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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2019 1:16:05 GMT -5
Continuing to read vintage pulp novels I have picked up recently, this time in the men's adventure vein, I just finished the first book in the Executioner series..War Against the Mafia by Don PEndleton, introducing Mack Bolan and his crusade against crime... Aside from being an inspiration/influence on the Punisher, and some comments made on these forums by codystarbuck and others, I wasn't very familiar with this series or this book in particular. I had seen plenty of them over the years at used book stores but had never run into book 1, so had always passed, but I ran across War Against the Mafia in an HPB for $3 a month or so ago, so picked it up figuring I would give it a try and see what it was actually like. It was a fun read, most likely the equivalent of a hard "R" rating if it were a movie and a little spicier than I was expecting on the sex end of the sex and violence spectrum. I guess I had gotten used to the likes of Howard essentially doing a fade to black and leaving the rest to the readers imagination as it happened "off screen" and was surprised when there was no fade to black (or it happened much later than it does in a typical Howard yarn) in these. Now that I now, I can set my expectations a little better if I read any more (I have I think 2 more from much later in the series in the pile of unread vintage paperbacks that may get to at some point). I enjoyed it for the most part, but I have some of the same issues I had any time I have tried to read Punisher comics or characters of that ilk in terms of straining credulity and suspension of disbelief that they can come out of these scenarios alive. This one at least offered a rationale for it in terms of planning, superior weaponry and trained soldier vs. amateur thugs, and had the character voice some of the same doubts about survivability of the scenario, so that nagging voice in the back of my head was at least placated for now. It wasn't great literature, and has a lot of warts and such, but it firmly fits comfortably in the niche of a guilty pleasure kind of read, and I can live with that. -M
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Post by EdoBosnar on Apr 27, 2019 4:26:05 GMT -5
(...) a little spicier than I was expecting on the sex end of the sex and violence spectrum. (...) Yep, that sounds about right. In the early '80s (when I was about 14) I read of a few of the books in this 'universe' (although probably not written by Pendleton): one was a 'Stony Man' novel, in which Bolan is the main character, but in which many of his associates with similar talents play a major role, and then two in a spin-off series featuring a black-ops-type anti-terrorist team called the Phoenix Force. I recall very little about the main stories in these books, but I can still remember the racy sex scenes, which usually involved very thorough descriptions of the women's bodies. I was definitely a bit young to be reading those, although, despite my raging hormones, I lost interest in them pretty quickly (as with the first few Gor novels about a year earlier).
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Post by EdoBosnar on Apr 27, 2019 4:48:37 GMT -5
Pandora's PlanetChristopher Anvil (pen-name for Harry Crosby) This is a mostly entertaining book; it was published in the early 1970s, but is a fix-up of several short stories Anvil had originally written and had published in various SF magazines since the late 1950s. The planet in question is Earth, as perceived by a race of conquerers (called Centrans, who look more or less like bipedal lions). They realize that although somewhat less technologically advanced, the inhabitants of Earth are more intelligent than Centrans, dangerously so, in fact. Not only are they fast learners, they're also incredibly persuasive, and easily convince many Centrans to adopt their various ideologies, economic theories and even fads (fascism, communism, consumerism, etc.). The main character is a Centran general named Horsip, who was initially charged with the nearly impossible task of administering Earth once it was conquered, and then later monitoring the people of Earth as they spread out to a part of the Centran galactic empire, and dealing with the consequences. It's nothing spectacular or ground-breaking, but still worth a read because of its mostly humorous tone.
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Post by Jesse on Apr 27, 2019 21:05:18 GMT -5
My girlfriend took me to a book sale at a library today and for $5 we were allowed to fill one bag. So for $10 bucks we got loads and loads of books. These are just the ones I got for myself. I was really glad to find most of the Foundation books I was missing now all I need is Prelude to Foundation and I own the entire series. As big of a horror fan as I am I've never actually read Stephen King so I'm glad I can finally start that after recently watching the film remake. I've always assumed Da Vinci code was overrated but never bothered with it or the films. The Tolkien Collection I actually picked up for my younger brother who got me into the books. Oh and that Vincent Van Gogh book is gorgeous to look at.
