NO DOMINION by Charlie Huston

No Dominion is Charlie Huston's second novel to feature vampire tough guy Joe Pitt, and in it we find Pitt a little down on his luck. He got on the wrong side of the largest Vampyre Clan on Manhattan—The Coalition—when he shut down one of their most profitable operations, and without them giving him the odd job Pitt has a difficult time making a living. He’s down to three pints of blood—well below his desired minimum—and he doesn’t have the money to pay his rent this month.

That's when Pitt gets a call from an old buddy. Terry is the leader of The Society, and the vampire who took Joe under his wing shortly after he had been turned, and they have a long history. Pitt was Terry’s strong-arm man for several years, and now Joe lives on Society territory at Terry's goodwill.

Terry wants Joe to look into something troubling in vampire land—the younger vampires are using a new drug that may have dire implications on not only The Society, but also the entire vampire population of Manhattan. This is where the story begins, but it doesn’t end until Joe travels the length of the Island through enemy territory, risks his life more than once and finds betrayal behind every helpful hand.

No Dominion is not your mother's vampire story. Joe Pitt is more Mike Hammer than Lestat, and it works very, very well. The underbelly of Manhattan is painted in broad, vibrant strokes and seemingly comes alive with stark description and hard action. Charlie Huston is a crime writer, and he writes with an old style—it feels like an old noir story filled with grimy streets and dives and working stiffs who can’t catch a break. It is all this, but No Dominion is also a vampire story, and a damn good one.

My only gripe, and it really isn't much of one, is it took Huston about 50-pages to really get the story moving. The opening was spent setting up the action to come, and a few times, I wanted just a little less explanation about Vampyre politics, and a little more action. But once Huston let the engine off idle, No Dominion jammed and I was sorry to find the last page

This is another reprint. It went live at SFReader 27-June-2007.

Breaking Bad

My wife and I finished the first season of the television series Breaking Bad last night; all seven episodes. Not nearly enough. Breaking Bad is the best episodic program I've seen on television in the last few years. It is the story of Walt White, a father, husband, and public school science teacher. In the opening episode he is diagnosed with lung cancer and the rest of the story--the season--chronicles Walt's attempts to leave his family something.

Walt's wife is pregnant and his son is handicapped. He left a successful career as a research scientist to teach and he doesn't have much except a crummy old Pontiac Aztec and an unfulfilling job. He doesn't have money, respect, or any other damn thing. He doesn't care what happens to him, but he is terrified at what will happen to his family after he dies.

Breaking Bad is a wonderful mix of comedy and drama. Walt is perfectly portrayed as the aggrieved protagonist by Bryan Cranston. He unveils a character who is much more than a victim. He is a man who has played by the rules his entire life and now, when the unfairness of everything crashes down, he chooses to do something about it.

What really makes Walt and the show work is that Walt discovers he likes taking control of his destiny. He finds it empowering and very fulfilling, which creates an interesting tension between law and order and survival. A tension that tightens with each act and episode.

The journey is painful, embarrassing and voyeuristic. The audience is part of the family and the often uncomfortable scenes of a family dealing with death are chilling and dry, but the death and depression are accompanied by a desperate and dark humor that soften the edges just enough. Breaking Bad is simply awesome, and it very nearly makes me want to order cable.

THE POKER CLUB: Official Trailer

I posted a link to the official trailer of the film The Poker Club a few weeks ago, but I found it on YouTube and I can embed it. I like that for a few reasons, but the single best reason is because it looks cool on my blog. Shallow, but true.

The Poker Club is based on the novel of the same title by Ed Gorman. It is scheduled to be released on DVD April 21, 2009 and it looks pretty great.

New Rat Pack Cover Art

Good news. The latest Rat Pack novel by Bob Randisi is scheduled for release and the cover art is drifting around the Internet. The title: You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Kills You. The release date: September 15, 2009. Nobody is Randisi's fourth Rat Pack novel and if it is as good as its predecessors it will be pretty damn good.

The Rat Pack novels feature Sands pit boss Ed G--he made friends with Frank, Dino and the boys in the first novel and he stays busy keeping trouble away from the pack. These are Randisi's best novels since the Joe Keough books and they are very much worth tracking down.

Now if a paperback house would pick them up.

AFTERLIFE by Douglas Clegg

Douglas Clegg is, one book at a time, proving himself one of the best horror writers working today, and he is in top form with his latest novel Afterlife. Julie Hutchinson is a suburban housewife, the mother of a young girl and wife of a successful Doctor. Her life seems perfect, a large house, a beautiful family, but everything is not as it seems. Her husband is brutally murdered. The police think him the victim of a serial killer who carves tattoos across the back and shoulders of his victims. Julie isn’t so certain. Her mentally unstable step-son, the product of her husband's first marriage, cuts similar designs into his own arm on the very day his father is killed. Their daughter claims her father, Hut, is visiting her in the dark hours of night, and perhaps more disturbing are the erotic dreams Julie begins having shortly after the murder.

