The Quarry books are really good.

Whom Gods Would Slay by Ivar Jorgensen (a pen name for Paul Fairman)

This one features an awesome cover by Jeffrey (Katherine) Jones, but once you get past that it is absolutely dire. The basic plot is Vikings vs. Martians, except the Vikings were guided by an old witch taught in the wisdom of the Secret Traditions of the Ascended Masters (Theosophists without using the term) and the Martians are led by a woman who was genetically spliced with ants who is a beauty beyond compare but seeks mates to give birth to hordes of killer giant ants who consumed Mars and now threaten to consume earth until one of the Vikings, who converted to Christianity shows up carrying a giant golden cross and prays bringing a plague of locusts to the site of the Martian ants who consume all the locusts and die because they overate on them and this causes the ant-Martian woman to try to flee and crash her ship into a mountain dying in the explosion. Yeah that's spoilers, but it doesn't matter, you should never read this. Please never read this or speak of it again. I found it for a buck and was lured by the Jones cover. That was a huge mistake on my part. Quote possibly one of the worse pseudo-Viking sword and sorcery attempts I have ever read. The Theosophist witch woman and her horde of wolves were the only remotely interesting part of it all and she dies in the first act.

-M

Greg Hatcher’s Dr. Fixit
Greg Hatcher, with Fred Adams, Jr. (2022)


This is an anthology collecting four stories featuring the late, great Greg Hatcher’s character, Dr. Fixit, the ‘handyman to the supervillains’ who earned a living in the 1950s and 1960s by making all of those cool weapons and installations for the secret lairs of costumed villains. The first three stories had already appeared in the anthology series Mystery Men (and Women), specifically in vols. 6, 7 and 8 (I’ve posted about them in this thread previously, here, here and here).
The fourth story is new; it’s one that Greg had started but did not complete prior to his death late last year. His publisher, Airship 27, arranged to have another writer, Fred Adams Jr., use Greg’s manuscript and notes to complete it. It involves the now long retired Dr. Fixit, Ernie Voskovec, getting kidnapped from his retirement home by a mysterious supervillain, who wants him to build, or rather re-build, something he had already done decades before: a super-fast earth tunneling device. The ever resourceful Ernie, however, manages to get a message out to a young NPR reporter, Christine Vance, who's otherwise been compiling Ernie’s stories about his heyday for a book she’s putting together.

The Crusades Through Arab Eyes
by Amin Maalouf

I was super excited to read this when I found it... not only is the other side of the story of the crusades something I've always wanted to hear, but that time period gives me nostalgia vibes playing Ghenghis Khan on my original Nintendo.

The book was very much focused on the various leaders in the Muslim world during the 200 years of the Crusades, with alot less about military strategy. It's also interesting that the western presence in Syria and the rest of the near East was essentially just a new accepted presence at first, just one more prince fighting for surpemacy. It was only later there was more unity among the various cities that the religious bit came into play and possession of Jerusalem became so much more important.

What was clear though, was that the Crusaders themselves were the big problem... from this end of the view they were essential rabid dogs just there for whatever loot they could find. The amount of times various Muslim factions allied with various western ones was perhaps the biggest surprise to me.

If I was going to critize the book, it's a bit too general of an overview.. 200 years of conflict is alot to get into 250 pages or so. Really glad to have found it though.. highly recommended.

The Guns of Navarone by Alistair MacLean

I've seen the film version a number of times, but I'd never gotten around to reading the book on which it was based...or any of MacLean's work for that matter.  It's been a long time since I've seen the film (at least a decade) so may not remember all the beats.  But I definitely can say that the plot of the movie follows the plot of the book pretty closely.  The Guns on Navarone are impervious to aerial and naval assault and can only reasonably be taken out by a small commando squad.  They control the passage to Kheros where a large number of British troops need to be evacuated.  And the only reasonable access to get the squad on to the island includes a nearly impossible mountain climb.  

The changes are in the characters, particularly the supporting characters.  Mallory goes from a New Zealander to an American.  Andrea was far more devoted to Mallory in the book than the film.  Miller changed nationality and character, somewhat, to conform to David Niven.  The two Greeks from Navarone were gender-swapped to allow for a bit of romance in the film and a broader appeal.  

Ultimately this is a good war/adventure novel.  I think it may fall slightly into the small category of "movie is better than book" but that may well just be familiarity.  It's still well worth a read.  And if you haven't seen the film it will be that much better. 

The Wild Shore
Kim Stanley Robinson, 1984

This is the first book (and Robinson’s first published novel) in what later became known as the “Three Californias” or “Orange County” trilogy. The main setting is a small agricultural and fishing village located in San Onofre on the southern California coast in the late 2040s (more or less). This is a sort of post-apocalyptic coming of age story, as it’s narrated by Henry ‘Hank' Fletcher, who’s in his late teens. As the narration progresses, the reader learns that this is a world in which the US was destroyed by thousands of neutron bombs that were set off simultaneously in every major population center in the late 1980s (it’s never entirely clear who was responsible, although most people in the story believe it was the Soviet Union that planned the attack). The seas off the coast are patrolled by Japanese military craft, which are apparently acting at the behest the UN. The people in San Onofre are pretty isolated, trading occasionally with communities (called ‘scavengers’) living farther inland. They eventually learn that San Diego, considered an immense city with its population of 2,000, is rebuilding and its mayor is trying to connect with other communities and organize a resistance to the Japanese and rebuild America (make it great again, so to speak). This becomes a major driver of the plot, as some of the younger San Onofrans get involved with the San Diegans – with calamitous consequences. This is a well-told story (you can always count on Robinson for that) and an interesting contemplation on how human communities could rebuild after a devastating catastrophe. Even so, I found myself wondering about a lot of the things that were left unsaid because they weren’t the main point of the story, like the larger political background for why things are the way they are.

I definitely read Wild Shore some time ago... I got it as a part of a little box set of the Three Californias books after reading the Mars books. I remember thinking it was missing alot too, that it was almost really good, but not quite.

I definitely didn't hit my good reads goal this year (I often don't though). Only in the low 70s out of 95... more comics and not enough prose I think. Hoping to do better next year!