Teaser For My Next Writing Project

I'm a couple of weeks away from finishing the first draft of Killer Instincts, and I've already got my next project lined up - a series of short historical adventure novels. Here's a working prototype of the cover for #1:


Three guesses as to what I might be writing about...

"There Is No More Deadly Weapon System..."

"...than a Russian with two AA-12. Keep in mind I am a professional Russian. Don't try this in home."



Automatic shotguns are great. Shotguns in general are pretty cool, and semi-automatic shotguns (SPAS-12, Remington 1100, Browning Auto, Benelli) are even more badass, but a shotgun that fires full-auto? That's like putting chocolate on awesome.

Back in the day when I was a wee lad and cutting my teeth on Able Team and Phoenix Force books, I loved how Carl "Ironman" Lyons had to have a weapon more badass than all his other combat buddies. While Pol and Gadgets were happy with their Beretta 93 Rs and their M-16s, Ironman had to have some customized Frankenstein M1911A1 .45 automatic with three-shot bursts and extended mags and suppressor, and his combat weapon of choice was the somewhat obscure Atchisson Assault Shotgun, a weapon designed in 1972. This is the original AA-12:

But the weapon has been redesigned into what you see in the YouTube video. This is one sick shotgun, and I can see now why Ironman loved running around with it, turning bad guys into sausage meat.

Apparently the spirit of Carl Lyons was ported into Actor Terry Crews when his character started kicking ass in The Expendables, blasting away bad guys by the bucketful (and you'll need a bucket to cart them away after he's done, believe me...). Here's some shotgun action from the movie:



One of these days I need to get my hands on an AA-12 and wreck crap with it. And hey, shotgun ammo is cheaper when you buy in bulk...right?

Book Review: The Sergeant #6: Slaughter City by Gordon Davis

Although post-modern pulp fiction is dominated by the serial vigilante novel, closely followed by the serial spy thriller / anti-terrorist kill team / gaggle of badass mercs adventures, there have been a couple of solid World War II post-modern pulp titles. The most notable of these is The Rat Bastards, which have at least 16 titles and possibly more (if anyone can give me a more accurate count I'd much appreciate it).

I've been recently directed towards another World War II title - The Sergeant, by Gordon Davis (the pen name of Len Levinson). This is a series of nine titles following the exploits of Master Sergeant CJ Mahoney, a real rat bastard himself, a thug and miscreant who enjoys screwing and fighting in equal measures, and apparently has to get some of each in each of the novels. I will direct readers to pulp blogger Henry Brown's excellent reviews of Book 1 and Book 4 - this is a review of Book 6, the crossing of the Moselle River and the assault on the city of Metz by Patton's 3rd army.

First off, I will mention that I enjoyed this book a lot more than I thought I would. It's not terribly written; although it isn't prosaic it is very readable, no better or worse than a lot of PMP fare. Levinson must have watched Patton about twenty times, because his depiction of Patton in this book is so spot-on with how he is portrayed in that film, especially during his morale speech before the crossing of the Moselle, that I could hear George C. Scott's voice practically reading the dialog to me.

Beyond the serviceable writing, this book reminded me a great deal of Bernard Cornwell's utterly awesome Sharpe series of Napoleonic War novels. I am a huge fan of this historical military action-adventure series, and so I was pleased to discover that in reading Slaughter City, the feeling was quite similar; a tough, no-bullshit lead character and a handful of repeat offenders who always get stuck with the dangerous important jobs because they've got the rare misfortune of being really good at what they do. Cornwell's sly mix of history and fiction allowed him to backdrop a lot of great fictional adventure with the history of the Peninsular Campaign, and I can see a similar feel in this book. Patton, Bradley, Hitler, Himmler and such are of course real characters fighting a real war, but interacting with Levinson's fictional creations to create a fictitious story loosely set within a number of facts.

And a bloody fiction it is. There is some real brutal violence in this book, which is fine by me, since, well - it's friggin' World War II. Bazookas, hand grenades, machine guns, high-powered rifles, tanks, artillery - it all makes for messy fighting. The most brutal examples of this combat take place during the Moselle landing, the house-to-house combat during the battle for Metz, and a desperate German gamble to use a rail line to punch deep into the Allied lines. Foremost in the insanity is the use of the bayonet in close combat.