Mr Clegg has an ability to create believable, realistic characters—they have the feel and quality of a neighbor, or even a sibling, a parent—and tighten the suspense and terror as they slowly descend into their own private nightmare. Julie slowly isolates herself from her family and friends as she investigates the strange events that surround her life. She makes arrangements to catch the ghost that visits her daughter on video, and when she finally catches a glimpse it is much more than she bargained for.

She enlists the help of a television psychic, and together they uncover pieces of her husbands past. Things Julie never knew, things she never wanted to know. The key to the mystery is a defunct psychic research center called Daylight. It is located in an old warehouse. Hut, her husband, died with the door key in his pocket. The mystery builds until Julie no longer knows what, or who to believe. She is either mad, or everything she has discovered is real. The novel weaves a spell of the occult, the supernatural and death. It is violent, real, and truly frightening.

This novel is something beyond the normal everyday horror fare. The characters are fresh, the plot is original and the story is damn good. Be warned, there is a fair amount of graphic sex, but it really is essential to the plot. It heightens the suspense and moves the story forward. This novel is not for the timid, but it is definitely for anyone who loves a good story, a good scare, and great writing. Afterlife is as good as the modern horror novel gets.

A NOTE. This review originally went live on SFReader September 3, 2005. I've hit a busy stretch at work over the past week or so, and I'm also in the final weeks of the semester so things may be a little quiet around here. Although I'm still going to try to get two to three posts up a week. I hope. I do have a few reviews planned: The Secret Keeper by Paul Harris, No Exit from Brooklyn by Robert J. Randisi, and Cage of Night by Ed Gorman.

Meme: Chapter 11

A unique idea came from Central Crime Zone's Jon Jordan (I learned about it from a post by The Rap Sheet's J. Kingston Pierce) for a meme. The idea? Post the first line of chapter 11 from the book you are currently reading. If you haven't guessed already, it is an homage--is that the right word?--to the financiers that are "too big to fail."

How do you get too big to fail? I need that in my next employment contract.

Without further ado...

The current novel sitting on my nightstand is the quiet and literate thriller The Secret Keeper by first-time novelist Paul Harris. The line fits nicely into the style and mood of the story: regretful, moody, and just a little nostalgic.

"Danny awoke as dawn slipped in through the open curtains."

The only problem? That line is too short--not for the novel, but for this post--so I decided I would punish you a little more. Just a little, and rest assured the only real punishment is my writing and not that of the authors.

I just finished an early Robert J. Randisi novel, which was terrific and with a little luck and work ethic may actually get reviewed here one day, titled No Exit From Brooklyn. It features P.I. Nick Delvecchio in a very Brooklyn story. The first line of the eleventh chapter stars a name many of you will be familiar with.

"Ed Gorman had had his nose broken so many times that it seemed to have ceased to exist."

One more. This one really is for the big boys--the AIGs, Citigroups, and Merrill Lynchs of the world. It is the final chapter--chapter 11--in a textbook I'm reading for my graduate program. The title? Managing Business Ethics. Ethics? Well, here it is...

"With the increasing globalization of business, more managers are finding themselves in an international environment full of ethical challenges."

Hmmm.

"The Plunge" by David Goodis

Spoiler Alert. This review is basically one big spoiler, so read with care.

David Goodis is a writer that every hardboiled reader should know. His work is dark—about as dark as you will ever read—heavy and literate. It is often difficult to differentiate between the good and the bad, and the tales are drenched with a self-loathing that gives the stories a deep and sinister glimpse into the darkness of the human condition.

His short story “The Plunge” is one of his best, and a perfect example of what Goodis did well—create men who are, for the most part, good and then twist their world just enough to push them out of bounds into waiting darkness.

Roy Childers is a clean cop in a corrupt department. He has risen through the ranks quickly; he is a homicide lieutenant with a bright future. He has four children and another on the way. His wife loves him and he seemingly loves his wife, but that isn’t enough for Roy. He doesn’t consciously understand that he wants more, but he does.

His world begins its slow descent when a warehouse is taken down for $15,000. The robber killed one security guard and blinded the other. It is a trademark Dice Nolan score. Dice is a man whom Childers has a special connection; they grew up on the same street and Roy has put him behind bars more than once. Now Childers wants to take Nolan down one last time, but he isn’t ready for what happens. Nolan has something Roy wants and it will be his undoing.

“The Plunge” is a brutal story. It chronicles the unwinding of a man. A man who seemingly has everything. A man who is better than his end. And a man who should know better. It is literate and the prose is pitch-perfect:

“Seven out of ten are slobs; he was thinking. There was no malice or disdain in the thought. It was more a mixture of pity and regret. And that made it somewhat sickening, for he was referring specifically to the other men who wore badges, he fellow-policemen. More specifically he was thinking of the nine plainclothesmen attached to the Vice Squad. Only yesterday they’d been caught with their palms out, hauled in before the Commissioner, and called all sorts of names before they were suspended.”

