blackoaks struggled to survive.
The book spawned three sequels that I can't wait to read.
Whittington learned propulsive plotting from his Gold Medal crime and western novels. Although this isn't an action novel, he brings the same discipline to this lost masterpiece. Despite the cover, it's not a romance novel. It's a literary novel with crazy family drama swirling for nearly 500 hard-to-put-down pages.
Hat tip to Ben Bridges on the background regarding the creation of this book and Pete Brandvold for alerting me to its existence.
First off, don't even think about reading this 500+ page plantation “slavery gothic” drama unless you've read and recall the first book of the series, “Master of Blackoaks” (1976). You'll be lost.
In the second 'Blackoaks', “Secret of Blackoaks”, crime and western author Harry Whittington (writing here as Ashley Carter) tells another compelling story of love, lust and violence among slaves and masters on the Alabama plantation of Blackoaks. This book begins about a year after the previous installment's conclusion. The novel is broken off into six sections with each focusing on a handful of characters from the first book.
There's a lot of travel happening in this volume - with action occurring in Tallahassee and New Orleans. Much of the drama concerns the Fulani slave brothers Blade and Moab with the central antagonist being plantation master Styles Kendric - in full, unhinged villain mode.
The story-lines were generally strong with the exception of one character's side adventure to New Orleans that felt a bit like page filler. But even that section pays dividends with a dramatic twisty conclusion.
There's also more action (think “Django Unchained”), graphic sex and violence than we saw in the first novel and the introduction of some fantastic new characters - including an abolitionist veteran in a decaying nearby plantation who may or may not be helping slaves find escape and freedom. A feisty new slave also enters the mix providing a reality check on the horrors of the institution to complacent counterparts.
Overall, this was another great outing from the King of the Paperbacks. If you read and enjoyed Blackoaks #1, you're sure to enjoy this installment. And with the strong and violent ending of this second book, you'll be dying to tackle the follow-up novel.
The 'Fox' books are an anomaly in the world of classic action/adventure series. While some of our favorite series have their roots in the tawdry paperbacks of the 1950s, and others reach back to the blood-and-thunder pulps of the 1930s - all very American - this series is completely different. It’s a British series by a British author about British history, written in the dry, formal style of British literature.
Specifically, it’s an Age of Sail series very much like the venerable works of C. S. Forester and Patrick O’Brian. The author is Kenneth Bulmer, using the pen-name Adam Hardy. Our protagonist, George Abercrombie Fox, joins the Royal Navy as an impoverished boy, and has various adventures (mainly at sea) in the very early years of the 19th Century.
The debut paperback, “The Press Gang”, has some interesting things in it. There are memorable battle scenes between Fox’s ship and French adversaries, but the best stuff takes place on land as Fox is assigned to head up a press gang. Essentially, the press gang sneaks around the waterfront, “impressing” unwary men into the Navy by spiking their drinks or clubbing them over the head and hustling them aboard ship. This practice was unpopular but legal at the time. Anyway, after a job well done, Fox enjoys some shore leave which ends when he falls victim to another ship’s press gang! Brutality and bad luck are recurring themes of this series.
The second book, “Prize Money”, is less interesting. There are a few highlights, including a battle sequence at sea in which a very heavy cannon is torn loose from its foundation and Fox narrowly prevents it from plunging through the lower decks and the hull of the ship. There’s also a demented ship’s captain with an imaginary flock of pet pigeons. Otherwise, most of the action consists of the British Navy wandering across the Mediterranean in search of Napoleon’s navy.
Well, it’s not much of a page-turner, but I do want to give the author some credit. His prose is very elegantly written and he can describe scenes aboard ship so expressively and vividly that you can see, hear and smell every last detail. Best of all, Fox himself is a fascinating character. He’s gruff, mean and selfish, but he’s also very compelling, and sometimes you have to remind yourself that you’re reading fiction rather than history.
The series does have one formidable drawback, at least for most of us: you’re at a real disadvantage if you aren’t already pretty familiar with the architecture of these old sailing ships. The author uses a great deal of technical jargon without ever explaining any of it. Here’s an example: “He called for Mr. Lassiter and supervised the setting up of a pair of sheerlegs. As they did not have a launch they could not use her masts; but Fox decided to use the spare topmasts housed amidships.” If you’ve read a lot of Horatio Hornblower, you probably know exactly what’s happening in that passage. But personally, I never quite got my sea legs while reading “Prize Money”.
