Into the Valley

Author John Hersey (1914-1993) wrote 25 books in his lifetime and was considered one of the first writers to incorporate story-telling techniques into a non-fiction novel. Working as a war journalist for prominent news magazines like Time and Life, Hersey was able to write bold, non-fiction “novels” based on his experiences. In 1959, Dell published “Into the Valley”, a harrowing account of Hersey's time with the US marines on Guadalcanal Island during WW2. The paperback features poignant illustrations by USMC Major Donald Dickson.

Billed as “A Skirmish of the Marines”, Hersey's “Into the Valley” is a vivid account of a three-day battle between US Marines and Japanese troops on the Matanikau River. This isn't a historically important struggle and Heresy admits it was really just another battle, another week, another moment for these veteran fighters. But the sense of realism, the sweaty, exhausting, all-consuming effort, is a time capsule of just how difficult fighting in the Pacific Theater.

The book is written first-person, placing Hersey onto the jungle trek with American soldiers. While often detailing the battle plans, Hersey introduces a solid half-dozen characters that make up this endeavor. The journey is well-documented, offering first-hand accounts of preparation and design while still creating an entertaining war novel. Once the troops hit the river, the war-torn horror is a thick fog enveloping Hersey and the reader.

Being raised in a military family myself, I've always been drawn to non-fiction books on US history, especially WW2 and Vietnam. While “Into the Valley” isn't an exceptional literary work, it is a short, vivid read on the tropical battles that made up the war on the Pacific. It provided enough details and descriptions of battle to keep me actively engaged and anticipating the inevitable retreat (or defeat). Does anyone really ever win? Vintage art aficionados should enjoy the illustrations immensely.  Dickson defied trends by offering more realistic looks at the life of the American soldier. The spit 'n polish look is replaced with a more genuine approach. Later, Dickson would illustrate a national comic strip entitled “Sgt Stoney Craig”. 

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Drawn to Evil

Harry Whittington’s “Drawn to Evil” first appeared in 1952 as half of an Ace Double packaged with “The Scarlet Spade” by Eaton K. Goldthwaite. The Whittington half has been reprinted as an eBook from Simon & Schuster’s Prologue Books imprint and is free for Kindle Unlimited subscribers.

“Drawn to Evil” is narrated by a Tampa Police homicide detective named Marty Carter who was passed up for the position of division chief because he was just too brutal. A beloved and respected state senator is murdered in cold blood, and Marty vows to catch the killer. In the aftermath of the senator’s murder, Marty meets Liza, the deceased’s grieving wife, and immediately becomes infatuated with her. Because this is a Harry Whittington novel, Liza’s a sultry, young looker. And because this is 1952, Marty has to slap her around a bit to get her attention after they first meet. Times do change.

Marty’s plan is that he’ll be the detective who solves the murder, and the Liza will be his prize. The problem is that Marty’s boss wants his help on the investigative team but has banned Marty from using his usual rubber hose tactics. So the cop who is normally a powder keg of violence races to solve the murder using pretty standard police procedures. Of course, a promise of restraint like that only can last so long. Marty is a fun character to ride along with because he is so filled with menace while trying (and failing) to do the right thing. He is pure id - fueled by lust and ambition.

The mystery takes Marty into the details of the senator’s personal life and into the bowels of Tampa’s crime syndicate. The action moves fast, and there are plenty of dysfunctional and twisted characters to gawk at along the way. More so than Whittington’s later crime novels, “Drawn to Evil” is a pretty conventional mystery - with a murder, clues, suspects, motives and a solution. However, things take a very dark and Whittington turn with about 30 pages left in the paperback when we leave Mike Shayne territory and go to a perverse and violent place at last. 

As I wind my way through Harry Whittington’s body of work, I’d put “Drawn to Evil” in the top-tier of his crime fiction writing. It had the requisite amount of sex, violence, amorality and darkness to declare this one a true noir fiction classic. The fact that it’s basically free as an eBook makes this a no-brainer must-read for fans of this type of thing. Highly recommended.

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The Bastard Bannerman

By 1964, crime fiction heavyweight Mickey Spillane was pushing millions of copies for his hard-nosed detective series 'Mike Hammer'. The 1947 debut, “I, the Jury”, exceeded six-million sales alone. It's no wonder that the magazine Saga, which debuted in 1959, would feature a 1964 issue declaring “New Mickey Spillane Mystery – Mickey at his Best”. The 65-page novella was “The Bastard Bannerman”, which later appeared in the Spillane compilation book “The Tough Guys” alongside “Kick It or Kill” (1963) and “The Seven Year Kill” (1964).

