Wraiths of the Broken Land

S. Craig Zahler (born January 23, 1973, in Miami, Florida) is a multi-talented artist: a screenwriter, film director, composer, cinematographer, novelist, illustrator and heavy metal musician. After studying film at NYU, he built a career behind the camera and on the page. Zahler gained acclaim for hard‑bitten, violent dialogue‑driven films such as Bone Tomahawk (2015), Brawl in Cell Block 99 (2017), and Dragged Across Concrete (2018), all of which he wrote, directed, and scored. Alongside his cinematic work, he’s penned several novels and graphic stories—his debut western, A Congregation of Jackals (2010), earned Spur and Peacemaker award nominations

2013’s Wraiths of the Broken Land stands as Zahler’s second western novel. It’s a relentless, genre-blending journey: half-pulp western and half-extreme horror. Beyond its popularity with readers, the novel drew Hollywood attention—20th Century Fox acquired film rights in 2016 for a film adaptation that has yet to happen.

It is 1902 and the book begins rather shockingly with an opium-addicted young woman named Yvette being held against her will as a forced prostitute in Mexico. The living conditions are grotesque, but resistance is futile due to her debilitating addiction. Soon thereafter, the reader meets her sister, Dolores, also an enslaved prostitute being held in a separate room by the same psycho Mexicans.

We then meet Nathaniel Stromler, age 26. He’s an erudite dandy of a gentleman in serious financial dire straits who has taken a job to ride along with the men of the Plugford family on a mission: recover the family daughters, Yvette and Dolores.

Nathanial is needed because he is bilingual and can pass for a gentleman john. He’s their ticket inside the kidnappers’ lair as a prospective client seeking to defile some captive white girls. The search for the sisters takes Nathanial and Team Plugford into the depths of Mexico from one promising lead to another in search of the brothel from Hell.

The scenes leading up to the rescue attempt are rather satisfying but the getaway’s immediate aftermath is less compelling. Pages upon pages of bickering among the Plugfords became tiresome as the novel’s secondary mystery of how the girls wound up as human sexual chattel is explored.

Things pick back up again with the backstory of the girls’ enslavement and a climactic confrontation between the opposing parties, but there was too much time on the road and scenes with characters waiting for something to happen.

To be clear, there’s plenty to enjoy about Wraiths of the Broken Land and Zahler is one of the great storytellers of our time. The problem is that this novel vastly pales in comparison to his other western, A Congregation of Jackals and his masterpiece crime novel, The Slanted Gutter. Those paperbacks spoiled me with their greatness while Wraiths was just good. If you’re trying to read them all (and I am), prioritize the other two first.

Get S. Craig Zahler books HERE.

Paperback Warrior Primer - Norman Daniels

Norman Daniels (Norman Arthur Danberg, 1905-1995) was a prolific author that experienced tremendous success in the pulp market before creating a second career writing numerous paperback originals, novelizations, and television tie-ins in a variety of genres. He used a multitude of pseudonyms and even collaborated with his wife Dorothy, a sensational paperback writer that specialized in gothic-romance titles. I presented the author's life and literary work on a podcast episode HERE, but wanted to provide a text on this workaholic writer that has seemingly vanished from the reader radar.

Here's a Paperback Warrior Primer on Norman Daniels. 

Norman Arthur Danberg was born in 1905 in Connecticut. He attended both Columbia and Northwestern University. Daniels' first published story was "The Death House Murder", which appeared in Detective-Dragnet magazine in 1932. That same year he saw his stories in magazines like The Shadow Detective Monthly, All-Detective Magazine and Gangster Stories. The December 1933 issue of Thrilling Detective featured a story called “Cold Steel”. This was an important moment for Daniels because it secured a relationship with the pulp powerhouse Standard, which was owned by Ned Pines. They produced a ton of titles in the 30s and 40s and competed with the equally productive publisher Street & Smith. 

Daniels was asked by Standard to pen stories starring their pulp hero The Phantom Detective. From my research it shows that he wrote over 30 installments of the series. After a little bit of a downward curve in pulp sales, the publisher began to think of new ways to gain readers. The idea was to create new heroes. Norman Daniels came up with the idea of The Black Bat character and placed him in Black Book Detective magazine in July 1939. I have a review for the first Black Bat story HERE.

Daniels not only created The Black Bat, he also had a hand in writing, and if not outright creating, a slew of other titles like Dan Fowler G-Man, The Crimson Mask, The Eagle, The Candid Camera Kid, Captain Danger, The Masked Rider, Range Riders as well as also writing for the rival Street and Smith publisher with their pulps like The Avenger, Crime Busters, Doc Savage, The Feds and the popular The Shadow Magazine. 

The author's Masked Detective character debuted in Masked Detective in 1940. It ran for 12 total issues with a 13th story appearing in Thrilling Mystery. Daniels wrote the first few issues of the series before handing the project off to the other work-horse authors of that era like Sam Merwin Jr. and W.T. Ballard. I reviewed the first appearance of the character HERE.

The author proved to be extremely busy in the 1940s writing shorts for the likes of Romantic Range, Army-Navy Flying Stories, Popular Detective, G-Men Detective, Sky Fighters, Clues Detective Stories, Crack Detective Stories, Thrilling Detective, and Exciting Navy Stories.