The story opens in normal enough fashion. The protagonist is a cop who wants to find a murderer. There is even something special and personal about this particular criminal, but Mr Goodis takes the premise and smudges it with his own recipe. He marks it with weakness and greed. He takes a good and strong man and chops him down with life, fear, and hunger.

The best part is, he does it all without ever losing his grip on the story or its impact on the reader. He makes it interesting and entertaining from beginning to end. He builds a path into darkness and then shows the reader the way out—a cleansing, but a rather messy and permanent one.

“The Plunge” originally appeared in Mike Shayne’s Mystery Magazine October 1958. I read it in A Century of Noir edited by Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins.

NORTH STAR by Richard S. Wheeler

The Skye novels are unique. They are a blend of the historical literary with the tall-tale dime novel. The characters—Skye particularly—are larger than life, but the beauty of the west and the context of the novels is pure literature. North Star is the 17^th title and it is no exception. It is well-written, beautifully detailed, and a touch melancholy as, what feels like the final Barnaby Skye story, is told.

Mister Skye is breaking down with age. He is sixty-five. His eyesight is blurring, and his body aches from too many cold nights on the hard ground beneath his lodge. He yearns for a home: A white man’s home with a wood floor, windows, a soft bed, furniture and rocking chair on the front porch. He has witnessed the west from the early days of the fur trade to the current westward expansion of the white man. It is the end an era—the west is opening up for the homesteader and rancher, but it is closing around the Indian tribes like a noose.

Skye is not a wealthy man. The fur is long since gone and there is little need for guide work in these modern times. He and his two Indian wives—Victoria and Mary—live with Victoria’s Absaroka People. Skye knows money will be a problem, but he also knows he needs a home to grow old in. He also has a place in mind in the Yellowstone Valley. It is a place where the old trappers would often meet in the old days and share stories and trade goods. It is near water, there are warm springs, game and enough beauty to last forever. Unfortunately—as is usually the case—everything that can go wrong, does.

North Star is a melancholy story. It is a story about age and change, but it is also a story about returns—Skye has stayed clear of his own people. He has lived with the Indians for years, but as age captures him he has the need to return to the life his people—the white man—live: a house, a warm stove, furniture, a bed.

The story is told expertly with a weaving and sundry plotline—it isn’t straight and clean, but rather it curls around Skye and his family with destiny’s own uncaring and callous style. It is told in third person and the perspective changes between Skye, his wives and his son Dirk. The prose is vibrant, melancholy and often beautiful with its subtle textures and understated style:

“They reached the riverbank during a spring squall, and continued westward along a worn trail, while wrapped in good blankets. That cold night they raised the lodge and found warmth and peace within.”

North Star is a tale that truly captures the spirit of the west. It is beautiful, harsh, and always dependent on the whimsy of nature. If you think the western is dead, you should read this book. Hell, everyone should read this book.

UPDATE: I received a kind email from Richard Wheeler. Apparently North Star isn't the last of Barnaby Skye. He has a two book contract with Forge to continue the series. The next novel is complete and is titled The Owl Hunt. He said about the next two books, "The next Skye novels will feature Skye's half-blood son North Star, or Dirk, and will be about early reservation life, and how Indians desperately tried to survive on a piece of land handed to them by white governments."

He also had more good news. He has another biographical novel scheduled for release later this year titled Snowbound. It "is about John Charles Fremont's disastrous Fourth Expedition, in which he lost a third of his men and all 130 of his mules in the San Juan mountains in winter--for no good reason at all."

Navarone

I learned something interesting a few weeks ago—Alistair MacLean’s Navarone series (The Guns of Navarone and its somewhat less successful sequel Force 10 from Navarone) has been continued by British author Sam Llewellyn. Llewellyn is best known, at least at my house, as the author of eight sea adventure / mystery novels published by Pocket Books; beginning with Dead Reckoning (1987) and ending with Maelstrom (1994).

Mr Llewellyn wrote two Navarone novels in the 1990s. The titles were never published in the United States and the reviews over at Amazon are less than glowing, but damn, two new novels featuring the boys from Navarone; two novels written by a writer whom I haven’t read in a decade or more, but a writer who could spin a terrific mystery / adventure story.

The titles are: Storm Force from Navarone (1996) and Thunderbolt from Navarone (1998).

The Amazon.com description of Storm Force:

“Alistair MacLean's gritty heroes from Navarone are not dead, and definitely not forgotten. Mallory, Miller and Andrea, the surviving commandos of Force 10 from Navarone, are sent on operation Storm Force a perilous mission through the Pyrenees to disable the greatest threat to the success of the D-Day landings, the Werewolf U-boats. They have less than six days to locate the subs and destroy them, operating outside of normal channels, without any backup . . . a true mission impossible, and a worthy modern successor to the original novels.”

The description for Thunderbolt:

“Fresh from their mission against Werewolf U-Boats, Mallory, Miller and Andrea are summoned to Naval HQ and given their mission: to reconnoiter Kynthos and determine the German development of the lethal V3 rocket, and destroy any facilities. A rocket expert accompanies them but can they trust him.”