The first-person narrative features the bastard Bannerman, Cat Cay, returning home after two wars and a life better led elsewhere. His family are mobsters and Cay, being born out of wedlock, was the runt of the litter. The story follows Cay's investigative work as he learns more about who his family is tying in with now. Historically the Bannermans have been a strong empire that was feared and respected. Now, the family has fallen on dire straits and conducting business with what Cay thinks are criminals of the lower echelon. 

While all of that is engaging, the heart of the story is the death of Cay's friend. Spillane's original idea is brilliant – the knife used to kill his friend has Bannerman fingerprints all over it. However, the family's new business partners snatch the knife from the murder scene before the cops arrive. Now, they want the Bannermans to pay a million-dollars or they bring it to the police. It's a cool blackmail scheme that forces Cay to help his family despite their indifference.

Spillane writes at a slower pace, heavy on dialogue and the obligatory gangster talk like “rods” and “hot”. That seems a little dated even for 1964, but easily ignored. It's a fine Spillane story that delivers the goods. It's certainly entertaining enough to interest any crime fiction fan.

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.44

There’s a beautiful reference guide compiled by Paul Bishop and Scott Harris titled “52 Weeks - 52 Western Novels” with an essay by author Peter Brandvold gushing about a 1953 paperback called “.44” by H.A. DeRosso. Brandvold makes the point that the short book is really a noir novel wrapped in western packaging. A western noir? Now, you’re speaking my language.

Dan Harland is a cowboy turned gunslinger turned assassin-for-hire. As the novel opens, a paid hit veers in an unexpected direction when his intended target - a fast draw named Lancaster - allows himself to be killed by Harland without putting up any resistance. Why would someone do that? It amounts to suicide and it begs a lot of questions that Harland wants answered. The experience of murdering a willing victim was profound enough to bring Harland to the conclusion that he’s had enough of the killing game. Lancaster could have easily shot Harland but instead chose to die. By Harland’s old-fashioned honor code, he owes Lancaster his life.

Harland was hired for the Lancaster hit by a middleman who refuses to share the identity of the ultimate client who paid for the job. Harland becomes obsessed with the idea of finding the hidden client, and he goes on an investigative quest to settle the score in Lancaster’s memory.

What we have here is a genuinely unique mystery where the murderer himself is on a journey to solve his own victim’s murder. The “hitman searches for his mystery client” story later became a recurring plotline in Max Allan Collins’ ‘Quarry’ series, but DeRosso’s take is a way darker, almost melancholy, work of noir fiction.

The mystery is intensified by the sheer number of people falsely confessing to Harland that they are his secret client. Was the motive a cattle rustling dispute? A gambling debt? Or could it have something to do with the recent big-money train robbery? And most importantly - who is the puppet master convincing these people to run interference with cock-and-bull stories crafted to keep Harland away from the truth?

Folks, this is a great Western. One of the best I’ve read in ages. It’s also one of the best noir mysteries I’ve read. It made me want to explore the rest of DeRosso’s body of work. Sadly, the author died in 1960 of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Since the novel’s Lion Books release in 1953, “.44” has been reprinted several times and is currently available as an eBook. This is great news since the book is a masterpiece and should be required reading for noir and Western fans. Highest recommendation.

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Russell Davis - The Ghost behind the Books: A Paperback Warrior Unmasking

It all began with a haircut.

I was waiting my turn at the barbershop reading a 1970s vigilante paperback, and the guy sitting next to me said, “Have you ever heard of a series of novels called The Executioner about a guy named Mack Bolan?”

I told him that I was very familiar with the series and regarded myself as a fan. In fact, I write for a wildly-popular blog covering vintage men’s fiction.

Then the guy said, “I wrote many of them. And lots of other books like that, too.”

He introduced himself as Russell Davis, a name I confess I didn’t know. It turns out that his anonymity as an author of genre fiction was no accident, and my investigation into his body of work uncovered some interesting business practices among house name authors. His story illuminates the difficulty in unmasking the real authors behind the legendary pseudonyms of men’s adventure fiction.

I checked the guy out with some writers and editors in the genre, and Davis’ claims checked out. He was the real deal. We met for coffee, and I heard his story.

His first sale was a science fiction short story in a 1998 anthology edited by Ed Gorman and Martin Greenberg called “The UFO Files.” The story was published under Davis’ real name.. “I received a letter from a guy in prison who read my UFO story. The guy’s letter was rambling, but the theme – as far as I could tell – was that the creatures we perceive as aliens from outer space are actually angels sent by God. I had young kids at the time and felt increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of unbalanced readers posing a threat to my family, so I opted for pseudonyms wherever feasible going forward. Most of my short fiction has been under my name, though not all of it, and all but a few of the novels I’ve written have been under various pseudonyms.”

