Valdez is Coming

Thus far, I've enjoyed everything Elmore Leonard (1925-2013) has written. From westerns like Escape from Five Shadows (1956) and Last Stand at Saber River (1959) to crime-fiction like Mr. Majestyk (1974). Arguably, one of his best western novels is Valdez is Coming. It was originally published in 1971 and was adapted into a 1974 movie starring Burt Lancaster. 

The novel features Bob Valdez as a constable working in Arizona in the late 1800s. After riding shotgun for a stagecoach, Valdez returns to town to discover several armed cattlemen surrounding a small farm. The group is led by a hardheaded, wealthy rancher named Tanner and a gunman named Davis. Tanner claims that he recognized the farmer, an African-American, as a man who murdered a friend of his years ago. Valdez questions the validity of Tanner's accusation and is dismayed by the vigilante justice that was set to occur. 

After Valdez questions Tanner, he walks through the circling guns to visit the farmer directly, eye to eye, and learns that the man may be completely innocent of the crime and has paperwork that proves a solid alibi. But, Davis refuses to idly stand by and impatiently fires at the farmer. In the exchange, Valdez fatally shoots the farmer. Once the gun smoke clears, Tanner examines the corpse and admits that he made a mistake and this wasn't the same man.

Mournfully, Valdez wants Tanner to pay the farmer's pregnant widow $500 as compensation for wrongfully killing her husband. He mentions it to the men and they ride away. When Valdez rides into Tanner's camp to ask for the money, he is ridiculed, shot at and ordered to stay away. Refusing to accept no for an answer, Valdez attempts asking again, this time riding to Tanner's ranch to make the request. It’s here that Valdez is violently tied to a wooden cross and cruelly forced to walk miles through the desert. After being rescued, Valdez contemplates his next move; accept defeat and carry on or continue the pursuit despite the odds. 

Leonard's novel centers around a character arc as Valdez slowly changes into the buckskin version of his younger self. Throughout the book, Valdez thinks about his prior life - a history of violence – and ponders his complacency in the present as a constable. Tanner's action is like a toggle switch for Valdez's transformation. The violence, emotional turbulence, and romantic angle – surprisingly, it has one – balances the hero's cool demeanor. While never a coward, Valdez still possesses reserved tendencies that ultimately make him weaker in the book's first and second acts. 

Leonard's storytelling prowess is awe-inspiring as he makes this rather simple story explode into an emotional and violent battlefield. There is clearly a reader investment – no matter if you are a western fan or not – that leads to a satisfying conclusion despite some negativity that is associated with the book's finale. I like the way Leonard finished the novel and found that the story didn't require a traditional ending. The “cowboy riding off into the sunset” conclusion may have tarnished Leonard's narrative.  Instead, it's simply a conventional western until it isn't. And that is what makes Valdez is Coming a masterpiece of the genre. 

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The Short Stories of John M. Sitan

 A recent Facebook posting in one of my book groups wondered if John M. Sitan was an alias of another writer, such as Jonathan Craig or Gil Brewer, also writing stories for Manhunt at the same time. I had no idea myself, so I did some homework to find out more about this shadowy author.

By way of background, Sitan authored only three short stories in Manhunt and then disappeared as a writer. According to The Manhunt Companion by Peter Enfantino and Jeff Vorzimmer, Sitan wrote the following stories for Manhunt in three consecutive months during 1954:

“My Enemy, My Father” – June 1954
“Confession” – July 1954
“Accident” – August 1954

Enfantino and Vorzimmer review all three stories favorably in the guide, but they single out “Confession” as something special. The story of a serial sniper (reviewed below) was selected by editor David C. Cooke for inclusion in his 1955 Best Detective Stories of the Year anthology. Vorzimmer later featured the story in his curated The Best of Manhunt 2 compilation from Stark House Press released in 2020.

I searched far and wide for any indication that Sitan’s work was ever published elsewhere and found nothing. The guy apparently sold three stories to Manhunt and then nothing else, so it’s not crazy to wonder if he was a pseudonym or a house name.

As fun as it would have been to unmask the pen-name of John M. Sitan, a few minutes of internet sleuthing revealed that he was, in fact, a real guy.

John McElroy Sitan was born on May 1, 1925 in Longview, Washington. He served in the U.S. Army during World War 2 from 1943 to 1946. Upon his return to Washington State, he began a 30-year career as a technical writer for Boeing. It was while he was gainfully-employed by Boeing that he decided to do some non-technical writing for the top hardboiled crime digest at the time, Manhunt.

