I recently did another Guide to Gothics episode with my pal Eric from the Paperback Warrior on my YouTube channel where we discuss this book. We had a special guest this time around, Chris from the Youtube channel Liminal Spaces. Here is the video but if you just want the quick written review, it is below.
The book starts off with a prologue chapter from the perspective of a young boy with “a big head, round pale eyes and a mouth that was too wide.” He stumbles upon a ceremony of what could be described as a coven of witches out in the woods who are surrounding a black kettle.
So, not a good start. The visual is so cartoonish. They might as well have had green skin, pointy black hats and giant warts on their nose. This really took the wind out of my sails almost immediately. A nail in my tire. Getting hit with the ball at my first at bat. My new fish dying in the bag on the way home from the pet store.
The boy realizes he has seen something he shouldn’t have and runs through the woods in a panic. Neither we nor him know if he’s being followed. The woods open to a lone house. The boy recognizes it as his doctor’s house who he regards as a very kind man.
Before he gets to the house a man in a robe with a hood drops from the tree in the front yard. He creeps up to the doctor’s door. He places something on the porch, rings the bell and runs back to the tree.
The doctor answers the door, sees the mystery package, picks it up, gets angry and throws it into his front lawn near where the boy with the big head is hiding.
The boy sees what it is.
It’s a doll with pins in it made to look like a lady he once saw the doctor with.
The man from the tree jumps back down, the boy grabs the doll and starts running but not fast enough because he suddenly feels a pain in his back like someone threw a rock and passes out.
And scene.
We now meet our protagonist Archeologist Joan Lambert. She is driving to Glen Oaks, Kentucky to visit her fellow Archeologist slash museum manager boss slash protective boyfriend Dr Wilfred Allen. But this isn’t just a weeklong lover’s getaway with her man. Dr Allen has invited an internationally renowned psychiatrist, a psychical research scholar (a ghost hunter), an anthropologist whose focus of study was East African tribal shaman incantations and a Doogie Howser type young psychologist. Now, to what purpose would this grouping of experts on the paranormal and human mind need to be assembled?
Sixteen months prior Joan was on an archeological expedition in Pyrenees mountain range straddling the border of France and Spain. While exploring a cave she was attacked by something that is described or insinuated as organic but then she believes that it followed her and is connected to her in a mental capacity, so it is supernatural. It’s very ambiguous.
In the cave she found not only ancient cave paintings that proved witchcraft was practiced in ancient times but she also found a defiled fertility statue called the Aurignacian Venus.
So, as limp as this story is I will say Frank Belknap Long did some research here. The Pyrenees Mountains were renown for witchcraft and satanism. The area was known as the Land of the Goat. There was a book just released in 2024 called Land of the Goat: Witchcraft in the Pyrenees by Julia Carerras-Tort which looks into the history of witchcraft in that area. So, the fact that FBL hit on something that is just now having books written about is pretty impressive.
So far, I am into this book. It’s an interesting premise incorporating real world historical witchcraft and a malevolent supernatural force straight out of a Weird Tales story.
After the exposition backstory we get some action. While Joan is driving a black monstrous figure appears in the middle of the road. Joan swerves to avoid it and wrecks her car. This part kind of reminded me of the scene in the Mothman Prophecies.
She climbs from her wrecked car, gasoline dripping everywhere, glad to be alive but then she remembers that she is out in the middle of nowhere, alone with a monster. She looks up to see it standing there. Its face is skull like. It has a hood on and even though the robe covered it she was sure it still had its taloned hands. With the gasoline leaking she thinks about lighting a match as she would rather take her own life than let this creature get ahold of her.
And that’s when the creature started coming for her. She gets up and panic runs through the dark forest. She can hear the thing pursuing her. Eventually she runs into a man. It’s the local sheriff out a-huntin. She passes out in his arms.
Hope you guys enjoyed that excitement. That’s about it.
There is an interlude chapter jammed in here where a newlywed couple are traveling through. They run out of gas. See a man in the forest with what looks like red hunting gear on. They walk through the woods to a clearing and see two cloaked men and a woman near an open grave. They do a ritual and then throw a dead woman in the grave. The couple runs back to their car in shock. Another car happens upon them so they can go get gas. Twenty min later both cars are at the bottom of a ravine. This chapter seemed kind of unnecessary as it just rehashes the prologue. In fact, the first three chapters have a character running through the same exact woods.
Speaking of reiteration. Joan wakes up inside Dr. Wilfred Allen’s home. Here she pretty much retells the second chapter over again. Isn’t that one of the rules of writing? Don’t rehash something you’ve already covered?
Later that night she hears a noise outside her window. She looks out to see 12 naked men and women circled around a figure twice the size of a man but looks like an impaled frog. The people start banging it out. She thinks, I would be all right with this if it was just a regular orgy but she knows that its part of a witch ceremony so she feels queasy.