Now, I won't argue that the bayonet was never used in WW2 - I'm sure it was. And I'm sure there were a few "bayonet duels" during that war, here and there. But at one point in the book it's as if every single soldier on the battlefield forgets he's carrying a repeating-fire (if not semi-automatic or selective fire) weapon, and resorts almost entirely to bayonet duels. At one point, a character even lays about himself with an engineer's hatchet, splitting German skulls and severing limbs by the sackful. Although Cornwell is guilty of an over-abundance of bayonet fighting in his Sharpe novels, at least the soldiers have a plausible excuse; the men of the 95th Rifles are carrying single-shot muzzleloaders, not M1 Garands.

Overall though, the action is fast and furious, the writing doesn't over-scrutinize the weapons and bullet trajectories a la The Death Merchant or other "gun porn" series, and there's enough amusing sexual content (a certain bet worth five hundred dollars comes to mind...) to remind ourselves that this is definitely "men's adventure" and not 196 pages of who shot who where with what caliber weapon. If you get a chance, pick up a copy if you come across it in your local used book store.

Scenes from Michael Mann's Collateral

I've been pretty quiet the last few weeks. Trying to wrap up my manuscript while working on reading at least five different books for future reviews and begin another writing project...on top of work and graduate classes. Hectic times.

Michael Mann is one of my favorite modern movie directors, and one of my favorite Mann movies is 2004's Collateral, with Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx. The story of Vincent the assassin and the way he is characterized was one of the seeds planted in my imagination that eventually grew into Killer Instincts; Richard, Jamie, and William all owe some of themselves to this film.



One of the coolest scenes in Collateral is the Club Fever Hit: Cruise goes into a crowded nightclub and assassinates his target with extreme prejudice...as well as a few bodyguards and cops along the way. This scene has a mix of combat and cool that really appeals to me.



During part of the DVD commentary, we learn that Michael Mann hired an ex-SAS commando to train Cruise for three months in the ways of combat tactics and marksmanship. A big part of that training was shooting drills...with live ammunition. I tip my hat big time to Mann for having the balls to insist on live-fire drills to instill in Cruise the methodology of firearm management you learn when handling a "real" weapon, not a blank-adapted pistol. Here's a chunk of that commentary:



One of the most lauded moments in the movie is the "Briefcase Shooting" - Tom Cruise out-shoots two guys in 1.3 seconds, one of whom has a gun in his face. Although yes, it is "fake", the methods and moves he uses are very well done - an impressive bit of shooting skill.



If you haven't seen this movie already, it's definitely worth checking out.

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: Roughneck Nine-One by Frank Antenori

Having recently finished SOG, but finding that book somewhat depressing and tragic, I hesitated to read another book about special operations forces, even one that dealt with a heroic victory against superior numbers and resources. But I was intrigued enough by Roughneck Nine-One to read the introduction while at the bookstore, and the author's summary of the action seemed positive and upbeat enough that I decided to give it a go and pay out.

I'm glad I made that decision. Although you'll grit your teeth like I did at some of the bureaucratic and leadership frustrations Antenori and his team experienced, you'll also grove on the positive, can-do will-do attitude these operators had from day one. Antenori, a veteran of Afghanistan and a number of other operations, decided early on that he would not run from a fight, even one against a numerically superior foe, and his team captain and fellow team members agreed with him. Thus, their team motto, "Nine-One Don't Run", was born.

I want to pause for a moment and look at this a little closer. A few years ago I took a military history class for the hell of it, mostly to see if I liked going back to school, and one thing that came up in discussion was the misconception that "Americans are risk-adverse in war". This notion was apparently something born, I guess, from the Vietnam war, and supposedly carried through to this day. My professor did his best to argue against that theory - that the American people may be risk-adverse to war, but the military was not. Furthermore, that there was a difference between "taking risks" and "being stupid".

American combat doctrine is filled with risk-taking and aggression. The fundamental philosophy of destroying the enemy through advancing under a process of fire and maneuver is inherently risky and aggressive, but it's how we helped break the stalemate of the Great War, it's how we took the beaches of Normandy and pushed through to Berlin, it's how we jumped from island to island in the Pacific and twenty years later, it's how we would send patrol after patrol into the jungles of Vietnam, hunting for the enemy so we could bring down the pain. It's how we planned out the Song Tay Raid, the Hatchet Force assaults launched against enemy targets, the SEAL team recon missions deep into the heart of the Mekong Delta. That military aggression is what drove Anthony Swofford and his fellow Recon Marines into the lion's den during the first gulf war, disappointed that he never fired a shot in anger the entire time. And when the second Gulf War rolled around a decade later, the next generation of Recon Marines in their over-burdened Humvees would barrel through enemy-occupied territory, daring the enemy to reveal themselves by firing at them so the Marines could tear the enemy apart with automatic weapons fire.

