QUICK SHOTS: Crown Vic 2 by Lee Goldberg

I was eagerly awaiting a package from Amazon the other night, Jason Striker Martial Arts Series Volume 3: Amazon Slaughter and Curse of the Ninja by Piers Anthony and Roberto Fuentes, if you must know. That's a real inside baseball book, because I bought it simply to read the extra materials, magazine articles that appeared in Marvel's The Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu magazine, short stories and other paperback pitches. That's the kind of book-geek I am. 

When it did arrive, there were two packages and inside one was a surprise copy of Lee Goldberg's latest book, Crown Vic 2. I didn't order it and I've done a little work for Lee, writing the afterward for Jon Messmann's A Bullet for the Bride (where apparently, I misspelled the hero's name several times, according to the Glorious Trash blog. I'm going to blame autocorrect. But I've never said I was good at this) and have occasionally received other surprise books to review. I say that to be transparent, I didn't buy this one, but I was going to.

Because Lee can write. I've long been a fan of his work, having stumbling onto The Man with the Iron-On Badge on a teenage trip to the library. When I started to get into Men's Adventure fiction, discovering Lee wrote the .357 Vigilante books made them an instant purchase. I also particularly fond of his Ian Ludlow series. Oh, and The Dead Man. Can you tell I'm a fan? I hadn't picked up the first Crown Vic but immediately ordered it after finishing the second. 

Besides there's another thing that makes me interested in the Ray Boyd books: I drive an old Crown Victoria Police Interceptor. I've driven a couple of them. My first was white with the side-light and push bar. My current is some sort of metallic dusty gray with roll-bar and the glass cage in the back. It gives my passengers the thrill of being a criminal without the consequences. They are the last true American sedan. Powerful, roomy and extra-large all around. Kinda like me. 

So, Ray was a man after my own heart. 

Crown Vic 2 is a quick tale that packs a lot of punch. Boyd is off to hunt down some diamonds stolen by an old man who he was in prison with. He does this at first with bagels and games of Battleship and then by harsher means. Then throw it some naughty mischief he gets himself into at his motel and Boyd's got his hands full. Boyd's a right bastard in the best way but still slyly humorous and, uh, sexually adventurous. Early on there's a nod to Jack Reacher, a character Boyd could easily be compared to (like all modern book-heroes, at least on their covers) but Boyd's grittier and frankly cooler. The tale moves along nice and easy, twists and turns and ends up a little bloody. What more could you want?

The only problem with this one is that it's simply too short. I wanted more Ray Boyd. It's a wonderful throwback tough guy Men's Adventure series but thoroughly modern at the same time. You can just imagine a slightly more PG-13 version of this tale being the headliner in an issue of Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine. I hope Lee keeps writing 'em cause I'll keep readin' 'em.

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QUICK SHOTS: Red by Jack Ketchum

Jack Ketchum has a legacy as an extreme author, extreme horror that is. I first encountered his work in my early-20s after getting my hands on a copy of Off Season, his version of the old Sawney Bean tale (directly covered in L.A. Morse's Flesh Eaters) of cannibals in the woods. I had known of the books reputation before I read it, but it didn't quite prepare me for the book. It's one of two books (the other being Joe R. Lansdale's The Nightrunners) that truly unnerved me. It's a wild, short, gory, rollercoaster ride through backwoods terrors. It gave me a viewpoint of Ketchum's work, a narrow viewpoint, think he only did EXTREME HORROR.

But slowly I began to pick up his work wherever I found it; Ketchum has never been easy to find in my neck of the woods. I bought them because I knew I liked his style, but I always just stuck on the shelf for the "another day." I got Red in a bundle with a few more of his early 2000s Leisure reprints, which are pretty neat because most of them have a bonus short story or novella in them, but they do have sort of lackluster covers. Give and take. Most of them actually have stickers indicting that they eventually wound up at Dollar General for a buck. That would have been a bargain, I tell ya. 

Remember when those bad guys killed John Wick's dog and he went apeshit on them in revenge? Yeah, Red did that first, just not to the extreme over-the-top action of the John Wick movies, but it is interesting to note. SO much so that I didn't realize it as I read the book, only making the connection talking to my wife about it when she brought it up. Avery Ludlow is an old man with an old faithful dog fishing one day when some teenage boys senselessly shotgun the dog to death. As an animal lover I felt Avery's pain there. The dog Red means a lot to Avery and the randomness of the attack shakes him. 

