ROBERT GEORGE DEAN – On Ice. Charles Scribner’s Sons, hardcover, 1942. Superior Reprint M654, paperback, 1945.

   Bill Griffith, private eye, had been tailing a man who had some diamonds to sell for a refugee. Now he is tailing the same man, who is picking up the money for the diamonds. Unfortunately, the man with the money is found sitting at his desk with no money and no life, his throat having been slit.

   Fearing that he might be suspected of involvement in the murder, since he is broke and is working for an almost bankrupt agency, Griffith asks his friend and former co-worker at the Imperator Schmidt Agency, Tony Hunter — one of Robert George Dean’s continuing characters — to he!p him out of this jam.

   A great deal happens in a short time. Hunter’s dog thinks she is going to have puppies; the dead man’s fiancee, for whom everyone is searching for various reasons, turns out to have predeceased her betrothed, and by the same murder method; the refugee who owns the diamonds acts strangely, and Hunter finds various females attractive.

   The detection here is good, the clues fair, the characters fairly interesting. I thought I knew who did it, but I was wrong. Not a great or a memorable mystery, but one that ought not be passed up if you fortuitously come across it at a reasonable price.

    The Tony Hunter series –

Murder Makes a Merry Widow (n.) Doubleday 1938.
A Murder of Convenience (n.) Doubleday 1938.
A Murder by Marriage (n.) Scribner 1940.
Murder Through the Looking Glass (n.) Doubleday 1940.
Murder in Mink (n.) Scribner 1941.
Layoff (n.) Scribner 1942.
On Ice (n.) Scribner 1942.
The Body Was Quite Cold (n.) Dutton 1951.
The Case of Joshua Locke (n.) Dutton 1951.
Affair at Lover’s Leap (n.) Doubleday 1953.

   Author Robert George Dean also wrote four mysteries under his own name featuring series character Pat Thompson, about whom I know nothing, and one stand-alone. As “George Griswold” he wrote four early 1950s espionage novels (I believe) with a mysterious Mr. Groode appearing or mentioned in all four, but the leading characters (with two appearances each) in reality being Jim Furlong and William Pepper.

GILLIAN ROBERTS – Philly Stakes. Scribners, hardcover, 1989. Fawcett, paperback, 1990.

    Philly Stakes is the second (after Caught Dead in Philadelphia) novel about Philadelphia private schoolteacher Amanda Pepper by Gillian Roberts (the criminous pseudonym of mainstream novelist Judith Greber).

    Amanda teaches a particularly challenging array of early teen-agers, and, in groping for a way to make Dickens real, conceives of a Christmas party. Her notion is that the children will feed the poor, but the father of one child, a wealthy businessman, turns it to his own ends. At first.

    It begins as a publicity-laden event with said businessman playing Santa Claus. It ends with his playing unmourned corpse, and three people confessing to the act. The case really isn’t assigned to detective C. K. Mackenzie, Amanda’s rather good friend, but it seems to be his anyway. It certainly isn’t assigned to Amanda, but there she is, squarely in the muddle of it.

    Quite pleasant, this tale, smoothly narrated and with an extremely well-hidden killer.

        The Amanda Pepper series –

1. Caught Dead in Philadelphia (1987)
2. Philly Stakes (1989)
3. I’d Rather Be in Philadelphia (1992)
4. With Friends Like These… (1993)
5. How I Spent My Summer Vacation (1994)
6. In The Dead of Summer (1995)
7. The Mummers’ Curse (1996)
8. The Bluest Blood (1998)
9. Adam and Evil (1999)
10. Helen Hath No Fury (2000)
11. Claire and Present Danger (2003)
12. Till the End of Tom (2004)
13. A Hole in Juan (2006)
14. All’s Well That Ends (2007)

JOHN R. RIGGS – Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing. Dembner Books, hardcover, 1989. Jove, paperback reprint, 1993.

   Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing is the first of John R. Riggs’ five novels about Garth Ryland I’ve read, and on this evidence I’ve missed four previous treats.

   Ryland publishes a weekly newspaper in the small Wisconsin town of Oakalla. Here he’s concerned about Diana, whom he loved and lost to English professor Devin LeMay. She and LeMay went to a cabin somewhere in northern Minnesota and both are overdue to return.