The Sheriff shows up to check on her. He tells of the murder of the big headed boy from the beginning. He also pulls out the voodoo doll that we now know is Joan.
Wilfred tells of how the doll was left on his porch and he threw it away. The sheriff is like, ok, why didn’t you tell me? Which, yeah that’s fishy, Wilfred.
Sheriff infers that Joan has something to do with it. Wilfred takes sheriff to the porch to go off on him.
While the two are outside the guests come up and introduce themselves to Joan. The first is a women who tells her she is Wilfred’s half sister...oh and also that she spent a year in prison after being falsely accused of murder but has recently been exonerated when the real killer confessed.
Wilfred never even mentioned he had a sister let alone one in prison even though they are very close. Hmmm.
Oh ho ho the plot thickens!
At the end of the day, the ideas, themes and ambience in this are wonderful but FBL likes to circle around the cool stuff at arm’s length. There is a lot of unnecessary talking in this and what’s even worse is they are talking about what has already been shown in the story. The part that I found most interesting, the creature from the Pyrenees caves, is all but forgotten once she gets to Kentucky. It is never explained or concluded.
I’m putting this one down as another miss from my boy Frank here. I really need to go back and read his golden era Weird Tales stories. These later novels aren’t doing it for me.
First published by NEL in 1974 as The Venomous Serpent
The Night Creature, which is what I’ll call it since I read the American edition and I’m a ‘Merican, is a 70s British folk horror novel in league with an Amicus or Hammer film. It’s a slow burn. It’s cheeky at the beginning. When I started it and the first-person narrative started spitting lighthearted pseudo-humorous quips I groaned and almost quit immediately. I shut the book and looked over the cover art. I re-read the back synopsis. No, there is no way this is a comedy novel. I read on and am glad I did.
Video review here. Written review below.
Sally and Andy are young lovers who were attending college back in the city. After dating for four short months they quit school and moved out to the rural area of Derbyshire. They rent a barn to live in/open a shop to sell tourist items like ceramic gnomes, discarded junk sold as antiques and paintings that Sally made herself.
One day Sally finds a monumental brass in a collapsed church located in the nearby ghost town of Stymead. What is a monumental brass you ask? Good question my fellow Americans. A monumental brass is an engraved sheet of brass laid into pavement. They were very popular in England though are located in other European nations also. People would make rubbings of the etching and sell them for big bucks.
So, that is Sally’s plan. She makes a rubbing of the brass and brings it home to Andy. The rubbing features a man and a woman but the woman’s face has been carved out. At each of their feet lies a pet. At the man’s feet is a lion and at the woman’s feet is a dog-like creature.
One night Andy wakes up after a horrendous nightmare. While looking at the rubbing now hanging on his wall, illuminated by moonlight, he thinks he sees movement in the woman’s dress and her pet dog. He’s a little freaked but heads back to bed. In the morning, he sees that one of his two kittens is dead. It looks as if a wild creature snuck into the house and attacked it. He thinks back on last night and the rubbing. While inspecting it he finds a bit of blood on the corner. Odd.
Andy is now freaking out and surprisingly enough Sally sort of believes him about the rubbing. They venture back to Stymead to inspect the brass and the church. The few locals that live there eye them slyly from behind their curtains.
This book is loaded with folksy atmospheric descriptions of rural England. After having blundered that intro with lite comedy I was pleasantly surprised to see it head off in this direction. This is heyday 70s Amicus and Hammer horror film era and this book reads just like one of those movies.
Once again Andy is plagued with a nightmare and the scene from the previous night is played out again only this time amped up. The moonlight is lighting up the whole room. The dust floating in the light gives it a dreamlike feel. The dog is now clearly moving but its legs have become snakes. It slithers up the woman’s body to her heart, where she reaches out and embraces it.
I read this right before falling asleep and had dreams of being out in the woods with snakes and small creatures lurking in the dark. It really creeped me out.
This all happens within four chapters and to tell more detail would spoil it.
The couple investigates the history behind the brass further. Their opinions about the rubbing bring tension to the relationship though at times Sally also seems aloof to the situation. What is going on with her? Who are the people pictured in the brass? Are these things that Andy is seeing real?
Like I said this is radiating classic gothic folk horror atmosphere. The barn they convert into their home was built in 1710. All of the roads are thin and winding country roads. It’s raining and overcast in the day. At night the moon is full and bright in the sky, shining through open windows. You can almost smell the earthy air and feel the cool breeze blowing in.
The young characters of Sally and Andy are written perfectly as happy-go-lucky youngsters with not much life experience. They aren’t a bitter old arguing couple. It’s pleasant to spend time with them. Their motives and actions feel exactly what a twenty-year-old couple would do. The characters from the two towns they interact with are colorful in their stereotypical characterizations. The scowling unwelcoming townie. The poor and shabby, superstitious rural yokel interacting with the college educated city youngsters is always an enjoyable trope. A local constable warns Andy, no one would venture to Stymead on May Day. Don’t you know it’s Walpurgis Night?
