TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT-Reviews of All Things Pulp By Tommy Hancock

HEAVENS ON FIRE
by Guido Henkel
Published by Thunder Peak Press
2010

Supernatural Investigators stumble over all sorts of Monsters and Mysteries in the world of fiction.  But if you look particularly close, when you tie the word paranormal or supernatural to the word investigator, often those tales revolve around monsters we’d expect to see- Vampires, Ghosts, Furry Beasties on Two Legs, and so on.   I enjoy it when someone gets it right, though, and by right I mean when a writer realizes that by tying those words together, it opens up a whole realm of possibilities beyond Hollywood creatures and bump-in-the-nighters.

In the fourth installment of his Jason Dark series set in Victorian England, Guido Henkel leaves behind the terrestrial fear bringers and applies the term of ‘terror’ and ‘monster’ to something more ethereal, holy even.   This novella finds Dark and his wonderful partner Siu Lin literally in the middle of a war between Heaven and Hell.  The earth is being assaulted by demons who have found a portal into our world. These hellish invaders are led by a vile creature who has the ability to essentially continually manifest demons as necessary.  And his intent is not simply to destroy the world, but to quite literally bring the Heavens, and all who reside there, crashing down at his feet.

I have been continually impressed with the twists and takes Henkel applies to the entire genre he’s exploring with the Jason Dark series.   Although the battle between angels and demons has become somewhat cliche, Henkel brings a level of actual humanity to it.  There are reasons the Demon is after God and there are reasons the Angels stand in the void and those reasons on all sides are not simply black and
white, they are in fact very…human.    Couple that with the usual fast pacing, tight plotting, and bits of tension fraught throughout a Henkel book and this is a great read.

Something that struck me as off, however, was the characterization, particularly of our two main characters.  I’m not sure if its simply because Henkel has settled into the characters of Dark and Siu Lin after four volumes, but there’s something missing.  I’m fairly certain that instead of adding nuance and depth to both the individuals and the two as a team as he has in the first three volumes, Henkel has basically brought Dark and Siu as they were in the third book into this one.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it does take a bit of unique vitality out of the tale that its predecessors displayed.

FOUR OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT- Great story, fantastic pacing, and enough supernatural hijinks to satisfy any fan of paranormal escapades with a good mystery thrown in to the mix.

http://rickruby.blogspot.com

In March, Airship 27 launched its 45^th title (the 4th of 2012) about a 1930’s pulp detective named Rick Ruby. All Pulp sat down with co-creators/writers Bobby Nash and Sean Taylor, writers Andrew Salmon and William Patrick Maynard, and editor/publisher Ron Fortier to delve into The Ruby Files.

AP: Tell us a little about yourself.

Ron: I’ve been a professional writer of comics and genre fiction for over thirty five years now. Created Airship 27 Productions seven years ago with my pal, artist Rob Davis. This book is the 45^th title in our current catalog of New Pulp fiction.

Andrew: My name is Andrew Salmon and I live and write in Vancouver, BC, Canada. I discovered Classic Pulp back in 2000 with Doc Savage and have been hooked ever since. When the New Pulp movement began in earnest 4 or 5 years ago, I had the great good fortune to write pulp stories of my own featuring classic, public domain characters like Sherlock Holmes, Secret Agent X, Dan Fowler and Jim Anthony as well as new creations like the Ghost Squad (with Ron Fortier) and Rick Ruby to name a few.

My short stories and novellas have since been nominated twice for the Pulp Factory Award (winning once for “The Adventure of the Locked Room” in Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective Volume One from Airship 27), three times for a Pulp Ark Award and once for the Ellis Award, which is the Canadian equivalent of the Edgar.

Writing pulp has been very rewarding, an experience I wouldn’t have missed for the world. I love writing pulp and have BIG plans for the future.

