High Treason by John Gilstrap
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Number 5 in the series supports my view that the Jonathan Grave series is like a literary comic book. The plots are far fetched, especially this one.

First to first note: I read this in 2016 a month after the 2016 presidential election. An angle in this story is as if Gilstrap could see the future. It’s hard not to read this and imagine certain people involved.

Even though the story is wild, it is a fun one. This is hard not to read fast as I was trying to figure out if the story was as outrageous as it seemed and if the resolution fit the story or cheated the reader. It fit the story.

Characters are all very well written, with the exception of the hero. More below. As usual, though there is plenty of description, the settings are still hard to grasp at times. This entry in the series could have used a bunch of editing as some things are learned that don’t really matter and the settings are lacking. This is especially true at the end where the setting is critical to the story.

The ending is fun, but just ridiculous. This resolution stretches all points of credulity and I didn’t buy any of it. Especially that no character died in all that happened or even got seriously injured.

There are many drawbacks in consistency in #5. First: A certain character that had been part of the last few books has entirely vanished with no mention at all. That wouldn’t bother me but there is the re-re-retelling of who the main character is, his pals, the HQ, etc. If all of that is to be rehashed each time, finishing a plot line from the last book should have been done.

A serious drawback: This is really one of the worst cases of Gilstrap stumbling in his writing. I guess to make the book work and to fill the lost of a member of the team, he tossed in a few other characters as helpers. However, earlier versions of the Jonathan Graves would never had done that, nor should the character have done it here, either. This really caved the book for me. If all sorts of strategy is being explained throughout, Gilstrap should have tried to explain the decision to include the helpers in the resolution. Sappy dialogue doesn’t cut it. My further concern is that Gilstrap mentions at the end that two of the helpers are based on two real people. I’d like to hope Gilstrap didn’t sacrifice the story for little rewards. Because the inclusion did sacrifice the story.

As much fun as this one is, it is a loss for me, so….

Bottom line: i don’t recommend this book. 4 out of ten points.

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Harpo Speaks by Harpo Marx
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I LOVE this book of the one, the only, Harpo!

I first became a fan of the Marx Brothers when i was about 9 years old being able to watch their films on television. It was also at this time that our weekly trips to the library had me shifting from the cartoon section to the section beside it, the written humor section. In the written section I found books of the writers of these Marx Brothers films and books of the Brothers, themselves. Book store trips had me purchasing with birthday and allowance money books of the Brothers. It was the perfect time as the 1970s was finding a resurgence of the Brother’s films and books to go with it! I have continued to build to my Marx Brothers library ever since.

One book i couldn’t find was ‘Harpo Speaks’. I finally found the book .at a library book sale in the early 1980s. I’ve saved it all this time to read in later life. With this year bringing the death of my father and health scares for me, I realized “Later in life” was now!

The wait was worth it! This is an incredible book about an incredible person and the people in his life. Harpo does an outstanding job covering his entire life up to publication of his book in 1961. The story gets very personal and easier for the reader to follow than other works of the Marx Brothers story. Especially well portrayed is the Marx Brothers parents and how strongly tied they were to the very existence of the team.

Other stories range from tales of his family, friends and a whole series of encounters with complete strangers that are funny and touching. His trek into Russa has as much intrigue as humor. His encounter of Hitler’s Germany comes back later in the book and is likey to stay with you beyond the book.

There are drawbacks to the book. Though there are many, many fun and happy stories. With the exception to the death of Alec Woollcott, no sadder stories are told. Many of Harpo’s friends died or had their lives drastically altered due to events. These are not mentioned at all. It would take knowing the larger story to know all that harpo leaves out.

Something hardly touched on are the movies and television Harpo and his brothers made. I know Harpo had many, many stories of film making. But that is not to be found in his book. He doesn’t explain why he leaves out the wrenching of their career with the loss of Irving Thalberg or the well known story of the Brothers having to reunite because “Chico needed the money”. Those stories were more told after Harpo’s death, so repetition wouldn’t have been a reason. Though, it turns out it would’ve been.

That’s what makes this tale unique. ‘Harpo Speaks’ is actually about the person of Adolph Marx – his love of fun, friends and hijinks – than a chronological logging in of Hollywood fables.

Bottom line: i highly recommend this book. 10 of 10 points.

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Otherwise lots of work on creating my own books!

Find This Woman by Richard S. Prather
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A nifty tale of Shell Scott in hot pursuit of someone he doesn’t know in Las Vegas. One of the niftier bits in this book is that it portrays 1950 Las Vegas. Prior to the extravagant glitz that would swarm the area years later.

Prather again power packs 160 pages that lesser writers today seem to have trouble corralling in 400 pages. This tale gets diverted as others get in the way that Scott must work around to learn what happened to two missing people. How Prather handles the plotting with so many complications is admirable. It’s fun, exciting and well written.

There is a bit involving Scott and desguises which is a bit much, but that was the only real drawback. Smaller trouble is just my historic preservationist self wishing there was far more written about the structures involved.

Bottom line: i recommend this book. 9 out of ten points.

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Spirit of the Mountain Man by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The story is basic. The writing is superior. This may be the best written of all of the Johnstone books I’ve read. The highlight are the vivid descriptions throughout the book of scenery and story.