The birth of the paperback in the 1950s would be a welcome mat for Daniels to increase his productivity. Using a variety of pseudonyms, Daniels went to work on creating a number of full-length novels that appeared in paperback format. While he was writing for this new format, he continued to write shorts for the magazines and pulps like Western Romance and Mystery Detective. But his paperback output really flourished at this time.

Under the pseudonym of Mark Reed he wrote sleazy books for publishers like Falcon and Rainbow. Books like Street of Dark Desires, The Nude Stranger, Sins of the Flesh, House of 1000 Desires. As David Wade, Daniels wrote at least six books - Come Night, Come Desire, Raise the Devil, She Walks by Night, Bedroom with a View, Only Human and Walk the Evil Street (review HERE). Under the name Norma Dunn he wrote Lida Lynn, Shack Girl, The Twist and Another Man in your Life. Under his real name of Norman Daniels, he produced novels like Mistress on a Deathbed, Sweet Savage and Bedroom in Hell.

While writing a lot of 1950s paperbacks, Daniels also wrote television scripts. According to IMDB, Daniels penned scripts for shows like Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Sugarfoot, Colt. 45, Zane Grey Theater, Ford Theater and General Electric Theater among others. In the 1960s, Daniels incorporated television novelizations and tie-ins into his repertoire with books based on shows like Arrest and Trial, Sam Benedict, The Smith Family, Chase, The Detectives, Ben Casey, Dr. Kildare, The Avengers, etc.

Also in the 1960s, Daniels created an eight-book spy series called The Man from A.P.E. starring a secret agent named John Keith. That series ran from 1964-1971. I read and reviewed the debut HERE. Daniels also wrote a two book series of spy novels starring a CIA agent named Bruce Baron. These were The Baron of Hong Kong from 1967 and Baron's Mission to Peking from 1968. He also wrote a stand-alone spy novel called Spy Hunt in 1960 (reviewed HERE). 

He wrote for a number of other publishers in the 1960s including several WW2 novels like Moments of Glory, Battalion, and Strike Force (aka Killer Tank, reviewed HERE). 

Daniels also wrote another short series starring a California police chief named Kelly Carvel. These books were The Rape of a Town in 1970 followed by One Angry Man in 1971 and concluding with License to Kill in 1972. I reviewed the series debut HERE.

Daniels also submerged himself into the marketable medical thriller and hospital trend. He authored titles like The Surgeon, Savage Heart, Jennifer James RN, Stanton Bishop MD and The Tarnished Scalpel.

In the 1970s, Norman Daniels began delving into the gothics genre. Daniels wrote many of them under the name Angela Gray. Some title names were The Ashes of Falconwyk, Ravenswood Hall, Watcher in the Dark and The Warlock's Daughter. He also wrote them under the name Suzanne Somers. These had titles like Mists of Mourning, Until Death, The House on Thunder Hill and House of Eve. He also used the name Cynthia Kavanaugh to pen gothic romances like The Deception and Bride of Lenore. He also wrote at least one under the name Geraldine Thayer, a novel titled The Dark Rider.  Daniels even wrote some gothic-romance novels under his wife's name to leverage her market value and name.

Norman Daniels was very prolific because he knew the paperback trends and pop-culture. He wrote what was popular at the time and hinged much of his success on what was selling at the cinema. If spy films were popular then he wrote espionage thrillers. Once the gothic market took off he was quick to jump into that concept. When WW2 and high-adventure became a trend, Daniels was quick to place his efforts in that niche. 

Norman Daniels died in Camarillo California in 1995. Much of his literary work, journals, notes and manuscripts were donated to Bowling Green University where they remain available for anyone wishing to browse the author's work. His wife Dorothy, who sold over 10 million copies and wrote over 150 novels, passed away in 2001.

Paperback Warrior Primer - Harry Whittington

Back in 2022, Tom Simon, an alumni of Paperback Warrior, was asked to write an introduction for the Stark House Press twofer A Ticket to Hell and Hell Can Wait, both by the iconic crime-noir writer Harry Whittington. I wanted to share this write-up with the Paperback Warrior fans and readers that didn't have the opportunity to purchase the book. I hope you enjoy it. 

"Investigating Harry" 

“Have you ever heard of an author named Harry Whittington?” I asked the used bookstore lady.

I was in Ocala, Florida trying to dig up information that might be helpful for the introduction to this Harry Whittington twofer. Smarter guys than me have written introductions for previous Harry Whittington reprints. I needed an angle, so I was sniffing around Harry’s childhood hometown looking for leads.

I should probably explain that I’m a recently-retired FBI Special Agent who spent the last five years of the job investigating federal crimes in Northern Florida. I worked a handful of cases in Ocala, but this was my first time back since I retired and opened my own private eye firm. However, it wasn’t my sleuthing that landed me this writing gig. Stark House hit me up because of my side-hustle, a blog and podcast called Paperback Warrior where I cover pulp fiction with my buddy Eric. We host the largest collection of Harry Whittington book reviews on the internet, so Stark House figured I might have something to say about Harry’s work that hadn’t already been said - a tall order.

Facing the problem of what to write that hadn’t already been covered, I recalled a saying: “When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.” I’m an investigator, so I drove down to Ocala to knock on some doors.

A Ticket to Hell was the first of Harry’s books I read and remains my favorite. I reviewed Hell Can Wait much later and enjoyed it quite a bit. I could go on and on about the stuff I liked about each paperback, but I don’t want to spoil either novel for you. I hate it when introductions do that, and I don’t want to be that guy. You should read both, and I promise you’ll like them. If you only have one week to live and must choose, go with A Ticket to Hell. It’s the stronger of the pair.

