Often a warm-up act for folk singer Glenn Yarbrough, the psychedelic folk-rock due (Clark) Maffitt & (Brian) Davies made one LP in 1968, The Rise and Fall of Honesty. It was released on CD in 2010 with six bonus tracks.

JOHN SANDFORD – Storm Front. G. P. Putnam’s, hardcover, October 2013. Berkley, premium paperback, October 2014.

   Some of the reviews of this book on Amazon give it only one star, claiming that Sandford has sold them out, that he had someone else write it for him. This is based on the dedication, which is to Michelle Cook (now his wife) for her help in writing it and that she is now a novelist.

   Well, I can understand how other readers might feel about this. Many of them claimed to have noticed the difference in writing style within the first couple of chapters. I’m not at all surprised about this. I looked at the dedications that Sandford included in other books in his Virgil Flowers series — this is the seventh — and in them he thanks any number of other individuals for their help in writing them. What input that Sandford had in any of them remains unknown, but on the basis of the evidence, I’d say perhaps some sort of supervisory capacity, but little more than that.

   Virgil Flowers is the only agent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension in the southern part of the state, his immediate superior being Lucas Davenport, the leading protagonist of Sandford’s primary series of “Prey” books, each with a two-word titles ending in that word. My sense is that Flowers was a recurring character in those books before he headed off for his own adventures.

   What the Object of Interest is in Storm Front is an ancient sacred stele, an artifact stolen from an archaeological dig in Israel and brought to the US by a local (Minnesotan) college professor who is dying of cancer. What makes it so valuable is that the inscriptions on it suggest Solomon, the greatest king of the Jews, may actually have been Egyptian, turning the Middle East into even more of an uproar of religious hatreds.

   So all kinds of people are on Professor Jones’s trail as well. Israelis, some of whom may be Mossad agents, Hezbollah agents, Turks, Syrian, all kinds of collectors of curios and other arcane objects, TV personalities, plus a good (and good-looking) friend of Virgil’s named Ma Nobles, who has five or kids with maybe as many fathers, a bountiful bustline, and — even though Virgil is investigating her in regard to some fake antique lumber scheme she is cooking up — an IQ of some 150 or more.

   In spite of the controversy mentioned in the first paragraph above, I read the book on its own merits, as I always do. The first 200 pages were fine. Very enjoyable, I thought. Lots of action, lots of sly humor, interesting characters. What are they complaining about?

   Unfortunately at 200 pages in, this was only the halfway point. There were still 200 pages left to go. This is the point at which I think the author lost control of the book. The humorous byplay along the way seemed shoved aside to concentrate on the story, which was spinning its wheels, going nowhere fast. The characters, which were so fresh and new in the first half, suddenly began to fade and lose their personality, and they became far less interesting.

   What really goes wrong is that there are simply too many characters, and as a reader, I began to feel manipulated when they began to pop up only when they were needed before popping back out again. To tell you the truth, I’m not exactly sure how the story ended, but without a scorecard, I’d long stopped caring about who the characters were, and what they ended up with.

   And at length the story did end, but in a strange anti-climactic finale that I found myself totally indifferent to. This is difficult to say, as it was obviously one the author had in mind all along, but frankly, it just didn’t work for me.

RUSS WINTERBOTHAM – The Red Planet. Monarch #270, paperback original, 1962. Armchair Fiction Double Novel, trade paperback, 2012; published in combo with The Shining City, by Rena M. Vale.

   This is the goods.

   I know I’ve used that term of incisive critical analysis before, but there’s no better way to describe a book packed with action, suspense, and characters just a bit deeper than they had to be. Call it Space Opera, call it Sci-Fi, but The Red Planet is an undeniably fast and thrilling ride.

   It’s also a bit of a murder mystery as first-person narrator astronaut Bill Drake describes the preparations for the first manned Mars expedition, commanded by Dr. Spartan, a brilliant egomaniac who seems averse to sharing the gory for what he considers his personal achievement.

   Dr. Spartan’s mania first manifests itself in a training accident that takes the life of an intended crew member. With no time to spare, the doctor decrees that the fallen comrade will be replaced by a qualified woman in the team, Gail Loring, and to allay outcries of moral impropriety (this was written in 1962, remember, when even the mild sex in the James Bond books raised eyebrows) she will marry him before take-off. Gail is a gal who knows her own mind however, and she decides Bill Drake would make a better husband-in-name-only — thus sealing Bill’s fate.

   The ensuing journey to the red planet (hence the title, huh?) is neatly done as author Winterbotham fleshes out the characters, throws in another mysterious death, and ratchets up the tension with personality conflicts till our party lands on Mars — which is where things really get exciting.