   His anxiety mounting, Garth checks out LeMay’s home (vacant, but with one most peculiar room, and watched over by a lovesick neighbor) and the one-time local resident who owns that Minnesota cabin. These trails lead to fearsome territories.

   Solid suspense, atmosphere thick enough to cut and package, vivid characters. Memorable stuff.

       The Garth Ryland series –

1. The Last Laugh (1984)
2. Let Sleeping Dogs Lie (1986)
3. The Glory Hound (1987)
4. Haunt of the Nightingale (1988)
5. Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (1989)
6. One Man’s Poison (1991)
7. Dead Letter (1992)
8. A Dragon Lives Forever (1992)
9. Cold Hearts and Gentle People (1994)
10. Killing Frost (1995)
11. Snow on the Roses (1996)
12. He Who Waits (1997)
13. The Lost Scout (1998)
14. Nothin’ Short of Dyin’ (2011)
15. After the Petals Go (2012)

Editorial Comment:   For a local newspaper story on John R. Riggs and his resumption of the Garth Ryland series after a lapse of 12 years, go here.

ROBERT RICHARDSON – The Book of the Dead. St. Martin’s Press, hardcover, 1989. First published in the UK by Gollancz, hardcover, 1989.

   The third of Robert Richardson’s novels about playwright and occasional sleuth Auguste Maltravers is The Book of the Dead. Here Maltravers is guesting in the countryside when a sixty-ish gentleman, widely respected and married to a habitually unfaithful young wife, is murdered.

   The man had in his safe an unusual treasure — an authentic and unpublished Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle. This Sherlockian tale — [itself] not to me very impressive — is fully recounted within Richardson’s narrative, and provides Maltravers with some dangerous clues to whodunit.

   Pleasant and devious story: the author had me confidently looking at the wrong person.

       The Augustus Maltravers series —

The Latimer Mercy, 1985.
Bellringer Street, 1988.
The Book of the Dead, 1989.
The Dying of the Light, 1990.
Sleeping in the Blood, 1991. US title: Murder in Waiting.
The Lazarus Tree, 1992.

LYNN BROCK – The Kink. Harper and Brothers, US, hardcover, 1927. First published in the UK by Collins, hardcover, 1927, as Colonel Gore’s Third Case.

   Lt.-Col. Wyckham Gore, D.S.O., senior partner of Gore & Talley, Confidential Agents, and his firm have failed to find a missing husband and a missing brother for two clients. One of the missing men turns up In a nursing home, having had, so he says, an accident necessitating the amputation of an arm; he is also missing a significant part of one ear and almost all of his nerve.

   When the Hon. Mrs. Ronayne, whose name had appeared in connection with both mysterious disappearances, calls upon Gore to begin a constant surveillance of her husband, a famous Irish poet who may be involved with the IRA, but does not say why she wants his movements watched, Gore’s interest is piqued.

   He is even more intrigued when her father, Lord Haviland, former Prime Minister, asks him to investigate the theft of what would seem to be some fairly insignificant items from his study, with the peer’s daughter and the poet both suspects.

   As Gore begins his investigation, he meets other members of the family and discovers that they all are more than a bit peculiar, as are some of the servants. Pornographic movies and orgies would seem to be the worst of it, but then someone is brutally murdered.

   Gore is a moderately interesting character, with a dry wit that should have been more in evidence, and a slightly more than adequate investigator. He gets things straightened out, at the risk of his life, in a rather complex but not particularly engrossing case.

    The Colonel Wyckham Gore series –

The Deductions of Colonel Gore (n.) Collins 1924; Harper, US, 1925.
Colonel Gore’s Second Case (n.) Collins 1925; Harper, US, 1926.
Colonel Gore’s Third Case (n.) Collins 1927; reprinted in the US as The Kink, Harper, 1927.
The Slip-Carriage Mystery (n.) Collins 1928; Harper, US, 1928.
The Mendip Mystery (n.) Collins 1929; reprinted in the US as Murder at the Inn, Harper, 1929.
Q.E.D. (n.) Collins 1930; reprinted in the US as Murder on the Bridge, Harper, 1930.
The Stoat (n.) Collins 1940 [no US edition]

    Under his Lynn Brock pen name, Alister McAllister (1877-1943) also wrote three books about Sgt. Venn, none of which have been published in the US, and two stand-alone mysteries. He also wrote two crime novels as by Anthony Wharton.