Red's an onion of a book. Slowly we begin to understand why the dog Red meant so much to the widowed and Korean war vet Avery and why he would go through such lengths to be a modicum of justice for it. Avery does a little detective work and then works through all the normal channels talking to the boy's father the rich guy McCormick who's a slightly shady real estate developer type, to going to the police, to suing, to a television news story, only to come up empty on all fronts. Then the paperback stuff happens, retaliations fly, there's arson, .38s and .44 Magnums, and it all comes to down to a white-knuckle thrilling finale, but mostly what the book does is use a thriller-plot to give a little mediation on grief, justice, and real evil. It's a different Ketchum then I found in Off Season which gave the same thrills, but a lot less of the heart. Avery is a whole person not just a hero-lead and it's easy to follow him along as you turn the pages. 

In a lot of ways, it reminded me of a John D. MacDonald Gold Medal stand-alone or a Donald Hamilton stand-alone. Clean writing, good characters, paperback excitement, evil villains, and solid action with consequences. Red is a terribly sad book, but very sweet in its own way. Red got me to buy the rest of Ketchum's back catalogue and the movie adaptation of Red staring Brian Cox, that's how good it was. It's an easy to find book so do yourself a favor, huh?

QUICK SHOTS: "A Ticket to Hell" by Harry Whittington

Harry Whittington is a hardboiled writer who probably needs no introduction. Anyway, here's the introduction. Harry Whittington's got a nickname, "King of the Paperbacks." It's a hard-earned name gained by writing something like 85 in the span of a twelve years across the spectrum of paperback companies from the top shelf to the bottom one. He wrote tough tales of bad guys, bad dames, crime, murder, sex, destruction that are cocked full of tough-guy patter and clean, chiseled out of stone prose. Can you imagine coming up to a spinner rack in some drug store in the 50's and finding it stuffed with desperate books by the likes of Day Keene, Bruno Fischer, Gil Brewer, Dan J. Marlowe and Harry Whittington? Maybe a Orrie Hitt and a pseudonym Whittington behind the counter in the "adult section." Salad days, my friends, salad days.  

Whittington was so busy that pulp-scholars are still tracking down "lost" novels that he might have written. And he's worth the hunt. A long stretch back in my day-hobby (hopefully day-job) of making and working on low-budget films someone with a passing interest in "noir" as they called it started talking to me about the genius of Jim Thompson, spurn no doubt by the films made from Thompson's books. I read all my Thompson when I was a moody teenager. Checked out from the school library no less! Now every time I try one as I've gotten older, I'll usually stall out. I've only ever made it through "The Getaway." Though I still have a stack of them and bought one just last week. Cause, maybe someday things with look bleak enough for me that I'll lift my spirits with the bleakness found inside the covers of his books. They've just stopped being my jam. Anywho, I told this filmmaker that they needed to try Harry Whittington and Day Keene and rattled off some titles for them. I wonder if they got the taste, maybe they would when someone gets smart and starts making a movie or limited series out of Keene or Whittington's stuff.

"A Ticket to Hell" stars Ric who shows us his paperback-bruteness in the first chapter by kicking a punk out of his speeding bathtub Porsche. He's a mysterious stranger who doesn't fit in with all the fancy stuff that's surrounding him, the swanky car, bag and motel that he's hiding out in, waiting for a phone call and trying to keep a low-profile. The .35 Smith and Wesson automatic (yeah, despite the funky caliber a real gun, I looked it up) that is in his shoulder holster feels natural for him though. This is the kind of book where plans go sideways. Soon enough he's wrapped up in an attempted murder, a lovely bride, a goon of a husband, a nosy and lusty hotel lady, cops, G-men, Judges and ex-wives. The plot unfolds masterfully, with Whittington giving you just enough bits and pieces of Ric's story as the action comes fast with speeding car chases, fisticuffs, mounting suspicions that burns through a "man on the run" tale and morphs into a "man on a mission" story. Ric's a fine protagonist for this kind of book. He's rough around the edges with a chip on his shoulder, but not a remorseless cold-calculating killer. Just a guy who'll do what it takes to succeed at what he started. He maybe a "bad guy" but he's easy to root for.

I've been on the lookout for Whittington's books for like, fifteen years and I basically never find any in the wild of used bookstores. In all that time I think I've stumble across "A Night for Screaming," and one or two of his westerns. Besides its original Gold Medal edition, the book was reprinted by Black Lizard books and Barry Gifford back when they were doing the pulp-gods good work. Stark House Press has reprinted a lot of his work in nice singles, doubles or triples. "A Ticket to Hell" is not the hardest book to track down, but I don't fall into many Black Lizard books anymore either. Plus, this doesn't seem to be available as an eBook, so snatch a book up and enjoy, because this really is a great book for a 50's crime fiction newbie or an old hat at it. All these old 50's crime books just keep climbing up and up in price so get them while you can or just let me buy 'em. 