Ocala is pretty far inland, so erase from your mind images of the sandy beaches of Miami or Daytona. This is non-coastal Florida marshland. Harry clearly drew upon this lush and humid ecosystem for many of his swamp-noir novels - Cracker Girl, Swamp Kill, Backwoods Hussy, and Backwoods Shack among them. If that sub-genre is your jam, the best is Backwoods Tramp, also released as A Moment To Prey. Driving through the sand pines and magnolia trees of the Ocala National Forest, I understood why this setting was so alluring for many of Harry’s early paperbacks. It’s a vivid and earthy place thick with Spanish moss dripping from the branches - a perfect setting for a rural noir tale.

When Harry was growing up, Ocala was a one-horse town. Nowadays, there are thousands of horses. In fact, breeding and training horses is Ocala’s main industry. The city leaders call it “The Horse Capital of the World,” and Marion County hosts more than 600 thoroughbred farms. Back in Harry’s day, Ocala farmers were mostly raising citrus, cotton and tobacco.  

Fun Fact: The town’s only real celebrity today is John Travolta, who owns a giant compound in a subdivision with its own airfield. I wanted to ask him if he’s heard of Harry Whittington, so I drove out to his gated neighborhood to snoop. I made it through a haphazardly-opened gate and toured for about ten minutes marveling at the mansions - each with their own airplane hanger. There was no sign of Mr. Travolta when I was pulled over by neighborhood security and swiftly shown the exit gate.

I continued my field investigation at Ocala’s best used bookstore. There are only two remaining, and the other one is a lousy firetrap. The good one is called A Novel Idea, and it’s in a strip mall near a movie theater. I always made it a point to swing by the place whenever I was working a case in the area. I had long since bought all their vintage crime paperbacks, but I still liked visiting  - mostly to see the store’s two in-house cats: Lord Byron and F. Scott Fitzgerald. In my absence, Fitzy had died. Now there’s only Lord Byron on the lookout for paperback shoplifters.

The store’s proprietor is Lori. Her daughter is the owner, but Lori runs the joint. She’s from Ocala but admitted that she’d never heard of Harry Whittington.

“He was born and raised here as a kid,” I told her. “He later moved to St. Petersburg and authored over 170 novels during the mid-20th century. They called him The King of Paperbacks because he was so prolific. He wrote books in a bunch of different genres under his own name and a giant list of pseudonyms.”

She listened politely to my Wikipedia speech and acted about as interested as retail politeness would dictate. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what I was expecting. Excitement? Tears? A discount?

I swung by the public library in Ocala and asked the same question with similar results. The lady at the information desk had never heard of Harry, and the library carried none of his books. I hadn’t struck out this much with women since I was dating. Small towns are supposed to lionize their native sons, but Harry had been seemingly wiped from everyone’s memory here.

I needed an informant with good intel, so I contacted the Marion County Genealogical Society and asked them to do some digging. A fellow named Arnold Davis turned up some good dirt using historical records.

Harry’s parents (Harry Sr. & Rosa Hardee) were married on June 12, 1912 at the home of Rosa’s parents on South Magnolia Street. The happy couple settled into a house on Pond Street, and Harry was born on February 4, 1915. His dad ran Staple & Fancy Groceries on Main Street, and the family was somewhat wealthy compared to the farmers residing in the area.

Arnold the Informant uncovered a mosaic of family stories from Harry’s childhood - family trips to the beach in Daytona and a wayward nail that almost blinded his mom. One foggy night in 1922, Harry Sr. crashed his truck into a “dummy cop” statue erected in the middle of Main Street. The city had strategically placed these dummies to slow traffic, and the accident resulted in a lofty fine of $11.10 to cover repairs to the inert lawman.  

I went by the locations of Harry’s three childhood homes in Ocala. I was pleased to find that there were many places in the Historical District remaining from Harry’s era, but none of his houses remained. I had lunch at an old fashioned diner that used to be Elliott’s Drive-In back in the day. The food was excellent, but the waitress never heard of Harry.

After World War I in 1918, Ocala was a hot spot for tourists from the north visiting by way of the Orange Blossom Trail, now Highway 27. This was before the development of America’s interstate highway system, and Model-T tourism sparked the golden age of roadside attractions. Ocala’s contribution to this culture was Silver Springs. It’s now a state park, and I paid two bucks to walk through the paths surrounding the waters. Signs warned me to beware of both alligators and monkeys (feed neither, please). When Harry was 14, a guy named Ross Allen used to wrestle alligators there to the delight of both locals and tourists. From 1958 to 1961, Lloyd Bridges filmed the underwater adventure scenes for Sea Hunt in the spring’s crystal clear waters. 

I hit up my friend Ben Boulden. He’s a great author living in Utah and a solid guy. I remembered his introduction to a Stark House double by Lionel White and how much I enjoyed it. Ben is a whiz at researching old census records, so I solicited his help.

Ben hooked me up with a good timeline of Harry’s life using census and other historical records that I overlaid with the intel from Arnold to create a coherent timeline. Sometime around 1924, the Whittington clan moved 100 miles away to Tampa on the Gulf of Mexico, and Harry’s dad landed a job as a salesman for C.B. Witt Company, a wholesale grocer. For unclear reasons, Harry returned to Ocala in September 1930 as a transfer student from St. Petersburg to complete his final two years of high school. I’m guessing he lived with grandparents or extended family until he graduated from Ocala High School on June 3, 1932. 