       From The Telegraph (UK):

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/10421552/French-spy-novelist-Gerard-de-Villiers-dies.html

    “Intelligence chiefs called him the best-informed spy novelist on the planet for predicting real-life James Bond-style hits before they happened.

    “He sold up to 150 million copies of his 200-tome SAS pulp-fiction series, in which hero Malko Linge, an Austrian aristocrat, carries out freelance spy operations around the world for the CIA to pay for the upkeep of his castle.

    “But Gérard de Villiers died on Thursday [October 31] aged 83 still nursing two regrets: his lack of recognition in his home country and failure to have his books turned into Hollywood blockbusters to rival the Bond films.

    “France’s literary establishment were appalled at the author’s hard-Right views and turned their noses up at his lurid tomes, with their trademark gun-toting femmes fatales, cardboard characters and obligatory sex scenes.

    “But his geopolitical insights, based on information gleaned from his vast network of intelligence officials, diplomats and journalists, were often eerily prescient….”

   It has proven difficult to find a complete list of de Villiers’ work online, but on the Spy Guys and Gals website I have found the following, which if the article above is correct, is almost complete:

       List Of French Titles

Nr French Title (Translation) – Year Published In France
1 Sas à Istanbul (Sas In Istanbul) – 1965
2 Sas Contre Cia (Sas Against Cia) – 1965
3 Operation Apocalypse (Operation Apocalypse) – 1965
4 Samba Pour Sas (Samba For Sas) – 1966
5 Rendez-Vous à San Francisco (Go To San Francisco) – 1966
6 Le Dossier Kennedy (The Kennedy File) – 1967
7 Broie Du Noir (Broods) – 1967
8 Sas Aux CaraïBes (Sas In The Caribbean) – 1967
9 Sas à L’Ouest De Jeruzalem (Sas West Of Jeruzalem) – 1968
10 L’Or De La RivièRe Kwaï (Gold On The River Kwai) – 1968
11 Magie Noire à New York (Black Magic In New York) – 1968
12 Les Trois Veuves De Hong Kong (The Three Widows Of Hong Kong) – 1968
13 L’Abominable Sirene (The Ugly Mermaid) – 1969
14 Les Pendus De Bagdad (The Hanged In Baghdad) – 1969
15 La PanthèRe D’ Hollywood (The Panther Of Hollywood) – 1969
16 Escale à Pago-Pago (Stopover In Pago Pago) – 1969
17 Amok à Bali (Amok In Bali) – 1970
18 Que Viva Guevara (Que Viva Guevara) – 1970
19 Cyclone à Onu (Cyclone To Un) – 1970
20 Mission à Saigon (Mission In Saigon) – 1970
21 Le Bal De La Comtesse Adler (The Ball Of The Countess Adler) – 1971
22 Les Parias De Ceylon (The Pariahs Of Ceylon) – 1971
23 Massacre à Amman (Massacre In Amman) – 1971
24 Requiem Pour Tontons Macoutes (Requiem For Tonton Macoutes) – 1971
25 L’Homme De Kabul (The Man From Kabul) – 1972
26 Mort à Beyrouth (Death In Beirut) – 1972
27 Safari à La Paz (Safari In La Paz) – 1972
28 L’HéRoïNe De Vientiane (The Heroine Of Vientiane) – 1972