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Post by berkley on Apr 27, 2019 21:21:56 GMT -5
Continuing to read vintage pulp novels I have picked up recently, this time in the men's adventure vein, I just finished the first book in the Executioner series..War Against the Mafia by Don PEndleton, introducing Mack Bolan and his crusade against crime... Aside from being an inspiration/influence on the Punisher, and some comments made on these forums by codystarbuck and others, I wasn't very familiar with this series or this book in particular. I had seen plenty of them over the years at used book stores but had never run into book 1, so had always passed, but I ran across War Against the Mafia in an HPB for $3 a month or so ago, so picked it up figuring I would give it a try and see what it was actually like. It was a fun read, most likely the equivalent of a hard "R" rating if it were a movie and a little spicier than I was expecting on the sex end of the sex and violence spectrum. I guess I had gotten used to the likes of Howard essentially doing a fade to black and leaving the rest to the readers imagination as it happened "off screen" and was surprised when there was no fade to black (or it happened much later than it does in a typical Howard yarn) in these. Now that I now, I can set my expectations a little better if I read any more (I have I think 2 more from much later in the series in the pile of unread vintage paperbacks that may get to at some point). I enjoyed it for the most part, but I have some of the same issues I had any time I have tried to read Punisher comics or characters of that ilk in terms of straining credulity and suspension of disbelief that they can come out of these scenarios alive. This one at least offered a rationale for it in terms of planning, superior weaponry and trained soldier vs. amateur thugs, and had the character voice some of the same doubts about survivability of the scenario, so that nagging voice in the back of my head was at least placated for now. It wasn't great literature, and has a lot of warts and such, but it firmly fits comfortably in the niche of a guilty pleasure kind of read, and I can live with that. -M The only "men's adventure" books I've read are two or three of the Destroyer series, written by Richard Sapir and Warren Murphy, but I intend to explore more of it in the future, including the Executioner. As you say, they were very much the inheritors of the whole pulp mentality of easy-to-read, disposable entertainment, relying on colourful characters, unlikely plots, and of course lost of sex and violence. I remember the Destroyer books, which I read as a young teenager in the early or mid-70s, as highly enjoyable.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Apr 27, 2019 22:09:54 GMT -5
Searching for Robert Johnson by Peter Guralnick. A short work by blues writer Guralnick looking at what was known at the time about blues great Robert Johnson. And there wasn't that much that was know when this was published in 1989. Thirty years later...there's not a lot more. At the time there was one known picture of Johnson. Now there are two that are pretty definitively him and three more that may be. At the time his musical reputation largely rested on the 1961 album King of the Delta Blues Singers. His records never sold well...and his music was much better known as covered by other artists than as done by Johnson. In 1990 the two CD The Complete Recordings was released with 41 of the 42 takes that are known to still exist of Johnson's recordings (it's missing one alternate take of Travelin' Riverside Blues). 41 takes of 29 songs. The collection sold more than a million copies...a ridiculously large amount for an archival blues project. But then I'd consider it the most important blues collection...probably ever. And certainly the most important blues release of the last fifty years. This isn't a full-fledged biography. Guralnick is publishing a summary of the work that musicologist Mack McCormick had gathered in anticipation of McCormick publishing a biography of Johnson based on his findings. That never happened. According to McCormick he lost interest. McCormick also did significant research on blues/ragtime musician Henry Thomas. We have a decent view of Johnson's musical career thanks to the remembrances of Robert Jr. Lockwood, Johnny Shines, Son House and Honeyboy Edwards. But Robert the man is still little more than a ghost. Guralnick muses that Johnson is the blues' Shakespeare. There's something to be said about that. Certainly Johnson's influence on blues and rock music is outsized. He also lived and worked and died in obscurity. Shakespeare is arguably the greatest writer of the English language ever. I wouldn't contend (nor would Guralnick I believe) that Johnson is the greatest musician ever. But his best songs are astonishing for an uneducated, largely self-taught musician. His ghost looms over the last 80 years of popular music. And if you have any interest in that music this short little book is decent place to start.
