October 2009 Book Round-Up

MY: 166: Heat Wave – Richard Castle(?)

WE: 167: Wolf Moon – Ed Gorman

AD: 168: Gangland”s Doom: The Shadow of The Pulps – Frank Eisgruber, Jr.

WE: 169: Trail of The Hunter – Dudley Dean

WE: 170: The Trailsman: Riverboat Rampage – Jon Sharpe

SF: 171: Ballroom In The Skies – John D. MacDonald

TH: 172: Blood Marks – Bill Crider

MY: 173: The Whispering Master – Frank Gruber

WE: 174: The Trailsman: Riverboat Rampage – Jon Sharpe

TH: 175: Top Ten – Ryne Douglas Pearson

WE: 176 The Last Gunfighter: Sudden Fury – William W. Johnstone with J. A. Johnstone

MY: 177: The Laughing Fox – Frank Gruber

TH: 178: Quarry In The Middle – Max Allan Collins

AD: 179: Doc Wilde and The Frogs of Doom – Tim Byrd

AD: 180: The Shadow: The Gray Ghost – Maxwell Grant(Walter Gibson)

October 2009 Movie Round-Up

Between God, The Devil and A Winchester(1968)

Beyond The Law(1968)

The Five Man Army(1969)

Blindman(1971)

Savage Guns(1971)

The Fighting Fists of Shanghai Joe(1972)

Grayeagle(1977)

The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. in Paperback

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Girl From U.N.C.L.E.

The Global Globules Affair – Simon Latter

The Birds of A Feather Affair – Michael Avallone

The Golden Boats of Taradata Affair – Simon Latter

The Cornish Pixie Affair – Peter Leslie

This is a series I’d coveted for a long time. For years I had no idea how to find books from across the ocean. Then the internet came along and made it so much easier for me to find and order them(I also filled out a couple of other series missing books from back in the sixties).

The Global Globules Affair

THRUSH’s plan here is to screw up the world’s monetary system by using a chemical called K.S.R.6. the plot is led by Dr. Karel Karadin. It’s up to April Dancer and her Partner Mark Slate to foil the deal.

The Birds of A Feather affair

This was the first book in the American series.

Mark Slate has been kidnapped by THRUSH and the ransom demand is more than U.N.C.L.E. will pay. April Dancer has to infiltrate THRUSH in order to find Slate before it’s too late.

The Golden Boats of Taradata Affair

The Palaga family, descended from pirates, rules the island of Taradata. Their industry these days is exporting coracles(small bowl shaped boats). Dancer and Slate are investigating the island when they uncover a nasty THRUSH plot to use the common cold as a weapon.

The Cornish Pixie Affair

Peter Leslie also wrote five Man From U.N.C.L.E. novels.

Pixies made of black porphery(a stone material commonly used for counter tops) seems to be in high demand. They are tied in with the murder of a female U.N.C.L.E. agent and April has gone undercover in Cornwall with a circus troupe to find out why the murder was committed.

Naturally she stumbles onto an insidious THRUSH plot.

The Birds of A Feather Affair – Michael Avallone

The Blazing Affair – Michael Avallone

There were two books in the American series. The first was later published as the second in the British series. Same cover photo in a different design.

The Blazing Affair

After escaping a trap in a South African diamond mine, Dancer and Slate are sent to investigate a new organization called TORCH, whose aim is to establish a Fourth Reich. The pair pursue their inquiries from Budapest to Johannesburg in an effort to stop the new Nazis.

2009 World Series Game 2

Tags

Phillies, World Series, Yankees

Game 2 of the series last night was another good one. It didn’t end like I wanted, though, as, being a Dodger supporter, I’m automatically an anti-Yankee fan.

A. J. Burnett of the Yankees did a much better pitching job than anyone had seemed to be willing to give him. The Phillies’ plan was to try to wear him down by taking a lot of pitches, but it back-fired as he kept them constantly in the hole with first pitch strikes(something like the first eleven batters).

Pedro Martinez wasn’t bad, the wily old veteran using all his tricks to hold them off for awhile. A-Rod struck out three more times, something mitigated by Howard striking out four times(something never done by a clean-up hitter in a series game before).

Final score 3-1 Yankees.

FFB: The Whispering Master – Frank Gruber

Tags

Forgotten Books, Frank Gruber, Johnny Fletcher

My selection this week is a third pick of Frank Gruber’s Johnny Fletcher mystery series. First published in 1956, it is another in the adventures of Johnny and his partner, Sam Cragg, con men and part time detectives.

As usual, Johnny and Sam are on the verge of being thrown out of their hotel room for being behind on the rent. Sam wakes up to find Johnny and his suit gone. Johnny had hocked it to get a few dollars to pay the rent. At the same time, he finds a record lying on the bed, one of aluminum, a master.

Johnny returns home to find the young woman in the room directly across the alley from theirs has been murdered. Sam is complaining because he can’t go out in his underwear and the cops are interested in the pair because they are in the vicinity of another death.