My only hesitation? I was burned more than once by those disappointing “Alistair MacLean” novels written by Alastair MacNeill (Death Train, Red Alert, Code Breaker, etc) a decade or so ago.

Although, to be fair, Alistair MacLean couldn’t write Alistair MacLean past about 1970. Wow, that sounds snarky.

CAPE FEAR and THE EXECUTIONERS

There have been two films based on John D. MacDonald's 1958 novel The Executioners. The first is a minor classic of dark suspense that starred Gregory Peck and Robert Mitchum. It was titled Cape Fear and was directed by J. Lee Thompson. The screenplay was written by James R. Webb.

Cape Fear was released in 1962, one year after Thompson's successful adaptation of Alastair MacLean's novel The Guns of Navarone.



The second adaptation was based on the screenplay of the first film. It was released in 1991 and starred Robert DeNiro, Nick Nolte and Jessica Lange. It was directed by Martin Scorcese. The screenplay was written by Wesley Strick.



The first film was the most successful. It captured the voice and tension of the novel--with some notable changes--and did it without the trickery and over-the-top-scares of the later production. Although I must admit I enjoyed both of these films a whole lot. And the novel was even better.

A little J. Lee Thompson trivia. Thompson directed numerous films from the 1950s to the 1980s. His work includes MacKenna's Gold (1969), Conquest and Battle of the Planet of the Apes (1972 & 1973), The Passage (1979), The Evil That Men Do (1984), and Death Wish 4 (1989). He was nominated for Best Director Oscar for The Guns of Navarone.

SCORPION'S DANCE by Warren Murphy

The past several months I have been re-discovering the work of Warren Murphy. I’ve read a handful of his novels, mostly thrillers from the 1980s, and I have been impressed. Impressed enough to have at least one of his novels in my to-be-read pile all the time. The current resident is the thriller Honor Among Thieves.

The title I just finished is Scorpion’s Dance. A novel that I enjoyed, but not for the reasons I thought I would enjoy it—the plot meandered a little, there wasn’t much action, but there was the trademark humor, and the characters where damn fun.

The United States and Russia form an elite joint-task force to counter an active terrorist organization called Tenterallah that is led by the illusive Abu Beka. As the novel opens Tenterallah is executing a successful ambush at Da Vinci Airport in Rome; seven passengers are killed and another 24 are injured.

The surviving terrorists are arrested, but quickly escape with the help of an outside party. At least that is how it seems until the escaped men are found dead hanging—in the hollowed husks of pigs—from a statue of the Madonna in the plaza in a small Italian village. The dead men have two notes attached that read:

“To the killers of babies and women: your turn in the pigskin is coming.”

and

“You Tenterallah butchers have run out of time. Abu Beka, you are next.”

The terrorists quickly become the victims of their own terror and the operation is controlled from the business offices of Mark Donovan. Mark is a wealthy businessman who, along with a Russian KGB officer named Petrov, plans to wipe Tenterallah off the map in a small and very well-funded operation. Unfortunately the pair has an unwitting mole on the fringe of their group and as they make the war personal for Abu Beka, Mr Beka brings the terror to their doorstep.

Scorpion’s Dance didn’t focus on the grass roots operation of Donovan and Petrov, but rather it was presented as a wide-angle perspective. Mr Murphy created a world for the two protagonists that included family, friends, lovers, and social events. It also included the occasional foray into the dark world of spies and law enforcement, but those scenes were rationed and used as climax pieces to unsettle and then pace the story; quite effectively too.

This quality made it very different from the usual thriller fare of the 1980s—it was published in 1990—when the Tom Clancy style thriller was king and it was a similar story, but Murphy cast his own unique storytelling on the entire operation. There was humor—the first few chapters in particular Murphy cast a humorous and telling light on journalism. When there is no news, they interview each other. And then do it again. The prose was smooth and very readable. The characters were witty and charming, and the bad guys were bad.

Scorpion’s Dance is an entertaining novel. It showcases Mr Murphy’s vast talent, and while it is not his best work, it is worth reading simply because it entertains in a smooth and easy style. It runs nearly 500 pages, but it doesn’t drag or bog and when it ended I was sorry to see it go.

The Poker Club Trailer

Good news. There is a trailer for the film The Poker Club available on the Internet. If you don't know it's based on the novel of the same title by Ed Gorman. It was directed by Tim McCann, the screenplay was written by Richard Chizmar--of Cemetery Dance fame--and Johnathon Schaech, it stars a few relatively familiar names including Loren Dean, Judy Reyes, Johnny Messner, and Johnathon Scaech.

To watch the trailer on IMDB click Here.

It looks like Sony picked up the distribution rights and the DVD release is scheduled April 21, 2009.

The description over at Yahoo Movies reads:

Four buddies discover and accidentally kill a burglar--who may not be alone--in the kitchen during their weekly poker night. Their lives and the lives of their families are forever changed by the difficult choices they must make.