William: Hi, I’m William Patrick Maynard. I have the honor to be authorized by Sax Rohmer’s Literary Estate to continue the Fu Manchu thrillers for Black Coat Press. I am fortunate to have been nominated for both a Rondo and a Pulp Factory Award. I also contribute an article on all things pulp each week for The Black Gate. My short fiction has appeared in GASLIGHT GROTESQUE and TALES OF THE SHADOWMEN. THE RUBY FILES is my first work for Airship 27.

Sean Taylor

Sean: I write stories. I write them in comic books, graphic novels, magazines, book anthologies and novels. I write them for money, and I write them for fun — both at the same time. I’m fortunate like that.

Bobby: I’m Bobby Nash. I write stories for novels, comic books, short stories, novellas, graphic novels, and have been dabbling with screenplays of late as well. I started writing pulp stories back when Airship 27 launched with its first title, Lance Star: Sky Ranger.

AP: What attracted you to The Ruby Files anthology?

Ron: I’ve always been a sucker for old fashion private tales whether it was Sam Spade or Mike Hammer, I love the tough guy heroes of fiction. We’d done some different genres in our line-up at Airship 27 but never a private eye series.

Bobby Nash

Andrew: I was a huge fan of hardboiled fiction long before I stumbled across classic pulp heroes like The Shadow and Doc Savage. I’m steeped in Cornell Woolrich, Raymond Chandler, Mickey Spillane, Ross Macdonald, Donald Hamilton, Dan J. Marlowe, John D. MacDonald, Ed McBain, Edwards S. Aarons, Richard Prather, Brett Halliday and so many others.

So when I got wind of Rick Ruby and discovered that an invite to race down the dark alleys of Ruby’s world was out there, I jumped, baby! Writing classic pulp characters has been a blast but I realized immediately that I hadn’t used my hardboiled voice in far too long. Well, with Ruby I’d have a chance to cut loose. No way was I going to miss it.

Ron Fortier

Added to that was the level of talent associated with the project. With Bobby Nash and Sean Taylor at the helm, the book couldn’t miss. Throw in brilliant artwork from Mark Wheatley (cover) and stunning interiors courtesy of Rob Moran along with the top New Pulp writing talent and a first-rate publishing outfit like Airship 27 and I could see right off that the book was going to be one for the ages. It was a perfect storm. I dove in with both feet and had a blast!

William: Hammett and Chandler and Ross Macdonald are a part of my essential appetite for fiction. I feel the same way about JOHNNY DOLLAR, SAM SPADE, and RICHARD DIAMOND for Old Time Radio and PETER GUNN and RICHARD DIAMOND for Golden Age TV. This was a natural fit. I’m very grateful to Ron Fortier for giving me a shot at demonstrating I could do something other than Yellow Peril thrillers. One of Airship 27’s strengths is the fact that they don’t try to pigeonhole talent. Encouraging versatility and believing in giving new voices a chance to be heard is definitely part of what helps Airship 27 make its mark alongside those stunning covers.

Andrew Salmon

Sean: Noir detectives? Duh. Next question.

Seriously, I’m a sucker for the noir P.I. One off my favorite series of a books at the moment is the Hard Case Crime line of books. Both the classic ones and the brand new stuff written in that style. Some of my favorite films are noir films, and the characters really resonate with me. The emotionally tortured, morally conflicted leading Private Dick, the femme fatale with legs up to where she hides the revolver, the dirty cops, the gangsters… what’s not to love?

And on top of all that, getting to do the book meant renewed life for the dead concept Bobby and I had originally conceived to tell stories of Richard Diamond. And let’s be honest, I much prefer Rick Ruby to Richard Diamond now anyway.

William Patrick Maynard

Bobby: I blame Sean Taylor. No. Really. I was slowly digging myself out of a backlog of stories under the weight of that old dreaded deadline doom when I noticed the discussion on The Pulp Factory Yahoo Group about detectives. I was intrigued, but was way too busy to add more to my plate at that time. Then Sean goes and throws down the gauntlet by suggesting that he and I co-create the character that became Rick Ruby. How could I refuse? So, yeah, it’s all Sean Taylor’s fault. (grins)

AP: The characters that fill the pages of The Ruby Files are classic archetypes from pulp and noir detective stories. What attracts you to these types of characters and stories as a writer and a reader?