The evil is mysterious and ancient. It builds its attack slowly from the shadows, each encounter one step closer to the inevitable doom. It’s not groundbreaking but it is classic pulp horror. Subtle and slow with ever building tension. Nothing too graphic though there is some bloodshed. This is one to read at night in the dark with only a book light on.
Nicholas Monsarrat was a Lieutenant Commander in the Royal Navy. He served in World War 2 and afterward used his seafaring wartime experience to write many books on the subject. In 1955, in the midst of all the high action war thrillers he knocked out this spooky gothic.
Written review below. Video review here:
The basic premise: Thomas Welles is a penniless American writer living abroad in Nice France. He has just finished his first book and sent it off to the publisher, awaiting his paycheck. At the moment though, he doesn’t even have money to eat. While sitting in a café drinking his last dime’s worth of coffee he spots a well-to-do man at another table. The man, whose name is Paul Erhardt, invites him over and buys him a petit pain. He learns of Thomas’ plight and offers him a job to be his personal secretary.
Thomas is then introduced to the man’s wife Anna. Anna is flirty. Tom doesn’t want to blow this new job, so he denies her advances. Later Anna tells her husband Paul that she wants to bang Tom. Paul is like, as you wish, my love.
Here we have our first hint that there is more than meets the eye with this rich power couple. They also have a local driver henchman named Hugo. What could they possibly want with Paul that Hugo couldn’t do? The couple will never admit where in the world they are originally from, and Tom can’t place the accent. He thinks they are just an eccentric wealthy couple and doesn’t think much about it especially because they are throwing money at him.
They want Tom to travel to the country near Grasse in the Alpes Maritimes and find them a castle to rent. They have extremely specific qualifications for this castle like it has to have a wall around it and a chapel and a tower. They want the atmosphere of the 18th 19th century to escape all the modern noise. Tom heads out with his camera.
After his first quest he is given another. He must find a blonde nineteen-year-old girl that looks and acts her age, who is a native French speaker and has zero family ties. He obviously finds this request ludicrous. What would they even want with this girl? Paul assures him that he can’t tell him, but no harm will come to the young girl and in fact she will be paid well enough to change her life. Tom knows he’s deep into something shady now. He’s obviously being set up for something but it’s hard to turn down the money and he continues on.
Does he find the girl? What do they want with her? What’s up with this castle? Who are these people?
And here we have the gothic mystery. It’s a conspiracy against Tom but one that is in his face. He’s not being gaslit like in other gothics. He knows it’s bullshit but keeps on with the charade. Does this have to do with the fact that he’s a man? An interesting sociological example of the way men and women were viewed back then. This is the first gothic mystery I have read where the protagonist is male. Maybe because it was before the 60s explosion of the paperback gothics specifically marketed to women? Other than the lack of gaslighting this is tit for tat a gothic. A sole character plucked from their normal life and placed alone in an isolated location filled with strangers who seem friendly at face value. The story is saturated in gothic atmosphere. Hell, we even got a bona fide crumbling castle, isolated in the French mountains. Anna, the wife of Paul exudes pure sexuality but there is also a more wholesome love affair.
The pacing of this book was like being behind someone on the road who keeps checking their phone. You’re driving along at a normal pace and then inexplicably slow down to five miles under the speed limit for a block, all of a sudden they pick up speed a little and you’re doing five over. On and on. Go. Lull. Go. Lull. At one point some of the characters do something that would warrant action on the part of Tom but instead of figuring out what happened our main character is hanging around the café, eating petit pains and drinking orange juice. Other times he's scaling walls and fist fighting unknown attackers.
Claudette Nicole is actually Trailsman creator, Jon Messman. Jon Messman was responsible for many action and Men’s Adventure series like the Revenger, inspired by the Executioner boom, and several entries in the Nick Carter Killmaster series. He had a two-part series inspired by the Travis McGee series called Logan. Many standalones in the crime, espionage and action-adventure genres, plus he wrote most of the first 200 books in the adult western Trailsman series. He wrote nine gothic mysteries under the name Claudette Nicole. Dark Mill was his fifth and was first published as a paperback original in 1972 by Fawcett Gold Medal.
Video review here. Written review below.
The basic premise: Valery Curtis is a compassionate nurse who cares for an rich old lady, named Carlotta Van Dyne, in the hospital. Carlotta is enamored with the thoughtful nature of Valery and offers her a job watching her granddaughter for two months in her remote Maine chateau. The pay is $3000 plus all expenses paid. Valery is in a mental slump and this seems like the perfect way to change her environment and revitalize her life.
When she arrives at the estate with the mysterious name of Verdelet no one is there but the gaunt Lurch-like caretaker/servant Labat. She waits for a month and just when she is about ready to leave the little girl Tansy appears. Tansy immediately asks to go down to the old mill. While walking around the dilapidated structure Valery falls through a rotten board and slips underneath to the now spinning water mill. After narrowly being crushed to death she eventually shimmies her way out, getting knocked out in the process.