The Violent World of Parker and Me; Plus "Slayground" by Richard (Donald E. Westlake) Stark

Confession time. 

I've been an accomplice of Parker's for a long time. No not as close as Handy McKay or Alan Grofield but I've been around the proverbial block with him. I came to Parker via the 1998 movie "Payback" which I liked a lot more before I found out who Parker really was. I learned that through the library and battered and tattered hardcovers for the later books and much worse paperback copies from the Avon run. I got a few copies for myself back then too, but Parkers have always been hard to get second hand. Parker's a keeper. The tale of Parker, his inception, his trials, troubles, near death and resurrection have been well documented by better literary historians than I, so I won't write anything to pale in comparison. Go to Violent World of Parker and loose yourself if you're not in the know. 

Donald Westlake taught me a lot as himself and as Richard Stark. Some good shit as Tucker Coe too. He's a writer who seemingly could do it all. Light and fun. Hard and dark. Sad and mysterious. Whatever you need. A true professional.  He's probably best known for being the fictitious Richard Stark, but hell I'm sure Stark would have thought Westlake was the phoney. Westlake taught me a lot about writing. Try to be like Westlake, try to be clean, try to be clever, get out of the way and follow your characters around and most importantly there's no limits. If you want to be funny in one thing; be funny. If you want to be the hardest-boiled ever; do that. He was amazing talent. I read Dortmunder books in a sitting, devoured his stand-alone's and then of course the Parkers. I even like the Grofield's a lot more than most people. I remember reading "Bank Shot" and "Jimmy the Kid" back-to-back over a long Sunday, in re-bound library hardcovers in a chair while visiting my grandmother and trying to block out Lawrence Welk reruns on the TV. Westlake might have made a good crook. If you think up a good way to steal a whole bank, like in "Bank Shot," then you might have had the right stuff. And hey, he already had the alias thing down. 

Recommendations as Westlake: "Bank Shot," "Jimmy the Kid," "Dancing Aztecs," "Why Me?" and "Castle in the Air." 

Parker is about the blankest slate you can make a book series out of. You never know much about him, he doesn't talk much, he just moves like a shark through the narrative to accomplish his goals. The goals are usually robbing, killing or surviving. Or all three, at least they all pretty much always happen. He operates in a quasi-age-less world of professional and unprofessional crooks and big time syndicates or Outfits, if you will of the mob. He's qualified, tough and you certainly don't want to be on his bad side. He's got no friends, associates; yes and a few ladies. Most notably Claire who sticks it out with Parker over a bunch of books. She's mostly a non-character though, often more in the background. It's all you need, the Parker books are about quick moving narratives full of death, deceit and pitch perfect storytelling. Overall some the novels are a bit of a formula pieces while other may stray too far off the formula (I'm looking at you "The Jugger") but Stark/Westlake on a bad day is still better than most.

I eventually read all the original 16 novels before Stark reemerged in 1997 with "Comeback," another confession I'm not really into the 8 novels from '97 to 2008. I've tried, but they failed to connect with me. It may be the time-frame, it may be the slightly longer page count or something stupid like the lack of a mass market paperback. I dislike holding trade paperbacks. I don't know, they just sort of fell flat to me. Someday I'm sure my head will screw on straight and I'll realize that I've been an idiot all these years. At least then I'll have 8 new Parkers to enjoy.

Recommendations as Stark: "The Score," "The Sour Lemon Score," "The Outfit," "Lemons Never Lie" (Grofield) "Deadly Edge" and "Slayground" 