For reasons unclear to me, he never caught the bug to continue his side-hustle as a fiction writer. Instead, he and his wife Hazel focused on getaways to a cabin John built himself on Mount Index and traveling the world on vacations following his retirement. The couple never had children, and John died on November 9, 2012. His limited contributions to the world of hardboiled crime fiction would have been lost to the ages but for a renewed interest in Manhunt spurred on by Stark House Books, Enfantino, Vorzimmer, and Paperback Warrior.

Copies of Manhunt are rare and prohibitively expensive, so mere mortals are forced to leverage modern short story anthologies that reprint the greatest hits from the legendary digest. As such, I’m left with only one resource to read Sitan’s work - the second volume of The Best of Manhunt from Stark House Books, where I found Sitan’s only enduring story, “Confession” from July 1954.

“Confession” is the story of a sniper named John Egan. As the story opens, Egan is pulling the trigger on his scoped and silenced rifle that results in a nurse’s head exploding as the round penetrates her skull on the street below. Egan is not a paid assassin. He’s a factory worker who happens to be a crackerjack shot with a long gun. He’s basically a serial killer before there was a term for such things.

When he takes to the road, the reader gains insight into Egan’s real motivations. Sadly, our modern society has become accustomed to mass killers without conscience. However, when Manhunt published Sitan’s story, it must have been a chilling peek behind the curtain of a remorseless psychopath. The ending was a bit abrupt to me, but it was a satisfying story in line with the dark fiction that made Manhunt great.

Despite his minimal contribution to the catalog of American crime fiction, John M. Sitan was a unique voice who deserves to be remembered. It would be nice to see his other two stories find a modern audience in a future anthology.

Buy The Manhunt Companion HERE:
Buy The Best of Manhunt 2 HERE:

Sin in Their Blood

Sin in Their Blood is a 1952 hardboiled crime paperback by under-appreciated author Ed Lacy (real name: Leonard Zinberg, 1911-1968) that remains available today as a reprint. 

Our narrator is Matt Ranzino. He’s a musclebound former boxer, cop and tough-guy private detective who set his practice aside to fight in the Korean War. While serving overseas, he suffered a head wound that almost killed him and contracted a case of tuberculosis that landed him in a hospital bed for 11 months. He’s now back in his unnamed hometown looking to rebuild his life with no money or job. 

His first stop is to visit his old PI partner, Harry. While Matt was overseas, Harry’s business really took off when Harry discovered the lucrative business of blackmailing businesses into allowing Harry to screen their employees for Commies. Harry offers Matt a job with his new Red-Scare firm, but Matt declines. 

Matt’s time in the hospital left him with a scarred lung that could burst open and kill him if he gets involved with any rough stuff, so he really wants to take it easy and live off his military pension. Because that wouldn’t make for much of a mystery novel, Matt finds himself at a crime scene where he is cajoled into investigating the murder of a dead socialite for a lofty fee of $50 per day. 

Once Matt has the gig, we have a rather typical private eye mystery - albeit with a rather exhausted and fragile hero at the helm. Ed Lacy was at the top of his writing game in 1952 when he authored Sin in Their Blood. The story moves along at a great clip, and the characters are all vividly drawn and interesting. It’s a conventional mystery tale, but it’s also the story of a shattered war hero regaining his confidence after the trauma of combat. 

There’s also a damn fine love story featuring a unique female character among the tough-guy patter and fisticuffs. I’ve enjoyed the romantic elements in other Lacy books, but this one is the tops. 

Overall, we have a fairly perfect private-eye yarn that deserves to be remembered. I’m happy to do my part by reviewing it. Now go do yours by reading it. 

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Phantom Manor

Author William Edward Daniel Ross (1912-1995) specialized in gothic paperbacks of the 60s and 70s. Using a variety of pseudonyms, the Canadian writer authored over 50 stand-alone gothics as well as an abundance of novels related to the television show Dark Shadows. My experience with the author is the gothic titles written under the pseudonym Marilyn Ross. After enjoying his 1965 novel Fog Island, I decided to read Phantom Manor. It was published just a year later by Paperback Library with the allure of another vulnerable beauty trapped in a mansion shrouded in evil. 

Phantom Manor is set in the late 1800s and stars a Philadelphia woman named Jan. She finds herself financially strapped when her sick father passes away. Her immediate relative is a grandfather living in England, an aggressive man that had an estranged relationship with Jan's mother. Before Jan's mother died, she swore that she would never return to her family's fog-shrouded Phantom Manor. But, Jan wants to know more about her family and sends a letter to her grandfather explaining her father’s recent passing. Her grandfather responds with an urgent invitation for Jan to finally visit her family home.