Ron: Growing up watching those classic black and white gangster and noire films with actors like James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, I loved the edge gray world they existed in. Not so much shiny white knights as tarnished souls in search of redemption.

Andrew: They’re real. It’s as simple as that. Often in hero fiction we forget that our stalwart defenders against injustice stare long and hard into the abyss. This affects them, how they think, how they act and their attitudes towards the world they inhabit. Sure, they can often be buried in cliches and stereotypes when written poorly, but they provide a wealth of great opportunities when handled properly.

As a writer, these are characters you can sink your teeth into. You can explore what makes them tick, how they survive what the world has thrown at them. Also the detective tale allows you to shine the spotlight on aspects of the human condition that we all experience in our daily lives to one extent or another.

As a reader, hardboiled fiction works as a kind of ‘what if’ morality tale. We’ve all got that boss we’d like to strangle or that co-worker who screwed us out of that promotion. But we don’t murder them and try to get away with it, do we? Or, maybe we do… why are their sirens outside my door just now?

Also, one does not have to look too long to see injustice in the real world and, sadly, a lot of the time the bad guys get away with it. Hardboiled detective fiction reminds us, in the fictional world, that there are people out there who will catch crooks, find kidnapped loved ones, bring murderers to justice and so on. Hardboiled fiction is great escapist fiction and we all need that sometimes.

William: It’s a simpler world without DNA testing and political correctness, but it’s still modern enough to turn an honest critical eye on capitalism and human nature at its worst. Chandler really laid it all out in black and white in his “Simple Art of Murder” essay – it’s all about the knight errant who rises above the dark streets he walks. That moral complexity hooks you every time. For me, hardboiled detective fiction or noir thrillers are pulp fiction at its purest.

Sean: I still remember with gusto the first time I saw Bogey as Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe in The Big Sleep and as Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon. Just one cocky line to the coppers, one snarky come-on to the femme fatale, one left hook to a crook’s glass jaw, and I knew I was hooked. (I learned how to whistle too, for the record, thanks to Bogey’s costar, but that’s another tale for the telling.) The addiction only grew stronger when I discovered Stacey Keach as Mike Hammer (in both TV versions, thank you very much), and later, the old radio show and television show featuring Richard Diamond.

There was something about these renegade men that appealed to the kid in me who needed someone not only to root for but to try to emulate. Sure, we all knew that smoking was bad for you and that you shouldn’t treat a lady like sexual property, but when the private dicks did it, it seemed somehow… innocent… as if a mere throwback to an era when it was all okay and kind of, well, expected.

Of course, looking back, I know now it was pure fantasy.

In reality, private detectives seldom got the girl, more often than not got stuck photographing cheating lovers, and rarely got to beat the cops out of any famous murder cases. And they never, ever, ever had leggy dames with curves like the coast of Florida lining up outside their offices for double entendres, sultry seductions and hard-boiled adventures.

Bobby: There’s something so exciting about watching the harried p.i. get in over his head and take his lumps while trying to solve a case he would rather not have taken in the first place, but only did so because he couldn’t resist a damsel in distress, even though every instinct he had told him that she couldn’t be trusted. As a reader, those stories are fun to read. I also love seeing them in TV and movies. Writing them was simply too much fun.

AP: Tell us a bit about your Ruby Files story and some of the challenges or unexpected surprises you encountered in Rick Ruby’s world? Ron, can you give us some insights about editing and publishing this volume?

Ron: I knew going in this was going to be a fun job for me. As each of the four writers were old pros, I had no anxieties their stories wouldn’t be great. It was the range of themes that took me by surprise, from Andrew’s delving into Rick’s past concerning his father’s death in WW I to Bill taking him to Hollywood in the heyday of movie making. Each story was, as cover Mark Wheatley so aptly put it on the cover, a real gem!