   Because it seems Dr. Spartan’s megalomania extends to his attitude towards the Martians: small but nasty plant/animal hybrids whom he regards as manifestly a lower life form who should be made acquainted with their new rulers. This naturally leads to a certain amount of bother, and the rousing finale is a pitched battle, rousingly-described, with the surviving crew members fighting for their lives as much against Dr. Spartan as against the Martian hordes.

   Winterbotham was apparently a very busy writer of westerns, horror and big-little books, and he keeps things moving right to the finish, in approved pulp-fashion. I can recommend this unreservedly to readers who like a fun, fast space adventure.

   The biggest surprise for me, however, was on the blurb page, where I read:

   â€œThe Author’s son-in-law is a member of the team developing the plasma space motor which is planned to carry men to Mars within the next ten years.”

   Did I miss a meeting?

Jazz singer Diannne Reeves, from her CD I Remember (Blue Note, 1991) —

GALLOWAY HOUSE. Pilot: “The Night Rider.” 1962. Johnny Cash (as Johnny Laredo), Dick Jones, Johnny Western, Merle Travis, Gordon Terry, Eddie Dean, Karen Downes. Story and screenplay: Helen Diller. Director: Michael Hinn.

   Two gimmicks are going on at once here. The first gimmick is the title of the proposed series. Galloway House was supposed to be an old-fashioned playhouse theater, complete with drawn red curtains and a emcee in full colorful regalia (straw boater hat, bow tie, suspenders), with one problem as far as I was concerned. The opening introduction was clipped from the version I saw, and the closing curtain and farewell remarks came as a surprise at the end.

   The second gimmick, as I understand it, and I had to hunt for a while online to discover this, was that each episode of the proposed series was to tell the story in songs and words, of a well-known country song. I don’t believe that country singer Johnny Cash was to be the star of each episode, but I haven’t found any online discussion about it, one way or the other.

   In this pilot (and only) episode the song was “Don’t Take Your Guns to Town,” one of Johnny Cash’s many hit songs. About half the show consists of the characters singing various country standards: around a campfire, at a saloon, and at a funeral. The primary story, of course, is that of a foolish young boy who wants to prove himself a man by taking his guns to town.

   Johnny Cash as the lonesome gunfighter doesn’t have to work hard to act troubled, regretful and sullen, but as effective as he is, truthfully he’s not much of an actor. Some of the other members of the cast were well-known western singers and stars. I’d like to add a special note of recognition to Karen Downes who played the saloon chorus girl, who sings “Skip to the Lou” in suitably sultry fashion. It was her only credit in either TV or the movies.

LUCY CORES – Corpse de Ballet. Duell Sloane & Pearce, hardcover, 1944. Collier, paperback, 1965. Rue Morgue Press, trade paperback, 2004 (shown).

   The first, and last, time he danced in his own ballet creation “Phoebus,” Izlomin went mad before its completion. Now cured, he plans to re-create his masterwork for the American Ballet Drama in New York City. This time he finishes the performance, but then apparently commits suicide by hanging himself.

   With the aid of Toni Ney, trained as a ballet dancer but who now writes an exercise column, Captain Andrew Torrant of New York’s finest investigates the circumstances surrounding Izlomin’s death and discovers a hotbed of intrigue and jealousy in the world of professional ballet,

   Balletomanes should appreciate this novel. I enjoyed it from the ballet aspect but found it otherwise lackluster.

Bibliographic Notes:  Lucy Cores has four entries in Al Hubin’s Crime Fiction IV. Corpse de Ballet was her second, with Painted for the Kill (1943) her first, also a case solved by both Toni Ney and Captain Tarrant. These were the protagonists’ only two appearances; both books are easily available from Rue Morgue Press.

   For more on Lucy Cores, the author herself, follow this link to the Rue Morgue website for a long biography of her.

Hurray for the Riff Raff is an American folk-blues band based in New Orleans. The lead vocalist is singer-songwriter and banjo player Alynda Lee Segarra.

From their latest CD, Small Town Heroes:

CLEOPATRA 2525. Syndicated. Episode #1 “Quest for Firepower” and episode #2 “Creegan.” January 17 & 24, 2000. Jennifer Sky (Cleopatra), Gina Torres (Hel), Victoria Pratt (Sarge), Patrick Kake (Mauser), Elizabeth Hawthorne (The Voice), Joel Tobeck (Creegan). Executive Producer: Sam Raimi. Created by R. J. Stewart and Robert G. Tapert.

   I’ve watched only the first two episodes, so far, and I’ve surprised myself by how much I enjoyed it. I can’t imagine the budget was all that large, but the sets are colorful and flashy, the special effects so-so or better, and who knows where the story line is going, but so far, so good.