His first novel sale came in 2001 as co-author of “Tom Clancy’s Net Force Explorers #17: Cloak and Dagger,” and the success of that book opened new doors for Davis in the world of house-name fiction. “My mom met Tom Clancy before he died and told him that her son wrote one of his books,” Davis said. “Needless to say, Mr. Clancy was not amused.”

For Davis, 2008 was a big year for his writing career as a professional ghost. He sold two novels in Gold Eagle’s ‘Room 59’ spy series published under the house name Cliff Ryder. Gold Eagle, a Harlequin imprint, had always been generous with giving the real authors a writing credit on the copyright page. But having learned his lesson from his prison fan mail experience a decade earlier, Davis opted to have the writing credit go to a pseudonym he created to hide beneath the house name. “I began using the names Garrett Dylan and Dylan Garrett for the house name books I wrote to preserve my anonymity,” he said.

At the barbershop, Davis told me that he wrote two adult Western novels in ‘The Trailsman’ series as Jon Shape, but I was unable to find any record that this was true. Weeks later at coffee, I asked him about this, and he let me in on an industry secret. “Ed Gorman was contracted to write two books in The Trailsman series, but he was swamped with work at the time,” he said. “Ed called me and asked if I’d be willing to write the books for him in exchange for $2,000 per novel. Ed was probably making $4,000 per book for the job, so it was a win-win. I asked him if he’d created plot outlines, and he said he’d sold them on the basis of the titles alone – ‘Louisiana Laydown’ and ‘California Crackdown’ - so I had to write them with no guidance other than the titles. I finished the books quickly, and the publisher was never the wiser. Subcontracting your house-name work to other ghostwriters for a reduced fee was a common practice, but it was rarely discussed in public.”

Davis’ ability to write fast, high-quality genre fiction landed him an opportunity to work on the legendary Don Pendleton series, ‘The Executioner.’ “I was a fan of the series from way back, but I hadn’t read one in years,” he said. “The editor sent over a box of recent Bolans, so I could get a feel for the current format, and I got to work on my first one.” His initial outing was published in 2009 as “The Executioner #371: Fire Zone,” and the going rate for a Pendleton ghost at the time was a flat $4,000 fee per book. “I can only assume that the more seasoned and popular authors of the series – like Michael Newton or Mel Odom – commanded a higher fee,” Davis said. The success of his first venture lead Davis to author a total of eight installments of ‘The Executioner’ series as well as double-sized ‘Super-Bolan’ paperback.

Gold Eagle worked hard to maintain a continuity in the Mack Bolan universe. When Davis wrote a scene in ‘Super Bolan #148: Decision Point’ (March 2012) that found Mack flying an airplane, he quickly heard from an editor at Gold Eagle. “Mack can’t fly a plane,” the editor said, and this was news to the author. “I told her that he could fly a helicopter,” he said. “Why not a plane? She replied that it was in the Bolan bible. The problem was I had never been provided the document telling me what Mack could and couldn’t do. I’d learned on-the-job by reading books in the series. Despite my argument, rules are rules, and the airplane scene was cut.”

In keeping with his low-profile approach, Davis’ work on the Mack Bolan brand was credited to either Dylan Garrett or Garrett Dylan on the copyright pages. “And then for one book, Gold Eagle screwed up and gave me credit under my real name,” he said. “The moderator of the Mack Bolan fan website somehow put it all together and sent me an email asking if I had written all the Dylan Garrett titles in the series. I told the truth, and he amended his website crediting me for the books I wrote. Basically, I was outed.”

Davis has also worked on media tie-in novels connected to The Transformers, The Librarian, and The Twilight Zone. He’s also been active in the science fiction writing community, and is a former president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA). These days he spends his time working on screenplays and as a university professor at a Master of Fine Arts Program for Genre Fiction. “If you want a master’s degree in how to write paranormal vampire romances, I guess I’m your guy,” he said. “I’m also going to be back writing original novels soon, and there are some announcements coming very soon on that front.”

In any case, Davis’ days as a ghost writer for media tie-in books are likely over. “I enjoyed the work while I was doing it, and it was a good way to make some money. But there’s only so many hours in the day I can spend writing, and the idea of doing my own thing with screenplays and original novels is ultimately more fulfilling from an artistic standpoint.”

