QUICK SHOTS: The Protector #1: The Brotherhood of Evil by Irwin Zacharia

My obsession with the little paperback publisher (and possible Mob-front) Carousel continues. There's just something so sleazy/charming about their books. The cartoony covers, the "first books" vibe of authors learning their craft and the scarcity of books themselves is all incredibly appealing to the weirdo me. Irwin Zacharia is my favorite of their stable (sorry Chet Cunningham and Mike Newton) simply because of the enthusiasm that pours off the page. I know nothing about Zacharia (if you know anything PLEASE COMMENT!) other then he wrote some slim paperbacks for Carousel and one about baseball for Major. But he certainly had a wild style all his own and plenty of kooky ideas that really set his books apart from their brethren. This is pure pulp, people, straight up and winking. 

The Protector series is a wild one. I.M. Reddy is the Protector (although so far in the books he's never called/or calls himself The Protector) is a big gutted, Sumo wrestling, low-rent private eye whose cases always run into the supernatural. Throughout the book it was hard for me not to imagine John Candy in the 80's as Reddy raining blows down on cult members, making it with chicks and enjoying some nice meals. "The Brotherhood of Evil" deals with a Voodoo scheme to buy up businesses and take over Haiti to build a totalitarian version of Las Vegas that is patrolled by a Zombie Army. THAT OLD STORY, HUH? Along the way there's plenty of voodoo dolls, drugged cult orgies, punks with knives, wisecracks, hotel hijinks, and pizza. Reddy is a lot of fun as a narrator, reminding me a little of "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" and Roger L. Simon's Moses Wine in a blender. He takes all the supernatural stuff in stride and just treats it as another day in the office but acknowledges the oddness of it all. It's also pretty refreshing to have an overweight hero who is totally fine with is body and uses his bulk to his advantage. Plus, he still gets the ladies! 

The first Zacharia I read "Reddy or Not" has a rundown on the three series he wrote for Carousel (I'm looking for The Landshark books, the final Protector and the first Vendetta. If you have 'em for sale let me know!) and he put out a lot of material in a short period of time and then just vanished. That is unless he started writing under a different name, he was already writing as Sarita Irwin, so who knows. With today's market for supernatural detectives, it would be great to see these get reprinted, even if it was a Wildside Press kindle Megapack. The books have a wonderful shaggy-dog 70s version of a "Weird Tales" series. Again, let me know if you got books or information, I'd love both.