The Covers of First Blood

A few weeks ago--maybe a month?--I followed suit with several other blogs and posted several images of different cover art for Alistair MacLean's H.M.S. Ulysses. I had such a good time with that one, that I decided to do it again. Only this time I've chosen David Morrell's classic novel First Blood. I'm partial to the original paperback edition published by Fawcett--simple, but cool.

The British versions are in the right column and the American editions are on the left.

ALREADY DEAD by Charlie Huston

Already Dead is the story of Manhattan P.I. Joe Pitt. He is tough, violent, and cynical. Or in other words, he is a study of the classical hardboiled loner private eye, with one catch: he is a vampire. In Charlie Huston's third novel he makes the transition from hard-boiled suspense to hard-boiled horror look simple.

Huston takes the familiar, Manhattan, and creates an underworld of undead. They live, breathe, work, and basically do their best to survive without bringing undue attention to themselves. They are infected with a rare blood virus. A virus that animates them, slows their aging process, increases their strength, improves their eyesight, and essentially makes them into creatures of the night. This however is where the generic vampire mythology ends, and Huston's underground world of the undead begins. Crosses are no bother, holy water is just water, garlic is um, garlic, and they have no problem combing their hair or applying makeup while looking in a mirror. Their only real problems are, they need uninfected human blood to survive; sunlight causes skin tumors to grow at grossly accelerated rates; and politics.

The politics are what makes Pitt's world a less than desirable place. The vampires associate in clans: The Coalition, The Society, and Enclave are the big ones, and their major goal is to keep the disease a secret from the masses. Their second goal is to put the other clans out of business, and Joe Pitt, being a free agent, is caught square in the middle.

The plot reads like standard detective fare: Pitt is hired by a beautiful, seductive woman to find her runaway daughter. The Coalition squeezes him to find and dispose of the "carrier" that is spreading zombie bacterium around the city, and The Society wants to know exactly what errands Pitt is running for the Coalition, and why; while the supernatural cult-like Enclave gives Pitt a little surprise of their own. Pitt is caught in a battle of power, vice, politics and downright evil. Before the final page is turned, his life, the life of his client, and the tenuous peace of the vampire clans will all be in jeopardy. Not to mention his girlfriend--his very human girlfriend--will require some damn good explanations for everything that is happening in Pitt's world.

Already Dead is an original take on the vampire story. The prose is hardboiled and tough. Joe Pitt, the tough guy anti-hero, is a mixture of fabled private dicks Travis McGee and Mike Hammer. He is hard and violent like Hammer, but Huston adds a dash of McGee--an uncanny understanding and humanist philosophy of his condition--to keep Pitt likable and believable.

Already Dead will appeal to fans of the vampire genre, crime and detective fiction, noir, straight horror, dark fantasy and even television's Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

This review originally appeared at SFReader 21-Sep-2006.

Three Alistair MacLean Trailers

A few weeks ago I posted five trailers based on the work of Alistair MacLean, and over the weekend I found a few more. I haven’t seen The Satan Bug, but I have seen the other two films—Force 10 from Navarone and River of Death. I have fond memories of Force 10; although it isn’t even close to the equal of The Guns of Navarone. But River of Death? It stars Michael Dudikoff. Enough said? Enjoy.

Force 10 from Navarone



The Satan Bug

River of Death

LINE OF FIRE by Donald Hamilton

Paul Nyquist is an expert shot. He owns and operates a gunsmith shop in Capitol City and his evenings are spent with a local gangster—Carl Gunderman. A man with whom he shares a dark secret and also a man who is, while not a really a friend, the only person Nyquist feels comfortable with.

The novel opens with Nyquist at the window of an upper floor of an office building. He has a rifle in his hand and a jumpy low-level tough guy at his side. It is a warm day. And when the target walks from the building across the street Nyquist carefully takes aim and fires. The man goes down hard, and unexpectedly, the door of the little office the two men occupy opens by the hand of a young woman who asks: “What was that awful noise?”

The job goes sour in a hurry and Nyquist is forced to take an action he isn’t proud of. The rest of the novel is Paul Nyquist’s dangerous and unhealthy attempts to get himself and a witness out the quagmire of a favor gone very badly wrong. And it very well may be the end of not only Nyquist’s relationship with the gangster, but the end of Paul Nyquist.

Line of Fire was first published in 1955 and it has all the hallmarks of the era; it is dark, sparse, quick and very entertaining. It is filled with an abundance of technical shooting details. The plot is thrilling—there are more than a few jolts and twists that I didn’t see coming. There is murder, betrayal, suspicion, and even a dab of friendship, tenderness and love.

The prose is tight and very readable:

“Four hundred yards is a long way, even for a bullet traveling better than twice the speed of sound. The gun came back at me with authority, throwing the scope up off the target; the room shook with the blast of the .30-caliber cartridge.”