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Post by berkley on Apr 27, 2019 23:24:11 GMT -5
Love that Vallejo-channeling-Berkey cover, though. Boris Vallejo produced a lot of excellent covers back in the day, before his style changed and he started using body-builders as models.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Apr 28, 2019 2:38:03 GMT -5
Boris Vallejo produced a lot of excellent covers back in the day, before his style changed and he started using body-builders as models. And one of the latter for his female figures was his wife, fellow artist and also body-builder Julie Bell. Kind of similar to Frazetta, whose wife Ellie often served as his model - just as I'm dead sure he used himself as the model for a lot of his male figures.
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Post by berkley on Apr 29, 2019 1:15:41 GMT -5
Boris Vallejo produced a lot of excellent covers back in the day, before his style changed and he started using body-builders as models. And one of the latter for his female figures was his wife, fellow artist and also body-builder Julie Bell. Kind of similar to Frazetta, whose wife Ellie often served as his model - just as I'm dead sure he used himself as the model for a lot of his male figures.
Didn't seem to have the same negative effect on Frazetta's work, though, from what I've noticed.
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Post by EdoBosnar on Apr 29, 2019 3:37:58 GMT -5
Oh, yeah. I meant similar in the sense that in both cases, their wives often served as models for their art. For me, there's no comparison in their actual output, as I think Frazetta's work is orders of magnitude better than Vallejo's.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Apr 29, 2019 23:27:16 GMT -5
Pandora's PlanetChristopher Anvil (pen-name for Harry Crosby) This is a mostly entertaining book; it was published in the early 1970s, but is a fix-up of several short stories Anvil had originally written and had published in various SF magazines since the late 1950s. The planet in question is Earth, as perceived by a race of conquerers (called Centrans, who look more or less like bipedal lions). They realize that although somewhat less technologically advanced, the inhabitants of Earth are more intelligent than Centrans, dangerously so, in fact. Not only are they fast learners, they're also incredibly persuasive, and easily convince many Centrans to adopt their various ideologies, economic theories and even fads (fascism, communism, consumerism, etc.). The main character is a Centran general named Horsip, who was initially charged with the nearly impossible task of administering Earth once it was conquered, and then later monitoring the people of Earth as they spread out to a part of the Centran galactic empire, and dealing with the consequences. It's nothing spectacular or ground-breaking, but still worth a read because of its mostly humorous tone. That sounds really fun... reminds of of Alan Dean Foster... I wonder if that's were got got some of his inspiration? Here's my book for the day: Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab I added this to my to-read list long ago, and finally got to it for book club. It seems like the sort of book I should like, and there was nothing really wrong with it exactly, but I can't say that I liked it. The first 1/2 felt like an 'atmospheric' book, but without the atmosphere... we get pages of description of 'Grey London' (our world, I guess? it's never clear... then it never factors into the story. We get detailed descriptions of several characters that serve no purpose but to die, and add nothing. The two main characters, Kell and Lila, are neither unique or particularly likeable (Kell is particularly UN-likeable, honestly). When the plot finally gets moving, there's lots of action, but there's not a great sense of urgency, since we're never really told WHY things are happening, or exactly what the consquences could be... there's no clear bad guys (unless a stone counts), and those that are on the evil side don't have much motivation, they're just generic power-hungry mustache twirling types. Then there's 'the four Londons'.. which have nothing in common except geographic location. Why do they even talk to each other? The worlds seem to be sorted by distance from magic, but we get no details as to how that shaped them, just that Grey London has no magic, Red London has 'good' magic, White London has 'evil' magic, and Black London is a dead wasteland because magic ran wild... no other info about the worlds (except the names of the kingdoms London is part of) are given. What do you get when you have a world building book that doesn't build a world? Meh.
