James Reasoner Reviews KILLER INSTINCTS!

A few weeks ago, as my novel was coming out on Amazon, I asked several authors if they would find the time to read my book, and if they found it worthy, give it a few kind words. Well, veteran author James Reasoner did more than that. Far, far more!

To quote a few passages from James' incredibly kind review:

"...I figured there was a good chance I'd enjoy his first novel KILLER INSTINCTS.  What I didn't really expect was that it would turn out to be one of the best books I've read so far this year."

"What makes KILLER INSTINCTS work so well is some fine writing that goes deeper into the characterization than is sometimes found in action/adventure fiction."

"...Badelaire never lets things turn into a lecture. Even when William and Richard are discussing the philosophy of violence, the dialogue is crisp, fast-moving, and often funny despite the grim circumstances."

"The action scenes are also top-notch, well written and easy to follow. More than anything, the character of William carries this book. He's no superhero, and he's complex enough that the reader can't help but root for him."

"If you're looking for a well-written, involving thriller, you should definitely check this one out."   

 I have to say, James' review has me grinning from ear to ear like a complete idiot. Thank you James, and for everyone else, take a moment to wander over to Rough Edges, James' blog, and take a look around. He's got some great articles and reviews, and many of his books are available on Amazon for the Kindle at very reasonable prices.

Book Review: THE DEAD MAN #5 The Blood Mesa

This time around, Matt Cahill finds himself in the American Southwest, trudging through New Mexico.  While hitching a ride, Matt notices a blood-red mesa off in the distance, and feels a now-familiar calling to go investigate.  Walking on foot, he encounters a man and a woman with a broken down flatbed truck.  The woman is pretty and friendly to boot.  The man is quarrelsome, suspicious, and to Matt's eye, half his face is falling away from the evil rot Matt is able to see.  Much adventure ensues.


The Blood Mesa is not an extraordinarily complex story.  In fact, I would say it's the most linear and straightforward of the DEAN MAN stories so far.  But this doesn't make it bad, or detract in any way from my enjoyment of Reasoner's yarn.  Cahill journeys with his new acquaintances to the top of Blood Mesa (can anything good ever come of going to a place with the word "blood" in its name?), where an archaeological dig is taking place, examining an abandoned Anasazi village.  The Anasazi, as anyone who reads weird adventure stories and creepy folklore can tell you, disappeared very suddenly from the southwest with no real reason that anyone can pin down - the Roanoke settlers of aboriginal American tribes.  What makes the Anasazi even more ripe for weird/horror story fodder is the archaeological evidence found around some of their abandoned camps; namely human remains that appear butchered with tools and gnawed upon by human teeth.  Yes, that's right - the Anasazi are suspected of being cannibals.

All of this, as well as the appearance of the diabolical Mr. Dark early on in the story, and you've got a nice recipe for trouble.  Matt's axe comes into play in a big way over the course of this adventure, one of the most brutal and violent entries in an already brutal and violent series.  The story riffs off of some creepy western themes, with a hefty dose of cannibalism, whacko/zombie-movie mania, and did I mention there's a few sticks of dynamite thrown in for good measure?

I have recently read a couple of James Reasoner's novels, and I consider The Blood Mesa another excellent yarn from the Texan author - it is highly recommended.

Book Review: THE DEAD MAN #4 The Dead Woman

Fourth in the DEAD MAN series of short action-adventure stories published by Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin, The Dead Woman is written by David McAfee, who has a number of titles in both print and eBook editions up on Amazon.  McAfee drops our (un?)dead hero Matthew Cahill in the small town of Crawford, Tennessee.  Of course, as luck would have it, there's been a serial killer on the loose in town, and pretty quickly Matt gets himself embroiled in the local drama.  Offering to aid Abbey, a young woman trying to close up her mother's antiques shop, Matt runs afoul of Abbey's ex-husband, Dale, one of the town's police officers.  Killers, cops, and beautiful young ladies, oh my...

