FFB: Danger: Dinosaurs! – Evan Hunter

Tags

Evan Hunter, Forgotten Books

Winston Science Fiction was a series, thirty-five, of juveniles published between 1952 and 1961. There was one collection and one non-fiction among them. SF writers mostly, but some more known for other genres. As here(this one and another couple were originally published as by Richard Marsden). All were especially written for the series and distinguished by that rocket on the spine. I frequently looked for that rocket when I was very young. Don’t know that I read all of them back then. Likely not.

Owen and Chuck Spencer should have been suspicious of Dirk Masterson from the start. Owen was the guide for the Time Slip back to the Jurassic era and Chuck was being allowed to go along. Masterson was unco-operative from go, not wanting to prove his identity.

Things only got worse when they went back. Masterson jumps into a jeep and takes off at high speed, crashing into and shoring out the force field that kept the dinosaurs away from them. And the recall wasn’t for a week.

When Masterson and his partner pulled hunting rifles from their truck, The Spencer brothers knew trouble was here. You see, this was a photography only mission. Killing was illegal.

And finally, Chuck discovers mining equipment and dynamite stored in Masterson’s truck.

A nice little juvenile science fiction novel. I did have problems with one plot line, but won’t give that away. Try it and see what you think. They are available as ebooks.

The Lawyer: Stay of Execution – Wayne D. Dundee

Tags

Beat To A pulp, David cranmer(Edward A. Grainger), Wayne D. Dundee

He was gaining a reputation as The Lawyer for a pair of reasons. First, lawyering was his profession. Or rather had been, that ending when he arrived home to find his family murdered, his house burned to the ground.

J. D. Miller then became a hunter for the ones responsible. Also judge, jury, and executioner. It became his mission and thus The Lawyer was formed. An unrelenting pursuit, only occasionally sidelined to help folks that needed aid.

In this first volume, he stops to help a young couple hurt by one of his targets, the husband shot, the wife nearly ready to give birth. In town, he gets pulled into a bully boy’s depredations against his will.

But he never did anything halfway.

Author Wayne Dundee and Beat To A Pulp, in the form of David Cranmer in his disguise(hah) of Edward A, Grainger, bring us what looks to be a very good series. Available HERE.

Devil’s Run: John Coburn — The Peregrine #2 – Richard Prosch

Tags

Richard Prosch, western

Richard Prosch brings us another adventure of John Coburn, The Peregrine, a man with a reputation in 1889.

He’s hired on to bring Tie-Down Sam Gustoffson to trial as a witness against his cousin Willy for the slaughter of a whole family. What Coburn doesn’t know is the sheriff of the small town they’s stopped off in for the night to get something to eat and Coburn to visit a lady friend was also another cousin of the same family. And he was incensed that one family member would rat out another.

Therefor Sam had to die.

Not to mention The Peregrine.

Another welcome addition to Richard’s growing body of work. Most excellent. Available HERE.

Skynoise – Ernie Lindsey

Tags

Ernie Lindsey, Mystery/Science Fiction

I’ve really grown to love Ernie Lindsey’s over the last few years. He’s equally adept in any genre he takes on. in SKYNOISE, he combines several: history, action thriller, mystery, and science fiction.

Thus we get the mystery of the lost colonists of Roanoke Island, just off the coast of my native North Carolina, time travel, those ever popular Men In Black(not the movie men, but those of legend and conspiracy theory), and plenty of action.

It’s; the story of author and researcher Helen Weils and apparent consiracy freak Chip Sledd, who’s taken to showing up at Helen’s lectures and book signings spouting his ever increasing whacky theories about thos long disappeared colonists.

Had a lot of un with this one. Can be ordered here.

Music For The Dead – Luis Gutiérrez Maluenda, Translator Nick Caistor

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Crime Noir, Luis Gutiérrez Maluenda, translator Nick Caistor

Private investigator Mike Winowsky has an immense love for both jazz and bourbon. In 1940s New York it often takes him to dangerous spots. For that he carries a .38 and a set of brass knuckles.

Tonight he’s at The Cotton Club to see Count Basie about a job. It seems someone is blackmailing a member of his band, Billy Strayhorn, a homosexual and the composer of Winowsky’s current favorite TAKE THE ‘A’ TRAIN. Basie wants Winowsky to frighten the blackmailer off.

Not a complicated job as Winowsky waits to catch the fellow, a hustler named Luther Smith, getting oral gratification from a hooker in the back seat of his car. He throws enough of a scare into Smith to feel that problem was over.

However, the next morning he reads in the paper that Smith had been found strangled in his car. The time had to be shortly after Winowsky’s encounter and surely his fingerprints would be found on the scene.

He’d been framed as the visit from two sadistic cops who take great delight in trying to beat a confession out of him. Throw in a mob boss who wants Winowsky dead, a rich white gut at Smith’s funeral who breaks into tears, and a second dead body killed in the same manner make it tough as Winowsky tries to figure out what’s going on and clear his name.

Author Luis Gutiérrez Maluenda is a Spaniard. MUSIC FOR THE DEAD is the first of his crime novels translated into English.