The movies are a mixed bag. Ranging from stone cold classics to complete messes (I'm looking at you "Parker") with a wide range of actors playing Parker (or the equivalent character) such as Lee Marvin, Robert Duvall, Jim Brown, Mel Gibson, Peter Coyote, Anna Karina and Jason Statham. "Point Blank" is the best movie of the bunch, but "The Outfit" is probably the best depiction of Parker as a character. Both versions "Payback" the theatrical and the director's cut have their pluses and minuses. "The Split" has one of the coolest cast ever assembled, but meanders too much. "Slayground" is an interesting hodge-podge of a movie, but Peter Coyote is miscast. I enjoy "Made in the USA," but it's not Parker at all and never tires to be. The Jason Statham led "Parker" is simply by-the-numbers affair that is quickly forgotten. The only one I haven't seen is the French "Mise a Sac" or "Pillaged" from 1967, which I desperately want too cause I love 60's French crime movies and it's based on "The Score" which is a dynamite novel. For a character that is relatively unknown to the public at large, the Parkers really inspire those who make movies. He's got a lot of adaptions (and ripoffs) for a series character in a non-series way. It's interesting to me that the blank nature of the character has an effect on filmmakers, its a good framework to build a picture on. It's a shame that there aren't more good Parker films. He's a wholly unique character, say if a film was announced tomorrow I wouldn't be surprised if Parker was played by Idis Elba or Mads Mikkelsen or Tom Hardy or Charlize Theron. They could all work. 

So, I felt the itch for a Parker. I don't generally like to re-read, there too many books in the world (and my library) for that. But I wanted a Parker. So, "Slayground" found it's way into my hands and I was off to the races. In my first reading of the series "Slayground" was a standout. It strayed from the standard Parker formula of planning and heisting, instead doing a "Die Hard" in a closed for the winter amusement park against a crew of mobsters and dirty cops. It's a crackerjack tale that builds and builds and leaves you wanting more. If you're new to Parker in might not be the best to start with since it's so far off of formula but there's a clear reason why its a fan-favorite: It kicks all kinds of ass. It's been a while since I've gone through the books and now that I've started I don't think I can stop. Which is fine, they will be almost new books to me, enough time has past that I only remember chunks and parts but not whole novels. 

I imagine I'll always be an accomplice of the professional thief Parker. His dark world somehow feels like home to me, I'll have to watch my back from the couch to the bathroom but home all the same never know who is closing in.

Quick Shots: "Let's Here It for the Deaf Man" by Ed McBain

Now, I've read Ed McBain before; a few times actually sometimes as Ed McBain sometimes under other names. BUT I've never read an 87th Precinct novel and now that I have I feel like an idiot. Why, oh why was I depriving myself? Well, actually I know why: it was an intimidating 55 book series and an admitted dislike of police procedurals. The concept of simply procedurals implies there's less fireworks than I usually like in a book. 

That whole paragraph was just there for me to announce to the world that I've been a dunce.

Ed McBain was Evan Hunter, sort of anyway. Evan/Ed could write the hell out of a book. I've read some of the stand alone crime/private eye novels he wrote towards the beginning of his career and uniformly enjoyed them. "I'm Cannon - For Hire" is a lot of fun in a specific 50's pulp kind of way, as is his work as Richard Marsten. I think I have have read some of his Matthew Hope series, but that was many beers and books ago so I can't rightly remember.

That whole paragraph was just there for me to announce to the world that I damned well knew Ed McBain could write and I STILL didn't read an 87th Precinct. What a dumbass.

So, I picked "Let's Hear it for the Deaf Man," because I have seen the film adaptation of "Fuzz" cause if Burt Reynolds is in a movie I'll watch it. Plus Yul Brenner. Plus Rachel Welch. Even plus Jack Weston. The Moriarty-like character of The Deaf Man, a criminal mastermind who toys with the boys of the 87th intrigued me. Half a page in I regretted all the lost time. McBain crafts several precision stories, crimes and criminals that need to get caught/solved by our heroes. Then he jumbles and and crosses the wires a bit. We bounce back and forth while semi-lead Steve Carella tries to find out who Crucified a hippie. While Kling tries to catch a cat-burglar who leaves kittens as his calling card. While the rest of the squad pop in and out helping out and dealing with their own crimes and misdemeanors. Then topping it off with The Deaf Man who is cryptically telling the 87th when and where he's going to rob a bank. Then we spend time with The Deaf Man and his associates and then we spend time with the unnamed city where all the action takes place. The city is just as important as the rest of the cast, we get bursts of activity, like small snippets of a news story rolling at the bottom of a TV screen while the newscaster tell your a bigger tale. The characters all had unique personalities and it seems by this time in the series, McBain knew them like old friends. The dialog crackles between the cops, bickering and spit-balling and joking. The action when it does come is fast and clear. Then it all wraps up nicely with some nice twists and turns. 

Bottom line, you should probably stop reading this and go pick up a Ed McBain book. 