I wanted to head over to Harry’s alma mater to regale the students vaping in the parking lot with stories about “The King of Paperbacks.” It became Forest High School in 1969 and is now Marion Technical Institute, a place for kids looking to get into the trades. I went by the school but didn’t see the upside of hassling these future welders, cooks and first responders with dumb questions about a long-dead author.

Harry returned to the family home in St. Petersburg after graduating high school in Ocala. By 1935, Harry’s dad was employed as a driver for Florida Milk Company. I recalled that a milkman was the main character in Like Mink, Like Murder, a Whittington oddity also reprinted by Stark House. For his part, Harry landed a job as a mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service.

On February 6, 1936, 21 year-old Harry married Kathryn Odom, and the couple settled down in Saint Petersburg with Harry continuing his mailman gig until he was drafted in 1940. This military service was followed by a voluntary enlistment in the U.S. Navy from April 1945 to March 1946. 

Shortly after his release from the Navy, Harry sold his first novel, a western titled Vengeance Valley. In 1947, he sold a hardcover called Her Sin about a pleasure-loving girl named Iris. Demand for paperback original novels exploded in 1950, and Harry met that demand becoming one of the most prolific writers of paperback potboilers in the world. By 1957, Harry had 50 novels published under his own name and a cadre of pseudonyms. That same year, he was identified as a professional author in a St. Petersburg citizen’s directory uncovered by Informant Ben. 

In 1979, Harry settled in Indian Rocks Beach, a bit south of Clearwater. I saw his house, a modest ranch-style home built in 1951 two blocks from the gulf. Harry paid $45,000 for the place the same year he sold a mainstream flop called Sicilian Woman - the last novel published under his own name. It was in this house that he wrote six entries in the Longarm adult western series as Tabor Evans and twelve plantation gothic titles as Ashley Carter. Evidently, the market for paperbacks in the king’s own name had dried up by that point.

My manhunt concluded at Royal Palm South Cemetery in St. Petersburg where Harry was laid to rest in 1989 - later to be joined by his wife and daughter. His tombstone reads, “Master of the Roman Noir: One Of The Greats Among American Novelists.” An internet search explained that “Roman Noir” is a French term for a mystery or thriller, literally a “Dark Novel.”

Indeed, Harry’s best work was noir fiction, and you are holding in your hands two excellent examples of an American author at the top of his dark novel game. Still, I found his epigraph a bit reductive. Harry excelled at so many different genres: Westerns, Espionage, TV Tie-Ins, Historical Gothics, Erotica, Nursing Dramas and on and on. Some were good and others were not - but the guy’s cross-genre productivity was staggering and unmatched among his peers.

I left his gravesite thinking that even on his own tombstone, Harry didn’t get the credit he deserves. In any case, I’m glad you cared enough about his writing to pick up this Whittington double-shot. 

After all, Harry is a guy who deserves to be remembered. 

Paperback Warrior Podcast - Episode 119

In this podcast episode, Eric explores the infamous Amityville murders and their impact on pop culture through a deep dive into The Amityville Horror and its many paperback sequels and spinoffs that shaped haunted house fiction in the '80s and '90s. He also reviews Grady Hendrix’s novel How to Sell a Haunted House. Stream below, watch on YouTube HERE or download HERE.

Listen to "Episode 119: Amityville Paperbacks from Hell" on Spreaker.

Paperback Warrior Primer - Charles Williams

Charles K. Williams (1909-1975) is an iconic crime-fiction writer that mastered the genre with his unique blend of criminality, sex, and conversational narratives.  He authored 22 books and was one of the best-selling writers in the Fawcett Gold Medal stable. John D. MacDonald, touted by Stephen King as the “hardest of the hardboiled”, said that Charles Williams was probably the best among his peers but never got the break he needed. His most productive years were 1951 to 1960, an era that produced 17 published novels. 

We've written a great deal on Charles Williams here at Paperback Warrior. We also covered his life and body of work on Episode 56 of the podcast HERE. But, we wanted to offer up a Primer piece for fans and readers to continue celebrating his achievements. 

Williams was born in 1909 in San Angelo, Texas. Later his family relocated to Brownsville, Texas and Williams went to school there. In 1929, Williams dropped out of school in the 10th grade and enlisted with the U.S. Merchant Marine as a radio operator. It was there that he fell in love with the sea, an aquatic serenity that would later influence much of his writing. 

In 1939, Williams, now married to Lasca Foster, worked as an electronics inspector in Galveston, Texas. Three years later he acquired a job in Washington State at the Puget Sound Navy Yard. During WWII he worked as a wireless operator, radar technician, and radio service engineer as a civilian with the U.S Navy. In 1946, Williams moved to San Francisco to continue his radio inspector career. 

In the late 1940s Williams had begun working on a novel titled Hill Girl. He began shopping it to publishers in 1950 and it was published by Fawcett Gold Medal one year later. At the same time he experience a small taste of the dying pulps with his short story, “They'll Never Find Her Head”, published in Uncensored Detective in December 1950. The 40-year old author quit his day job to concentrate on writing.

Often the author's first three novels are referred to as “The Girl Trilogy” - Hill Girl (1951 Gold Medal), Big City Girl (1951 Gold Medal), and River Girl (aka Catfish Tangle, 1951 Gold Medal). In these books, Williams walks the line between a noir crime novel and forbidden romance story. Williams followed the success with his most well-respected novel, Hell Hath No Fury (aka The Hot Spot), published by Gold Medal in 1953. Anthony Boucher of The New York Times reviewed the book and described Williams' writing style as reminiscent of Cornell Woolrich and James M. Cain. 