She awakes in her bed to a handsome man standing over her. He is the little girl’s uncle, Bob Van Dyne. He’s charming, boisterous, outgoing, confident and he wants a piece of Valery’s sugar pie. Valery is not against the prospect.
Also, there is his friend and coworker Glen Perry. He is quiet and sheepish. Submissive to Bob’s every command. The lack of back-bone bothers Valery. What a waste of a handsome man, she thinks.
The little girl, Tansy isn’t bothered in the slightest by this near-death accident of her new babysitter. She almost seems bored by it. She is a smart mouthed little brat whose soul purpose is to belittle Valery psychologically. She is described as looking like Shirley Temple with bouncing blonde curls and little kewpie dresses. You’re going to hate this girl.
As Valery gets to know these new people she is also informed another uncle will be showing up. A Brother Martin Van Dyne, a monk who left the official church but not the cloth. This guy sits around smiling while constantly spewing nihilistic philosophies on the inherent desire to kill inside humans and how there is nothing wrong with it. He strangely seems to not believe in good or evil so therefore any travesty a person commits is in the laws of nature. Valery is not a fan of his philosophies or his company.
Like most gothic mysteries the mystery is often whether the odd things that are happening are real or all in the main character’s head. Is there a conspiracy against her? Who can she trust?
The mystery in the Dark Mill is who is this strange aristocratic family and what are their dark secrets? Was Valery really hired to care for this little girl is there something more sinister at work?
Gaslighting is a huge part of most of the gothics I have read and this one is no different. The little girl is a sadist whose torment of Valery escalates as the plot progresses. By the end Valery is in a tight spot and has to make some serious decisions that go against her own moral character. It makes me wonder what exactly Messman was trying to say here about the murderous nature hiding in every one of us and what it takes for it to come out. And when it does, is it even necessarily a bad thing?
Maybe I’m reading too much into it but the book is filled with such philosophies emitting from the mouth of the questionable monk.
Either way, this was a wonderful conspiracy mystery peppered with all the gothic flavor. Here’s a little taste. All from the first paragraph:
Cavernous old house. Afternoon turned grey. Chill wind. Her tall willowy body. An echo of the cattails. Violet eyes. Jet black hair. The wind stabbed at her again. Strange place. Hollow of land. Beauty here was an ominous thing, at once frightening and compelling.
I had a great time this year doing this here book blog thing. I started the Youtube channel on Oct 20th 2023 so like 14 months ago. I made quite a lot of friends which is something I didn’t expect; fellow channels, people in the comments who at first I thought didn’t like me but then ended up sending me books and being my pal- thanks Stiv. I got invited by Jake at Pulp Mortem to be a collaborator/cohost along with Tim at Secret Fire Books, on his book show, The Elusive Exclusive Book Society. Our last guest of the year was Eric from the Paperback Warrior which is crazy to me because their podcast was the reason I started this blog/ YouTube channel. So that was kind of surreal and then also in the past year I got mentioned in the Paperback Fanatic. It’s crazy. I don’t know anything. I’m not an expert. Hell, I barely graduated high school (because I was a JD, not because I was dumb.) I can’t believe people actually want to hear me stumble and bumble my way through these videos and watch as I learn this seemingly endless world of exploitive, explosive, sleazy and most of all fun vintage genre fiction.
I also wanted to give a shout to Bob from Menspulpmags.com and Justin from Fathompress.com for sending me their releases to review. I appreciate it immensely.
I made some shirts, by the way. I have a screen printing business so I printed these myself. The art was done by my good friend Bryan Brady. They are available on my business website streetlightprinting.com
If you don't feel like reading, I did make a video for this one:
For the list we’re not including new releases as this is primarily a vintage genre fiction blog. Though we will give a shout out to Terrance Layhew and his book One Man’s Treasure- it was incredibly enjoyable. We’re also not including art books, or magazines but we’ll mention them all here because I love them and everyone should support them by buying a copy; Paperback Parade, Paperback Fanatic and the MAQ. We will, however, be including the Men’s Adventure Library series collections as they are entirely reprinted fiction from the past.
We read 68 books:
17 horror
16 crime/mystery
9 sci-fi
8 spy
8 men’s adventure
5 westerns
4 S&s/fantasy
1 gothic
68. Deathworld 2- first book we read for EEBS. It was less a plot and more a vehicle for HH to speak at us about how religious people are horrible. I’m not religious in the slightest but this was totally unfair and the worst crime of all is it was boring. It was repetitive, lazy, pretentious and insulting. It’s one of the worst books I’ve ever read.
67. Vortex- this is a book about a huge tornado ripping through a town and the people fighting to survive! Just kidding. It’s a book about some dusty old politician visiting his dying side chick in a rural town where a tornado should be coming any minute now. Lots of dry reminiscing. Lots of republican/democrat BS. A very luke warm murder mystery side plot and two pages of tornado action at the end.
