Before he became a popular author of quirky crime fiction bestsellers, Elmore Leonard (1925-2013) was a working author of gritty, well-crafted westerns. He started with short works in the western pulp magazines and transitioned seamlessly to paperbacks in the 1950s. Last Stand at Saber River was released by Dell in 1959, and the subsequent British edition was re-titled Stand on the Saber. Somewhere along the way, the novel was also released in hardcover as Lawless River. Over 60 years later, the book is still in print as a paperback, ebook and audiobook.
Our hero is Paul Cable who fought for the Confederacy in the U.S. Civil War for over two years and is returning home to his ranch on Arizona’s Saber River to be with his family. The war had been rough on Cable as he took bullets in his hip and thigh and was sent home to Arizona before the outcome of the war was determined.
Upon arrival back in Arizona, Cable finds that things have changed in his absence. Specifically, there are men living in his house that he and his wife built themselves. While Cable was at war, a man named Vern Kidston came to town with a sizable crew of men and set up a business supplying horses to the Union Army. He took over the Cable house and has been housing his men there while Vern’s horse herd grazes on Cable’s land. As you can imagine, Cable isn’t thrilled with this arrangement. Likewise, Vern and his men are not interested in negotiating with or taking any guff from a former rebel soldier.
At times, the book felt like a home invasion horror novel with a lot of cat-and-mouse suspense. Other times, it was a straight-up combat adventure tale with lots of gun-pointing stand-off scenes. As the title of the paperback indicates, all the disrespect and mini-skirmishes along the way lead to a series of showdowns where Cable defends his property rights against Vern’s men.
Elmore Leonard was a master at plotting and dialogue, and this knack is on full-display in Last Stand at Saber River. The characters are vividly drawn and they always seem to say the right thing at the right time in the right way. The author wisely steers clear of the relative merits of the Confederacy vs. the Union and uses the divide to explain the mutual distrust and hostility between the novel’s combatants.
The short paperback’s resolution was intelligent and unexpected - if a bit abrupt, and it was a testament to Leonard’s superior storytelling abilities. If you like westerns filled with moral dilemmas and smart character development, Last Stand at Saber River is definitely for you. Recommended.
Movie Night:
In 1997, Last Stand at Saber River was adapted into a TV movie starring Tom Selleck on the TNT cable network. It remains a available as a $2.99 rental on all the major streaming services. You won't be surprised to learn that the universal consensus is that book is better than the movie.
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Author Jack Bennett (1934-2000) was born in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. He became a cadet reporter in 1957 and later joined the Australian Broadcasting Commission in 1974. One of his first novels, Mister Fisherman, was published in 1964 and examined racial tensions. In 1981, Bennett wrote Gallipoli, a war novel based on the Australian film of the same name. Of the eight novels I can identify by Bennett, it appears the author's literary work was mostly outdoor/nature fiction that examined social or environmental issues. Those themes are the heart of Bennett's 1967 novel The Hawk Alone, published by Bantam.
The book examines the life of Gord Vance, an elderly man who lives in South Africa with his wife, Julia. Vance is a former soldier, serving in a number of military campaigns including the South African War (often called Boer). Over the years, Vance has worked a number of professions, but his life's work has been as a safari hunter. After years of struggle, Vance now finds himself impoverished due to the environmental changes that have impacted the hunting industry. Living hand to mouth has made Vance disgruntled with his “golden years” and regretful regarding the decisions he's made throughout his life.
Bennett's narrative is written in the past and present with Vance remembering key events in his life – crippled in a bar skirmish, his military experience, prior hunts and various interactions with his friend Roy. These events are sometimes mirrored by present failures like a horse dying, his derogatory credit at the town store, his truck's engine stoppage and the inability to hunt. Vance's skill-set is shooting, but he doesn't own a large parcel of land and his ability to hunt other lands has dwindled. Bennett conveys these emotional defeats perfectly.
As an adventure novel, The Hawk Alone fails. But, this isn't a disappointment credited to the author or the story. Bennett's storytelling is steeped in Hemingway and exhibits primitive simplism. Bantam's marketing strategy was to present the book as an adventure novel, complete with a misleading cover and the exciting premise of “an aging white hunter takes four teenagers on his last and most dangerous safari.” This is only partially true. The book is an emotional, end of age tale about regret, failure and purposeless life – essentially Vance is “the hawk alone.” The promise of a dangerous safari and four teenagers arrives twenty pages before the book's end. While the finale is riveting, it's credited to Vance's disappointments and Bennett's strength as a story-teller, not a dangerous, savage safari.
The Hawk Alone is brilliant. After the last page was turned, I felt emotionally moved. What you may feel will be in the eye of the beholder, but the novel will certainly make you feel something. The ability to convey some sort of emotional experience on to the reader or listener is the cornerstone of good storytelling. The conversational style of Bennett's narrative had me entranced, but again readers should control their expectations.
Paperback Warrior fans should realize this is a different novel than the usual action-adventure shooter or vintage crime-noir. However, this literary variation was a rewarding change of pace that I think you should experience. I can't say enough good things about this pleasant surprise of a novel. Highly recommended.