The author's nautical suspense began to surface with his 1955 novel Scorpion Reef (aka Gulf Coast Girl), a book based on a novella titled Flight To Nowhere (Manhunt, September 1955). Williams' writing career evolved into more sea-bound stories and settings, evident with books like The Diamond Bikini (1956) and The Sailcloth Shroud (1960). One of his most popular novels is a two-book series starring a boat broker named John Ingram and his lover Rae. The two first appeared in the 1960 novel Aground and then re-appeared in the 1963 book Dead Calm. 

Twelve of Charles Williams novels were adapted into film or television works in the U.S., France, and Australia. The Texas native also contributed to six screenplays including the 1964 French film Les Felins based on Day Keene's crime-fiction novel Joy House. 

When his wife succumbed to cancer in 1972, Williams moved to a property located near the California and Oregon border. Suffering from depression, he relocated to Van Nuys, California and took his own life on April 5th, 1975. 

His novels and stories are critically-acclaimed and celebrated by publishers like Stark House Press and Hard Case Crime that continue to reprint classic crime-noir for future generations to enjoy. 

Get his Fawcett Gold Medal vintage paperbacks HERE. Reprints from Stark House Press HERE.

Sour Candy

Kealan Patrick Burke is an Irish-born contemporary horror author with a winning streak of highly-regarded terrifying novels and novellas. My first dip into his world was his 86-page Sour Candy, available as a thin paperback or a Kindle ebook.

The story opens with childless Phil grabbing some chocolate from the candy aisle of a Wal-Mart for his girlfriend at home. While browsing the sweet treats, he sees a little kid having a total meltdown in the store accompanied by his stoic and unreactive mother. Witnessing this, Phil’s primary thought is, “Man, I’m glad that isn’t my kid.”

On his way home from the store, a car plows into the back of Phil’s Chevy at a stoplight smashing the vehicle like an accordion. When the dazed Phil extracts himself from his car, he sees the driver who struck him is the lady from the store - somehow without her hellion child in tow.

That’s when things start getting scary as hell.

Giving away further plot points would spoil the fun, but if you’ve seen the terrifying film It Follows, you have an idea what’s happening. Creepy kid stories were a staple from the Paperbacks From Hell era of late 20th century horror fiction, and Sour Candy can be seen as a modern homage to that sub-genre.

I liked this story quite a bit and found it generally unnerving and quite scary in parts. I think the author was reflecting upon and playing with the anxiety that childless couples must feel at the prospect of upending their lives by having a kid. Be warned that this story won’t do much in the way of convincing young adults to take that plunge.

In any case, Sour Candy is a fun, scary ride that cemented Burke as an author to watch in the horror genre. Recommended.

Get the book 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.

Paperbacks from Hell Visualized Feature

Way back on Episode 65 we covered the horror sensation of Paperbacks from Hell. This remains one of our most beloved features. What better way to celebrate this feature's popularity than a visualized enhancement!?! We've repurposed the segment into an awesome visual experience complete with dozens upon dozens of full-color horror vintage paperback covers and photos from our own personal collection. Enjoy the show HERE and be sure to subscribe. 

David Grant #01 - Death's Foot Forward

George Brown Mair (1914-?) was a Scottish medical doctor and world traveler who drew upon his vacations behind the Iron Curtain in his ten-book spy series starring NATO Secret Agent David Grant from the U.K. The entire series has been reprinted on Kindle for modern electronic paperback readers starting with 1965’s Death’s Foot Forward.

As the novel opens, Grant is in Moscow on a date with a Russian ballerina. Grant is a surgeon working for the World Health Organization as a cover for his secret NATO spy missions. In any case, the ballerina’s Soviet minders want Grant to stay away from their girl. He travelled to Moscow to see her after a fling in Paris, but the Soviet security service is now hell-bent on extinguishing this budding romance.

It doesn’t take long before Grant is released and he starts doing violent spy stuff. Grant is a legit badass with a hard-on who kills any Russian standing between him nailing this ballerina again.

Grant’s espionage assignment doesn’t emerge until deep into the paperback. Basically, the Soviets have developed a drug/bio-weapon that will open the door to world domination by the U.S.S.R. Grant is tasked with infiltrating the Kremlin, killing the scientist behind the bio-weapon, and smuggling a culture of the germs while leaving none behind for the Russians. Of course, he wants to get his ballerina out with the germ sample.

As James Bond knockoff paperbacks from the 1960s go, this one is pretty good. The spy gadgets thing was a bit overdone and the preparation for the Moscow mission seemed to take forever, but the hardboiled violence was graphic and a spot-on while the mission never veered into the cartoonish. Recommended. 

Godin #01 - Thirty Days Hath September

Under the pseudonym Owen John, Welsh author (and accountant!) Leonard Owen-John (1918-1995) wrote seven espionage paperbacks featuring a Russian-born MI6 operative named Haggai Godin. The first novel in the series was Thirty Days Hath September from 1966 and - fair warning - it’s hard as hell to find.

The premise of this novel is amazing. It opens on September 1 with a man named David Lyman waking up in a windowless concrete room containing nothing but a bed, a jug of water, a ream of blank paper and several pencils. His direction? Write a daily diary.

