Mon 24 Mar 2008
Western Review: NORMAN DANIELS – The Deadly Ride.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Western Fiction[14] Comments
NORMAN DANIELS – The Deadly Ride.
Lancer; paperback reprint, no date stated but stated elsewhere to be 1968. Original title: The Marshal of Winter Gap, as by Peter Grady (Avalon Books, hc, 1962); paperback reprint: Airmont Books, 1963.
I’m not too sure of the date for the hardcover edition, which I found online in several places, since the copyright date given in this Lancer edition is 1963. A trifling matter, I suppose, and I guess it ought to bother me more than it does.
Nor have I done much research into the western fiction that Norman Daniels wrote. I found two more he did as by Peter Grady, but his overall output – hundreds of books, mostly mysteries, but romances too, including gothics as by Dorothy Daniels – is too large for me to start sorting out which is which right now. Suffice it to say, I’m sure, Daniels could write anything that someone paid him to do, beginning in the era of the pulp magazines, and for the most part he made it come it out right and professionally done.
This western at hand is a perfect example of that. It’s slight and in the beginning a not very promising story of a rancher who used to be a gunman, emphasis on the “used to be,” especially now that he has a nine-year-old son.
But when his wife is killed by a stray bullet in the lawless town of Winter Gap, he’s sorely tempted to revert to his old ways, which doesn’t quite do. Prodded on, though, by the urging of Louise Amister, whose father was the last marshal the town ever had, what he does do is appoint himself town marshal, daring any of the rougher elements in town to tell him no.
Characterization is slim – I’ve outlined about 80% of it already – but there’s just enough here, along with a surprise or two, and a semi-sappy, soapy sort of ending, to make for a couple of hours of reading and a story that’s surprisingly hard to put down.
March 24th, 2008 at 7:46 am
I remember enjoying some of the books in Daniels’ “Man from A. P. E.” series long, long ago.
March 24th, 2008 at 9:02 am
From Al Hubin’s Crime Fiction IV:
KEITH, JOHN
* Norman A. Daniels:
o The Hunt Club (n.) Pyramid 1964 [Munich]
o Overkill (n.) Pyramid 1964 [Albania]
o Operation K (n.) Pyramid 1965
o Spy Ghost (n.) Pyramid 1965 [Paris]
o Operation N (n.) Pyramid 1966 [Beirut]
o Operation T (n.) Pyramid 1967 [Australia]
o Operation VC (n.) Pyramid 1967 [Viet Nam]
o Operation S-L (n.) Pyramid 1971 [Sierra Leone]
but while I own most of these, I confess that I’ve not read one of them. I suppose, Bill, that even after 40 years, you remember what A.P.E. stood for?
For the pulps he did stories about The Phantom Detective, The Black Bat, The Crimson Mask, and I didn’t realize this until just now, when I looked it up, Doc Savage.
For the paperbacks in the 60s and 70s, besides mystery and adventure novels, he also wrote plantation novels as well as a large number of TV tie-in’s, such as Dr. Kildare, Arrest and Trial, and The Avengers.
While I don’t think he ever wrote any science fiction, somehow I wouldn’t be surprised if he did.
March 24th, 2008 at 10:04 am
He even hit Gold Medal a couple of times. And I have no idea what A. P. E. stood for. I think I’ve read only the first two of the series. I liked SPY HUNT, which was about a different secret agent. I can’t remember his name.
March 24th, 2008 at 11:06 am
I may have missed one of his Gold Medal books, but here’s what I’ve come up with so far:
* Suddenly By Shotgun,. Gold Medal s1113, 1961.
* Shadow of a Doubt, as by Harrison Judd, Gold Medal s1124, 1961.
* Jennifer James, R.N., Gold Medal s1179, 1961.
* County Hospital, Gold Medal s1278, 1963.
* Something Burning, Gold Medal k1283, 1963.
And because I hadn’t found a cover image to post earlier, here’s one of the A.P.E. books, and no, I don’t know what it stands for either.
March 24th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
Until someone looks through an old copy of one of the books, I guess it will have to stand for “A Perplexing Enigma”.
March 24th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
I’ve been thinking of a few possibilities this afternoon, Jerry, and that’s as good as any I’ve come up with.
March 25th, 2008 at 5:45 am
It’s actually not very inventive: APE is American Policy Executive.
March 25th, 2008 at 7:34 am
Thanks, Juri, but you’re right. That’s pretty blah. I almost wish you hadn’t told us!
March 25th, 2008 at 7:46 am
Norman Daniels wrote a few lead novels for the Masked Rider and Range Riders pulps under the names Jud Talley and Charles Alan Gregory. I’ve read them and they’re okay, but I got the feeling he wasn’t as comfortable with Westerns as he was in other genres.
Also, I don’t believe he wrote any of the Doc Savage novels, even though Philip Jose Farmer credits him with some of them in his Doc Savage “biography”. If I remember correctly, the Doc Savages that Farmer credits to Daniels were actually written by Laurence Donovan.
March 25th, 2008 at 8:03 am
James
I wasn’t aware that Daniels did Masked Rider and Range Riders stories, but why doesn’t it surprise me very much?
When I started to read The Deadly Ride, I was ready to find that Daniels wasn’t up to the task of writing a western, but I was wrong. Written a few years later than the pulp novels, the book is far from a classic, but even though I was all set to find fault with the western trappings, I came up dry, with nothing to report. It’s a smooth ride, all the way through.
And you’re right about Daniels not doing a Doc Savage novel. I found the information in several sources, including one of John Gunnison’s Adventure House pages, so I went ahead and repeated it.
A good source for who actually wrote which Doc story seems to be this Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Doc_Savage_novels
I say “seems to be” since as everyone should know, Wikipedia is far from perfect itself. (I had occasion to edit one page this weekend, and for the better.)
— Steve
July 27th, 2017 at 1:11 pm
Not to be argumentative, but this is the first I’ve read that Norman Daniels (new to me) and Dorothy Daniels (well-known as a writer of ‘gothics’ or romantic suspense) were the same person.
Is there some authoritative source for that? Again, not doubting you; just curious.
July 27th, 2017 at 1:15 pm
P.S. According to his obit in the LA Times, they appear to have been husband and wife.
July 27th, 2017 at 1:39 pm
Yes, the two were married. One source that states that Norman used his wife’s name for the Gothics is wrote is this biography online, based on his papers stored at Bowling Green University:
http://ead.ohiolink.edu/xtf-ead/view?docId=ead/OhBgUPC0016.xml;chunk.id=bioghist_1;brand=default
“Through the 1960’s and 70’s Daniels wrote for mystery magazines and mass-market paperbacks. His books include spy thrillers, adaptations of television shows, doctor and nurse novels, Gothics and romances, some of which were published under the name of his wife Dorothy.”
Other sites say that Dorothy both edited and typed his manuscripts. I would also accept with a high degree of possibility that she collaborated on the actual writing as well. That aspect of who wrote what they always tried to keep secret.
January 4th, 2018 at 4:05 pm
Sorry for the tardy “Thank you,” but it’s sincere all the same. Cheers.