Andrew: My entry is called “WOUNDS” and it was an honor to learn that the story would kick off the anthology. It explores to some extent what I was talking about earlier. The characters inhabiting hardboiled tales are often broken but most, if not all, have been wounded in some way. I wanted to explore that in my tale. The character bible sketched out that Ruby’s father had died in WWI and I hit on a way to touch on this in the tale as Ruby tries to hunt down the people responsible for a cop’s murder.

It was a challenge getting into Rick’s head as he was not a character of my own creation. I wanted to do justice to what Bobby and Sean created and stick to their guidelines to the best of my ability. The hardboiled world was one I was very familiar with so I had no trouble slipping into that however.

When I hit my stride on the tale, I was surprised at how easily I was able to tweak some of the hardboiled tropes we all know and love. The result is a tale I hope will feel familiar to fans of this wonderful genre but will also bring something new to the table. Also the ending of the tale is not what readers would call typical for the genre. I wanted my story to hit and hit hard. I pulled no punches. That to me is what good hardboiled fiction is all about. Only readers can decide if I succeeded or not.

One of the big surprises of writing the tale was how many pop culture easter eggs simply dropped into Ruby’s world. They were not intentional but just fell into place while I was writing the first draft. Savvy readers will be able to spot them. Sorry, no hints. But, hey, Easter isn’t that far away. What better time for a little easter egg hunt? Can you spot them all? Happy hunting!

William: My story, “Tulsa Blackie’s Last Dive” is a fish out of water story. We take Rick out of his comfort zone of New York and drop him into the artificial utopia of 1930s Hollywood. We get to see the glitz and the grime underneath. Rick has enough trouble being underestimated at the best of times, it’s even worse out among Tinsel Town sharks.

No real challenges fleshing out the story. I was working with a great character bible and I immediately felt I knew Rick so it was easy enough to drop him into a case in a town where everyone is a fish out of water (whether they’re immigrants or small town dreamers) trying to act like they belong. This was pure pleasure to write. I love THE RUBY FILES and hope the series takes off big for Airship 27.

Sean: My story formed in my head the minute Bobby and I finished fleshing out the character. I saw the tawdry love quadrangle (love square?), the leggy jazz crooning dame to mix up Rick’s thinking, and the way that a man in that kind of situation just needed one little match to set off one heck of an explosion. I couldn’t help but make sure she carried a full box of matches, just in case.

But if you’re asking for specifics, my tale puts Rick in the middle of a defecting German scientist, a worried niece, and a lethal level of inheritance. And that’s never a safe place to be.

Bobby: My story for The Ruby Files volume 1 is called “The Case of the Wayward Brother.” On the surface, the case seemed simple enough. All Rick Ruby had to do was track down the runaway brother of the sexy socialite from California then collect his fee. Of course, in Rick Ruby’s world, even the simplest case is never that simple.

AP: Where can readers find and learn more about you and your work?

Ron: We have a brand new website for all things Airship 27 Productions and we hope our readers, old and new will check it out. Not only that, but register as well. That way they can keep abreast of each new book we release during the year. http://robmdavis.com/Airship27Hangar/airship27hangar.html

Andrew: I don’t have a website at the moment, but most of what I’ve published to date can be found here: http://www.amazon.com/Andrew-Salmon/e/B002NS5KR0/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_7?qid=1328666769&sr=1-7

Folks can also swing by my Facebook page.

William: Well, I have a blog, http://www.setisays.blogspot.com/ that cross-posts my articles for http://blackgate.com/ and archives the articles I wrote for http://thecimmerian.com/ I use Facebook as a free marketing tool rather than social networking so anyone is welcome to befriend me there. Outside of my work, I’m a husband and father and keep that side of my life private from my writing.

Thanks, I enjoyed being part of this.

Sean: Are you kidding?! I’m all over the place. For more information visit http://www.taylorverse.com/ or my blog, Bad Girls, Good Guys, and Two-Fisted Action at http://seanhtaylor.blogspot.com/. Or visit any social networking site from Facebook to Twitter and look for seanhtaylor and the new Rick Ruby site at http://rickruby.blogspot.com/. I’m easy… to find, I mean.