You see, David is a British national on loan to the U.S. Air Force as a missile researcher, and his captors are Chinese. The action of the novel is interspersed with David’s diary entries revealing his evolving state of mind and the reasons for this unusual kidnapping. His questioning by his Chinese captor is unorthodox, but it’s made clear that the captors demands must be met by October 1st.

The slow-burn interrogation scenes and the geopolitical revelations in this 175-page novel are next-level excellent. The background explaining the kidnappers rationale is so smart, and the reader becomes smarter while reading it.

Eventually, the U.S. Air Force grows concerned with David’s disappearance and engages the CIA to rescue the captive scientist. Because David is a Brit, the CIA loops MI6 into the mix to find and rescue him.

The ostensible hero of the series is MI6’s Haggai Godin, but he doesn’t make an appearance until well-over halfway through the novel — raising questions about whether this book was truly written with an eye towards a series character. In any case, he is a badass hero, enigmatic and brimming with competence. When we first meet him 100 pages into the 175-page paperback, it’s obvious why the author chose to bring him back for six further installments. But be aware he’s not the protagonist of this novel in any way.

As the September 30 deadline approaches, the tension increases and the action scenes showcase Godin’s particular set of skills. The climax is an action set piece consistent with the best men’s adventure novels of the era and provide a welcome counterpoint to the more cerebral tone of the hostage manipulation comprising most of the book. The ending also solidifies my position that this was written as a one-off stand-alone novel.

Most espionage paperbacks are either stupid and easy to follow (The Baroness, Killmaster) or smart and overly-complex (John LeCarre, Robert Ludlum). The cool thing about Thirty Days Hath September is that it’s smart as hell, yet easy to follow. It’s also one of the best spy novels I’ve ever read. The fact that it hasn’t been reprinted in 58 years is a crime against literature. This one is a true lost masterpiece. Highest recommendation. 

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Devil Wind

It’s 1985ish and I’m a young adolescent walking around our local K-Mart department store with my $5 allowance for the week. I’m typically scoping out the latest Hardy Boys installment, those cool “modern” ones with the explosive painted covers, or an R-rated movie novelization (living in the bible-belt, R-rated flicks were off the table, so my only option was to read the novelizations). But today…I see the incredible covers for a series of young-adult horror paperbacks called Dark Forces. I snag Devil Wind, the fourth installment, and camp out in my porch rocker to consume black magic, the occult, and the Dark Forces. I don’t recall the quality of the book, but I do remember enjoying it and picking up a few other books in the series before moving on to Stephen King, John Saul, and Dean Koontz.

 
Bantam published 15 Dark Forces young-adult paperbacks from 1983-1984. These were all stand-alone novels - roughly 160 pages – that challenged for market superiority among the crowded ranks of Point Horror, Goosebumps, Private School, and prolific author Christopher Pike (Kevin McFadden). That guy was everywhere. The series was authored by a rotating blend of writers including Scott Siegel, Les Logan, Bruce Coville, and Jane Polcovar. The collaboration of Paul Alexander and Laurie Bridges produced three series installments - Magic Show, Devil Wind, and Swamp Witch. 

For funsies, I tracked down a copy of Devil Wind and gave it an adult spin nearly 40 years removed from my first experience with the book.

 
The novel stars Peter Wardwell, a high schooler living in the small coastal New England town of Northport Bay. In the book’s opening pages, readers learn that a dilapidated house was recently demolished, and Peter found an old whistle in the rubble. With his new whistle, and his family’s boat, he takes his sweetheart Mary Jane (human not plant) to a small, hidden cove he discovers down the coast. Mary Jane immediately gets the creeps there and the place reeks of rotted flesh. But Peter insists they stick around and soon pulls out his whistle and takes a blow. A thick fog rolls in and the two become separated. Peter falls into a deep slumber and Mary Jane is rescued by a salty sailor. The two soon find Peter and bring him back home. Only, this isn't really Peter.

 
Over the course of the book readers experience Peter’s transformation from a kind American boy into a Satanic warlock from the 1700s. You see Northport Bay experienced a curse from Simon Wardwell, Peter’s great-great-gr….you get the point. Simon died in the little cove, along with his sadistic followers. But, when Peter blew the whistle, his body was possessed by this creepy Satan-worshiper. Between Mary Jane, the salty sailor, and a wise old woman in town, they must stop Peter from raising Hell on Northport Bay on Halloween.

As a breezy horror paperback, Devil Wind is a lot of fun to read. The four key characters made a great team-up to fight the forces of evil, complimented by the authors' emphasis on character development (despite the short page count). It's a young-adult novel, so don't expect any Jack Ketchum or Bryan Smith slaughterhouse action. Instead, the storyline is your classic small-town horror that places average people into extreme situations. I got the vibe of John Carpenter's excellent The Fog, so if that's your palette, then this should please any age group. 

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Flesh Parade

In the 1960s, Lawrence Block wrote many, many sleazy sex paperbacks under a variety of pseudonyms. Most were pretty mediocre, but some were kind of excellent in their own way. Flesh Parade is one of the good ones. It was published in 1962 under the pseudonym Andrew Shaw, and remains available today as a paperback, e-book, or audiobook.

Our “hero” is 21 year-old Tony Cross, and he is fresh out of the U.S. Air Force and looking to start a new life pumping gas or changing tires in his hometown of Norfolk, Virginia. He sees a pretty girl at the bus station, and decides to go to Cleveland with her in hopes of an encounter.

