One Man’s Treasure by Terrance Layhew

Self-published 2024

Cover art: Victor Maristane

Terrance Layhew is a fellow YouTube personality who hosts a show called Suit Up! wherein he interviews guests from the world of the written word to talk books, writing, and everything that inspires them all while dressed to impress. To be fair though, I think Terrance dresses like that every day. He has published three books so far. Two romance novels; Reason and Romance, Prose and Procrastination and this here adventure novel, One Man’s Treasure.

Basic premise: Two brothers acquire a treasure map dating back to 1670 won in a poker game. They venture off to the Caribbean to determine if this treasure really exists. Along the way they have feisty romantic entanglements with ladies, storms in the jungle that almost drown them, mental chess games with adversarial peers, sword fights and a showdown with pirates.

The story is alternately told through the perspectives of both brothers, Sam and Dix. Sam is the younger. He’s an engineer. Shy. Reserved. Unsure of himself. Mechanically inclined. And he’s asking the love of his life Amy to marry him. He is intrigued with the map and is the spark that gets the adventure going. His older brother Dix is a macho, shark of an attorney who would have a gambling problem if he didn’t win so much and doesn’t always put others feelings before his own. He’s also aces with a rapier. The chapters alternate perspective with each brother’s narrative. I’m kind of daft so I was a little confused until like the fifth chapter and then I was like, oh duh. Which is really embarrassing because Layhew literally heads each chapter with who the narrator is.

We get an excellent historical background on the treasure and the pirate Killian Jack, who once owned it.

Sam’s fiancée Amy joins the brothers on the trip. She is levelheaded, intelligent and often the voice of reason. Also, we have Mallory, a love scorn romantic victim of Dix’s conquests. She’s a sympathetic character who has her own moments of strength buried beneath her vulnerability. At times a damsel in distress but I get the impression Layhew holds women in very high regard so it’s never insulting. And to be fair at one point Sam is the damsel in distress but of his own witless doing.

The adventure is very classic pulp fiction style. At first, I questioned the decision to make the two protagonists high class professionals. But then I realized a lot of classic pulp heroes were exactly that. The later era working class hero that I’m used to, came in when Men’s Adventure took the place of adventure pulps.

I appreciated that Layhew included the things he obviously loves; James Bond, Indiana Jones, Romancing the Stone. All things classy. Tuxedos and high stakes poker games. Fencing; a gentlemen’s sport of violence. We’re on yachts. We’re in wealthy lawyers’ skyscraper office buildings. Romance and not just the kind between two human beings. The settings are romantic, the adventure is romantic, the style is romantic. Dig up Alan Ladd and William Bendix and put them in some tuxedos, I have a movie for them to star in.

I really enjoyed the excitement-build-up scenes on the yacht. Layhew’s strongest ability is dialogue, and it keeps accelerating in quality as the plot moves forward. But he also knows how to add a good fight scene and macho attitude when the story warrants it. At one point a character’s face is described as “very punchable” which I absolutely enjoyed because I say stuff like that all the time.

When the pirates make an appearance, we meet Captain Marks who I would imagine was inspired by the Dread Pirate Roberts from The Princess Bride though he is described as looking like Errol Flynn. A fair and somewhat good-natured Wesley only in the pirate business for the adventure and the money. He was definitely the right highlight needed for the climax of the book.

Overall, this is an adventure novel with moments of light-hearted quips in the middle of the action and a touch of romance. It reminded me of movies like Brendan Frasier’s Mummy or Journey to the Center of the Earth. Maybe even an atmosphere from a 1940s adventure movie. There is nothing crude and the only modern thing in this book is some technology. There is danger and excitement but it’s also fun and has the feel of an exciting vacation mis-adventure.