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S. Craig Zahler is a novelist, filmmaker, and voracious consumer of old pulp fiction. While watching his movies Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in Cell Block 99, and Dragged Across Concrete, his literary influences are crystal clear: Zahler is a Paperback Warrior kind of guy. As such, it’s only fitting that I divert from vintage fiction for a day to review his 2010 gritty western, A Congregation of Jackals.
The year is 1888, and Virginia brothers Oswell and Godfrey both receive telegrams inviting them to the wedding of James Lingham in Montana. The invitation causes the bothers much consternation because they haven’t heard from Lingham in decades. Moreover, the invitation ominously references that “all old acquaintances” will be there.
The author slow-deals the revelations and reasons why the invitation sparks worries in the invitees, but the gist is that they were once part of a group of outlaws years ago that included the groom. Things went nightmarishly wrong for the gang, and vengeance was sworn by a terrifying adversary. Everyone went their separate ways hoping to put their pasts behind them, and then the vexing invitation to a wedding arrives. The fear is that failing to travel to Montana for a reckoning might bring trouble to the no-shows and harm to their respective families.
One of the other invitees - also an alumnus of the long-disbanded outlaw gang - is a Manhattan playboy named Dicky. He’s smart, charming and funny - by far the most charismatic and relatable character in the paperback. Dicky joins the brothers on their journey westward via train and stagecoach to a wedding they’re all pretty certain will be a total bloodbath. Of course, the reader is counting on that being true, and the Montana scenes definitely don’t disappoint.
A Congregation of Jackals is a well-written and engaging paperback and the pages turn quickly thanks to the cinematic quality of the set-pieces the author creates. Mahler’s novel is also periodically violent and shocking with scenes of brutality rivaling the darkest moments of the Edge series by George Gilman with the sheen of a literature written with time and care. Admittedly, there’s a lot of build-up to the final confrontation, and some readers may find it slow at times. However, stick with it because the extended climax is really something special.
Nothing about this strong recommendation should come as no surprise to fans of Zahler’s films, and if you liked Bone Tomahawk - or the westerns of Quentin Tarantino - you’re going to enjoy the heck out of A Congregation of Jackals.
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Author John Gearon (1911-1993) began his career play-writing for theater in the 1930s. His first novel, 1935's The Velvet Well, was a hit. While not that much is known about Gearon, my research suggests that he authored eight total novels under the pseudonym John Flagg. Most, if not all, are espionage stories. Of the eight, five make up the Hart Muldoon series. Being unfamiliar with the series, I jumped in with installment number four, Death's Lovely Mask, published in 1958 by Fawcett Gold Medal.
Hart Muldoon was a former operative in the O.S.S., the early version of what is now known as the C.I.A. After leaving the business, Muldoon is then hired as an international private-eye or spy by the U.S. government investigating murders, kidnapping, heists and the early blueprints for criminal activity that may plague America or it's allies. It's the last part that brings Muldoon to Venice in Death's Lovely Mask.
A senate committee member named Hirem, who Muldoon served with in the O.S.S., threatens Muldoon into an assignment he doesn't want to accept. The job is to tail a young Prince named Sir-el-Donrd from the small, fictional country of Donrd-Arabia. His father has become gravely ill and it looks like the young Prince will be taking the throne soon. The country exists as a feudal state and if Sir-el-Donrd takes over, the applecart is turned over and the Arab chieftains will begin grumbling over oil interests. The U.S. involvement is through the German-American Oil Company within the country, jointly controlled by American and German management. To make matters worse, Sir-el-Donrd is defying generations of feuding by dating the daughter of an Israeli leader. It's essentially Romeo and Juliet with global implications between the rival households.
The author fails to convey to readers what Muldoon's actual job entails. From what we gather, it's frolicking around Venice having an affair with an oil-executive's wife while also banging a 15-year old girl on the side. The bulk of the narrative plays rather operatic with the hero guesting with the super rich Winthrop family. It was like an episode of Downton Abbey with Queens and Countesses and upright pinkies. The murder mystery superimposes itself during an elaborate costume party. However, by this point I just didn't care anymore. The last 20-pages were agonizing.
Perhaps the fourth book isn't a fair representation of the Hart Muldoon espionage series. From what I can gather, Gearon's other novels written under the Flagg name are of the same pedigree – castles, watery canals, wining and dining in plush locales throughout Europe. In essence, Death's Lovely Mask revealed enough to show its true self: an extremely dull book.
Hart Muldoon Series:
1. Woman of Cairo (1953)
2. Dear Deadly Beloved (1954)
3. Murder in Monaco (1957)
4. Death's Lovely Mask (1958)
5. The Paradise Gun (1961)
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Paperback Warrior Podcast Episode 51 delves into the shadowy world of CIA operative, Watergate burglar, and vintage genre fiction author Howard Hunt. Also on the show: Shopping excursions, Reviews of End of a Stripper by Robert Dietrich and .44 by H.A. DeRosso and much more! Stream the show on your favorite podcast app, below or download directly HERE.