29 Berlin, Check-Point Charlie (Berlin, Check-Point Charlie) – 1973
30 Mourir Pour Zanzibar (Dying For Zanzibar) – 1973
31 L’Ange De Montevideo (The Angel Of Montevideo) – 1973
32 Murder Inc., Las Vegas (Murder Inc., Las Vegas) – 1973
33 Rendez-Vous à Boris Gleb (Visit Boris Gleb) – 1974
34 Kill Henry Kissinger (Kill Henry Kissinger) – 1974
35 Roulette Cambodgienne (Roulette Cambodian) – 1974
36 Furie à Belfast (Fury In Belfast) – 1974
37 GuêPier En Angola (Bee In Angola) – 1975
38 Les Otages De Tokio (The Hostages Of Tokio) – 1975
39 L’Orde Regne A Santiago (The Orde Reign In Santiago) – 1975
40 Les Sorciers Du Tage (Wizards Of The Tagus) – 1975
41 Embargo (Embargo) – 1976
42 Le Disparu De Singapore (The Disappeared From Singapore) – 1976
43 Compte à Rebours En Rhodesie (Countdown In Rhodesia) – 1976
44 Meurtre à AthèNes (Murder In Athens) – 1976
45 Le TréSor Du NéGus (The Treasure Of The Negus) – 1977
46 Protection Pour Teddy Bear (Protection For Teddy Bear) – 1977
47 Mission Impossible En Somalie (Impossible Mission In Somalia) – 1977
48 Marathon à Spanish Harlem (Marathon Adverse Harlem) – 1977
49 Nauffrage Aux Seychelles (Nauffrage In Seychelles) – 1978
50 La Printemps De Varsovie (The Spring Of Warsaw) – 1978
51 Le Gardien D’IsraëL (The Guardian Of Israel) – 1978
52 Panique Au ZaïRe (Panic In Zaire) – 1978
53 Croisade à Managua (Crusade In Managua) – 1979
54 Voir Malte Et Mourir (See Malta And Die) – 1979
55 Shanghai Express (Shanghai Express) – 1979
56 OpéRation Matador (Operation Matador) – 1979
57 Duel à Barranquilla (Duel In Barranquilla) – 1980
58 PièGe à Budapest (Trap Budapest) – 1980
59 Carnage à Abu Dhabi (Carnage In Abu Dhabi) – 1980
60 Terreur à San Salvador (Terror In San Salvador) – 1980
61 Le Complot Du Caire (The Plot Of Cairo) – 1981
62 Vengeance Romaine (Roman Revenge) – 1981
63 Des Armes Pour Khartoum (Weapons To Khartoum) – 1981
64 Tornade Sur Manille (Tornado In Manila) – 1981
65 Le Fugitif De Hambourg (The Fugitive From Hamburg) – 1982
66 Objectif Reagan (Objective Reagan) – 1982
67 Rouge Grenade (Red Grenade) – 1982
68 Commando Sur Tunis (Commando In Tunis) – 1982
69 Le Tueur De Miami (The Killer In Miami) – 1983
70 La FilièRe Bulgare (The Bulgarian Industry) – 1983
71 Aventure Au Surinam (Adventure In Suriname) – 1983
72 Embuscade à La Khyber Pass (Ambush At The Khyber Pass) – 1983
73 Le Vol 007 Ne RéPond Plus (Flight 007 No Longer Meets) – 1984
74 Les Fous De Baalbek (Fools Of Baalbek) – 1984
75 Les EnragéS D’Amsterdam (The Rabid Amsterdam) – 1984
76 Putsch à Ouagadougou (Coup In Ouagadougou) – 1984
77 La Blonde De Pretoria (The Blonde Pretoria) – 1985
78 La Veuve De L’Ayatollah (The Widow Of Ayatollah) – 1985
79 Chasse à L’Homme Au PéRou (Manhunt In Peru) – 1985
80 L’Affaire Kirsanov (The Case Kirsanov) – 1985
81 Mort à Gandhi (Death To Gandhi) – 1986