The action is well-scripted and perfectly paced within the bullet-fast plot. The dialogue has the feel of authenticity, and the dark sorrow and regret of the protagonist is done without the self-pity that would turn the reader off. The truly amazing element of the novel is the setting and description. Hamilton creates a detailed atmosphere with seemingly minimal effort. The reader is in the room with Nyquist when he pulls the trigger and that tangible sensibility and realism is carried to the final page.

Line of Fire is, without a doubt, the best novel I have read in 2009—some 54 years after its first publication. I have read a handful of Donald Hamilton novels, mostly from his Matt Helm series, but I have never had a great affinity to his work until this minor masterpiece.

Everything worked; the plot, the characters, the dialogue, the action, the setting, the description. It is a novel that packs more punch than any modern thriller I have read and it comes in at a shockingly short 159 pages. And I can tell you that Donald Hamilton is now on my watch list. Permanently.

VIETNAM: GROUND ZERO: THE FALL OF CAMP A-555 by Eric Helm

Mack Gerber is a captain in the US Army Green Berets in wartime Vietnam. He is also the commanding officer of Special Forces Camp A-555 near the Plain of Reeds. The year is 1965 and the novel opens with a general officer ordering Gerber to take his entire force into the field near the Cambodian border on a search and rescue mission.

A VIP was in a transport plane that crashed in the jungle. Gerber is uneasy about the orders, but he can’t find a contradicting order from within his chain of command so he takes his men—the Americans and most of the Tai strikers on the mission. The only problem is he left the wrong group at the base. When he returns he discovers the A-555 has been overran by the Viet Cong. The rest of the novel is Gerber’s attempts at retaking his base without getting the hostages—a general officer and a reporter—killed in the process.

I enjoyed these novels as a teenager and I have to admit that they haven’t held-up as well as I would like, but these books aren't bad. The action is well crafted and the men are also fleshed out fairly well in a men’s adventure sort of way.

The prose is smooth and easy to read. It is very much like the style made popular by Tom Clancy; at moments just a little more gritty and interesting. The plotlines are formulaic, but within the confines of the action and plot the authors do an excellent job of creating the visual and emotional elements of the war experience. The bravado and fear and male interaction are solidly developed and help lift the majority of these novels from the usual to something just a little better.

The Fall of Camp A-555 is the fourth title in the series and it fits perfectly with what the authors intended the series to be: quick, loads of action, and entertaining. The heroes are larger than life, but muted and balanced by the well-developed setting. The landscape and climate of Vietnam is well rendered and while the Vietnamese people are not developed beyond cardboard this title, and its place within the series, is an interesting and entertaining novel.

My favorite feature of these novels is the glossary at the back. It is a limited dictionary of slang used in Vietnam. The majority of the terms are seldom used in the novels, but the words and phrases are interesting. I can't vouch for the accuracy of the glossary, but still I like it. A few examples:

CO CONG: Female Vietcong solder

FIIGMO: F*ck It, I've Got My Orders. Pronounced fig-mo.

GO-TO-HELL RAG: Towel or any large cloth worn around the neck by grunts to absorb perspiration, clean their weapons and dry their hands.

LEGS: Derogatory term for regular infantry soldiers used by Airborne qualified troops. Also known as grunts.

The Vietnam: Ground Zero series consists of 27 novels. The first was published in 1986 and the final book was published in 1990; There were also four “super” Vietnam: Ground Zero titles published between 1988 and 1990. Gold Eagle published the series.

Eric Helm is a pseudonym for two writers: Kevin Randle and Robert Cornett. I’ve read—where and when is a mystery to me—that the name Eric Helm is a tribute to Donald Hamilton’s Matt Helm series. Matt Helm’s code name was Eric, and the two obviously share the same last name.

Kevin Randle is a familiar name in the late-night radio arena and ufology. He is the co-writer, with Donald Schmitt, of the best-selling books The UFO Crash at Roswell and The Truth About the UFO Crash at Roswell. He is also a prolific fiction writer; he has written in several genres including action and science fiction. 

Hubble Space Photos: Saturn

I enjoy the beautiful images the Hubble Space Telescope captures. It is the art of the natural world captured without the filter of our own atmosphere. The beauty is monumental and something that past generations were unable to enjoy. It makes me feel the wonder an awe of a child.

It's interesting that as our own world gets smaller and smaller the Universe gets larger and larger. There is so much out there that we have yet to discover let alone understand that it is inspiring and slightly frightening at the same time. Here are a few images of Saturn. A planet that isn't so far away and during the summer months can often be seen Southern sky. But nothing like this...

Infrared view of Saturn.


Saturn's moons.


The black spot at bottom-left is Titan's shadow.


Saturn.


These photographs are credited to: NASA, ESA and E. Karkoschka (University of Arizona). You can view many Hubble Space images at the official NASA website Here. All are in the public domain.