Selected Men’s Adventure Bibliography of Russell Davis

‘Net Force Explorers’ as Tom Clancy:
- #17: “Cloak and Dagger” (2001)

‘The Trailsman’ as Jon Sharpe:
- #319: “Louisiana Laydown” (2008)
- #324: “California Crackdown” (2008)

‘Room 59’ as Cliff Ryder
- #2: “Out of Time” (2008)
- #4: “The Ties That Bind” (2008)

‘The Executioner’ as Don Pendleton
- #371: “Fire Zone” (2009)
- #392: “Shadow Hunt” (2011)
- #395: “Hazard Zone” (2011)
- #405: “Lethal Diversion” (2012)
- #415:  “Ivory Wave” (2013)
- #416:  “Extraction” (2013)
- #428:  “Desert Impact” (2014)
- #436:  “Perilous Cargo” (2015)

‘Super Bolan’ as Don Pendleton
- #148: ‘Decision Point” (2012)

Drive East on 66

Richard Wormser (1908-1977) was a Princeton man and a pulp author who wrote 17 of the original Nick Carter books for Street & Smith (long before the Killmaster era) as well as several popular Westerns under the pseudonym of Ed Friend. He also wrote two paperback originals starring Southern California police Lieutenant Andy Bastion: “Drive East on 66” (1961) and “A Nice Girl Like You” (1963).

The premise of “Drive East on 66” is awesome. A California real estate tycoon hires Andy away from his police duties for a two weeks side job. The assignment is for Andy to drive Ralph, the businessman’s troubled 16 year-old son, to an insane asylum in Kansas. The family also hires an attractive psychology grad student named Olga as the teen’s caregiver during the trip.

Along the way, Andy notices that their car is being followed by a mysterious maroon Buick. Is the tail planning a robbery? Was it sent by dad to keep an eye on them? Or is the pursuer determined to make sure they don’t make it to Kansas alive?

Andy, Ralph, and Olga are three vividly-drawn characters for the reader to join on this thousand-mile road trip. Although Ralph’s mental illness isn’t specifically defined, it feels like he’s an autistic savant of sorts - highly intelligent but prone to unexpected outbursts. Olga is a beauty trying hard to be professional during this unusual assignment, and Andy the cop is a top-notch pro with a good sense of humor. The competent officer provides the likable narration for the 150-page pursuit mystery.

The book opens great and ends with some satisfying plot twists. There’s a bit of filler in the middle, but nothing too cumbersome. Overall, “Drive East on 66” was a good natured coming of age mystery that lacked any real edge or violence, but it was enjoyable enough if you’re not looking for a hardboiled bloodbath. Recommended.

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Chopper Cop #01 - Chopper Cop

'Chopper Cop' debuted in 1972 as a Popular Library paperback. Author Paul Ross is actually Dan Streib, the man behind 70s action oriented series' like 'Killsquad', 'Hawk', 'Steve Crown' and 'Death Squad'. The series would last three installments with Streib writing the first two. While the cover, font and badge logo would indicate a high-paced action formula fitting of Streib's writing style, the end result is an entirely different type of story. Personally, I think this was probably a grand misplacement of what literary power-broker Lyle Kenyon Engel envisioned when hiring Streib. Engel would later denounce the author, furthering the theory that the supply didn't meet the demand.

Think of series debut, “Valley of Death”, as an eerie, Gothic investigative novel. Odd I know, but Streib's use of heavy sea fog, moonlit graveyards, old mansions and an abandoned mining town are the perfect backdrops for this dense thriller. They are almost characters themselves, springing up from time to time to introduce darkness and death.

No, this isn't the long-haired, biker riding “Easy Rider” that's depicted on the book cover, but our hero Terry Bunker does dress the part. He works for the California Governor, sort of a special operative piece that is utilized by leadership as an official State Department of Criminal Investigation...investigator? He receives requests from the Governor to solve crimes. He's extremely successful, allowing him to refer to leadership as “hey guv” despite hatred from his departmental peers.

The debut mystery is a rather grim one; young wealthy women are committing suicide in San Francisco and Sacramento. Yet, they are reaching out to their loved ones posthumously through bizarre phone calls or supernatural apparitions lurking just outside the window. The crime? Whoever is behind the ghostly apparitions are ransoming the return of these resurrected dead girls for millions of dollars. The culprit might be a strange seaside cult that's sacrificing drugged women for cash. But that doesn't explain the seemingly life after death undertaking of these heists.

Bunker isn't as funny as say...Kolchak, Fox Mulder or Carter Brown's bumbling detective Al Wheeler. But he's no Shaggy either. This character is vulnerable, even scared at times as he navigates ghosts and graves to find the criminal leader. But he can get the job done. It's a slap in the face to readers looking for a hard-edged, bone-breaking chopper cop. But once you can forgive the creator, this is a really fun mystery that had some longevity. I could see this sort of thing working on multiple levels, whether supernatural or just a “crime of the week” featuring some abstract scenario. Unfortunately, the struggle between publisher and author led to this being canned shortly thereafter. I'm on the hunt for book two.

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