82 Danse Macabre à Belgrade (Dance Of Death In Belgrade) – 1986
83 Coup D’Etat Au Yemen (Coup In Yemen) – 1986
84 Le Plan Nasser (The Plan Nasser) – 1986
85 Embrouilles à Panama (Entanglements In Panama) – 1987
86 La Madone De Stockholm (The Madonna Of Stockholm) – 1987
87 L’Otage D’Oman (The Hostage Of Oman) – 1987
88 Escale à Gibraltar (Stop In Gibraltar) – 1987
89 Aventure En Sierra Leone (Adventure In Sierra Leone) – 1988
90 La Taupe De Langley (Langley’S Mole) – 1988
91 Les Amazones De Pyongyang (The Amazons Of Pyongyang) – 1988
92 Les Tueurs De Bruxelles (The Killers Of Brussels) – 1988
93 Visa Pour Cuba (Visa For Cuba) – 1989
94 Arnaque à Brunei (Brunei Scam) – 1989
95 Loi Martiale à Kaboul (Martial Law In Kabul) – 1989
96 L’ Inconnu De Leningrad (The Unknown Leningrad) – 1989
97 Cauchemar En Colombie (Nightmare In Colombia) – 1989
98 Croisade En Birmanie (Crusade In Burma) – 1990
99 Mission à Mouscou (Mission Mouscou) – 1990
100 Les Canons De Bagdad (The Guns Of Baghdad) – 1990
101 La Piste De Brazzaville (The Track Of Brazzaville) – 1991
102 La Solution Rouge (The Red Solution) – 1991
103 La Vengeance De Saddam Hussein (The Vengeance Of Saddam Hussein) – 1991
104 Manip à Zagreb (Manip In Zagreb) – 1992
105 Kgb Contre Kgb (Kgb Kgb Against) – 1992
106 Le Disparus De Canaries (The Missing Canary) – 1992
107 Alerte Plutonium (Alert Plutonium) – 1992
108 Coup D’éTat à Tripoli (Coup In Tripoli) – 1992
109 Mission Sarajevo (Mission Sarajevo) – 1993
110 Tuez Rigoberta Menchu (Kill Rigoberta Menchu) – 1993
111 Au Nom D’Allah (The Name Of Allah) – 1993
112 Vengeance à Beyrouth (Vengeance In Beirut) – 1993
113 Les Trompettes De JéRicho (The Trumpets Of Jericho) – 1994
114 L’Or De Moscou (Gold In Moscow) – 1994
115 Les CroiséS De L’Apartheid (The Crusaders Of Apartheid) – 1994
116 La Traque De Carlos (The Hunt For Carlos) – 1994
117 Tuerie à Marrakech (Killing In Marrakech) – 1994
118 L’Otage Du Triangle D’Or (The Hostage Of The Golden Triangle) – 1995
119 Le Cartel De SéBastopol (The Cartel Of Sevastopol) – 1995
120 Ramenez-Moi La TêTe D’El Coyote (Bring Me The Head Of El Coyote) – 1995
121 La RéSolution 687 (Resolution 687) – 1996
122 OpéRation Lucifer (Operation Lucifer) – 1996
123 Vengeance TchéTchèNe (Chechen Revenge) – 1996
124 Tu Tueras Ton Prochain (You Kill Your Neighbor) – 1996
125 Vengez Le Vol 800 (Avenge The Flight 800) – 1997
126 Une Lettre Pour La Maison-Blanche (A Letter To The White House) – 1997
127 Hong Kong Express (Hong Kong Express) – 1997
128 ZaïRe Adieu (Zaire Farewell) – 1997
129 La Manipulation Yggdrasil (Handling Yggdrasil) – 1998
130 Mortelle JamaïQue (Lethal Jamaica) – 1998
131 La Peste Noire De Bagdad (The Black Death In Baghdad) – 1998
132 L’Espion Du Vatican (The Spy In The Vatican) – 1998
133 Albanie Mission Impossible (Albania Mission Impossible) – 1999
134 La Source Yahalom (The Source Yahalom) – 1999