The family's robust estate is a coastline manor situated on a small peninsula. When the tide rises, the only road leading from the estate to the village is enveloped in seawater. This is an important part of the book's finale and also lends some isolation to the book's narrative. Upon Jan's arrival at the manor, she discovers that her grandfather had died from health complications prior to her visit. She also learns that one of her uncles is now deceased and another has ran off to Australia chasing women and good fortune. He hasn't been heard from in decades and most fear he is now dead. Remaining is the estate's staff, the dead uncle's widow, her disabled son, and a distant cousin that serves as the manager of the manor. With no immediate relatives available, the grandfather named Jan as the sole heiress of Phantom Manor. 

Jan learned that years ago (and recapped in the book's prologue) that her grandfather and a nearby monk order had feuded over land rights. It was rumored that the feud led to the death of a monk named Francis. Supposedly, Phantom Manor's third floor is haunted by the monk's vengeful ghost. Oddly, the estate staff has Jan's lodgings on the third floor. Needless to say, she's immediately attacked by this skeleton specter. Later, she falls to an unseen attacker in the house's wine cellar and is also nearly crushed by a large falling stone outside. After multiple attempts on her life, she begins to align herself with the family attorney. Together, the two suspects that the dashing and handsome distant cousin (the only family member remaining alive) could be the mysterious attacker (you think!?!).

Phantom Manor is rather dull with a bulk of the narrative spent on Jan's relationship with the distant cousin and her new role as the manor's sole heir – learning the staff, new instructions for the staff, fighting with the staff, firing the staff, etc. It's like reading a human resources guide on running a mansion. I didn't find any of it particularly spooky and mostly it was missing the atmospheric touches that made Ross's Fog Island work so well. I did enjoy the crime-mystery aspect of the book's closing finale, but I had already figured it out in the book's opening chapters.  

Overall, there are hundreds and hundreds of these gothic paperbacks. There's no reason to spend any of your precious time reading this. 

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The Cooler

George Markstein (1926-1987) was a Canadian-born British journalist and television writer best known for his work scripting the TV show The Prisoner. He was also an author of espionage thrillers, including his first novel, The Cooler, from 1974.

The Cooler takes place during World War 2 in 1944 England. The British employ an obscure spy agency known as the Inter Services Research Bureau for incursions into Nazi territory - mostly France - for assassinations and sabotage. The novel follows three spies - two Brits and one German. Here are the players:

James Loach is a seasoned spy in London. The day before he is to embark on a dangerous mission behind enemy lines in Nazi-occupied France, he learns that his team, already there, has largely disappeared. The last message that London receives from the team’s radio operator instructs Loach not to join them because of the imminent danger. As such, Loach is sidelined in London awaiting word on the fate of his team, and he gets into some trouble at home. Weird trouble. Kinky trouble. Sending a violent sex maniac like Loach on another mission in France just isn’t an option.

We also meet Claire. She’s a sexy trainee in the secret agent saboteur program learning how to infiltrate, fight and kill Germans with Ninja-like skills. Her training sequences were among the best I’ve read in adventure fiction. The problem is that maybe Claire is just a little too violent and unsuitable for the subtle work of spy tradecraft. Until the agency figures out how to use her, she is also benched. That’s where she meets Loach - in a remote holding facility for wayward spies called The Cooler.

Finally, we meet a German spy named Grau operating in London with false identity papers. His mission in London — I won’t spoil it here — is really, really clever. Any reader of spy fiction will be able to appreciate the ingenuity of the author’s inclusion of this storyline.

Markstein takes his sweet time introducing the principals and putting them in their places before the plot takes shape. That’s the problem. It takes forever for a storyline to develop. For what it’s worth, I was never bored because the characters were all vividly-drawn, seriously-flawed intel officers. But at some point, all these great characters need to actually do something, and that doesn’t happen until the very end.

It turns out there is someone spying for Germany from inside The Cooler, and the book quickly becomes a whodunnit. None of this really worked very well despite some fine writing. The ending felt rushed, and the solution was anticlimactic. I’m not giving up on Markstein as an author, but this debut needed some serious reworking before it was released for public consumption.

Bottom Line: Time is a precious commodity. Don’t bother with this one. 

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By Her Own Hand

Los Angeles native Frank Bonham (1914-1988) specialized in westerns, young adult fiction, and television scripts. Between 1941 and 1952, Bonham honed his skills by writing for the pulps. He authored only three crime-noir novels, including By Her Own Hand. It was originally released in 1963 by Monarch Books. 

In an undisclosed California city, Captain Chilton is taking over the Plaza Division police station. Before Chilton, the department had spiraled into a rather chaotic, under utilized precinct. This portion of the city reflects the old guard and braces for the new. Caught in the transition are two Vice Squad Sergeants Skip Kawano and Lou Michikowski. Both are feeling the heat as Chilton increases the pressure to clean up the streets.