Along the way, Tony gets off the bus to get laid, and temporarily settles down in a small town. There he is propositioned by a bartender to commit a smuggling crime in and out of Canada with a woman the bartender assigns him. On this trip, he discovers the wonders of marijuana.

In a normal Lawrence Block novel, this would have been the spark for a series of criminal misadventures. However, this is a 1960s sex book written under a pseudonym. The paperback is really a coming-of-age story about a guy choosing to travel across the country getting laid at every stop. He does some pretty immoral things along the way, and the listener reader is left wondering if he will find any kind of ethical redemption or even love?

As far as plots go, it’s actually fairly weak. The sex scenes are plenty hot for the era and somewhat disturbing at times. Tony is not a good person, and you should not be rooting for him. He leaves a trail of broken hearts and broken lives behind and treats women as conquests. But he’s a dysfunctional character in a completely interesting way.

The reason you should read and enjoy this novels because the writing is very crisp. It’s noticeably a Lawrence Block novel, almost a darker prototype for the Chip Harrison books from slightly later in his career. The pages flew by and left the reader wondering how Tony would get out of one mess only to find himself enmeshed in another.

Flesh Parade is not a sleaze fiction masterpiece. If you’re looking for that, check out the novels of Orrie Hitt. But I think you could do a lot worse than this book. It was compelling as hell and you should check it out if you’re into this type of thing. Recommended. 

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The Magpie Coffin

The genre “splatter western” came to fruition when Patrick C. Harrison III of Death's Head Press made it a company goal to release a series of western trade paperbacks featuring explicit violence and gore. There have been at least 13 paperbacks published by Death's Head Press as their “splatter western” offerings, but countless others have appeared from various self-published authors and small publishers. I've always enjoyed the western genre, so I borrowed a friend's copy of The Magpie Coffin (2020). It was written by Wile E. Young and represents the very first Death's Head Press splatter western title published. 

The Black Magpie is the book's anti-hero protagonist, a moniker heaped upon a notorious outlaw named Salem Covington. He's an American Civil-War Veteran that prowls the wild frontier (for reasons never really disclosed) killing and torturing bad people (?). He collects pieces of his victims – pieces of flesh, scraps of clothing – and uses them in black magic rituals to gain power. He possesses a gun that apparently (and magically) doesn't miss and it is revealed that Covington can't be killed by bullets. So, who the Hell is he then?

That's the part that Young never really dishes out to his reader, and that's the most frustrating part of the book's narrative. For reasons unclear to me, the author only provides hints of Covington's backstory and life purpose. For example, there is a brand of some sort below Covington's eye that provokes stark fear for anyone that sees it. But, what is it? Young really doesn't elaborate. There's an entire scene in the book where readers finally have the opportunity to learn more about Covington's mission when he meets “the coffin maker”. This man has some sort of history with Covington, but nothing specific is ever mentioned. It's all incredibly frustrating and senseless.

The Magpie Coffin's narrative features Covington on the revenge trail for the group of killers that murdered his mentor, a Comanche shaman named Dead Bear. Covington locates Dead Bear's corpse (far too easily) and puts him in a coffin wrapped in chains. But, Dead Bear is still somehow alive spiritually, which begs the question on why Dead Bear doesn't just perform his own revenge. Nevertheless, Covington rescues a young Union soldier and a prostitute and takes the two with him on a quest to hunt down the killers.

If you enjoy graphic violence often found in the horror and splatterpunk genre, then the sheer levels of brutality should be a pleasure for you. Like I wrote in my review for Suburban Gothic (co-wrote by a splatter western author Bryan Smith), the details of raping a corpse, scissoring off testicles, or sewing lips shut does nothing for me. It's all shock and awe, which isn't a satisfying substitute for a riveting story. There's not enough left in The Magpie Coffin contents to warrant a compelling read. This is standard volume feedback with gore. Nothing more, nothing less. Skip it.

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Someone's Watching

Andrew Neiderman is a Paperbacks from Hell kinda guy. He was born in 1940 and became a best-selling novelist with his 19th career novel, The Devil's Advocate, which was later adapted into the 1997 film starring Al Pacino and Keanu Reeves. Before that, he was writing horror paperbacks with covers featuring dolls, skeletons, haunted houses, and killer dogs. In total, he has authored nearly 50 novels, all of which are either horror or suspense. He was even able to temporarily ghostwrite under the name V.C. Andrews, which is like a legal ticket to print money. Needless to say, the guy is doing okay with the bank tellers. My only experience reading his stuff is a creepy looking 1983 horror paperback from Pocket Books called Someone's Watching. 

The book is set in a rural small town in northern New York and features two protagonists, 18-year old mechanic Marty and his step-sister, fifteen year-old high-schooler Judy. Immediately, your mind is going back to the mid-20th century sleaze paperbacks from Midwood that fixated on the 'ole brother-sister-swingding. Your mind isn't playing tricks on you, because sure enough Marty and Judy get to swingin' when Marty's alcoholic deadbeat father Frank marries Judy's gullible imbecile mother Elaine. One happy family.

So Frank is a drunk pervert 99% of the day, which makes it really uncomfortable for innocent Judy. After moving into Frank's house, Judy confides in nice guy Marty that she feels as if Frank is wanting to rape her. Marty, who knows his Dad is a total douche, sympathizes with Judy and promises to protect her in case Frank gets out of hand. With Elaine and Marty out of the house, it's just a matter of time before Frank gets randy. When Marty returns home, he catches Frank in the midst of raping Judy. Grabbing the closest blunt object to repel a rapist, Marty clunks Frank over the head. Hard. Frank hits the ground and Marty totally panics.