66. Stallion- if this was a cover art list this thing would be in the top five. Unfortunately, the book isn’t anywhere near as good. A horse-riding farm in the sticks in the UK. A giant horse next door. A sort of possessed horny teenage girl. Nervous breakdown mom. Hints of the supernatural but no follow through. Honestly, not much horror at all.
65. Rogue Agent no 1- started off kind of cool with an undercover spy which then leads to sneaking into West Germany to grab this defector scientist and then on the way out it all falls apart and it looks like the spy guy has been set up. Great premise but then he just kind of hangs out for most of the rest of the book. He goes to the beach. Visits some friends. It gets a little more spy toward the end but it has zero climax.
64. Ghostbusters- imagine the script of the movie and now take out all of the jokes and actors charm.
63. Aftershock- underground mutant monster comes to the surface to eat human brains after an earthquake. The monster is depressed and spends most of the book sulking. The humans up top spend most of the time talking biology and medicine. Not nearly enough brain eating. The kills were splendid though. Heads ripped off with attached spines.
62. The Last Rangers- Post apocalypse Texas ranger takes on all manner of bad doers in the pretty much lawless wasteland that is Texas. I remember this having a really solid middle. Like it was a short story and they tacked on an awkward beginning and ending.
61. 13 Horrors of Halloween- This is a case of wanting one thing and getting another. I wanted a spooky book to read during Halloween. What I got was a genre mash up of stories that happened to take place on Halloween but have zero spook factor.
60. Blue Sunshine- one of my favorite B movies. It’s about some bad acid that people took in the 60s that is making them psycho killers in the 80s. And lose all of their hair. This suffers the same fate as Ghostbusters. Pretty much the script and missing the actor’s performances.
59. Foxx no 1- This is an adult western about a Railroad detective who is a manly man named Foxx who goes after some guys that tried to blow up a train. This had lots of detail descriptions of the old west setting. It was impressive but dragged it down and made it feel very dry. The dialogue was basic, the writing was at a 5th grade level. Pretty bland all around.
58. Sliders- one of my favorite tv shows. This one was pretty enjoyable. Unfortunately, I was under the assumption that it was a new story but it was just a novelization of the pilot episode. So, for that it lands towards the bottom. Unlike Blue Sunshine and Ghostbusters though, it was written way better with lots of extra panache added.
57. Caviar- a collection of short stories by Theodore Sturgeon originally published in the pulps. I had high hopes for this when I picked it up because I really enjoyed his story in another collection coming up much later in this list. These were pretty disappointing though. Some a little too cheeky. Some flat out boring. Out of the 8 I really only liked 1.
56. Deathworld 3- the final installment in the Deathworld trilogy. Coming right after the trudge through the second one, this one didn’t stand much of a chance. The crew end up on a brutish Conan type world and instead of just giving us some hack and slash release after the preaching of the second one we instead do lots of sneaking around and undercover work. If this was a standalone it might have been rated better but I just couldn’t shake number 2.
55. Bumsider- another EEBS books. A lackluster noirish mystery lightly sprinkled with some sci-fi stuff. This books main issue was that the main character didn’t want to be there and it made you feel like you didn’t want to be there either. I was into it at first. The world was very Soylent Greenish. It unfortunately meandered too much.
54. Operation Atlantis- French author writes a French spy book where the actual hero is a US spy. This had moments of 60s schlocky spy fun, but I really wanted it to be more about the French hero.
53. Badman- the cover states, “he was an outlaw out for revenge.” This had some great shoot outs and action scenes as the main character is on the run from the law after getting set up for a train robbery gone wrong. It read like parables as he travels from place to place getting into morally grey encounters. He spends a lot of time reevaluating his life and it was smart and insightful but a little too deep for what I was hoping for.
52. Dead Man Dead- beautiful Robert Maguire cover. I love the Exotica theme of Calypso and voodoo and mix it with crime and a murder mystery, and I’ll be buying that book in a second. This was just average. Nothing mind blowing. The fact that it had almost zero calypso or voodoo as the cover suggests drops it a little further down the list.
51. Hunger- a group of killer biologically enhanced mako sharks escape their government testing pin and head out to the open ocean to eat people. This was pretty enjoyable but had too much padding. Too much filler not enough killer…sharks.
50. Cherry Delight no 14 In a Pinch- Cherry is a super sexy agent of NYMPHO- New York mafia Prosecution and Harassment Organization. In this one she helps a fellow busty lady take out some mafia button men who were responsible for killing the girl’s brother. As far as Cherry’s go, this one was pretty meh. The sleaze wasn’t that sleazy and the plot got a bit repetitive.
49. Drowning Pool- an entry in the Lew Archer PI series. He investigates a wealthy family because the wife is being black mailed for cheating and they have dirty pictures. This was a pretty good read. It reminded me of Chinatown a lot. Nothing really stuck out as mind blowing but nothing stuck out as bad either.
