QUICK SHOTS: Dead Man #5: Blood Mesa by James Reasoner

The other day I was rearranging bookshelves. Call it my form of mediation. It started out as a book hunt, a "do I have that book, or have I just been thinking about buying it?" Then I spotted some things that didn't belong in their respective spaces, and I decided to remedy that situation. This snowballed into a light rearranging that took a whole afternoon. I recently finally gave up my day-job for my side-work and make my own schedule now and spending an afternoon hip deep in the library organizing sure put my head on straight again. Ah, Zen. 

It's inevitable that if you dig around your own shelfs enough, you find the forgotten treasures. I finally tracked down an elusive copy of Walter Wager's 58 Minutes that I'd been searching for and a wayward stack of the Dirty Harry books by Warner books. But I also dove into my trade-paperback and hardback shelves, which I honestly don't look at much. The mass market paperback is the finest book format ever created, and I'll die on that cross. So, I was surprised to find the second volume of the Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin lead Dead Man series that I didn't remember actually buying. I enjoyed the first volume immensely but got side-tracked keeping up with it. After an afternoon of bookwork, I decided on a treat. 

The Dead Man series is the classic Men's Adventure set-up. A revolving door of authors tackling entries in a series built around a badass protagonist. Here it's Matt Cahill, a man who died in an avalanche until to be un-frozen, only to see the evil that a certain Mr. Dark has infected people with. Before you can turn your TV to The Fugitive or The Incredible Hulk, Matt hits the road searching for Mr. Dark and having adventures along the way. I suggest you read the first novel first to get the whole set-up, but after that they can be read at your discretion. 

It had also been too long since I had read anything by James Reasoner, so I flipped this second volume to his entry Blood Mesa, cracked open a cold beer and started reading. Matt finds himself in New Mexico on a remote archeological dig as a truck driver. Naturally this dig on top of the titular blood red mesa and of course Mr. Dark's evil is a problem again. With its remote location, there's a bit of a "siege atmosphere" as the members of the dig turn into crazed killers, leaving Matt and his trusty axe to save the survivors. There's a little interpersonal drama, plenty of axe-action, some explosions, rotting people, ancient curse-stuff and a beautiful woman to fall for Matt. This is a quick, tense read, the length of The Dead Man novels is one of the series great strengths. They fly by and keep you wanting more. 

Reasoner is a helluva writer. I always mention his private eye novel Texas Wind and his sadly aborted Men's Aventure series Diamondback whenever his name comes up, but the truth is you can't go wrong any of his work. He's a true-blue pulp writer cranking out wonderful adventure tales. He works a lot in the western genre, and he infused a little of that into this horror/action tale, and it really work for me. His entry it got me itching to read more of his stuff AND more adventures of Matt Cahill. 

And my now traditional sign-off, my first novel Gunpowder Breath is available on Amazon as an eBook!

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.

My book, GUNPOWDER BREATH is OUT and available on Amazon!
Check it out!

QUICK SHOTS: The Dead Man #1: Face of Evil by Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin

The Dead Man series harkened back to the old school way of putting out a Men's Adventure series: multiple writers cranking out wild and wholly action tales as fast as they could. Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin co-created it and then got some great writers to write the continuing adventures of Matthew Cahill and his axe. It's a wonder its's taken me this long to getting around to this series because the names attached read like a list of my favorite authors, Goldberg himself, Christa Faust, James Reasoner, Bill Crider etc. etc. Plus, their wonderfully short and to the point. I'm slow on the uptake, folks. 

Matthew Cahill is a good guy/widower who works at a lumber mill who loves his father's axe and watches out for his no-good best buddy, Andy. Andy gets fired and Cahill quits in protest and then ends up going skiing with his new love interest Rachel and ends up dying in an avalanche, which is just some bad luck. Cut to a few months later when he's found frozen and then miraculously wakes up and feels fine, only being dead that long has to have side effects right? 

It does. Cahill can now see the evil in a person as it festers and rots them like a zombie in his eyes. Sort of like the sunglasses in "They Live." Then there's the series big-bad the uber villain Mr. Dark who seems to be pulling all the strings. Luckily Cahill's a cool cat and real good with his axe and proves to be a very likeable protagonist. Then when his buddy Andy falls into the evil around him Cahill is the only guy around to take care of the problem.  