Bobby: Much like Sean, I’m all over the net. My home base is http://www.bobbynash.com/, which has all you need to know to find more about me and my work. You can also find me at www.facebook.com/AuthorBobbyNash, www.twitter.com/bobbynash, http://www.lance-star.com/, http://ben-books.blogspot.com/, and the new Rick Ruby site at http://rickruby.blogspot.com/.

More Ruby Coming Soon

AP: And finally, Ron, Bobby, and Sean, what are the future plans for Rick Ruby and his companions? Can we expect a return visit to Belle’s Bar?

Ron: Alan Porter has already turned in a wild and wacky Rick Ruby tale for Volume Two, so yeah, we’re rolling again. Going to be interesting to see what kind of new trouble old Rick gets himself into next time.

Sean: Oh, hell yeah! I’m already hard at work plotting a new adventure to see which sultry dame will turn Rick’s head next and get him in a world of trouble. Readers of the book already know that one of Rick’s regular affairs doesn’t sit well in 1930s society, and succumbing to racial “experimentation” can be the kind of thing than can get a man and his girl killed in two shakes of a lamb’s tale. So yeah, we’re definitely heading back to Belle’s for good times, strong drinks, and fast bullets.

Bobby: I’ve already plotted a new Rick Ruby story called “The Life” that has Rick running afoul of a high-end prostitute who may or may not be more than she appears. It should be a fun time.

Please visit the official site for The Ruby Files at http://rickruby.blogspot.com/.

THE RUBY FILES PRESS RELEASE:
GANGSTERS & GUNMOLLS

Airship 27 Productions dons its tough-guy mantle, as it premiers its newest pulp star in THE RUBY FILES.
It was the 1930s and America was locked in the grip of the Great Depression. Gangsters controlled the major cities while outlaws roamed the rural back country. It was a time of Speak Easy gin-joints, Tommy-guns, fast cars and even faster dames. This is the world of New York based Private Investigator Rick Ruby, a world he is all too familiar with. From the back alleys of Gotham to the gold laden boulevards of Hollywood, Ruby is the shamus with a nose for trouble and an insatiable appetite for justice. So if you’ve got a taste for hot lead and knuckle sandwiches, tug your cuffs, adjust your fedora and light up a Lucky, a brand new pulp detective is coming your way.

Created by pulp masters, Bobby Nash & Sean Taylor, Rick Ruby echoes the tales of Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe while offering up his own brand of two-fisted action. Joined by fellow pulp smiths Andrew Salmon & William Patrick Maynard, these modern scribes of purple prose present a quartet of tales to delight any true lover of private eye fiction. This instant classic features a gorgeous Mark Wheatley cover and eight evocative black and white illustrations by Rob Moran.

This is a book that harkens back to the classic black and white Warner Brothers gangster movies that featured James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart and Edward G. Robinson to name a few. The atmosphere is gritty with a no-nonsense hero pulp fans are going to applaud from the first story to the last. And when that last tale comes to a close, you can bet we haven’t seen the last of Rick Ruby, Private Eye.

AIRHSIP 27 PRODUCTIONS – PULP FICTION FOR A NEW GENERATION!
$3 digital copy available here – http://robmdavis.com/Airship27Hangar/airship27hangar.html

From Create Space here – https://www.createspace.com/3810386

POD version from Indy Planet – http://www.indyplanet.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=6797

Please visit the official site for The Ruby Files at http://rickruby.blogspot.com/.

But before we get to this week’s topic, John Carter (of both Mars and East St. Louis), I’d like to apologize to the students and faculty of the State University of New York at New Paltz for the talk I gave there on Friday, during which I allowed myself to ramble…

But you want to know what’s pathetic? An old fossil, his dome a’shining, unable to remember if he ever edited (or wrote) a John Carter of Mars comic book.