   Cleopatra 2525 appeared as the first part of the “Back2Back Action Hour,” followed by Jack of All Trades, starring Bruce Campbell. Thirty-minute live action TV series have been scarce for quite a while, but for some reason I don’t recall, they came into vogue again in the early 2000’s.

   In the year 2525 (based on the song, I assume), the human race has been driven underground in a series of caverns connected by huge shafts by monstrous machines called Baileys. Fighting these new overloads are Hel and Sarge, both female, joined by Cleopatra, an exotic dancer from our era who was put into suspended animation after breast augmentation surgery that went badly.

   Of course the women who star in this show wear skimpy clothing. There’s no denying that. That’s part of the appeal. But they are decent actors, and they look good flying through the shafts that connect one part of their underground living quarters to another. Cleopatra — very blonde — is a bit of a ditz, but that’s part of the design, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

   She’s still learning her way around in episode two, which also features Creegan, an evil scientist whom I assume will be the women’s main adversary through the rest of the series. Creegan may also be a mad scientist, since his clown makeup outdoes The Joker of Batman fame by a country mile.

   I probably won’t report back on future viewings, but so far the two 22 minute episodes I have seen (after the commercials have been deleted) have done their job and drawn me in very well.

TARZAN AND THE SLAVE GIRL. RKO Radio Pictures, 1950. Lex Barker, Vanessa Brown, Robert Alda, Hurd Hatfield, Arthur Shields, Tony Caruso, Denise Darcel. Based on the charcaters created by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Director: Lee Sholem.

   After the first twenty minutes or so, I was all but ready to give up on Tarzan and the Slave Girl. There was a lot of frenetic activity in the jungle, a few tribes running amok, and what not. But it didn’t seem to be leading anywhere in particular.

   But I’m glad I kept watching, because this entry into the Tarzan filmography turned into a rather enjoyable escapist adventure. Directed by Lee Sholem, Tarzan and the Slave Girl is notable for being Lex Barker’s second portrayal of our eponymous hero and actress Vanessa Brown’s sole portrayal of Jane.

   The plot follows Tarzan as he seeks to rescue slave women held captive by a jungle tribe that is suffering from a mysterious health ailment. Tarzan teams up with a somewhat alcoholic game hunter named Neil (Robert Alda) to both find the aforementioned tribe’s hidden city and to rescue Jane and Neil’s would-be girlfriend, Lola (Denise Darcel). It’s a lighthearted little adventure film that, while not particularly memorable, ends up being quite fun to watch.

ANTHONY HOROWITZ – Trigger Mortis: A James Bond Thriller, with Original Material by Ian Fleming. Harper, US, hardcover, September 2015. Orion, UK, hardcover/softcover, 2015.

               The rain swept into London like an angry bride.

   That may not be the authentic voice of Ian Fleming, but it is close, and not surprising the source is polymath Anthony Horowitz, whose accomplishments include many episodes of Poirot, the highly praised Foyle’s War and Midsomer Murders series, the bestselling adventures of juvenile secret agent Alex Rider, several other juvenile series in horror, fantasy, and mystery genres, and more recently, the highly praised Sherlock Holmes pastiche, the bestselling Moriarity and House of Silk. Horowitz is the latest writer to tackle the Bond series and with more than a bit of success.

   Since Kingsley Amis’s Colonel Sun, written as Robert Markham, one writer or another has attempted to keep the Bond series going. (An earlier attempt by Geoffrey Jenkins, Per Fine Ounce, was never published and is a sort of minor grail for Bond collectors, and an original un-canonical novel, Jim Hatfield’s The Killing Joke is a mixed bag that does away with Bond decisively at the end.)

   Christopher Wood wrote two novelizations of the screenplays for The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker,which had nothing to do with Fleming’s novels, and about which nothing much needs to be said. John Gardner had great success in terms of sales, though popular as they were, his Bond was never quite Fleming’s (not surprising as he created Boysie Oakes as a reaction against Bond and was himself the anti-Fleming, a radical leftist ex commando/vicar).

   Raymond Benson was a bit more popular with Fleming fans as opposed to the movie fans, but again the authentic voice was not quite there, though certainly closer than anyone could hope from an American writer.

   All those books have and deserve their own fans, but they are none of them quite Ian Fleming’s James Bond. They kept Bond alive in print, and I personally enjoyed many of them, but they were never Ian Fleming nor did they really try too hard to be. They were instead what the publishers and the public seemed to want, a hybrid of the literary Bond and the cinematic one. In regard to that the Bond series has been lucky to be helmed by so many conscientious writers.