Eight for Entertainment -- Summer Edition

I get bogged down with life sometimes—work, family, and every other adult responsibility I have. The days seem to blend into one long week after another; and when that happens I like to find something, anything, to look forward to. Maybe a weekend, a road trip, a visit to a friend, a bookstore or something else that separates the living from the merely functioning. And if I can’t find the time for any of the above I like to hop on the web and visit a few bookstores and websites to find something of interest.

Which is exactly what I did today, and I found eight novels scheduled for release over the next few months that really made me happy. And maybe, just maybe these titles will make you happy, and even better give you something to look forward to as well.

March

Schemers by Bill Pronzini. Schemers is a Nameless Detective novel scheduled for release March 31, 2009 from Forge Books. The product description over at Amazon.com reads:

"Nameless wasn’t supposed to come into the office on Mondays; he wasn’t supposed to answer the phone. On this Monday, he did both. The call was from Barney Rivera—once a friend, now despised—at Great Western Insurance. Against his better judgment, Nameless agreed to meet with him. The investigation was relatively simple: a multimillionaire rare books collector had reported the theft of eight volumes, worth a half million dollars. From a locked library. To which he has the only key. The books were all crime fiction and suspense--a locked room mystery about mysteries.

This ordinary Monday brought a second oddball case. The Henderson brothers were being stalked. Someone had dug up the ashes of their late father and poured acid over them, then destroyed the headstone the same way, and left a sign warning that this was just the beginning. Searching for peace of mind and the distraction of work, Jake Runyon is more than happy to bring an end to the brothers' terror."

House Dick by E. Howard Hunt. House Dick is also scheduled for release the end of March, and it is written by the Watergate mastermind himself. I’ve only read one E. Howard Hunt novel—it was something like fifteen years ago—and for some reason this particular title really sounds appealing to me. I hope it is.

April

Hunt: At the Well of Eternity by Gabriel Hunt. This is the first in the new pulp series edited by Hard Case Crime’s Charles Ardai. It is a celebration of the old adventure pulp writers like H. Rider Haggard, Edgar Rice Burroughs, etc. I can’t wait to try this first title. It is scheduled for release April 28, 2009. This series has a bunch of terrific writers involved including a favorite of mine; James Reasoner. I'm wagering these books are great.

May

The Unforgiven by Alan LeMay. This is the third in Leisure’s Classic Film Collection and the second by Alan LeMay. It is the basis for the film of the same name that starred Burt Lancaster and Audrey Hepburn. It was directed by John Huston. The other Alan leMay novel in the series is The Searchers. It's sitting on my nightstand right now. I just need to get it read.

Guild by Ed Gorman. This is a reprint of Ed Gorman’s first western novel. He wrote three novels that featured Leo Guild, and this is the only one of the three that I haven’t read. The other two are terrific. Dorchester’s descriptions reads:

"Guild is a man tormented by his past. He already narrowly escaped one lynching, and he certainly isn’t about to get caught up in another one. He’s just a weary bounty hunter looking to collect his reward when he rides into the dusty Dakota town of Denton one evening. He doesn’t plan to stay long—until an old buddy and a beautiful woman convince him to change his mind. But some folks don’t like his presence in Denton. They don’t like the questions he’s asking and the insinuations he’s making. And they’ll do everything they can to make sure he leaves mighty quick—whether it’s on the back of a horse or in a narrow pine box."

July

The Shimmer by David Morrell. Morrell’s newest novel is scheduled for release July 7. Mr. Morrell described it on his website as a Michael Crichton-type thriller with a David Morrell style. That gets my attention, and I’m more than excited for it to hit the bookstores.But I usually can't pass-up a David Morrell novel.

The Midnight Room by Ed Gorman. Ed’s latest thriller is—it is an original paperback from Leisure—scheduled for release sometime in July. Probably towards the beginning, but I didn’t find an exact date on this one. It sounds awesome. The description at Leah Hultenschmidt’s Romantic Reads:

"It started as a burglary. That would have been bad enough. But when the masked intruder forced Dr. Olson at gunpoint to open his safe, the doctor knew he was really in trouble. In the safe were two DVDs, private movies he had made of those girls he had kidnapped…and killed. Suddenly the burglary became blackmail. But blackmailing a serial killer can be a dangerous game. Especially when he’s as smart—and good with a scalpel—as Dr. Olson."

August

High Bloods by John Farris. I have been a fan of John Farris for several years and this is his first new novel since 2007’s You Don’t Scare Me. A novel that was entertaining and oh so good. I’m excited to get my hands on this book for the simple reason that I have never read a Farris’ novel I didn’t like.

High Bloods is scheduled for release August 18.

It’s going to be a great summer of reading.

PRISON OF ICE by David Axton

Dean Koontz is a marvelously talented and prolific writer. His work carries back decades; his first published novel was one-half of an ACE Double SF titled Star Quest. He started out writing science fiction, but his work has evolved and changed extensively since his early days. And in his early days, like many writers, he worked in various genres and venues—he wrote science fiction, mystery, thriller, horror, and even gothic romance.