"Face of Evil" is clearly the "pilot" to the series. These are the hardest to write and get through all the set-up and explanation and still make it light, interesting and fun. Rabkin and Goldberg handle it all with professional skill. It never really bogs down in too much detail and keeps the tone fairly light and fun for all the gruesome goings-on. It has that comfortable syndicated action show from the 90s vibe. A little "Incredible Hulk," a little "Fugitive" or "The Invaders" mixed up with the over-the-top vibe of "Tales from the Crypt." 

These books a super easy to get ahold, go to Amazon and you can get them on Kindle, Audible, or in three-in-one bind-up paperbacks like I did. These would be perfect little snacks in-between longer novels. 

QUICK SHOTS: .357 Vigilante #2: Make 'em Pay by Ian (Lee Goldberg) Ludlow

Before I really paid too much attention to the Men's Adventure genre, I did know about Pinnacle's short-lived .357 Vigilante books. I knew them because I was a fan of Lee Goldberg (especially "The Man with the Iron-On Badge) and I somehow figured out he wrote them. So, the first book in the had been on my shelf for a long time. When I started to figure out M.A.-fiction is what I was looking for, I promptly cracked open the spine and had a good 'ol time with it. It took a bit before I tracked down the other two Pinnacle put out and it's taken even longer to tackle them. Sometimes my stupidity astounds me.

Lee Goldberg took on the VERY authorly-name of Ian Ludlow when he started writing the .357 Vigilante series back in the day. Later he would write books ABOUT his pseudonym with the Ian Ludlow series. Which stars Ludlow as a thriller writer pushed into living one of his book plots, but that's a different story. Brett Macklin is the .357 Vigilante or actually really, he's Mr. Jury. Mr. Jury seems to be Lee's preferred series title since that's what they are republished as. Brett's got a grudge against crime to the murder of his policeman father; with his dad's revolver he dispatches fast judgement when the law fails. By the 80's this was old-hat within the genre. You already had The Executioner, The Reprisalizer, two The Revengers, The Sharpshooter, The Marksman, and so on, but Lee made the genre conventions work for him. The Mr. Jury books are probably about the most fun you can have doing so vicarious vigilanting. 

"Make 'em Pay" is about a the vilest of subject, entering Andrew Vachss territory. Even the cover is super tough to look at. But, as you know dear reader: a vile villain only makes the outlaw justice more satisfying. Brett goes up against a nasty porn-killer who rapes, murders and (of course) is untouchable by the courts. Brett's an everyman protagonist. He's got no tough-guy past or special training, just a pilot with a gun and some luck. He's also not as insane as say, Mike Barry's Lone Wolf and questions his violent actions. It gives enough introspection to make it easy to root for him. It's pretty refreshing compared to the other heroes of Men's Adventure fiction, a lot which are, well, sorta just big 'ol assholes. There's plenty of smooth and fast action that builds to a nice high-energy "action-movie" finale, colorful characters, some Hollywood in-jokes, different ways to use ice cream and a lot of fun banter. 

The .357 Vigilante series is top-shelf 80's adventure fiction. There's a reason Goldberg is still a successful author and it's fantastic that these books are still in print now through Brash Books, including the never released 4th novel. And I'm not just saying all this because I've done a little writing work for Brash Books *cough* "A Bullet for a Bride" by Jon Messmann *cough* or anything, they are just good books.  

"All Kinds of Ugly" The Long-Lost Final Hardman Novel by Ralph Dennis

Can you tell it's my favorite?

My memory is fuzzy. Jim Hardman and Hump Evans either found their way onto my bookshelf with a blind purchase of a gaudy paperback or I might have stumbled onto them via Thrilling Detective either one is possible. I was a teenager and reading private eye novels which I had developed a Jones for after getting hooked on Joe R. Lansdale's Hap Collins and Leonard Pines novels through his horror fiction. Hap and Leonard pressed their world views into my brain, they became a personal thing, tough guys who stood up for things and bantered like an old married couple. Hap and Leonard sent me looking for more and more and suddenly I was in a flame red El Camino between Montana and Texas with a Vietnam Vet named C.W. Sughrue ("Sug as in sugar and rue as in 'rue the goddamned day'") and the road was full of dirty wit, shocking  violence and deep sadness. I knew I wanted to be a writer then. I have a lot of writers that I like, some mean a whole hell of a lot including the oft quoted "Holy Trinity" of mystery writers: Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and Ross MacDonald (though Mickey Spillane is much higher on my list then MacDonald) but they weren't my personal "Holy Trinity." The three guys I'd pick are Lansdale, Crumley and Ralph Dennis.