Like most traditional police precincts, the way to topple the top echelon of crime is through prostitutes. They are the perfect informants and mostly the police lay off their profession in exchange for valuable bits of information on criminal rings. The same thing occurs here as both Kawano and Michikowski utilize prostitutes to gain valuable intel. In turn, other precincts rely on these same prostitute informants to minimize crime waves. But, Chilton doesn't see it that way. 

At 126 pages, Bonham's novel is more like a quick novella. Mostly, the action is around an investigation into a murdered prostitute to determine what information she was withholding. Chilton's department faces intense opposition for arresting the prostitutes and removing them from the streets. Included in the investigation is a side-story that leads into the porno movie business. For a 1963 novel, Bonham doesn't pull any punches in terms of explicit imagery. This side-story involves a gangbang that's recorded in an after hours park. The scenery, time of day, and skill of the photographer allows the investigation to branch off into some unusual places. 

Overall, I really enjoyed this quick read and found it to be slightly ahead of its time. Also, the characters and plot are soaked in realism due to Bonham's involvement in youth gangs and urban violence. He advocated for peace and was often riding along in police cars to learn firsthand the negative influences affecting California's youth. To my knowledge, By Her Own Hand has never been reprinted, but affordable used copies are still available. It's worth your time. 

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Steve Holland: The World's Greatest Illustration Art Model

On the Paperback Warrior Podcast, and on this very blog, I've often reminisced about my early childhood and my father's love of 20th century paperbacks. I can still remember summer days walking up our creaky staircase, hoping to discover something new or exciting about my humble, and often very quiet, father. In an unfinished guest bedroom, there were leaning stacks of welding manuals and plastic bins of old bolts. There were also stacks of boxes spilling over with western paperbacks. Occasionally, I would read one just to break up the monotony of Stephen King and Dean Koontz, but sifting through the books was the real pleasure for me at that age. Thumbing through the stacks, I began to think the vivid gun-slinging character depicted on the covers was actually the same hero, but was just calling himself Buchanan, Nevada Jim or some other tough-as-nails sounding name to fit the book. It wasn't until many years later that I discovered it was the same hero, only his real name was Steve Holland.

In a new coffee-table book called Steve Holland: The World's Greatest Illustration Art Model, author Michael Stradford reveals that he had a similar experience in the 1960s when he discovered Doc Savage in a Cleveland book store. In this visual and informative book, Stradford delves into the life and career of Holland, the most iconic male model of 20th century literature. My softcover version weighs in at over 200 pages and features hundreds of paperback covers, exclusive photos, and larger than life paintings that honor the man that launched a thousand paperbacks. 

The book's introduction is written by Jason Savas, a friend of mine that inherited Holland's crown in the 1980s. Savas, a former model employed by the esteemed Wilhelmina Model Agency, has been featured on a 1,000 book covers himself. Savas details his experiences in the industry working with Holland, a man he deemed “the consummate pro.” Stradford includes a biography of Savas, featuring a handful of stirring, action-adventure book cover scans as well as the beautiful Steve Assel painting The Iron Marshall (Louis L'Amour) that Savas posed for. 

Stradford's layout is divided into sections dedicated to various eras of Holland's career. For example, numerous pages detailing his paperback career are divided into genres like action, adventure, romance, western, sci-fi, etc. There is a complete section focusing on just the men's adventure magazine paintings, the Doc Savage era, and various advertisements featuring Holland's face or likeness. There is a biography on Holland, and a detailed interview with Holland's daughter Nicole and third wife Jean. Also, author Will Murray's expanded interview with Holland from Starlog is expanded and exclusively included. Murray has been the primary contributor to the Doc Savage series for decades. 

I really enjoyed artists Bob Larkin (Conan, Iron Fist, Hulk) and Bob Caras (The Avenger) discussing their experiences painting Holland. There are so many amazing artists and photographers interviewed for the book, including Alex Ross, Frank Reilly, Joe DeVito, Robert Osonitsch, and Jack Faragasso. It was personally rewarding to learn how humble and kind Holland was as described by his peers, friends and family. I never needed validity, but the real life Holland seemed to parallel the admirable, heroic characters he became on canvas.

Steve Hollad: The World's Greatest Illustration Art Model is absolutely a mandatory reference for anyone fascinated by 20th century paperbacks, magazines and male-oriented advertisements. I was enthralled for days just researching the paperbacks and building my shopping list based on these incredibly vivid covers. More than 20 years after his death, Holland's face is still selling publications. That is a testament to his phenomenal physique, likable face and ability to provide the perfect likeness for all of these amazing visuals. Stradford has honored Holland in such a beautiful way and I can't thank him enough for his labors in creating it. 

Get the book HERE