Like a good 1950s crime-noir tale, Marty refuses to see the logic of summoning the police to explain Judy's rape and ensuing scuffle. Instead, they do what any step-siblings in love do – they pack their bags and hit the fugitive highway to live and love. Here's where things get pretty darn creepy and horrifying in this vintage horror paperback. 

The duo decides the best place to hide is an old abandoned resort area in the Catskill Mountains. It's here that a sprawling hotel once thrived with a casino, baseball field, and deluxe swimming pool. But, decades ago the place went under financially and the bank repossessed it. Oddly, aside from dust, broken light fixtures, and black mold, most of the complex is still fully furnished and usable. Oh, and there's a homicidal mentally-disturbed person living in the attic. That's sort of the problem right there. The murderer.

Approximately 100 pages are spent on Judy and Marty exploring the old hotel and learning more about its history. The only other person besides the three of them (Judy, Marty, Killer) is an old man that owns the hotel. You see he is also mentally ill and living in the hotel thinking it is still thriving and filled with happy tourists. In his dementia, he doesn't know any other way besides continuing to work at the hotel and providing support for his imaginary workers and guests. This old man has a son-in-law (real guy) that randomly delivers food via the back door. 

While Neiderman spends a great deal of time on Marty and Judy, including some tepid sex scenes, most of the book is divided into perspectives of different characters. The first is obviously Marty and Judy, but the second, and most interesting, is the perspective of the deranged lunatic living in the building's attic space. This guy's identity is relatively unknown for most of the book, and his mental headspace is a perverted creepy wonderland. Think of being trapped in the mind of say...Norman Bates (Psycho). The narrative slowly builds to the inevitable confrontation, when all three parties eventually run into each other in the massive hotel. There's also another character that eventually ends up there too, but I won't spoil it for you here. 

Listen, this isn't the best horror or suspense novel you'll read. But, the idea of having an abandoned resort hotel as a sprawling “do what you want” wonderland is pretty darn amazing. The aspect of hotel exploration was really intriguing, and it compares to the more superior novel Creepers by David Morrell. When it wants to be creepy and psychologically enthralling, it is. Unfortunately, the old man's participation in the narrative was a real downer. The novel would have worked better with just the three characters. But, overall, this one is worth reading. 

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Death Tour

In Stephen King's Danse Macabre, the 1978 horror novel Death Tour is described as “funny/horrible”. The book, authored by a rather obscure guy named David J. Michael, made an appearance in Grady Hendrix's Paperbacks from Hell, and is often a novel lumped in erroneously with the “fall, mauled, and clawed” animal-attack genre that permeated the 1970s and 1980s. No matter which cover used, the hardback version published by Bobbs-Merrill Company in 1978 or the NEL 1980 paperback (painting by Bob Martin), both versions suggests the book feeds the urban myth of raging, ravenous alligators attacking unsuspecting maintenance workers and sewage tourists (they exist!). 

Unlike David Hagberg's 1976 genuine sewer-dwelling creature-feature Croc, reviewed right HERE, Death Tour isn't really a gator-munchin' tale at all. It just seems that way.

Tom Marsh is a journalism student that leads a five-member band of spunky production workers contributing to the University, a college news-rag. It's a hip group of kids, cleverly calling themselves Five-Star, that drive around in a hearse to investigate sensational newsworthy incidents. Tom's girlfriend Mary is in the group, and their relationship is central to the narrative. Mary's father, a disgruntled sanitation manager that oversees shit (literally), is overprotective and absolutely despises Tom, aka Academic Scholar. 

Through Mary, Tom learns that there is a real possibility that alligators are ravaging the city's sewer pipes. You see, this was a thing that started in New York City in the 1970s, when people would purchase baby alligators from pet stores. When responsibility and space became too cumbersome, owners flushed their beloved reptiles down the toilet where they grew into monstrous creatures devouring underpaid union workers. The flushing of the reptiles probably happened, but nothing resembling the mass hysteria created by the film Alligator (1980). 

Soon, the Five-Star gang are driving their hearse to a nearby manhole cover where they descend into the madness with a dead duck and lots of camping gear. While the hunt for a gator was fun, the narrative was really bogged down with a lot of filler and sludge. I almost threw in the towel...or toilet paper...but by 100 of 193 pages, this novel rose through the mediocre crap to be totally badass. 

It turns out that alligators may or may not be in the sewer, but the real menace is human. When one of the group is impaled with a metal spear, the Five-Star gang discover a grizzled, cloaked human living in this nasty underwater dwelling. Does Death Tour become Hunter's Blood in the sewers? It's not quite the “cannibals hunting humans” gimmick you're thinking of. But, there is definitely a similar cool vibe throughout the book's third act. I was pleasantly surprised to learn what the real menace was and it neatly tied up an earlier plot development.

By no means is Death Tour riveting, well-written action-adventure. Nor is it a shocking, white-knuckle terror-ride. It doesn't have to be. Instead, this obscure novel demanded my attention and I was well-rewarded with a fun reading experience. This was really enjoyable and I highly recommend hunting down a copy. Don't listen to Stephen King. It isn't funny or horrible, it's just a damn good time.

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