The story is a bit complicated in how three men want to rid the world of Smoke Jensen. How they lure him out is obvious. Encounters along the way of the bad guys and sets of good guys and others enriches the story greatly.

The writing of this book and the one previous, ‘Power of the Mountain Man’, shows the night and day difference of using ghost writers. Due to certain underlining simple aspects of the story, I see where Johnstone, himself, set the basic story and the actual writer built way up from there.

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 9 out of ten points.

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Power of the Mountain Man by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This entry in the Mountain Man series is, to me, a great stumble. The intent is a brash battle of many entities in a sprawling story that takes in real historical events. What is read is a non-stop predictable chase that reads more like a Matthew Riley novel. Even wonder if he was the ghost writer for this book.

Something else that happens in Riley novels happens in this book: The bad guys fold too easy. This makes a chase easier, but unrealistic. The train chase is also very Riley-ish and preposterous. This is the first Mountin man book to reach toward Science Fiction, including a number of nods to the supernatural.

The characters are standard and way below par for a Johnstone book, which I can’t recall having happened in the nearly 60 Johnstone novels I’ve read. The settings are really lacking. A good part of the book takes place in California sometime in the 1860s or so as indicated by Smoke jensen’s age mentioned. The settings are essential to understand the story/battles. Yet, the descriptions are slight and hollow. I happen to be writing this after reading the Mountain Man novel that follows this that, obviously, has a different writer that accomplishes scene writing that this writer does not.

Bottom line: i don’t recommend this book. 4 out of ten points.

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Everybody Had a Gun by Richard S. Prather
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’ve enjoyed the seven or so Shell Scott books I’ve read and this is one of the better tales. There are a lot of layers to this tale and Scott is written in to straighten out more than what appears. I especially liked the plotting of the story and how each piece is presented and then solved.

The characters are all very well written. Backdrop and settings are very good. Many younger readers will be very confused about a dumb waiter, not even called that, used.

This book, in particular, has an astonishingly good story concisely filled into 159 pages. As usual, i wonder why books can’t be written like this today?

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 8 out of ten points.

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Six Ways from Sunday by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is an odd book coming from the Johnstone Clan camp. The hero, is hardly that. He’s a bumbling ne’er-do-well that has little success in anything he does. This book is almost more of the main character as an observer of all that occurs. He sure doesn’t solve much of anything. Making this book one hard to grab a reader.

The story is OK with a better than average explanation as to the mechanics of how an area can be taken over. So happens the efforts described here happen even today. But as a typical western, this one has little gun play and, though lots happens, there is a meandering feel to the tale in that it’s rather clear the main character isn’t up to fixing the problem.

All of the other Johnstone Clan adventures the reader roots for the hero. With no hero and a cast of characters that is hard to like, this book misses the engaging storytelling that makes Johnstone Clan stories so compelling.

The setting is also not as well depicted. Never could get a handle of the town and it’s layout.

Bottom line: I don’t recommend this book: 4 out of 10 points.

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Pattern for Panic by Richard S. Prather
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Apparently this book by Prather was originally written with a different character and using another name as author. Later to be re-written to fit the Shell Scott series. This is definitely a different book for the character Scott. More involed and more political. Also no mention of some typical side characters that are not to be found. This story takes place entirely in Mexico and is a fight against Communism.

The story is certainly a solid one with political sludge everywhere fort Scott to try and fight through. The Maguffin being a chemical that annihilate the sentient population sounds like a plan Stalin would have loved. The Stalinist mentality is a part of the book that would be lost on today’s American population, who really don’t understand they’ve already adopted a lot of the tenants of Communism. The effort is a large scale model I see in my work in politics all of the time. If only the population realized how much it is manipulated. Reading this book might waken some snoozing Americans.

As usual the characters are well formed, making the books far easier to follow. As always, sex is a part and all tags to the storyline. I have to admire Prather’s ability to tie the two in and usually for different reasons. The scenery is well described also as usual. In particular the Reforma road is nearly a character in the book.

My complaint would be that, unlike the other Shell books, this one had a very obvious bad guy and little in the way of twists.

I’ve yet to compliment the wonderful cover art for this and all of the Scott paperbacks and re-prints. A job that no longer exists.

Bottom line: I recommend this book: 8 out of ten points.

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The Scrambled Yeggs by Richard S. Prather
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This a rollicking good tale of P.I. Shell Scott out to solve a hit and run death. The set of characters Prather writes to involve Scott with are rich and real and distinct. Prather writes a mystery with lots of moving parts and pieces that has hero Scott winding through the labrynth created.

The mystery is solid, with the exception of the first fourth that is a bit muddled in setup. The rest has the typical Scott sex scenes, again integral to the story. But as you read through, you’ll have great difficulty trying to figure who did it.

This particular book has outstanding setting descriptions, again almost it’s own character in the book. A bit more time is spent in Scott’s office in description and we spend a bit more time with the pet guppies.

This is the first of the series where Scott’s wardrobe is further described. Something interesting about the 5 other Scott books I’ve read is that the stories could take place anytime. There is little to tie to the time period of the ’50s and ’60s. This one the most references to the 1950s.

I liked this alot and, again, a thoroughly fulfilling story all in 160 pages. Excellent!

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 9 1/2 out of 10 points.

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