One more thing about New Paltz… I’m not sure why I rambled – I did have notes laying there on the table in front of me. But ramble I did and, again, I apologize…

John Carter? Yes, John Carter. As most of you know, there is a major movie, in 3-D as well as the plain vanilla 2-D, just released and undoubtedly playing at a theater near you – here in Nyack, the nearest screens are at the Palisades Mall and we’ll probably saunter up there one day soon. We didn’t go on opening day because I’d promised to speak at New Paltz…

Yeah, about New Paltz: I think I was okay until I asked for questions from the people in front of me – handsome, lovely young people! – and let me assure everyone that the questions were and are not to blame, the fault is entirely mine….

But I was telling you about John Carter: I know I once worked on a title that featured some John Carterish material, probably adapted from the work of John Carter’s creator, Edgar Rice Burroughs… By the way, did you know that he also created Tarzan of the Apes, which was his big, big success…

I should mention to you kids at New Paltz that I often ask for questions from the audience or class or whatever I’m talking to – well, actually, there’s no particular reason I should mention it, it’s just that I want to mention it…

And while we’re on the subject of mentioning – did I mention that John Carter is one of my oldest friends? That I was best man at both his weddings? Wait…this might be confusing. I wasn’t at the wedding or weddings of John Carter of Mars, assuming he was ever married – did he make an honest woman of Dejah Thoris?… no, my John Carter is from East St. Louis, Illinois, though he now lives in Northern California near San Francisco, which has always been one of my favorite cities, even before John Carter – the one who never got to Mars…never even got as far as the moon, unless he did and neglected to mention it to me – even before that John Carter took up residence in the Bay Area and that’s got to be something like forty years, more or less, and single-parented one of my favorite people, Katie, who teaches psychology in Washington State…by the way, I’m also fond of John Carter of East St. Louis’s other offspring, Dylan, who lives and works in Missouri – I haven’t seen either of John’s children in years, though I did exchange email’s with Katie and had a phone conversation with Dylan…

Five hundred and twenty eight words already? Where does the space go?

FRIDAY: Martha Thomases and the Doonesbury Strip-Tease

TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT- All Things Pulp Reviewed by Tommy Hancock

THEATER OF VAMPIRES
by Guido Henkel
Published by Thunder Peak Publishing
2010

I’ll admit that I’m usually (with a few exceptions) an easy reviewer of initial books in new series.  And there’s a few reasons for that, but that doesn’t mean my praise on the first volume is false, it isn’t at all.  The true strength, though, for me in a series is not simply how good the first book is, but if the second book in the series meets or exceeds my best thoughts of its predecessor.  That’s how I gauge whether or not I’m going to stay with a series for awhile.


Guido Henkel’s THEATER OF VAMPIRES, the follow up to DEMON’S NIGHT and the second in the Jason Dark series definitely set the hook I’d already swallowed with the first volume.


In this adventure, Investigator of the Supermatural Jason Dark and his now apprentice/partner Siu Lin (one of the best parts of the first book) set out to investigate killings that may center around a theatrical production new to England.   This extravagant, wildly weird stage show, considered an example of Grand Guignol, is allegedly about vampires and how they feast on humans.  When Dark becomes concerned that reality may be stranger than staged fiction and a real threat might haunt the aisles and back stage of this production, he and Siu Lin turn to one of Dark’s old friends and jump neck first into the bloodiest, boldest adventure yet.


It’s a foregone conclusion with this book that Jason Dark will encounter something monstrous, something supernatural. As a matter of fact, that point is driven home even more in this volume due to a certain Doctor spying Dark at the Theater and imploring that Dark visit this Doctor and his ‘friend’ soon, a friend who, though in the same field as Dark, did not believe in the supernatural, only in the logical.    Henkel fantastically weaves a believable world in his own version of Victorian England, even sprinkling it with real and fictional personages.   One of the neatest is Dark’s inventor friend, Herbert, who although he doesn’t appear in this volume, casts a long enough shadow that I have a fair idea who he is.    Combine this wonderful name dropping with Henkel’s horrifying descriptions, crackling dialogue, and excellent pulpy pacing and THEATER OF VAMPIRES is an excellent second chapter in the literary life of Jason Dark


FIVE OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT-Wickedly fun.

