F.C. Schaefer's Blog, page 3

The Gunfight at the OK Corral; the truth is better than the legend.

As someone who loves western films, books about American history, and anything that is simply a good story, fiction or non-fiction, Tom Clavin’s TOMBSTONE: THE EARP BROTHERS, DOC HOLLIDAY, AND THE VENDETTA RIDE FROM HELL was a must read for me. Having read the author’s previous book, DODGE CITY, I knew Clavin would do justice to the often told story of the clash between lawmen and cowboys at the OK Corral in Tombstone, Arizona, on October 26, 1881. The Earp brothers and their feud with a nefarious bunch of outlaws and cattle thieves in that corner of the southwest have been the basis for number of classic films, including John Ford’s MY DARLING CLEMENTINE, John Sturges’s GUNFIGHT AT THE OK CORRAL, and later on, TOMBSTONE, which had Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer doing some of the best work of their careers as Wyatt Earp, and his disreputable, but loyal, friend, John Henry “Doc” Holiday. Their story and what happened that day in October have truly become an American legend, one of the quintessential clashes of good and evil that shaped the American character. Revisionists would replace “legend” with “myth,” and point out that none of the participants in that violent encounter were paragons of virtue.

Be that as it may, Clavin’s book gives the reader not only a full picture of the events leading up to the gunfight, but also telling the story of its aftermath, with all of its revenge and retribution, not to mention a number of violent confrontations that easily rivaled the bloodshed at the OK Corral. We also get the full background on how the mining town of Tombstone came to be, with portraits of many a colorful character, along with why southern Arizona became a haven for cattle thieves and rustlers after Texas and New Mexico cracked down on them and their lawless ways. The Earp brothers¬¬—Wyatt, Virgil, Morgan, Warren, and James—were like many in the decades after the Civil War who headed west to seek their fortunes, and they sought it in ways that would certainly raise eyebrows today, namely operating houses of prostitution and living off the proceeds of gambling. Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan were also peace officers, serving first in Dodge City (where they worked beside Bat Masterson), and were good at it, possessing the courage needed to do the job, though I have the impression that they put on a badge not out of some noble calling, but mainly because it was a steady paycheck. Wyatt seems to have been a natural leader, calm in a tight spot, and capable of coming through a gunfight unscathed. It might come as a surprise to some that Wyatt Earp was not the top officer of the law in Tombstone; that honor went to Virgil, who was serving as town Marshall, an office equivalent to the chief of police, with Wyatt in the role of deputy.

Though the gunfight at the OK Corral has often been depicted as a simple clash of good and evil, with the forces of law triumphant, Clavin’s book makes it clear that it was more complicated than a morality play. What was happening in Arizona was something very American, where varied interests competed and came into conflict in a struggle for who would be in charge, a battle for control between men who wanted the rules bent in their favor going up against those who wanted the town or the territory run their way. And it didn’t help that many of those involved had bad tempers and prickly dispositions, quick to take offense, hold a grudge, and settle a score, even if it meant shooting someone in the back. That is the picture that emerges in Clavin’s book of Ike Clanton, Curly Bill Brocius, and Johnny Ringo, all of whom at one time or another were the unofficial leaders of the cowboy faction who tangled with the Earps. Doc Holliday, the tubercular dentist who made his living gambling, was probably even worse when it came to a mean temperament, but he was always ready to drop everything and stand with his one true friend, Wyatt. One character who stands out in the story is the slippery and ineffectual Sheriff Johnny Behan, no ally of the Earps, and a romantic rival of Wyatt’s for the affections of the actress, Josephine Marcus. Clavin does give attention to her, and the other long suffering women who were part of the lives of these tough men.

The best part of Clavin’s book for me concerned the aftermath of the gunfight, and how all the drama played out. It’s an unfamiliar and surprising narrative, proving that truth can be better than legend or myth, that not all heroes get happy endings, and that some villains don’t always get what is coming to them, at least some of them. And Clavin does give us a good portrait of an America where the pursuit of happiness really meant something, as most of the individuals encountered in his book are men and women who headed out over the horizon, left their circumstances behind in search of something better, a search that led them to a town in southern Arizona in the early 1880s. Clavin’s book does them all justice, and at 383 pages, it’s a short read where a reader will be thoroughly entertained, and likely learn a lot.

Get started on my horror trilogy at BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, found on Amazon at: https://amzn.to/3GsBh2E
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My alternate history novel ALL THE WAY WITH JFK: AN ALTERNATE HISTORY OF 1964 can be found on Amazon at: http://amzn.to/2jVkW9m
and on Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/2kAoiAH

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Shelby Foote's history of the Civil War, the LOTR of American history.

After finishing the second volume of Shelby Foote’s truly mammoth history of the American Civil War last year, I resolved to sit down and read the final book in his series, titled THE CIVIL WAR: A NARRATIVE: RED RIVER TO APPOMATTOX. I’m ashamed to say both books sat on my shelf for more years than they should have, but being a lifelong history buff, I was determined to finish them, and I am all the better off for it, because Foote, who became known to millions of Americans through Ken Burns’ great documentary series on the war, was not only a master of history, but also a superb storyteller, and that talent is manifest on every page.