When Sgt. First Class Antenori and his team made the decision to never run from a fight unless they were in danger of being wiped out, this decision was not made out of reckless bravado, but in the spirit of the aggressive American fighting man. Antenori knew his team had the training, the weapons, and the resources to bloody the nose and halt the advance of an enemy much larger than his team, and that his mission, above and beyond the specifics of any individual operation, was to seek out and kill the enemy whenever he was encountered, to capture and destroy the enemy's resources, and find and exploit intelligence assets. In short, Antenori's mission was to bring the fight to the enemy, using their mobility, aggression, weapons and training to, as he puts it, "eat the elephant one bite at a time".

Truthfully, I found the battle to be, if anything, a little bit anti-climactic. There are certainly tense moments, an increase of the "pucker factor" as Antenori puts it, but without giving away any spoilers there is never really a moment while reading the book that I was thinking "Oh man, they are toast!". The men of Roughneck Nine-One were cool under fire, performed their tasks admirably, and even when the enemy brought superior weapons to bear and attacked with main battle tanks and armored personnel carriers, the team knew what to do and handled the situation like pros.

In fact, the most depressing and disheartening part of the book is Antenori's disgust over the performance of their company leader, a man referred to only as "Major X", who refused to "let slip the dogs of war" and allow his teams to finish out their assigned tasks for fear that a casualty so late in the mission would tarnish an otherwise superbly executed operation. Without exception, every individual warrior under Major X's command was furious; as several of them put it, "We didn't join the Special Forces because we were afraid of getting hurt."

Roughneck Nine-One is a fast, enjoyable read; I finished the book in two days. It's a great account of a modern Special Forces A-Team in action, and what they are capable of when put to the test. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning more about small unit operations during the second Gulf War.

What The Libyan Rebels Need is Airwolf

I didn't realize it, but I am apparently some kind of psychic foreign policy rainmaker. Just a couple of weeks ago I decided to start watching Airwolf on Netflix, and of course, the first two episodes, Shadow of the Hawk Parts One and Two, deal with Airwolf's evil genius creator taking the super-copter to Libya so he can use it as a bargaining chip to do all sorts of sadistic things to women. Hey, I guess even aeronautical engineering madmen need love too - it just involves dead hookers.

C'mon, do you want to try and pick up chicks in a back-talking blabbermouth sports car,
or a silent, bulletproof, supersonic assault helicopter that resides in a secret desert lair?

When I was a kid, I loved Airwolf. Of course, I also loved The A-Team, and Magnum P.I., and Knight Rider, and MacGyver, and pretty much any other 80's television series that involved kicking ass and taking names. This was the era in which America's post-Vietnam angst provided television with a smorgasbord of ideas; television shows about Vietnam veterans, or episode plots that revolved around vets, or simply grooved off of the post-modern pulp fiction era's themes of harsh vigilante justice, taking the fight to the enemy and "winning the unwinnable war", and many others.

Airwolf was, in many ways, a top contender for the king of the post-modern pulp television series. Although A-Team might beat it out in some regards, Airwolf had the secret government agency, the Vietnam angle, the high-tech gizmos, the Cold War adventures, and most telling, it had a body count. I understand the plot reasoning as to why the A-Team didn't kill people, but just as I got tired of Xena: Warrior Princess punching bad guys with her fist instead of stabbing them through the head with her sword, I got a little tired of the A-Team not lighting up the scumbags they always dealt with.

Okay K.I.T.T., let's see you do THAT. Oh wait...you can't. Because you're unarmed. Like a little bitch.

Airwolf, on the other hand, kicked ass for reals, yo. Rocket launchers, cannons, machine guns; Airwolf had it all. Stringfellow also packed a .45 and knew how to use it. But most of all, what two key aces did Airwolf have up its supersonic sleeves?

An Agency honcho with one eye and a spotless white suit, and Ernest Borgnine wearing a bad tie.

If you haven't had a chance to see this show in a while (like...20 years or so...), give it a shot. It's the 80's, the plots are about as tightly woven as a fishing net, but it's still a lot of fun.