135 Sas Contre P.K.K. (Against Sas P.K.K.) – 1999
136 Bombes Sur Belgrade (Bombs On Belgrade) – 1999
137 La Piste Du Kremlin (The Track Of The Kremlin) – 2000
138 L’Amour Fou Du Colonel Chang (L’Amour Fou Colonel Chang) – 2000
139 Djihad (Jihad) – 2001
140 EnquêTe Sur Un GéNocide (Investigation Of Genocide) – 2001
141 L’Otage De Jolo (The Jolo Hostage) – 2001
142 Tuez Le Pape (Kill The Pope) – 2001
143 Armageddon (Armageddon) – 2002
144 Li Sha-Tin Doit Mourir (Li-Sha Tin To Die) – 2002
145 Le Roi Fou Du NéPal (The Mad King Of Nepal) – 2002
146 Le Sabre De Bin Laden (Sword Of Bin Laden) – 2002
147 La Manip Du Karin A (The Manipulation Of The Karin A) – 2002
148 Bin Laden: La Traque (Bin Laden: The Hunt) – 2002
149 Le Parrain Du “17 Novembre” (The Sponsor Of The ‘November 17′) – 2003
150 Bagdad-Express (Baghdad Express) – 2003
151 L’Or D’Al-Qaida (L’Or Al-Qaeda) – 2003
152 Pacte Avec Le Diable (Pact With The Devil) – 2003
153 Ramenez-Les Vivants (Bring Them Back Alive) – 2004
154 Le RéSeau Istanbul (Network Istanbul) – 2004
155 Le Jour De La Tcheka (The Day Of The Cheka) – 2004
156 La Connexion Saoudienne (The Saudi Connection) – 2004
157 Otages En Irak (Hostages In Iraq) – 2005
158 Tuez Iouchtchenko! (Yushchenko Kill!) – 2005
159 Mission: Cuba (Mission: Cuba) – 2005
160 Aurore Noire (Dawn Black) – 2005
161 Le Programme 111 (The Program 111) – 2006
162 Que La BêTe Meure (The Animal Dies) – 2006
163 Le TréSor De Saddam : 1 (Saddam’S Treasure: A) – 2006
164 Le TréSor De Saddam : 2 (The Treasure Of Saddam: 2) – 2006
165 Le Dossier K. (The Dossier K.) – 2006
166 Rouge Liban (Red Lebanon) – 2006
167 Polonium 210 (Polonium 210) – 2007
168 Le Defecteur De Pyongyang (The Defectors From North Korea) – 2007
169 Le DéFecteur De Pyongyang, Tome 2 (The Defector From Pyongyang, Volume 2) – 2007
170 Otage Des Taliban (Taliban Hostage) – 2007
171 L’Agenda Kosovo (Agenda Kosovo) – 2008
172 Retour A Shangri-La (Back In Shangri-La) – 2008
173 Al-Qaida Attaque T.1 (Al-Qaida Attack, part 1) – 2008
174 Al-Qaida Attaque T.2 (Al-Qaida Attack, part 2) – 2008
175 Tuez Le Dalai Lama (Kill The Dalai Lama) – 2008
176 Le Printemps De Tbilissi (Spring In Tbilisi) – 2009
177 Pirates (Pirates) – 2009
178 La Bataille Des S-300 T.01 (The Battle Of The S-300, part 1) – 2009
179 La Bataille Des S-300 T.02 (The Battle Of The S-300, part 2) – 2009
180 Le piège de Bangkok (The Siege Of Bangkok) – 2009
181 La liste Hariri (Hariri’s List) – 2010
182 La filiere Suisse (The Swiss Chains) – 2010
183 Renegade, T.1 (Renegade, part 1) – 2010
184 Renegade, T.2 (Renegade, part 2) – 2010
185 Féroce Guinée (Wild Guinea) – 2010
186 Le maître des Hirondelles (The Master Of The Swallows) – 2011
187 Bienvenue à Nouakchott (Welcome To Nouakchott) – 2011
188 Rouge Dragon, T.1 (Red Dragon, part 1) – 2011
189 Rouge Dragon, T.2 (Red Dragon, part 2) – 2011
190 Ciudad Juarez (Juarez City) – 2011