Listen to "Episode 51: Howard Hunt" on Spreaker.
Along with Alistair Maclean and Desmond Bagley, British author Hammond Innes (real name: Ralph Hammond Innis, 1913-1998) is one of the masters of high-adventure fiction. Hammond authored 34 novels from 1937 through 1996 and also penned nonfiction and children's stories as well. My first experience with the author is his 1947 novel The Lonely Skier, which was released in the U.S. as Fire in the Snow. The book was adapted for cinema in 1948 under the title Snowbound.
Set in the snowy Dolomite mountains of Northeastern Italy, the book focuses on a British man named Neil Blair. As an ex-Army officer, Blair is a family man who's unemployed in the book's opening chapter. His friend Engles, a movie producer, asks Blair to vacation at a remote ski lodge called Col Da Verda. The purpose is to write a movie script and team with a photographer named Joe Weston. Aside from the primary role of film creator, Engles asks Blair to search for a mysterious woman named Carla.
Upon Blair's arrival at Col Da Verda he is introduced to a cast of characters that become mainstays in the book's narrative. Blair eventually meets Carla and learns that she is a wealthy Countess and has a romantic past with a few of the book's characters. The most interesting revelation is that the lodge was once owned by Stefan, a former Nazi officer who was later captured and ultimately died from suicide. The resort supposedly holds an abundance of stolen Nazi gold that Stefan hid for safekeeping.
Innes' novel teases high-adventure, explosive action and perilous skiing. However, the reader is forced into the lodge as a spectator for most of the plodding narrative. In fact, the bulk of the book is Blair and the cast of characters drinking at the bar and accusing each other of withholding information on the treasure's location. There are chapters upon chapters of suspicions, finger pointing and threats of violence. Sadly, none of this comes to fruition until the book's last 20-pages. It's as if Innes just didn't have enough story to create a pleasurable experience for readers.
Innes is a fine author and I'm certainly not doubting his literary legacy. It appears I simply picked a bad book. Oddly, his 1948 novel Blue Ice seems to have the same story-line – a stashed treasure in the cold Norwegian mountains. Like his contemporaries, the idea of lost treasure (mostly Nazi) seems to be a prevalent sales pitch for avid readers. I'll certainly read more Innes, and I have a short-list of what fans consider his best work. I'm hoping I'll find a real gem there, but Fire In the Snow isn’t it.
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Milo March was a fictional spy turned insurance investigator created by Kendell Foster Crossen using the pseudonym M.E. Chaber. The series ran for 22 novels and a handful of short stories from 1952 to 1973, and is currently being reprinted by Steeger Books with fetching cover art. Based on a tip from Crossen’s daughter, author and literary estate curator Kendra Crossen Burroughs, I decided begin my march into the series with the second installment, No Grave for March from 1953.
March is an investigator for Denver-based Intercontinental Insurance, but he used to be a OSS operative during World War 2. Some of his books are straight-up property crime investigations and in other books, the U.S. government presses March back into service for an espionage assignment. This series setup provided the author great flexibility to plug his hero into any kind of pulpy genre book he felt like writing. No Grave for March is an international spy adventure paperback.
As the novel opens, March has been away from the spy business for seven years. He is summoned to a clandestine meeting in Washington, D.C. with an old colleague from his war days. It seems a diplomat with a head full of secrets has defected to the Soviet client state of East Germany. Because March speaks German, he is the choice to slip behind the iron curtain, kidnap the diplomat, and bring him back to the West. One of the secrets at stake is a mind-control device that can reprogram the public to either love Stalin or apple pie depending on who’s pulling the trigger.
I had always written off the Milo March books as being lightweight, inconsequential paperbacks along the same lines of Richard Prather’s Shell Scott or the many heroes of Carter Brown. Instead, the author put some actual thought into his work with summaries of communist theory embedded into the plot-line and interesting historical tidbits. This isn’t a work of genius, but it’s also not completely disposable fiction.
It’s also not a fast-moving shoot-em-up paperback. March spends a good bit of the novel just trying to convince the commies that he’s one of them and not an American spy. I found this fascinating, but it’s certainly not a breakneck Killmaster thrill ride. Crossen also has an annoying habit of writing lots of dialogue in German and Russian with no translation. You get the gist, but why bother showing off like that? There’s also a lot of specifics about East German tactics, ambitions, and party machinations that you will find either interesting or not.
Things become very exciting in the novel’s final act with a pulpy action sequence among the best I’ve read. I wish the rest of the paperback had set pieces as thrilling as the conclusion. Despite some missteps along the way, I genuinely enjoyed No Grave for March, and I look forward to exploring more of the series in the future.
Addendum:
No Grave for March has been reprinted several times. In the Paperback Library 1970 edition pictured above, the publisher numbered the installment #13. Don’t be fooled: it was truly book #2 in the series. An earlier printing of the novel was titled All the Way Down. Unless you’re a hardcore collector, don’t buy the same book trice.
Also, the Steeger House reprint contains an interview with Kendell Foster Crossen from 1975 that was informative for both his fans and pulp fiction historians.
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