"The Honest Thief" 2020 Movie Reivew

I'm pretty easy to entertain. I can usually turn off my "writers brain" and just go along for the ride when a movie is simply made to be enjoyed. If a movie is supposed to be something special I tend to be a lot harder on it. "The Honest Thief" was made to be enjoyed, but why the hell was it constantly making me think about how half-ass it is? It seems to go out of it's way to be a sloppy mess. I love Liam Neeson. Even before his "Taken" inspired second act. "Darkman," "Next of Kin," Michael Collins," and then I do really love "Taken," though the cottage industry of "Liam Neeson Punches People" movies are a decidedly mixed bag. Movies like "The A-Team," "The Grey," and "Run All Night" deliver the goods, while others seem like pale imitations of themselves on a loop. 

I guess I'm harder on crime movies then about any other genre, its a genre I truly love and when they are good can be a tightwire escapade of tension and thrills or serious ruminations on the nature of crime and law. "The Honest Thief" wants to be be a thrill ride with a love story at the center. Unfortunately it rarely thrills and gave us no time to develop any feelings toward our happy couple Liam Neeson and Kate Walsh. A tired "meet-cute," then a time jump do not make a solid love story. The love is supposed to be strong enough for bank robber Liam to give back the money and go to prison for her. Maybe if the two had chemistry or any substantial screen time together. Yeesh.

One of the big issues is that the script seemed to be written for someone half Liam's age. I spent a good chunk of the runtime trying to figure out who old the characters were supposed to be. Liam's character Dolan was supposed to be a war veteran, purposely left vague who came home and ended up robbing bank because a bank foreclosed on his father's farm. He continued to rob banks just for the thrill, never spending the money and now feel guilty about it. Here's were the movie wants to have its cake and eat it too. Liam could easily burn the cash and never get caught and live his life, the FBI are not onto him. Hell, it takes them a while for them to even believe that he's (snicker) "The In-and-Out Bandit." Of course he doesn't tell the love of his life he's a bank robber, cause women love giant surprises like that. Instead he goes off and gets a hotel to wait for the feds. Which turns into a limp "on the run from dirty cops" story. They want Dolan to be a noble Robin Hood type instead of a cold thief like Richard Stark's Parker, I guess so he can fall in love and the audience won't feel in conflict in rooting for a seemingly "bad guy" but its such a limitation to the character. If the Dolan character who was a hardened crook known to the FBI but never caught and decides to retire only to get caught up in the same dirty cop story you might have something compelling. A little moral ambiguity goes a long way.

Nobody in this movie has enough to do, especially Kate Walsh; who stands around, sometimes mad then sometimes is cool with Liam being a bank robber and mostly just dresses like a 20-year-old in a number of jean skirts. My wife is a costume designer and I never took much notice of how much a characters clothes and draw you in or pull you out of a film until watching movies with her. She simply couldn't get over the number of short jean skirts 50 plus Kate Walsh wears and soon I couldn't un-see them either. As much as the female lead is lacking; it completely wastes awesome actors like Robert Patrick and Jeffery Donovan. Jai Courtney is supposed to be the bad guy but the writing is so flat that he never comes off as a real threat to Liam, maybe Courtney and Donovan or Patrick should have switched parts. Anthony Ramos playing the conflicted FBI gives it his best shot at making a compelling character and at least comes off as noble despite his faults. He really is the strongest secondary character, but like everyone really doesn't have a big moment or scene with enough weight to fully land. It plugs along, there's an explosion and then it just sort of ends. Oh, there's a nice dog in it. I liked the dog.

This movie simmered in my brain for a few days before I latched onto the one thing that I think really cheesed me off. In 2014 Liam starred in "A Walk Among the Tombstone" an adaptation of Lawrence Blocks monumental Matthew Scudder series of private eye mysteries. And it's a really good movie, not absolutely perfect but nice and close. Liam is perfect, his Scudder is wounded, trying, failing and its encased in a nice mystery with plenty of thrills. Writer/director Scott Frank is one of those guys who would have been Don Siegel league in the 70's, just churning out great material year after year. It could have been the first in series of Scudder movies. But the movie bombed. And what annoys me is that this could have been the third or fourth Scudder movie by this point, each nestling in to Liam's low-budget "Taken"-ish place on his filmography, between the "serious" movies he does. I really miss an era of smart-escapist fair. Plus as Liam ages, its really getting harder to buy him as an action hero. A tough detective, on the other hand absolutely. It really grinds my gears.

Plus it only makes me think that Liam Neeson might have been a really strong Parker. Liam Neeson starring in "Slayground" or "Butcher's Moon." Yeah that could have been pretty rad.