You see it happens to them all to frequently and Johnny has to solve the crime for their own preservation. In order to get Sam out of the hotel room, he has to pull off a most complex check kiting scheme: opening an account with their last funds from the suit hock, getting a few checks and going around buying things with checks, hocking them for as much as they can get, opening more accounts, getting the checks, buying and hocking more, until he has a couple of thousand dollars in checks floating around a number of banks after an initial outlay of only about twenty bucks.You couldn’t pull off a deal like that in these days of computers.

Now he has to come up with some cash to cover all those checks before they can get back to the various banks and put the cops on their trail. First they check out their record master and learn it’s the final recording of an artist recently killed in a plane crash. There are two versions of the same song on the master and on the second they can hear some whispered cursing.

Upon learning that the murdered woman had recently recorded a song for a local recording company, lights go off. Johnny smells money and finagles his way into a meeting with company execs, intimating he has the master. Immediately, he is offered $5,000 in cash.

He holds them off for two reasons: more money and solving the murder of the young woman. Along the way, there is a sister and a fiance of the murder victim who holds a majority interest in the recording company, which is about to file for bankruptcy because of the missing recording.

Everyone of these mysteries I read(only five of sixteen) they seem to get better. I can’t wait to find more and I recommend this one for any crime/mystery fan.

Go Phillies!

Tags

Phillies, World Series, Yankees

I was pleased with the outcome of game one last night. Any time the Yankees lose, it’s a good day. The Phillies, or specifically Cliff Lee, completely dominated New York. Ten strike outs, no walks, Lee looked as relaxed as I’ve ever seen a pitcher in the series. The sportscasters say it might have been the greatest series game pitched in recent memory.

The nonchalant catch of Damon’s pop-up to the mound, the command of all his pitches, the behind the back stab of the line drive(it was surely luck) that he snagged, he was never in any real trouble. He likely would have had a shut-out but for a minor flub by Rollins.

Chase Utley’s two single run homers were icing on the cake.

Can they keep it up? The experts still say the Yankees will win the series. Of course, everybody was picking the American League representative for game one. It didn’t happen.

We’ll see how tonight’s game goes.

The Last Gunfighter: Sudden Fury – William W. Johnstone with J. A. Johnstone

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The Last Gunfighter, William W. Johnstone

Frank Morgan was riding through the redwood forests of Northern California when he heard the screams and gunfire somewhere ahead of him. Curious and never one to run from trouble, he investigates. The scene he comes upon is one of horror. A number of dead men, loggers, lay around a clearing. The extreme violence did to them, Morgan had never seen the like.

Bodies were shredded, throats ripped out, limbs torn from the torsos. It had to be some sort of animal. Right?

When the rest of the logging crew comes up, the Drifter learns it’s a creature tagged as the Terror of the Redwoods by everyone. Described as a monster, giant, hairy, smelling really bad, with a fierce roar, he doesn’t believe it’s some exotic creature like everyone else. But what is it?

He learns that Rutherford Chamberlain, the owner of the logging rights in the area, has placed a $10,000 bounty on the Terror’s head. He knows that won’t be a good idea when he’s first accosted by three gunmen who, upon learning his identity, want to take down the Drifter and then gets caught in a crossfire between two bands of hunters firing wildly at each other, so scared of the Terror, in spite of their greed, that they fire at any noise.

Morgan goes to visit Rutherford in his redwood “palace” in the forest to try talk him out of the bounty. His reputation preceding him, he’s given the offer of doing the job himself and the bounty will be pulled. He refuses at first until he speaks with Rutherford’s daughter who has another idea and begs his help. Never one to turn down a lady, he gives in and takes the job.

Something else is going on though. He fids another group of the Terror’s victims, but a critical examination of the bodies tells him they have been chopped up with axes. He soon learns that another timber baron wants the leases. And apparently that gang is being lead by an old childhood friend of Morgan’s, a man he’s fought with over the years, saved each other’s lives on more than one occasion.

The tale told here has Morgan in a time limit to find the Terror, or the bounty will be doubled, one gang out to kill him so that will happen, this other gang probably working for the opposition trying to take him out, and a sad young woman to whom he made a promise.

The author does his usual superb job of carrying one of Johnstone’s characters through a fine new adventure.

Recommended if you like a good western.

2009 NFL Week 7

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Jets, Panthers, Redskins

The Panthers’ game with the Bills was an ugly mess. At the end of the first half, the Panthers had them beat in first downs, 13-2, ahead of them in possession time, 24.5 minutes to 7.5 minutes, yet the score was 7-2 Buffalo.

The main reasons: a bad pick by Jake that led to a touchdown, two missed field goals by Kasay(hooked one, pushed the other), going for first down on a fourth and one instead of taking the field goal, only to be stopped cold by the worst run defense in the league.

