Revenge of the Mountain Man by William W. Johnstone

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I figured if I kept reading books made by the Johnstone clan eventually I’d find one with kinks. This one had three that bothered me. One was having the main character disguised in a way that made little sense and did not fit the character already established in the three previous books. Also the overall plot was much like the last two. The story outside the rehash made it all worthwhile. The third is something I really like about the five Johnstone clan books I’ve read so far, but can’t mention here without giving away story secrets.

I otherwise recommend the novel. It’s exciting and fun to read as the other Johnstone clan books I’ve read so far. It moves the story of the Jensen family along and begs the reader to move on to the next in the series, which I will do as soon as I find the next one! 🙂

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Here’s my newest watercolor painting! This one is of Six Gun Territory. The scene is lifted from a postcard and the humans are replaced with frogs. This is the Father’s Day card I gave to my father this past week.

Good People by Marcus Sakey
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I hate it when I know the ending early in a book. It happened again. Why couldn’t the author had peopled the book with more people and elements to make it, at least, a bit difficult to know where the book was going??? There were complications that were nice surprises, but still mostly fillers to get to the conclusion. Which leads to….

The other complaint I have, almost consistently with recent authors – Too much excess needlessness. I get working out character motivation. But the emotional pablum is tedious. Obviously the publishers are demanding meaningless gunk pumping up the page count. There should be more actual story – and, thus, harder to figure out the ending.

The writing is OK, though obvious work is done to insert certain wording to give the book a pulp feel. The characters are well written. Each is distinct and the best part of the reading experience.

I was also disappointed with the ending. Especially after finishing ‘Home Invasion’ by the William Johnstone clan. Seems to me the Johnstone motto is something like: ‘Anything goes, but end with a great story”. Author Sakey should mine some Johnstone logic – if an editor will let him.

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Meant to post this weeks ago. Here’s the finished watercolor painting that I had posted a photo of the pencils of a while back.
This is a commissioned piece of a family’s chickens and their self made chicken coop.

Here’s the pencil drawing:

Case Of The Phantom Fortune (Perry Mason Mysteries by Erle Stanley Gardner
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Not one of the best of Gardner’s books. The story is so-so to begin with. The problems lie in the story structure and, more specifically, the dialogue. It seems that at obvious points that separate paragraphs were constructed and pasted into the book. Considering how much one sentence dialogue is in this story, a large, descriptive diatribe about legal or investigative methodology doesn’t read cohesively. There’s a great story here, but the structure is off as the story slows and speeds at different points and then there are the technical speed bumps. Almost wonder if Gardner wrote this at all and if this was put together by a staff. There are far better Perry Mason stories and those should be read first.

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Home Invasion by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Wow! I liked this book a lot! I like how the characters are written, the plot, the pull of the story, the story, the writing, the plot twists, the ending, etc. I short the book a star due to a few items that bother me.

The book is about a small city in Texas taken over by a very large entity and more that will have to be discovered while reading. The great thing is that none of the takeover takes place right away. The story has number of threads and it takes a bit to tie it together. The reader knows it’s going to tie together and that is one of the things keeping you on the edge of your seat trying to figure how that will happen. This book starts on one level and ends up in a very different place. I love when i can’t figure an ending out and that was pretty impossible here. Another great things is that every character is expendable, which is typical of the Johnstone westerns I’ve read. Love how that worked out here. Made it all so much more realistic.

These days, in our current political atmosphere, the plot seems possibly not far off from possible. Staunch liberals will hate this book. People opened minded will greatly enjoy it. I sure like that conservatives are put in a good light here. I read so much contemporary mess where the conservatives, Republicans, patriotic people are evil. Though this book flips the favoring, it is still less strident than sooooo many authors I’ve read.

My concerns are mostly technical. I’m not a lawyer, but I believe there are some pretty big holes in how the court case early in the book is handled. Though I like the ending, I don’t quite believe everything would go so quick back to normal considering the premise of a fixated populace.

Besides a great story, I’m also amazed at the level this book is considering it’s coming out of the Johnstone mill. The amount of books pumped out a year by Johnstone and company would lead one to believe the books are just rot machine gunned out by ghost writers. This is the second book recently produced by the mill and am staggered at it’s quality. I really expected a loosey-goosey mess of a non-stop battle involving what I figured might be the “Invasion” before reading the book. As I read I discovered how very wrong I was. Have to almost wonder if some of the ghost writers are long-time professionals filling in some economic gaps by producing these.

I highly recommend this book.

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Savage Texas by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The seemingly never ending Johnstone literary legacy continues. I had to suspect that this relatively new entry into the fray might not live up to the early days of the Johnstone western series thirty years ago. With Johnstone himself long gone and seemingly a team of ghost writers pumping out volumes of books every year, I wondered if these spin-offs of spin-offs could sustain quality.

Well, this one does. It’s clear the framework setup by Johnstone oh so long ago is being strictly adhered to. The story draws you in and keeps you turning pages to the end. It’s a wonder why this rather innocuous series isn’t better known. This was far better written than any of the recent fiction I’ve read by contemporary authors. My usual complaint of over explaining everything is somewhat found here. But in no way to the degree of what i find in the current best seller market.

Someone else here found something that I, too, found. Part of the book is missing. I was mighty confused when one of the characters is alive one minute and dead the next. If the other contributor is correct, then the page count is the problem. However, my copy had even less pages- 314.

Nevertheless, I highly recommend this book.

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It’s Taylor’s 21st birthday! Here’s the annual little bit of animation to celebrate and below is a photo of one of two banana splits a year I have in honor of. Hoping Taylor has a tremendous birthday today!

This is the latest I’ve posted for Taylor’s birthday. Being on the road for the past five days, along with car problems, got this out later than I’d liked it to get out.

Got to meet up with old pal Jeff Parker this evening in Tallahassee during a brief stop there. It’s the first time I’ve seen Jeff in two years. Great catching up and we exchanged some goodies. Hope to see Jeff again before two years.

Killing Castro by Lawrence Block

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Block’s book follows a handful of folks out to kill Castro. The story is very good and the outcome of the task is interesting as the reader learns about the ones out to take out Castro. Block does a very good job of crafting the relatively short story. The best part is the history of Castro and Batista and their rise to power interspersed throughout the book.

Block starts the book in Ybor City, near Tampa, in Florida. Considering the atmosphere of Ybor City at the time this book takes place in the early ’60s, it’s a shame Block didn’t know more about the area to be more descriptive.

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Trail of the Mountain Man by William W. Johnstone

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This third in the series is much like the second with the obvious intent to make it different. Almost as if Johnstone wanted to rewrite the second in the series.

It’s still a real good book. You get to really know the various other characters involved. Most are fleshed out. It was quite a task. I almost wonder if Johnstone went too far with his descriptions. Not sure if he needed to flesh them out as much. But that is a light complaint compared to the overwrought Reacher novel I finished before this.

This is also a fun story with all kinds of things happening, lots of side stories and a satisfying conclusion. Johnstone does give a view of the bad guy and the like to understand their positions. It’s a satisfying reading pleasure.

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