48. Deathworld- a psychic gambler gets hired to figure out why a planet is trying to kill it’s people. When this first started I loved it. It made me excited to read more sci-fi. But then it just comes off the rails. Plot points are thrown to the side. The reasoning behind the conflict was meh. It did have lots of action though and the world was fun, brutal and interesting.
47. Nine Princes in Amber- one of the princes of the real world of Amber tries to take the throne from his brother. I had no idea this was such a well-loved series when we covered it on an episode of EEBS and if I had I probably wouldn’t have been so harsh on it. Ultimately though, what can I say, I still feel the same. It was a bit too dreamy and loose for me and I just felt like the ho hum motivation of the characters infected me as a reader. Not to say that there weren’t great parts in this; I loved the tarot card idea, the accessible other worlds, one of the coolest fight scenes ever where two armies fight through a single file line…but yeah I don’t know, I am going to try out the second in the series. It really bothers me that so many people who I usually agree with loved it so I’m going in for another round. I hated Lost Highway when I first watched it and now it’s one of my favorite movies. Now THAT’S a nonsensical plot.
46. Devil World- a star trek book featuring the original characters. Kirk and co go to a Forbidden Planet- quite literally it’s just like the movie Forbidden Planet to help a young looker find her dad. This was fun and essentially feels like a lost episode from the original run.
45. Hawk no 1 The Deadly Crusader- Reporter playboy Michael Hawk’s humble beginnings. This is before he inherits his fortune and is just a working reporter. I was surprised by how different this was than the later entries. It’s written really well. Like functionally well. The plot is wishy washy though and it just didn’t have that 80s action b-movie feel that the other Hawk books have.
44. The Golden Stag- I was in the mood for some treasure hunting which is what this was selling but instead it turned out to be a run of the mill men’s adventure which would have been great if they would have thrown in the treasure hunting as mentioned but it was like five pages of the entire book and that’s what I was there for.
43. Ninja Master no 1- we went over this in EEBS so just briefly, I read a later entry in the ninja master series and loved it so I wanted to see how it all began. It began with a whimper. Not enough fighting, not enough ninja. It did however nail the low budget vigilante movie in tone and for that I enjoyed it.
42. The Executioner no 2- the series that started off the one-man-versus-the-mob genre. I had never read one before and wanted to start at the beginning, but I found number 2 for $1 so we started there. Lots of action. Gun fights. Action. Military talkin. Killin. Guns. Action. Bombs. Missiles. Buddy comrade. Guns and action. No plot. No tension. Just shootin.
41. Cosa Nostra- Small town Maine sheriff takes on the mob as they try and infiltrate his small town. Sleazy and kind of ridiculous plot about the mob wanting to set up a spot close to the border of Canada so they can connect with gangsters in Montreal. It’s more like a PI story as you follow the main cop character in trying to figure out what the mob is even doing there. It’s really tough talking. Politically incorrect. Violent and gritty. It was a little slow though and kinda meh plot wise.
40. Hawk no 12 Virgin Stealers- later era style Mike Hawk that we’re used to and love. This one was mid-teir Hawk only because it had all this snuff stuff in it and I just hate that shit. I hate the idea of it. I hate torture. If you took the snuff out it would have gotten much higher.
39. Angel Eyes- E Howard Hunt’s hardboiled CPA character Steve Bentley got the number one spot last year with the Calypso Caper. In Angel Eyes Bentley is back in DC and it just didn’t stand out as much as Calypso Caper. I think this is the case of loving the last one so much that the bar was raised high. This was still enjoyable but I wanted another home run.
38. Hook no 5 Corpses in the Celler- Insurance investigator and former boxer, The Hook, kicks ass, beds ladies and denies you your insurance claim on the fire at your nightclub. This was ridiculous. Which made it fun. It had some decent fist fights and a decent little mystery.
37. Gun Code- A young man returns to the town is father was murdered in 15 years after him and his mother were chased out. He wants the land that is still in their name and half of his fathers business but the other half is owned by the man everyone says killed his father. So what actually happened? A pretty decent cold case murder mystery that pulls you back and forth between the two possible killers.
36. The Walking Dead- sequel to the Sinking Pit. A supernatural pit in the woods that hypnotizes people into killing their loved ones. I mean...
35. The Book of Skulls- four college bros traveling from NY to Arizona to find a cult who one of the lads believes will make you live forever. The only problem is, they will only accept groups of four and one of them must die. What an incredibly original novel. When they get to the cult it was eerie and filled with tension. I NEEDED to know what was going to happen!! So why wasn’t it higher? Most of the book is a road trip of college bros doing college bro things. I get that the end doesn’t work if we don’t know the guys well but man, it was a little too much. Still. What a memorable book.