This week, the Earth Station One podcast tackles a topic that pulp fans can understand and sympathize with. That’s right. They’re talking Reboots, Reimaginings, Remakes & Relaunches. Oh my!

Stop if you’ve heard this one before! The ESO crew gets deja vu all over again as we discuss the hot button topic of remakes in TV, movies, comic books, and more. Are they just money grabs or is imitation indeed the sincerest form of flattery? Mike Faber, Mike Gordon, and Bobby Nash point out the good, bad, and completely unnecessary. We also talk to Rebecca Perry about her spine-tingling experiences at the Days of the Dead show in Atlanta and artist Anthony Owlsey takes a turn in The Geek Seat. All this, plus the usual Rants, Raves, Shout Outs and Khan report!

Join us for yet another episode of The Earth Station One Podcast we like to call: Reboots, Reimaginings, Remakes & Relaunches. Oh my! at http://www.esopodcast.com/
Direct link: http://erthstationone.wordpress.com/2012/03/14/eso-episode-102-reboots-reimaginings-remakes-relaunches-oh-my/

Table of Contents
0:00:00 Intro / Welcome
0:04:56 Rants & Raves
0:39:17 The Geek Seat w/ Anthony Owsley
0:56:56 Reboots, Reimaginings, Remakes & Relaunches
2:00:08 Khan Report w/ Rebecca Perry
2:31:36 Shout Outs
2:36:17 Show Close

If you would like to leave feedback or a comment on the show please call the ESO feedback line at (404)963-9057 (remember long distance charges may apply) or feel free to email us @ esopodcast@gmail.com

TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT- All Things Pulp Reviewed by Tommy Hancock

DEMON’S NIGHT
by Guido Henkel
Published by Thunder Peak Publishing
2009

Ever since a particular detective first made his literary presence known in The Strand Magazine (and actually in other ways even before that), there’s been a bevy of creators find themselves drawn to tell imaginative tales replete with shadowy twists and tangled turns in the fog ridden streets of England in the late 19th Century.  Many of those have dared to mimic Doyle, others have worked to flat out ignore him, and still others have gone steps beyond where his most notable creation ever went.   It’s a rarity, to me anyway, when someone writes in that vein and simultaneously completely respects what came before while completely and totally having absolute fun with what they are doing.

Guido Henkel, the architect of the now 11 volume JASON DARK series, skillfully manipulates everything readers love about Victorian England and the supernatural while obviously having the best magical, mystical, monstrous time a writer can have in DEMON’S NIGHT, the novella featuring the debut of the Victorian Detective that handles the cases his better known peer won’t often even entertain.

People are dying in Whitechapel.  Not an unusual thing, except the bodies being discovered are withered, drained of every fluid possible, dried like prunes.   Tweaking the interest of Dark, the murders are the doing of a demon, a slave serving a master seeking release.  And only Dark and a young Oriental woman with skills all her own stand in the way of this netherworldly plot.

DEMON’S NIGHT is a wonderful story and great introduction to Jason Dark.  Obviously owing a bit of who he is to those who came before him, Dark is also a figure all his own.  At times moody, often introspective, and dangerously spontaneous when it’s least advised, Dark applies logic while opening his mind to the weirdness the world truly has to offer.   The supporting cast appearing around Dark for the first time is definitely an added asset to the story and the character.  Siu Lin, initially a victim of the beast of the tale, quickly proves her worth to Dark and makes a great compliment to his rather complex lead.

Henkel keeps the story rolling, darting back and forth between Dark’s and the demon’s perspective, and makes sure the reader stays along for the action packed storm that unfolds from beginning to end.

FIVE OUT FIVE TIPS OF THE HAT- DEMON’S NIGHT is not only a great start, it’s a truly awesome tautly told, well crafted novella featuring the best of Holmesian influence and Henkelian talent.