The bulk of Mr Koontz early work is out-of-print. I read once that when he hit the best-seller list he went on a buying frenzy—he purchased the rights of many of his early titles from the various publishers that owned them because he didn’t think most were worthy of marketing to his new, mainstream, audience. I’ve always admired that about Dean Koontz, but what I admire even more is his work. All of it, even the few titles I’ve read that he has made the decision to keep off the shelves, is pretty damn good.

I ran across his novel Prison of Ice in a thrift shop a few weeks ago and I couldn’t wait to crack it open. It was published in 1976 in hardcover by J.B. Lippincott, and then in mass market a year later by Fawcett Crest as by David Axton. It has since been updated—Koontz rewrote and republished it in 1995 as Icebound. He updated the technology and added something like 150 pages to the paperback. I’ve had Icebound in my collection for years, but never made time to read it, but when I found the original I couldn’t help myself.

A United Nations scientific team is conducting a research expedition in the hostile North Artic. They are studying the possibility of dislodging large segments of icebergs to transport and use as irrigation water in the western desert of the United States. The team consists of nine members, and when the novel opens eight are planting bombs in the ice in an attempt to separate a section from a large ice shelf.

A brutal storm is expected in the next few hours and the group is in a hurry to finish and get back to their base camp, but before they can a large tsunami-like wave hits the ice shelf—it was caused by multiple seismic incidents several hundred miles away on the ocean floor. The wave hits the ice shelf and separates the work area from the larger body of ice.

The team quickly realizes they are trapped on an iceberg that is slowly moving south with an artic blizzard brewing. Their only hope of escape are two trawlers several hundred miles away that can’t possibly forge through the bitter storm. They have limited supplies, and worse the bombs they planted are set to go off at midnight. Then, when their odds of survival are particularly bleak, one of their own is knocked unconscious in an attempted murder on the ice. No one knows who the murderer is, but everyone knows the murderer is a member of the expedition.

Prison of Ice is an homage to the work of Alistair MacLean—a fast and crisp thriller with enough betrayal, suspense, hardship—both from the physical elements and the intrigue of just who really is the bad guy—and adventure to keep the reader entertained without ever once questioning the very implausible action on the pages. There is even a tagline on the front cover that compares it to the work of Alistair MacLean—“Super suspense-adventure in the thrill-a-minute tradition of Alistair MacLean….”

The plot is sleek and fast. Mr Koontz moves the story quickly enough from crisis to crisis that the reader doesn’t have time to question and evaluate the happenings. Rather, the reader simply, and blissfully, straps in and enjoys the ride. The story is measured in time. It opens at 11:57am and closes twelve hours later. It is written in third person and the characters are built soundly enough to make them likable, and there are enough red herrings to keep the murderers identity a secret until the final climax.

The prose is perfectly matched to the story. It is sparse and stark without embellishment or unnecessary description: “Unclipping his flashlight from the tool belt that encircled his waist, he cut open the perfect blackness with a blade of light and looked at the snowflakes swirling inside.”

Prison of Ice is an excellent and entertaining novel. It is the only one of its kind and style that Dean Koontz has written, which is a shame because he has a knack for it. With that said, is it as good as MacLean’s early work? No, but still, it is a great and fun read that anyone who enjoys thrillers in this vain will absolutely love.

A Trio of Charles Bronson Trailers

I'm not sure if I want to publicly admit this, but I've been on a Charles Bronson kick the last few months. I've watched a few of his films and really enjoyed each. I love his tough guy persona--it's so far over the top, but somehow, someway he always pulls it off. And with not more than a snicker or two. But I am pretty damn forgiving.

I looked at Bronson's IMDB list and he had an impressive number of credits. He started on television in 1949--was this the first season of TV ever?--as a guest star on something called "Fireside Theater". He then worked steadily until the late 1990s. He is best known for his tough guy roles in the late-1970s and 1980s, specifically the Death Wish films.

My favorite Bronson film--if you take out the large cast The Great Escape--is the western film Breakheart Pass, but I have fond memories of his Eighties roles; they all sort of blend together, but...I remember liking them. Although, how can help from liking the old vigilante / revenge tales of the 1980s?

Here are some of the trailers of the better Bronson films I've watched over the last couple months. Enjoy. And, be careful with the trailer for 10 to Midnight because there is a very brief flash of nudity at the beginning.

10 to Midnight



The Mechanic -- we watched this one last weekend, and if you watch closely (okay, you don't have to watch that closely) you'll notice a very young Jan-Michael Vincent. I saw this guy on an interview a few months ago and he looked like he is 900 years old. He does a pretty good job in this film.



The Evil That Men Do

Short Film: "The Long Silence After"

I ran across a film adaptation of a an Ed Gorman short story: "The Long Silence After". I haven't read the short story and I'm not sure if it has been collected and if so where it was collected. I checked the few Ed Gorman collections I have with no luck.

The film is good. I read on Gorman's blog it was produced by film students. It runs about eight minutes and it's a diversion well worth the time.