It’s a good one.

By Blood Bound: (The Smith & Sons Saga) – Wayne D. Dundee

Tags

Wayne D. Dundee, western

A story of a family estranged from each other. Silas Smith had fought for the North in the war. His Southern father-in-law, a hidebound old Rebel, had poisoned his wife and young sons minds against him so that, after years away, they hated him.

Silas walked away and had seen none of them for a dozen years. In that interim, he’d become a lawman in a small Nebraska town.

Then his mother-in-law came to see him. His wife was dead, his father-in-law had committed suicide, two of her other sons were gone. All that was left were her, her youngest and weakest son, and his two sons. She wanted them to reconnect and extracted a promise from Silas to give it a try.

This is the story of he halting steps each side takes to do that, especially when their lives depend on each other.

Another fine western from an excellent writer. Can be ordered HERE.

Ghost Town Belles – Chap O’Keefe

Tags

Black Horse Western, Chap O'Keefe

Alexander Garrity, better known as Drift for his propensity for moving on frequently, was looking for something: his past. Father went west when he was a baby to find gold, mother died broke, he raised in an orphanage. Drift became a cowboy, a grueling life. In the off season, it was a hardscrabble existence, looking for work, any work, to sustain him.

Drift first runs into Mad Dungaree Dan, a reclusive ex-miner who lived in a mountain ghost town where he kept captive his two beautiful daughters, Melissa and Isabella, when he rescues Melissa from a dangerous situation and is nearly killed by the old man for his efforts.

He ends up getting a job on a large ranch, mostly at the instigation of the owner’s beautiful daughter, Rebecca. Which puts him on the wrong side of the foreman Zack Emmett, vicious range boss and one- time gunfighter, who Drift had already whipped in a fist fight. The man had his eyes set on Rebecca and control of her father’s ranch.

A final showdown in an old ghost town and some surprising revelations highlight this fine western. According to the author, the Kindle is tro be released on December 24th and can be pre-ordered here.

Legacy: Trial and Terror – Warren Murphy & Gerald Welch

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Gerald Welch, Warren Murphy

I’ve been a fan of the Destroyer universe going all the way back to the beginning in the early seventies. Never been disappointed except one stretch where neither Murphy or any of the best writers were working. Thankfully things gor back on track.

The LEGACY series concerns Remo Williams’s children half siblings Stone and Freya. Both are trained by their grandfather, Sunny Joe of the Sinanju Indian tribe in the Southwestern United States. Stone is the older and a former Navy Seal, but has less experience than sixteen year old Freya in the Sinanju discipline.

They work for a branch of CURE and deal with terrorists trying to bring down America.

In this latest volume, Trail and Terror, the pair have to deal with a master spy intent on bringing down the American infrastructure. The test case is in Virginia Beach where a computer virus shuts down all electricity grids.

A most enjoyable series and a worthy addition to the Destroyer universe. Author Gerald Welch is also an artist who does the covers. He’s quite accomplished at both

Can be ordered HERE.

Carnosaur Weekend( Kyler Knightly and Damon Cole Book 1) – Garnett Elliott

Tags

Beat To A pulp, Garnett Elliott

Kyler Knightly and his uncle Damon Cole are sort of time police. As members of the Time Corps, It’s their job to keep the time lines stable to preserve the world as it should be in their time. The Zigma Projector was their mode of travel through time. Kyler was a Dreamer, a psychic, transferred to field agent. He had visions as he slept that usually proved true.i
In CARNOSAUR WEEKEND, the pair find themselves in the Cretaceous Period at a modern resort built by developers for the super rich. The aim was to turn the past into a vacation spot. What that might do to the time lines no one wanted to consider. Kyler and Damon were out to shut it down and trace the real estate company responsible.

Dinosaurs in a science fiction tale have always been a favorite.

THE ZYGMA GAMBIT tells the tale of how Kyler was promoted to field agent when a vision showed his uncle lying dead in a future jaunt. He waylays Damon in order to stop his vision.

THE WORMS OF TERPSICHORE is a tale of the future and giant killing centipedes on another planet.

Loved these three tales and look forward to more. It is numbered Book 1 after all.

Recommended The latest from BEAT TO A PULP.

Devil’s Ledger(John Coburn – The Peregrine Book 1) – Richard Prosch

Tags

Richard Prosch, The Peregrine

Author Richard Prosch brings his character John Coburn, AKA The Peregrine, back. A man of reputation and the star of dime novels. Not to mention A number of short stories by Richard.

John Coburn stumbles across an old cell mate, Bandy Murphy, running from a gang after the Judas Book in Murphy’s possession.

Supposedly a journal kept by an itinerant preacher Judas Warren, it was filled with confessions, locations of buried bodies and stolen fortunes. That was the legend. Coburn never really believed it was real.

But now here was Murphy claiming he had it and there was a pack of killers after it, mre than willing to kill anyone who stopped them from gaining control of the book. But it was so much more.

A fine novella from Richard Prosch. As with most of his stories, both western and more modern, it’s set in his native Nebraska. And the good news is it’s the beginning of a series

Highly recommended and can be ordered HERE.