34. Brood of the Witch Queen- A serialized novel originally published in the pulps. Black magic. Ancient Egypt. 1930s occult out the yin yang. This was in three parts. The first was a little better than good. The middle was outstanding. The third was forgettable. Which places it right in the middle of the list.
33. Black Canaan- REH’s horror stories. This is a short story collection also originally published in the pulps. The Black Canaan story was the main standout. Completely memorable. It takes place in the swamps. There are voodoo zombies and atmosphere galore. The rest of the stories were just ok. Fun horror pulp stories but nowhere near as good as Howards action and adventure stuff. I think this is another case of the bar set high.
32. None of Maigret’s Business- Maigret’s are my comfort read. If I’m feeling stressed, overwhelmed or depressed I read one of these and it never fails to completely take me in. I love this series. LOVE IT. If you don’t know, Jules Maigret is a chief inspector in Paris France. He solves puzzling mysteries. I always say he is the bridge between Sherlock Holmes and those early hard-boiled novels. This one was different. Basically, Maigret takes a vacation and solves the mystery by reading the articles of the murder in the newspaper.
31. Texas Israeli War 1999- We read this one on EEBS and Jake picked it because he thought it was going to be a hilarious shit fire. Turns out it was actually pretty great. A mix of post apocalypse, alternative future history, and a war novel. After the world has been nuked, everything is in disarray. Texas succeeds. They kidnap the US president. Israeli mercenaries are brought in to rescue him.
30. The Face of Night- This was an odd one. It comes out of the gate as an ultra grimy 70s urban crime novel. Lots of heroin and pimps and crooked cops etc. As it goes on it becomes less about an exact crime or plotline and more about the psychological destruction of the main character. This guy starts off as the shining knight and by the end just an absolutely hateful piece of shit.
29. Crown no 1 The Sweet and Sour Kill- Ridiculously fun kung fu cop exploitation novel about a detective in Hong Kong getting revenge for the murder of his grandparents. Look. It’s dumb. I know. I have it above REH. That’s just not right but the thing is I was loving it. I looked forward to it every night.
28. Overkill- I read a book by Dorothy Daniels and while doing research for the review I saw that her husband was also an author and I happened to own one of his books. This is a great spy book that takes place in Albania and involves Russians and Chinese and big surprise a nuclear bomb. Classic Cold War era espionage.
27. Shanghai Incident- Another great cold War era spy book. This one takes place in China and has an ex-soldier returning to find a missing geologist. What was great about this book is it was a spy plot but the style was classic hardboiled detective. It wasn’t a straight narrow mystery but more of a conspiracy mystery.
26. Maigret Sets a Trap- a serial killer is loose on the streets of Paris and Chief Inspector Maigret is tracking him down. This one probably would have been higher but they had made a movie out of it and not only have I watched it like twenty times but the movie was actually better. They didn’t just add scenes but really fleshed out the killers motivation. Regardless, it’s a great entry in the Maigret series.
25. Nighthunter no 1- Part one in a six part series about a psychic killer who uses supernatural elemental forces. What a well researched occult horror novel. The lore in this thing was incredibly on point and the kills were brutal. My biggest complaint is I would have rather just had the story in one book and not stretched out over six. But who knows, maybe it’s worth it to read all six. It’s pretty great as just one though.
24. The Quick Red Fox- this is my third in the Travis McGee series and so far my favorite. Florida houseboat lovin PI Travis McGee is hired by a famous actress to hunt down the guy who is blackmailing her with scandalous photos taken at an orgy she attended. Like other TM entries, the mystery in depth, with many layers and the outlook is bleak.
23. Tight Case- cop book about hunting down the mob. The cops are drunk and willing to break the law to catch the mob. This was written by a real world FBI man who took on the mob. One of the grimiest books I’ve ever read. Everyone in this is a shit heel.
22. To Renew the Ages- Laser books no 26- Post Apocalyptic sci-fi about a man and woman who band together to travel across the wasteland. They get into inventive random encounters and fall in love. This was action and romance and I loved it.
21. The Running Gun- A man is set up as the fall guy in a murder and must travel to the rugged deserts of Mexico to clear his name. Much like the last book this is about a man and woman who band together to travel across a wasteland and fall in love. Sci-fi or Western apparently this is a plot line I enjoy.
20. Panic- Halloween horror book about a boy and then man haunted by a group of wispy imps who only he can see. This was recommended to me by odditypardonme on Instagram and he was right. It rules. No filler. Great Scottish folklore. The main villain is unsettling. And it delivers on the Halloween.
19. Silverglass no 1- sword and sorcery with a female lead written by two female authors. It was tough and exciting. Sleazy. Lots of sex scenes. These ladies get their freak on and they are in control of it. Conan esque type main character who is quick with the sword and hates magic. Reminiscent of a great D&D campaign. Just a lot of fun.
18. Shadow Over Innsmouth- this was a reread so I dropped it lower than it should be. Lovecraft’s haunting story of a town of fish people who made a deal with the old gods.
