Ghost Eater by Frederick Highland

 

“So where does that leave us?” I asked miserably.

“There’s a little cove I know of, north of Malacca, where a man might find some friends.”

“Contrabanders and pirates, you mean.”

The Irishman pulled his head back in. His voice was hard. “A pirate, you might know, is a poor man with the gall to act like a rich one.”

This novel follows a Civil War Naval veteran escaping a past by venturing to the South Seas where he winds up on an unusual paddleboat voyage up a jungle river.

The novel plays as an historical adventure mixed with a quest with dreamlike overtones and a dash of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness thrown in for good measure.

The dreamlike qualities touched on here and there kept this reader at a bit of a remove from the action.

What I enjoyed most were the concrete touches. The concocted relationship with Alfred Russell Wallace, the co-discoverer of evolution, the nautical lore and the threat of what is to be found in the unknown jungle ahead.

Well-written if a bit too ornate in its dreaminess at times; it’s as if the author were “dressing up” a straight adventure novel with a reach for a bit more.

I can’t fault him for that; many fine storytellers [Talbot Mundy comes to mind immediately] traipse into the mystical to ornament their tales.

It is merely my taste speaking here that finds these phantastic additions to remove me from the story.

If your taste for the fantastic old school adventure is high, you may have a fine time in front of you.

Shadow Prey by John Sandford

 

Because it occurred in the midst of the American Civil War, you don’t hear much about it, compared to the later Indian Wars in the West. The Sioux Uprising in Minnesota, however, may have been the deadliest of them all.

There were at least 447 deaths among white settlers, and probably more that weren't documented, almost twice as many as in the Custer fight. The number of Sioux casualties is unknown, but directly and indirectly, was very large. During the hostilities, captured Indians were held in a concentration camp less than a mile from what is now Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport, in the heart of the Twin Cities, and like later concentration camps, it was a place of terror, rape, and death.

After the uprising, Mankato, Minnesota, became the scene of the largest mass execution in American history, when 38 Sioux were hanged in a single drop from a huge scaffold, with the approval of President Lincoln.

This novel, the second in Sandford’s long-running Lucas Davenport police-procedural series, was based on a series of articles he and fellow reporter Nick Coleman did for the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

I am an unabashed Sandford fan [along with Bernard Cornwell who sings his praises] and was looking forward to this novel that deals with some 20^th-century vengeance for the 1867 Sioux Uprising.

Sandford’s story is, as usual, brisk. The procedure seems right but…there is far more “soap opera” elements within than I am used to from this usually streamlined craftsman.

While not a bad novel by any stretch, with an intriguing subject at that—I found this to be the least of all my Sandford reads—a rare “Feel free to skip this one” is issued.

A skilled storyteller at the beginning of his game.

The Wrath of God by Jack Higgins

 

The chief of police usually managed to execute somebody round about noon on most days of the week, just to encourage the rest of the population, which gives a fair idea of how things were in that part of Mexico at the time.

That is the opening line of Jack Higgins’ 1971 novel.

If you recognize the name, yes, that Jack Higgins, of The Eagle Has Landed and other such uber-British stiff-upper-lipped adventure fare.

For the record, I’ve read and enjoyed immensely The Eagle Has Landed and Storm Warning but found his later work to fall off a bit. But what was solid, was solid.

This novel is his only stab at a Western. A western set in the Mexican Revolution. Rife with dust, sweat, venal authorities and half-venal antiheroes.

This novel plays like a lost Sergio Leone or Robert Aldrich Western.

One can easily imagine a ‘70s era Lee Marvin, Richard Harris, Rod Steiger and Fernando Lamas eating these chewy characters alive.

This is a solid, briskly paced testosterone fueled adventure filled with fine imagery.

I regret Mr. Higgins did not write more in the genre, but I will salve myself by delving deeper into his earlier work.

If anything I stated here is your cuppa, then you’re in for a fine afternoon.

Enjoy!

Cowboy Slang by Edgar “Frosty” Potter

 

He had callouses from pattin’ his own back.

The subtitle of this book is “Colorful Cowboy Sayings”; a compendium of, well, that.

We get 123 pages of single space “witticisms” such as “Plain as the hump on a camel” or “Dished up soup made out of dirty socks.”

This volume seems more composed than an accumulation of research.

If one reads Ramon F. Adams’ The Cowboy Dictionary or Win Blevins’ Dictionary of the American West you will find very little [if any] crossover from Potter’s book with either of these more scholarly books.

That is not to say scholarly makes all things better, but Adams and Blevins give us authenticity. They culled from original sources to give us words and sayings as they actually existed in the “wild.” We get a feel for the humor and wit of the men and women of that day.

Mr. Potter’s work feels more like, “Oh, I thought of another good one, I’ll write that one down.”

It feels more yarnspinning’ than truth. More Twain truth-stretching than reportorial accurate.

The problem is, as with the examples offered, none of these manufactures are particularly clever or memorable.

If one needs a feel for authenticity for one’s own tale-spinnin’ or would simply like a homespun chuckle, well, frankly there’s better fare than this.

I admire all who put pen to paper to make a mark in the world; perhaps this would have fared better with me if it wasn’t offered as truth.

Instead of truth one is served a plate of whimsical “I don’t think so.”