Quick Shots: "The Broker's Wife (Quarry #2) By Max Allan Collins

Sorry for the long delay in posts. I've been doing more writing than reading here lately. For those not it in the know, I'm a very low-budget (multiple award-winning) filmmaker. I have to throw the award thing in because otherwise the only way anyone knows is to come into my house and see them collecting dust on the shelf. So, I've been writing short films, two features, tinkering on my second novel, rewriting and polishing material. Since my team and I are all fully vaccinated and can finally (somewhat) get out of the house and make shit. I only tell you all this as a some-what lame excuse for the lack of reviews. 

Anyway, Max Allan Collins has been a staple of my reading nearly since the beginning, at least my "adult reading." I'd imagine if he wrote children's novels I might have gravitated toward those too. It was his movie tie-ins that I first picked up (see the movie thing ties in here too) I'd always ben a movie freak and since the movies that they showed at school rarely showed gun-fights, fisticuffs or had curse words I turned to the tie-in world to carry my movies with me. I was a real weird middle-school kid with a copy of "In the Line of Fire" in my book-bag. These days that might have got me in trouble, who knows. Max's tie-ins for "U.S. Marshals," "The Mummy" and the like made me know his name.

But it was his own novels that made him a favorite of mine. 

For some reason though his Quarry novels had eluded me, so I have missed out on what is really might be his crown jewel. Right before I started the blog I fixed this by buying most of the novels and tearing through "The Broker." I loved the book and became an instant Quarry fan. I was already a Nolan, Mallory, Ms. Tree, and Nate Heller fan mind you. "The Broker's Wife" is the 2nd Quarry novel only if you go by publication date. The order of the books zig-zags around and the titles change for different editions. It's a bit of a maze to master so I just decided to play it like I was reading them as they came out. 

Quarry is a wise-ass 'Nam vet who returned home to find his wife cheating on him, after a little creativity with a car-jack the man who was screwing his wife is dead, Quarry gets away with and lands in the sights of The Broker. The Broker has a network of killers-for-hire and offers Quarry a job. Since killing is about the only thing he knows he accepts. Things go sideways in the first novel and the second finds him hiding out in a cabin waiting for some hitmen to come and try and take him out. They do and the narrative is off and running. Along the way Quarry tackles killers, dirty lawyers, the beautiful widow of The Broker and even uncovers an old family secret. Max has a really nice clean "meat and potatoes" writing style, uncluttered and unpretentious. He (at least with these books) wants to tell a clear, exciting story and he absolutely delivers. Quarry's voice is a affable one for a stone-killer, he's a guy you like to hear stories from but might not want to actually know. People who know Quarry usually end up dead it seems.

I'll be forever grateful for Hard Case Crime for giving Max the opportunity to continue the series and pile up books on my shelves. Max's books are the most exciting novels coming out of  HCC anymore.  Man, I didn't even mention his collaborations with Mickey Spillane which are just uniformly excellent. Plus I just picked up "Skim Deep" the first Nolan book in 33 years, which I'll be covering here soon I'm sure. Then I'm also going to have to pick up his new series about 60's spy John Sand, that hits all the right buttons for me. Then there's his Jack and Maggie Starr series that I need more off, plus his stand-alone "Midnight Haul." Wait, then I need to get the rest of his Elliot Ness books. Whoa. Can you tell I'm a fan? 

Earl Drake #5: Operation Breakthrough by Dan J. Marlowe

Dan J. Marlowe is correctly regarded as paperback royalty.  "The Name of the Game is Death" and "One Endless Hour" are stone cold classics (they work best as one bigger-novel) that are hard touch. In them we are introduced to Earl Drake (under a different name) a hard-case criminal who gives Richard Stark's Parker a run for his money. To top it off Marlowe's got a run in the 60's for Gold Medal with a great string of standalone hardboiled work that are nearly all great. Marlowe's real-life story is a paperback novel too full of amnesia, spanking women, local politics, bank robbers, death and drink. I'm not going to get into that too much, as there's much better places that delve into Marlowe's world. What I find interesting is that Marlowe seemed to work with a co-author a lot of the time. Apparently credited co-author on "The Raven is a Blood Red Bird" William C. Odell ( a Colonel in the U.S. Airforce) worked with him on the early Drake books at least, as his entry on the U.S. Naval Institute website credits him as wining a Edgar award that was surely the award the Drake novel "Flashpoint" won. Some online sources cite Fletcher Flora as the co-author to the stand-alone "Vengeance Man" as well. Then there's his noted working with convicted bank robber-turned-writer Al Nussbaum. I get the vibe that Marlowe played things fast and loose in life. I need to track down Charles Kelly's "Gunshots in Another Room: The Forgotten Life of Dan J. Marlowe" and maybe all my questions will be answered.  