   Only a few of these have been translated into English. From Crime Fiction IV, by Allen J. Hubin (which is inclusive only through the year 2000):

      DE VILLIERS, GERARD (1929-2013).

*The Angel of Vengeance (Pinnacle, 1974, pb) [Malko Linge; Uruguay] Translation of “L’Ange de Montevideo.” Paris, 1973.
*The Belfast Connection (Pinnacle, 1976, pb) [Malko Linge; Belfast, Northern Ireland] Translation of (?): “Furie a Belfast.” Paris, 1974.
*Black Magic in New York (NEL, 1970, pb) [Malko Linge; New York City, NY] U.S. title: Operation New York. Pinnacle, 1973. Translation of “Magie Noire a New York.” Paris, 1967.
*Checkpoint Charlie (Pinnacle, 1975, pb) [Malko Linge; Berlin] Translation of “Berlin: Check-Point Charlie.” Paris, 1973.
*The Countess and the Spy (Pinnacle, 1974, pb) [Malko Linge; Austria; Hungary] Translation of “Le Bol de la Comtesse Adler.” Paris, 1971.
*Death in Santiago (Pinnacle, 1976, pb) [Malko Linge; Chile] Translation of “L’Ordre Regne a Santiago.” Paris, 1975.
*Death on the River Kwai (Pinnacle, 1975, pb) [Malko Linge; Thailand] Translation of “L’Or de la Riviere Kwai.” Paris, 1968.
*A Game of Eyes Only (Medallion, 1986, hc) [Malko Linge; El Salvador] Translation of “Terreur au San Salvador.” Paris, 1981. Film: UGC, 1982, as S.A.S. San Salvator (scw: Gerard De Villiers; dir: Raoul Coutard).
*Hostage in Tokyo (Pinnacle, 1976, pb) [Malko Linge; Tokyo] Translation of “Les Ostages de Tokyo.” Paris, 1975.
*Kill Kissinger (Pinnacle, 1974, pb) [Malko Linge; Kuwait] Translation of “Kill Kissinger.” Paris, 1974.
*The Man from Kabul (Pinnacle, 1973, pb) [Malko Linge; Afghanistan] Translation of “L’Homme de Kabul.” Paris, 1971.
*Operation Apocalypse (NEL, 1970, pb) [Malko Linge] Translation of “Operation Apocalypse.” Paris, 1970.
_Operation New York (Pinnacle, 1973, pb) See: Black Magic in New York (NEL 1970).
*The Portuguese Defection (Pinnacle, 1976, pb) [Malko Linge; Portugal] Translation of “Les Sorcies du Trage.” Paris, 1975.
*Que Viva Guevara (Pinnacle, 1975, pb) [Malko Linge; Venezuela] Translation of “Que Viva Guevara.” Paris, 1970.
*Versus the C.I.A. (NEL, 1969, pb) [Malko Linge; Iran] Pinnacle, 1974. Translation of “Contra C.I.A.” Paris, 1965.
*West of Jerusalem (NEL, 1969, pb) [Malko Linge; Italy] Pinnacle, 1973. Translation of “A L’Ouest de Jerusalem.” Paris, 1967.

ROBERT J. RAY – Merry Christmas, Murdock. Delacorte Press, hardcover, 1989. Dell, paperback, 1990.

   L. A. private eye Matt Murdock is back, celebrating a holiday in decidedly unfestive fashion in Merry Christmas, Murdock. Here the past rises up before Murdock in two ways.

   Cindy Duke, a teen-ager who had maybe saved his life a couple of years earlier by driving him out of a burning canyon, asks him to find her father. He teaches in Wisconsin and came to L. A. in response to Cindy’s cry for help, raged at his ex-wife, battered her brother’s car with a baseball bat, ranged through a shopping mall in a failing search for Cindy, and disappeared.

   Meanwhile, another teen-ager, Heather Blasingame, lies in a coma from a hit-and-run encounter with a vehicle at that same mall. She’s the daughter of Jane Blasingame, feisty Texas state senator, and the senator (though with considerable reluctance) hires Murdock to supplement what seems an inept police investigation.

   These two cases are of course related, and powerful interests — not only Cindy’s grandfather Wheeler Duke and Duke Construction — are willing to go to about any lengths to keep Matt’s nose out of these matters.

   Vivid, active tale.

        The Matt Murdock series –

1. Bloody Murdock (St. Martin’s, 1986)
2. Murdock for Hire (St. Martin’s, 1987)
3. Dial ‘M’ For Murdock (St. Martin’s, 1988)
4. Merry Christmas, Murdock (Delacorte, 1989)
5. Murdock Cracks Ice (Delacorte, 1992)
6. Murdock Tackles Taos (Camel Press, 2013)

Bibliographic Notes: For more on the author and this last book in the series, published after a gap of 21 years, go here. For more on Matt Murdock himself. check out Kevin Burton Smith’s essay on him here.