Ralph Dennis didn't have the luck the other two and some of everything is luck. Dennis wrote his Hardman books with Popular Library a mid-level publishing outfit. Not Pinnacle or Gold Medal, but usually a bit above some of the other paperback places. They didn't set the world on fire but he must have burned through type writers cause he wrote 12 of them in three years or so. More importantly they are each a hard bitten little diamond in the Atlanta rough.  Dennis knew he was writing pulp, there's enough ass-kicking and gun-fights to keep anyone interested but the characters are a lot deeper then their kinda silly named suggests. Hardman and Hump always makes my wife giggle. Hump and Hardman's relationship; a white pudgy ex-cop and a black former NFL player in the South in the 70's was certainly not the norm. Dennis was ahead of the curve and there's less of the usual racist and sexist stuff in the books then the average Men's Adventure tales. Partly cause they aren't Men's Adventure, they are simply crime tales with a lot of action and thrills. Hump and Hardman grow closer and become the only family either of them has that fully understands. Not that they'd say that to each other. They show it to each other in their actions and these a hard-drinkin' 70's men who wear their emotions buried deep in their heart.

After 12 Hardman's Dennis wanted to break away from the character. That's understandable, that's a lot of writing and he wanted that hardback life and some respect that he deserved. He didn't really make it. He wrote other books and the world remained unlit, so flame-less that they stopped getting published. The years passed and Hardman and Hump seemed to be forgotten. I never thought anyone else really loved them the way I did. Boy, I was wrong.

Lee Goldberg, a hell of a writer his-own-self did the Paperback God's good work and did that long play to get Hardman republished by his Brash Books, who reprint a lot of the good stuff. Eventually there was the unpublished books, a sequel to "Deadman's Game," a ultra-hard-boiled spy novel, another espionage tale "The Spy in the Box," and a standalone mystery called "Dust in the Heart." And in a twisting mystery tale of it's own (I won't spoil it, buy the damned book and read the afterword when you're done) a book called "The Polish Wife," which became "All Kinds of Ugly," the damned-near lost final Hardman novel.

It was a long work week. A week of shiftless reading, the kind where you pick up books and they don't grab you. Honestly I had bee avoiding the final Hardman, that'd be a special occasion, like a expensive bottle of whisky. Though, I had finally gotten around to buying the paperback so it was in my house lurking and calling my name from the shelf. It found it's way to my armchair and there was a bottle of beer on the upturned plastic wooden barrel I keep beside it for remotes. Then BOOM! I'm halfway through the book and two beers in.

Hardman goes to London to find a rich kid and escape his romantic problems. Marcy one of the only reoccurring characters in the books has left him and multiple beers at George's Deli haven't helped. Maybe a little work will and change of local. That's the jumping off point and Hardman meets the Polish wife of the would be title and gets buried neck-deep into a rich families problems. There's murders and tough-guy scenes, a lot of local color and a man who's growing older and sadder and doesn't think things are going to work out the way he wanted. The action starts in Atlanta and then moves to London. I didn't know what I'd think about Hardman in a different locale, so much of Hardman IS Atlanta, but my doubts all faded away. Hardman just drank in pubs instead of bars and his nose still got stuck in places it shouldn't. Hardman quickly finds the missing guy dead and is back in Atlanta with the Polish Wife in tow. There's echos of Ross MacDonald's Archer in the probing of the family but it's ultimately not about the rich family and a dash of classical "locked room" mystery even if it's in a horse stable instead of the parlor. It's about Hardman and the Polish Wife both brutally scrambling for what they want and knowing its the last shot they will ever have. The Polish Wife herself is a interesting and fairly likeable and relatable real human version of the "femme fatale."  You understand exactly why she does what she does and falls the way she falls. That's the beauty of Dennis's writing: pulp with real people. Everybody is someone you know, know of or don't want to know.

And in one evening, barely moving from my chair with four beers drank; the book was done. The last Hardman was read and that sure is something. 

Maybe it wouldn't mean as much without the benefit of the previous twelve books but it's an ending and you should probably read it last. It's not as action-orientated as some of the other books and there's a little bit too little Hump (isn't there always?) but it's a full-blown miracle that it exists. So, Lee Goldberg will have my eternal thanks, all of Ralph Dennis's library is easily purchased in paperback or ebook from Brash Books. The Hardman books are some of the finest examples of crime fiction in the 70's and finally some light it getting shown on them and it's about good-god-damned time.