So, maybe Fawcett Gold Medal wanted another spy series to go with the adventures of their other series espionage characters and for some reason thought the cold-blood bank robber Chet Arnold, er, Earl Drake would be a good fit. Or maybe Marlowe just wanted to write about spies as he had done before in some of his stand-alone work and wanted to ride the wave of the good vibes from "The Name of the Game is Death." Who knows. Either way Drake became a freelance spy working under a shadowy Government man named Karl Erikson. This era of the Drake books is often kinda dismissed in comparison to his early work which is a shame. The first Marlowe book I read was one of the last Drake novels and it certainly turned me onto Marlowe's writing. The 70's were a weird time for Gold Medal, the emphasis had definitely shifted from standalone's to series work, probably trying to get all that "Executioner" money. There were ongoing series entries in stable series like Matt Helm, Sam Durrell and Joe Gall, plus upstart series like Daniel Da Cruz's Jock Sargent books. I won't even get into the "The Godfather" knockoffs they stuffed the spinner racks with. So, where does Earl Drake land? For my money he's the best Gold Medal spy of the 70's. Sure they're not up there with Marlowe's earlier glory but they are certainly strong works of Men's Adventure. 

"Operation Breakthrough" starts off with a slam-bang heist, barrels through a "man on the run" story, then spy shenanigan's to a break out yarn. Earl Drake is a slick lead character with a nice man-of-a-thousand-faces-gimmick. He's stuiably tough and dangerous with his .38, but he's still a bit of a fish out of water when it comes to spying. This gives him a realistic-vibe, not making him a perfect superman, plus a bitchin' girlfriend names Hazel who's cool under pressure. Marlowe tosses full characters down on the page with ease and short work, all the side-characters seem real or real in a pulp way anyway. There's a continuing story going on here too; you probably need to read the early ones in order; as there's a lot references to past escapades.  If I remember correctly the later books are pretty stand-alone. This is really no-frills top-shelf Men's Adventure. 

Donald Hamilton and the "Line of Fire"

When I read "Danger in My Blood" a bit ago it lit the Gold Medal fire under my ass and I dug through my shelves and set myself up a Gold Medal To-Read Pile. It's got some Peter Rabe, E. Howard Hunt, Gil Brewer, Stephen Marlowe, and as an afterthought I looked at the Donald Hamilton shelf in my house. "Line of Fire" I had mentioned in that "Danger in My Blood" review, I read it years ago between two Matt Helms when I was on one big Hamilton kick. I remember liking it well enough, but younger didn't see everything that was lurking between the covers on this one. With the paperback in my hand I found that I was reading the first chapter and then the first turned into the fourth and I was just rereading it. Matt Helm is one of my favorite series especially the early ones; the higher they get the flabbier and exhausted they get. Series fatigue is a natural thing I suppose, but a lesser Hamilton is still a notch or two above most writers, he only suffers in comparison to himself. 

It's often said that "Line of Fire" is a proto-Matt Helm, he wrote it a few years before the masterstroke that is the first Matt Helm "Death of a Citizen" and it's got a lot of the same voice. The weary professional tough guy voice of Paul Nyquist,, the causal information and opinions on various firearms and the hard-boiled violence is all in line with what you get when you pick up a Helm. The comparison is apt but it doesn't paint the book in a lesser light, because this is truly almost as good a "Death of a Citizen." 

Paul Nyquist is a gun-shop owner, a veteran, a hunter and a guy who just shot a big wig politician. Right after he takes the shot with his 30-06 (and after he loving tells you about the rifle) a women bursts in the door to surprise him and the mob goon that is there to watch him make the shot. The goon pulls with Walther P-38 and Nyquist doesn't hesitate and blows him away with his rifle. The plans all gummed up and he goes on the run with the dame right? Well, not really. It's all part of the interesting curve ball that Hamilton threw in the middle of the book, which I won't spoil. The curve-ball really keeps the book from devolving into cliches and keeps the reader on their toes. Hamilton obviously knew the genre and this is work of a helluva writer working within his genre and turning the whole thing on it's head. Bodies do pile up and there are fisticuffs, gun-talk, few dames, cops, hoods and nosy reporters, it hits all the marks.  The suspense is constantly ratcheted up, the characters a fresh takes on the archetypes of these kind of books and its all burns into a nice bloody climax. They could have used this as a guidebook for anyone trying to write a Gold Medal Paperback. 