Jake had moments of the old Jake, a couple of deep pretty passes, but also two more picks at awkward times. He threw for 325 yards. All for naught. I don’t know what’s up with Jake. It looks like he might be near the end of his career. Or at least with the Panthers. The coach John Fox, who’s probably under some pressure himself, made noises to the local press Sunday about reassessing Jake as a starter.

update: Now Fox says he hasn’t thought about replacing Jake. You know what that means? He’s likely on his way out.

A good drive for a TD had cut the margin to eight with seven minutes, the defense held, and the Panthers were set to get the ball back with six minutes to go. Then the punt was fumbled and the Bills recovered deep and wound up with a touchdown.

Final score 20-9 Bills.

The Bucs lost over in London to the Patriots, 35-7, the Falcons went down, 37-21, to the Cowboys, and the Saints got way down to the Dolphins before making a fierce comeback to win, 46-34. those guys are good.

But I bet, Charles, they had you sweating bullets for a while there. LOL!

The Jets, on the other hand, swamped the Raiders 38-0, to stay just one game behind the Patriots.

And talk about messes. The ‘Skins play the Eagles tonight. They are likely to get stomped on as the Eagles lost to the Raiders last week. I’ll watch(I am a ‘Skins fan after all), but I’m also a realist. If they win another game this year, I’ll be surprised.

Well, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I’d imagined. The ‘Skins lost 27-17, but they had their moments. The defense was pretty decent. They gave up a sixty-five yard TD run early in the game. Other than that, though, they played well.

It was the offense and special teams that kept leaving them in messes. After a good drive late in the first half, cutting the lead to ten, the defense holding the Eagles without a first down, the special team player muffed the punt and let the opposition get the ball in the red zone. Jason Campbell threw a pick earlier that let the Eagles run for a NINE yard TD.

Three turnovers in the game, six sacks of Campbell, sixty-two yards rushing, 3-12 on third down conversions. They never really had a chance, but it could have been a lot worse.

That’s depressing for a long time fan, talking about could have been worse, than talking about winning.

Blue Oyster Cult

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Blue Oyster Cult

I was somewhat disappointed when I saw these boys live. Not in the show itself, but the length. They were opening for Rush and were allowed to play only about twenty minutes or so. I am a fan of Rush, but I went there to see The Cult.

Here are a couple of my favorites.

I didn’t include the usual suspects, Godzilla and Don’t Fear The Reaper, though they rank among my favorites also. Those two they play on the radio fairly regularly, but almost never anything else.

The Cult can almost be considered a fantasy band I suppose. One album was mostly based on Moorcock’s Elric, with the author getting song writing credits on Black Blade and Veteran of the Psychic Wars.

Between God, The Devil and A Winchester(Anche Nel West C’era Una Volta Dio)

Tags

Gilbert Roland, Richard Harrison, spaghetti westerns

As I was watching this film, It seemed all too familiar at times, even though I knew I’d never seen it before. It took me way to long to figure out why. I can only plead that it has been forty-five years or so since I last read the novel upon which it is sort of based.

It starts off with a fat man running from someone. He kills several people that get in his way, then takes a room at a saloon/hotel run by a man known as Uncle Pink, who constantly talks about his days as a cook in the Confederate army. He tries to hire Juan Chasquisdo(Gilbert Roland), a man with an iron hand, to guide him into a desolate valley deep in the desert. No money up front though. No go.

The man, Bob Ford, then pays a young Mexican boy named Tommy to bring his food up to his room at each meal, warning him to be on the lookout for a scar faced man with a patch over one eye.

That man, an advance scout for a band of outlaws led by Serraldo, arrives only to be killed by Ford, who then proceeds to hide something in a nook of the ceiling of his room. Tommy sees him.

When the rest of the gang rides up, Ford is killed in the fight before he can reveal anything and they start slapping around Pink, demanding to know where the map is hidden. A search finds nothing and the place is set on fire, the bandits riding off in disgust.

A mystery man shows up at this time, known as Pat(Richard Harrison), helping to get everyone out, then rescuing Tommy when he goes back into the fire to rescue the hidden object. it turns out to be a map.

That’s when things start to come clear. A treasure map, a villain with an eye patch, a boy, a rogue with an iron hand, the quiet man who steps in to help. I was watching a spaghetti western Treasure Island.

The boy is charmed by Chasquisdo, who seems to have an agenda of his own, making deals of his own with Serraldo and his gang.

Pat turns out to be Father Pat Jordan who was on the trail of Ford, whose men looted a Catholic mission at the end of the Civil War and hid the gold and jewelry in a cave. He’d broken out of jail and went after the gold, Father Jordan pursuing him.

The story sticks pretty close, just substituting the desert for the ocean, and Tommy becomes close to Chasquisdo, who seems to have a soft spot for Tommy. There’s double cross and double cross again as we’re never quite sure whose side Chasquisdo is on. Of course we know where this is all headed.

The movie has a lot of shoot-em-ups, but still is not nearly as violent as most films in the genre. This is, after all, an adventure story, not a tale of revenge, and one the whole family could enjoy together.

I give it a B. It also has a decent music score.