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Post by EdoBosnar on May 1, 2019 4:19:08 GMT -5
The Holy MachineChris Beckett Set in a dystopian near future in which most of the world's countries have collapsed into dogmatic theocratic states (Christian, Muslim, etc.) and often at war with each other, the story centers around a young man named George, who lives in the world's sole island of scientific rationality, a city-state called Illyria that's situated somewhere on the southern Adriatic coast (based on geographic clues in the story, either in today's Montenegro or possibly northern Albania). It was founded by refugees from countries throughout the world, who fled the persecution of the religious regimes because they refused to renounce their atheism and reliance on rational thought. In many ways, Illyria is a technological paradise, in which its residents enjoy a high standard of living, but much of this depends on both robotic servants and large numbers of foreign (i.e., non-citizen) guest workers who do a lot of the menial work. Many of the robots have "self-evolving" programs, while the foreign workforce is disgruntled due to their second class treatment - both of these aspects become problems that drive the story. Basically, the foreign workers start holding protests, while the robots/androids often just wander off. George, who's fluent in a number of languages, works as an interpreter and lives with his single mother, who spends most of her time hooked up to a VR device, preferring it to the real world. As he ambles around for a purpose in life, George among other things starts visiting a brothel in which all of the sex-workers are very, very life-like androids. He realizes that the one he frequents, named Lucy, begins to exhibit signs of sentience - and when the city's government announces that it will periodically wipe the memory of 'self-evolving' robots because of their increasingly frequent problematic behavior, George decides to flee Illyria with Lucy in tow, even though that means going into what are called the "Outlands" by Illyrians, where religious zealotry holds sway and where androids, if detected, are immediately destroyed because they're considered demonic abominations. Very good story, and very well-written. Beckett, who's otherwise a social worker and university professor, is a very good writer. A few of his short stories are (or at least used to be) available online. They're worth tracking down.
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Post by wildfire2099 on May 1, 2019 7:48:22 GMT -5
Fake I.D. by Christoper Starr The cover scene actually takes place in the book, this one it' the title 'Fake I.D' that doesn't make sense.. sure, the main character is a bouncer, but otherwise there's no connection to the story at all. Relatively typical fare of a seemingly average joe a bit down on his luck that spirals out of control. It's definitely a page turner, but the main character does more than a few things that don't make alot of sense(Like visiting his boss' wife when he says she disgusts her, or going to Vegas with his stolen money), but it almost seems like maybe the author meant us to think he had lost his mind, which would make slightly more sense. Not the strongest entry in the series, but worth a quick read.
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Post by wildfire2099 on May 3, 2019 19:18:53 GMT -5
The Falling Torch By Algis Budrys This is one of those books that's sci fi in name only.. it's really a war story with a very thin science fiction vaneer... it's set 500 years in the future, where Earth has been taken over by 'the Invaders' and the colony of Centaurus is really the main human settlement... they are a clear analog for the US and Earth is your favorite southeast Asian conflict of the late 50s or early 60s. The author had some interesting thing to say about leadership and the war mentality, but there's not a huge amount of plot... a young guy gets disillusioned with people then decides to take over to make his ideals reality. Not a terrible read, but definitely not really sci fi, so if you're looking for one of a 'what did they get right' sort of looks to the future, this isn't it.
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2019 23:40:18 GMT -5
Continuing the parade of pulp novels, I just finished the first Doc Savage adventure: Doc Savage, Man of Bronze. I picked up this Golden Press hardcover edition (and one of the second book in the series as well) at a con late last year. The cover art is by Ben Otero and there are spot illustrations throughout by Ron Villani. I wasn't familiar with either's work before finding this book. This edition is form 1975 from Western Publishing (parent company of Gold Key and Whitman I believe) and plays up the super-hero angle on the cover, and I believe it is targeted towards younger readers (as opposed to the mass market paperback versions of Doc's adventures). These are the size and format of Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew books from the same era, and the trade dress reminds me of those lines, which is what makes me think they are targeted at a younger audience and would be shelved in a bookstore near those other series. The first Doc adventure is fun, and does a lot to set up the character and his henchman, but the story itself does not hold up well over time mostly because it involves finding a surviving lost Mayan civilization and the depiction of the Mayans has not aged well, as our understanding of Mayan culture has grown and popular depictions of them from the past do not stand up well to modern discoveries. That doesn't stop the book from being a fun adventure romp and an entertaining read, but it does make it feel dated. I've read a few other Doc adventures from the original pulps (via the mass market paperbacks and the series of "double novels" that collected 2 pulp prose adventures with spot illustrations in a package that resembled a comic trade paperback in size, shape and page count), and those stood the test of time better than this introductory adventure (and again I think the results will vary depending on the subject matter of the adventure plot-the inclusion of the Mayans is what was problematic in this one), so I am not going to let these flaws discourage me from reading the other Doc novesl I have or from picking up others as I find them. -M
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