This is really just a crackerjack novel of crime and suspense, the world grows smaller and small for Nyquist and he's caught in the middle of his friends, women and his enemies, sometimes all in one person. There's some convenient paperback stuff in here, mostly in the quick conclusions and instant trust variety, but nothing to hamper the enjoyment of the book on the whole. Hamilton mostly wrote Matt Helm's, a couple westerns and a few crime/suspense books like this one. "Night Walker" was reprinted by Hard Case Crime and I remember liking that well enough too, so I'll have revisit that one too. I wish Hamilton had some more stand-alones to his name, I'd be eager to dive in.

Quick Shots: Ed Wood's Killer in Drag

What is the worst?

Edward D. Wood Jr. was a particular kind of guy. I personally love him. The label of "worst director" ever is a short-sighted view of the man. Being a filmmaker I can appreciate that creative endeavors can go sideways for a number of reasons, film being the most susceptible. If someone makes something with a burning passion that is enjoyable on ANY level, it's a shame to call the creator "the worst,". didn't they just entertain you? "Good" or "bad" are just constructs that people assign to for lack of a better word "art," (I personally hate the overuse of the word art or artist when it comes to film making, but that's just a pet peeve) I've seen people enjoy the hell of a movie, laughing at the right times, gasping at the other and then still deride the flick after the fact. Books, movies, whatever are meant to entertain. That can mean thrills or laughs. It can also mean emotional connection, a cry session or the viewer getting an outlook they might not have ever seen. Either way the work should make you keep flipping pages or glued to the screen. Our obsession of tearing down or like something ironically is going to slowly ruin our ability to actually enjoy anything.

*Steps down from soap-box*

Ed Wood was a lot of things, but he was a GREAT creative. You don't stick around as long in the public consciousness as Ed Wood has and be worthless. As a filmmaker he crafted endless entertaining movies with a burning passion, as a writer he seemed to do the same and they are all uniquely Ed Wood. 

That's the mark of a good writer in my opinion: A finely tuned voice. And Ed had that by the bucketful.  

"Killer in Drag" stars angora-wearing mob assassin Glen Satin, or Glenda when's he's all dolled up. Glen/Glenda wants out of the killer-for-hire racket but knows that the drop-dead gorgeous Glenda is too valuable to give up in the murder business. Glen/Glenda needs someone with connections to get out alive and after a liaison with a suger-daddy ends in his murder and the hopes of their sex-changed dashed Glen/Glenda has to go on the run from the cops and the mob. They do what anyone does when they run away: join the circus. Or buy the circus is more like it. While hitch-hiking and cross-dressing though out the country plus a little ass-kicking and robbery Glen/Glenda ends up in a small town with the deed to the circus and a hot small-town hooker in their bed. There's tons of talk of women's clothes, some circus freaks, sex and real kinky folk. Glen/Glenda seem to have a real connection to the small town hooker they shack up with as they come from similar situations. People in control of them from above and society misunderstanding them. And after some initial trepidation (and a wild night) she accepts Glen/Glenda for who they are. Plus Glenda's a swell looking dame. But the cops don't like Glen too much and the whole situation boils over with a circus riot, maybe some real love, car chases and kinky sex.

This is a stream of consciousness soft-core 50's pulp novel, one written to a very niche group and meant to be hidden between readings. It was clearly written in a few settings and knowing Ed Wood with a stream of liquor. And, sure yeah there's a lot of stuff that doesn't hang together and plot lines that don't get the best conclusions plus some hokey dialog and distasteful characters. Despite all that it's very entertaining, it's got all the hallmarks of Wood's work, the booze, the women's clothes and undergarments, the sleaze, the desperation and above all the bravery. Ed Wood's work is hallmarked by being brave. It takes guts to make a movie and put yourself out there. It takes a lot more guts to make your first movie about your love of dressing like a woman in 1953. Ed was a Marine after all.

Obviously this book isn't for everyone, if you like sleaze books it's a lot of fun. If your interested in what gender fluidity/LGBTQ life (if you were a killer-for-hire) looked like in the 50's this would be interesting for you. If you can't get past the novel's "hero" wearing a skirt while shooting dudes with his pearl-handled .32 then you should skip it. It would have made a wild exploitation film, in fact I kept being reminded not of Ed Wood's films while reading it but Russ Meyer's "Faster, Pussycat, Kill, Kill," both are hard-bitten forward thinking crime tales seeped in the era's expectations of women and transgender people, plus the action and violence.  It's not for everyone, but as Lou Reed once said, take a walk on the wild side.