17. Nolan no 1- Heist novel. Retired thief anti-hero Nolan is being hunted by the mob and is forced to do one last last job to get out from under their scopes. Strong characters. Well written. Exciting which is weird because a lot of it is planning the robbery.
16. The Mexican Connection- Another book where the “bad guy” is the hero. A group of drug runners are trying to do one last big run of quaaludes, so they can retire. A walking hard-on of a cop is on their trail. Someone is snitching. Who is the weak link, can they get away with it? I had no idea the drug dealers were the good guys until the halfway point and it blew my mind when it dawned on me. I think that made me rate it higher.
15. The Night Stalker- The original novel the TV movie was based on. What’s great about this is that the book was actually first even though it wasn’t published until after the movie. It’s different but not in a bad way. Kolchak isn’t the main hero here. He’s the vehicle for telling the story. He gathers together a network of people, so we get lots of other great characters which only adds to the enjoyment.
14. The Maya Temple- the one and only gothic on the list. A woman travels to the jungles of Mexico to find her missing archaeologist father. I loved the setting. The mystery. The Mayan folklore. It was so fun and completely grabs you. Plus, there is a hilarious scene where the main character eats some magic mushrooms and trips out.
13. Atomic Werewolves and Man Eating Plants- I’ve read a few of the Men’s Adventure Library collections and this one has been my favorite. It’s all Weird Tales-ish horror type stories that originally appeared in the pages of Men’s Adventure mags from the 50s-70s. So many great selections that really stick in your mind. In fact, since I’ve read this I have been judging all other short story collections on how great this was.
12. The Golden Child- ok this guy’s trippin. He’s putting the golden child novelization at number 12. Look man. Number one, I love that movie. And even though it doesn’t have Eddie Murphy’s charm and humor it was great but in a different way. This was an entirely different monster. Hardboiled occult detective steeped in Eastern folklore. I looked forward to reading this every night.
11. Monster from Earths End- learned about this book from the Paperback Warrior blog when they reviewed it. Reminscent of The Thing/Who Goes There. Classic b monster horror movie.
10. Sorcerers- spy book with a black magic cult written by E Howard Hunt. This has cold war political intrigue, world traveling, undercover and action scenes. It’s romantically spy and it has a witchcraft cult.
9. A Stir of Echoes- I loved the movie so I decided to go back and read the book. It’s just as eerie but not in your face. There were moments in it that genuinely creeped me out. Excellent haunted house story.
8. Black is the Color- John Brunner writing spy fiction. He takes all of this South African political strife and moves into the swinging hip jazz scene of 60s London and spices it up with voodoo. And he does it well.
7. The Dead of Winter- A group of buddies find one of their own murdered in a strange and violent way. They dig through his life and uncover some shady connections. I thought this was going to be a straight vigilante action book and instead was floored by this complex but understandable mystery novel and they didn’t forget to bring along the vigilante action.
6. The Seth Papers- This is an entry in the occult detective series Dr Owen Orient. He is hired by a woman as a translator for the locals as her and her partner do and archeology dig. They find the Hand of Seth which is a mummified hand that gives prophetic powers. Dr Owen realizes these people are in an evil secret society and must stop them. Halfway through a female CIA agent comes in and takes over the narrative and it’s equally as fun as it turns into a spy novel.
5. Jirel of Joiry- Early sword and sorcery starring a female warrior written by a female. Jirel of Joiry is different from Conan in that she goes about defeating her enemies in other ways. The worlds, creatures and scenarios are completely one of a kind. It borders on horror a lot of the time.
4. Crime Partners- Donald Goines Kenyatta series entry with two hitman who team up with a black militia group to take on cops and drug dealers. Low down and gritty. This is the hardest novel I’ve ever read. This is from the street, written by an author who was in and out of prison.
3. The Gang Girls- I got this for the wonderful juvenile delinquit exploitive cover art and was surprised to find a completely engrossing story. A young lady and her drunk prostitute mom move from Ohio to New York City. The girl gets jumped by a girl gang. Fights back. They invite her to join and from then on its fight, drugs, violence and crime.
2. Assignment Burma Girl- another exciting entry in the Sam Durell spy series. When you read one of these books you not only get an enjoyable history lesson but you get to experience exotic locations from the comfort of your home. Sam Durell is stern and serious but not dry bureaucratic spy fiction. He’s also not martini’s and poonanny. It’s always a great mystery with exciting action and realistic with a tinge of pulpy fun.
1. The Hanging Stones- Manly Wade Wellman comes in at number one on my list this year with this Silver John entry. Someone is building a replica Stone Henge on top of Teatray Mountain. Being a curious fellow John heads up the mountain. We get werewolves, druid folklore, ghosts, fist fights, greed, philosophy, Christian mysticism, occult detecting and songs as John is a travelling folk singer. Such an incredibly inventive and different idea Manly Wade Wellman had come up with. He really brings this world to life.