   The latest round of pastiche began with Sebastian Faulks’ The Devil May Care, which was interesting and certainly literate, but didn’t quite fit the bill. Jeffery Deaver’s Carte Blanche recreated 007 and updated everything, but while it was a good thriller it wasn’t Bond or Fleming — just a thriller calling its main character James Bond, 007.

   But with William Boyd’s Solo this latest series found its legs. Boyd, author of A Good Man in Africa and Brazzaville Beach, not only found an authentic voice that echoed Fleming, he actually wrote a damn good James Bond novel, more serious perhaps than any by Fleming, but an adventure that took Bond to Africa in the sixties to good effect. If anything Solo is actually better than some of Fleming’s novels while still clearly Bond.

   Trigger Mortis is the new Bond pastiche by Anthony Horowitz, and it takes a bit of original material by Fleming from an incomplete story from the For Your Eyes Only shorts he never finished that took Bond into the world of Grand Prix. From that Horowitz has extrapolated an adventure that begins just after the end of Goldfinger.

   Bond is in London living with Pussy Galore who he has successfully kept out of prison, but things are deteriorating between them and domesticity doesn’t really suit either of them very well. There is a nice observation by Horowitz when Bond recalls introducing her to a friend in London and recognizing just how puerile her name was outside of one of his exotic adventures.

   Bond’s discomfort and self-recognition are something sadly missing from many Bond pastiche, but part of the authentic Fleming Bond. Both Boyd and Horowitz recognize that the Bond books are not individual adventure or suspense novels, but a saga, part of a very personal evolving fantasy auto biography by Fleming much the same way John D. MacDonald used the Travis McGee novels or Raymond Chandler used Philip Marlowe as more than simply a series about a continuing character.

   Bond will be saved from the ‘soft arms of the good life’ by a mission that puts him on the Grand Prix circuit, pits him against SMERSH and the mad bad and dangerous Korean Sin Jai Seong, aka Jason Sin, and he finds himself in the arms of the intriguing and all too self-aware Jeopardy Lane. It seems Smersh has been enlisted to help along the Russian entry in the Grand Prix stakes, and Bond is sent to foil their plans, but not before he saves Pussy Galore from the same gold plated fate of Jill Masterson in Goldfinger. Eventually the trail takes him from the Tyrol to a bomb laden train racing beneath New York with the intent of laying waste to most of Manhattan.

   Best of all is a nice little snipe at the film Dr. No (the book properly is Doctor No) when Bond discovers plans for an American rocket in Sin’s office and is told about any Smersh plans to sabotage American rockets: “… suppose he did manage to blow up a couple of rockets. Would it really make all that much of a difference? The Americans are managing perfectly well without him. Last January they fired off a Thor rocket. It managed all of nine inches before it fell in two and blew up.”

   A well-stated reminder of our space program late in the Eisenhower administration when this takes place — in terms of the timeline of the books: Doctor No takes place in about 1958 and Goldfinger in 1959.

   What is surprising here, and in Boyd’s Solo, is that the books read like an undiscovered Fleming and not a pastiche. Boyd and Horowitz capture the feel and the authentic Fleming effect in a way none of the previous writers have, and it is the Bond of the books and not the films, a mistake made by all of the previous pastichers, who tried too hard to split the difference between the two.

   Either book could have been written at the height of Fleming’s powers the way the best Holmes pastiche sometimes rises to echo Doyle or Robert B. Parker’s authentic sounding continuations of Raymond Chandler sounded so much like Marlowe.

    Trigger Mortis is not only good Bond, it is good Fleming, not surprising since Horowitz’s Alex Rider books are canny takes on the Bond novels themselves. Solo and Trigger Mortis are not Ian Fleming, but they have the feel and at times the voice of Ian Fleming without ever simply imitating his work, and far and away mark the first time fans of the books have reason to truly celebrate Bond pastiche.

   I’m not sure if fans of the films or of the Gardner or Benson Bond’s will be entirely happy with these, but they are the closest thing to finding a pair of lost Fleming novels available and that is as high a praise as admirers of the original Bond novels and Ian Fleming can deliver. This is not the Connery, Moore, Lazenby, Dalton, Brosnan, or Craig Bond, but the Fleming Bond.

   Of all the Bond pastiche written since Fleming’s sudden death at the hands of the ‘iron crab’ on that golf course, these are the first two I would happily include as authentic Bond novels since Amis’s imperfect Colonel Sun.

   They are, as advertised, James Bond Thrillers, and for some of us that is exactly what we have been missing for far too many seasons in the past, not books about a character called James Bond, but books about James Bond. There is a subtle difference there, but fans of the authentic Ian Fleming James Bond will know exactly what I mean.