I won't ruin the plot by giving much else away, but Matt winds up discovering that he is not the only person to possess his gift of seeing the evil within a person's soul manifested as rot and decay eating away at their bodies.  There is also more conflict with Mr. Dark, the ancient and demonic entity who torments Matt on his adventures.  We are given glimpses of more layers beneath other layers; the plots of the DEAD MAN stories continue to shed light on something much more elaborate, perhaps even epic, taking place with Matt caught in the middle having far more questions than answers.

The DEAD MAN series has gone on for some months now, with several more books on the way, and it is in no danger of growing stale.  In fact, with each new author comes a new perspective, a new lens through which we are viewing this twisted world.  While The Dead Woman doesn't have the jaw-dropping gratuity of Ring of Knives or the brutal violence of Hell in Heaven, there is found in The Dead Woman one of the more well-developed and interesting secondary characters thus far, and I hope this isn't the last time Matt runs into this character again.  Maintaining each of the DEAD MAN stories as its own complete episode, while at the same time drawing out an overarching plot that pulls us along, this series has legs enough to carry us through for many more installments to come.

Book Review: THE DEAD MAN #3 Hell in Heaven

One of Robert E. Howard's original Conan stories was "The Phoenix on the Sword", and this story was later re-written into a Kull story called "By This Axe I Rule". The basic gist of both stories is that Conan (or Kull), having slain the former King and usurped the throne, is now stuck with the task of ruling over a bunch of petty, scheming jerks who keep trying to manipulate him into making decisions that only further their personal agendas. Essentially, lobbyists.

In the Kull story, Kull gets fed up with all this "civilized" nonsense, because his chamberlain or seneschal or whatever keeps telling him he needs to rule according to the laws written down on some ancient stone tablets gathering moss and dust in the corner. After some lobbyist jerks try killing him in his bedchamber (he doesn't like pork-barrel politics much), Kull is sick to death of these laws because they keep staying his hand from making decisions as he sees fit. So, being the sort of "to the point" guy who usurps thrones for a laugh, Kull calls for one of the tablets (that which forbids slaves to marry) and then smashes the tablet into bits with his axe, declaring "By this axe I rule!". If he's the king, then he makes up the rules, period, end of discussion.

So yeah, what the hell am I getting to by talking about Conan and Kull? Am I one of those reviewer jerks who just rambles on but doesn't actually review the book? Well, what I'm getting to is, THE DEAD MAN #3: Hell in Heaven is a direct spiritual descendant of the sorts of awesome pulp action adventure tales that the greats like Robert E. Howard loved to write. Its got magic, its got evil, its got murder, its got beautiful women and grotesque violent freaks out for our hero's blood. It's even got axe-fighting and law-giving and a general tone of complete badassery. I won't give away any plot spoilers, but I will say the story ends in a much different way than you might expect when you read the first couple of pages.

After I received my review copy from Lee Goldberg, I burned through this story in one sitting and was grooving on the Sword & Sorcery vibe the entire time. The direct Conan references the main character makes, rather than coming off as corny or annoyingly self-referential, just make you nod and say "Hell yeah, dude!" and as I write this, I have not one, but two Conan Frazetta prints hanging over my writing desk. That's just how we roll here in Chez Badelaire.

By tapping into the sort of stories written by Howard and Leiber that I feel defined the 30's Sword & Sorcery pulps, and a generation later the post-modern pulps of such writers as Gardner Fox and Karl Wagner, Hell in Heaven further cements THE DEAD MAN series as a crossroads of pulp action, a storyline open and flexible enough to accommodate any niches or sub-genres. This means that as each new author comes in to write the next volume in the series, they have the artistic license to approach the story from the angle they find the most comfortable, ensuring a lot of variety and quality in these stories for a long time to come.

Book Review: DEAD MAN #2 Ring of Knives by James Daniels

The Dead Man isn't your typical serial vigilante. He's not a former Marine, an ex-Special Forces sniper, CIA freelance operative, martial arts expert, grieving liberal accountant, disgruntled cop, or any of the usual former professions for the average protagonist in the men's vigilante adventure sub-genre. Matthew Cahill was just a lumberman working in a sawmill, until one fateful day something horrible and unexpected happened that forever changed him. Now Matt wanders alone, searching for the mystery of what happened to him, and the origin and motives behind the mysterious Mr. Dark.

Lee Goldberg was kind enough to send me a review copy of DEAD MAN #2, Ring of Knives just before I went on vacation for the weekend, and as I was planning on bringing my iPad with me anyhow, I read RoK on the bus down to NYC. It was definitely a page-turner; I read the whole installment in little more than an hour. The action and suspense came fast and furious, and when I reached the end, I was immediately disappointed that I'd have to wait (im)patiently for the next tale of the Dean Man to come along.

Now that the origin story in issue #1, Face of Evil is out of the way, Ring of Knives gives us a glimpse into what this series could really look like, and the prospects are fantastic. This is a creepy, violent, action-packed tale of suspense and supernatural horror. This isn't just weird, it's a glimpse into a dark, bizarre, and twisted world, one that the average person is completely unaware of...until the screaming begins. And then it's too late. If you loved the glimpses into the world of the strange and unusual given by such shows as The Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, X-Files, and Fringe, you're going to love DEAD MAN.

After having read the first two installments of DEAD MAN, I feel I can say with some confidence that this is the future of serial adventure fiction; short, snappy page-flippers that provide a solid hour (or two, or three) of exciting literary entertainment delivered right to you instantly through the Internet. As long as prices continue to stay low and quality continues to remain high, I see the DEAD MAN series having a long and successful publication run, the pioneer for what is sure to be many more serials to come. This is going to become, in more ways than one, a return to the era of the classic serial pulps, and I for one couldn't be happier.

When it happens, I'll be the first in line every time.

Book Review: Lee Goldberg's New Series THE DEAD MAN

Mix one part lurid crime thriller, one part Stephen King-esque weird supernatural horror, add in a dash of colorful sex and a few sprinkles of gratuitous violence, then shake well over ice and pour into a tall frosty mug of icy death. You've just mixed up Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin's new short novel series, THE DEAD MAN.

I've been asked to avoid any spoilers, so I'll just say that the plot involves a young man who suffers a traumatic event, and afterward, finds himself exposed to a mysterious secret he never knew existed. To quote the Amazon.com page for THE DEAD MAN - Face of Evil:

Matthew Cahill is an ordinary man leading a simple life...until a shocking accident changes everything. Now he can see a nightmarish netherworld of unspeakable evil and horrific violence that nobody else does...

For Cahill, each day is a journey into a dark world he knows nothing about...a quest for the answers to who he is and what he has become...and a fight to save us, and his soul, from the clutches of pure evil.

The short novel (only about 25K words) is fast and tightly written. There isn't a lot of action (this is the first book, so a lot of things have to be set up first), but what violence there is counts as definitely cringe-worthy - in a good way. After reading Goldberg's book JUDGMENT I have definitely become a fan of his over-the-top depictions of murder and mayhem, and this new book doesn't disappoint.

Face of Evil has some sex thrown into the mix, which is always a good thing. I for one think there needs to be more sex in action novels; like peanut butter and chocolate, the two go so well together. There's some sharp humor as well, although the humor is rather bleak - just the way I like it in a crime / horror novel. The random asides given to minor characters throughout the book are especially amusing.

With the soaring popularity of the eBook format, I think we are going to see a great resurgence in the short novel and novella as a legitimate book length, something that's been largely missing from genre fiction since the late 80's. Despite the book's modest word count, I felt it is worth every penny of its $2.99 price tag, and would have been more disappointed if the story had been "padded out" to give it bulk. Face of Evil is a lean, mean story that does well to whet your appetite for future DEAD MAN releases.