RED RIVER TO APPOMATTOX picks up where the previous book left off in early 1864, with Ulysses Grant taking command of all Union armies in the field, surely the best decision Abraham Lincoln made as President, and journeying from the western theater of the war to Washington, leaving behind William T. Sherman in his place. Thus the main narrative of this book is taken up with Grant’s campaign in Virginia to capture the Confederate capital in Richmond, and destroy the rebel Army of Northern Virginia under the command of Robert E. Lee, and with Sherman’s legendary invasion of Georgia, with its goal of capturing Atlanta, and then gutting the Confederacy by marching his army through the heart of the South to the sea. The intention of both campaigns was to utterly destroy the Confederate States’ will to continue the rebellion and to reunify the United States of America. And though Foote gives these campaigns the ample attention they deserve, he is no less diligent in covering the ill-fated Red River expedition, the cavalry exploits of John Hunt Morgan and Nathan Bedford Forrest, the military actions in Arkansas and Missouri, and the war waged at sea between the United States Navy, and what forces the Confederacy was able to muster on the Atlantic and along the eastern seaboard. These latter actions are often portrayed as side shows to the main theaters of war, but they had an impact on the larger conflict just the same.

As in his previous books, Foote’s attention for detail is unparalleled, and combined with his abilities to craft a compelling narrative, takes the reader into the heart of the battles, putting them right there beside the commanders on both sides in their councils of war that decided the fates of thousands of men under their command. Through Foote’s narrative, we come to understand how the Confederacy’s luck simply ran out in 1864, when faced with relentless foes in Grant and Sherman, who brought the full military might of the North to bear against a South that was simply running out of resources, especially in manpower, and forced on the defensive, where it slowly and grudgingly, but inevitably, lost ground until there really was nothing left to lose, or for which to continue fighting. Not that the Confederates truly didn’t go down swinging, giving it all until the last bloody mile. We get as good an account of the duel between Grant and Lee as anyone is likely to read, as blow by blow, they clash in The Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, Cold Harbor, and ultimately, the siege of Petersburg. But as compelling as that part of the book is, I really enjoyed reading about Sherman’s push into Georgia, and the minuet his army played with Joseph Johnston’s Confederate forces in the northern part of the state. Sherman proved to be a shrewd commander in the field, and like Grant, he knew how to grasp an opportunity, and if one did not exist, found a way to create one. But Johnston earns our respect, for he knew he was outmanned and out gunned, and did his best to play the cards dealt him to his advantage and not waste the lives of the men serving under him. He is quite the contrast to John Bell Hood, who succeeded Johnston when Jefferson Davis grew tired of Johnston’s reticence to take the fight to the invading Yankees. Hood proved to be more aggressive on the battlefield, but his tactics were no match for Sherman. Hood is among the many Generals, both North and South, we come to know well in these pages, including George Thomas, Philip Sheridan, James Longstreet, Jubal Early, and John B. Gordon.

The last year of the Civil War was the final act of an incredible real-life drama, far more compelling than anything a writer of fiction could conjure, with triumph and tragedy in equal measure and in conveying all this, Foote surpasses himself. One cannot help but be moved by the way Union men and their Confederate foes, made peace with each other after years of slaughter on the battlefield. Somehow they were able to rise above the bitterness of defeat and the desire for vengeance, and remember that they were all still Americans. Though he is reviled today for his actions after the war, Nathan Bedford Forrest’s final order to his men, issued at Gainsville, Mississippi, in May of 1865, will come as a revelation. I don’t think I’ve read a finer account of the road to Appomattox, and how Lee and Grant came together in Wilmer McLean’s parlor.

To say that THE CIVIL WAR: A NARRATIVE: RED RIVER TO APPOMATTOX is not light reading is putting it mildly. This is the ultimate deep dive, and Foote builds cinderblocks of text—paragraphs that take nearly a whole page in some cases—that some readers will find intimidating. My copy comes in at 1060 pages, and it was a daunting task to complete. Published in 1974, it is most certainly a work of old school history. Foote’s objectivity may not sit well with many in the 21st Century; there is no “presentism” in these pages, no attempt at weaponizing history to serve an agenda. Make no doubt about it, Foote was no apologist for the Confederacy, no romantic when it came to the “Lost Cause.” His focus is squarely on the Americans who took up arms against each other between the years of 1861 to 1865, and I do believe he does them justice. I would consider his three books on this epic struggle to the LORD OF THE RINGS of American history books, and a must read for any serious student of the subject.

Get started on my horror trilogy at BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, found on Amazon at: https://amzn.to/3GsBh2E
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My alternate history novel ALL THE WAY WITH JFK: AN ALTERNATE HISTORY OF 1964 can be found on Amazon at: http://amzn.to/2jVkW9m
and on Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/2kAoiAH

Visit my Goodreads author's page at:
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Truly the anti-Twilight Saga.

I’ve had a copy of Catherine Jinks’ THE REFORMED VAMPIRE SUPPORT GROUP on my bookshelf for a few years now and finally got around to reading it. I’m a sucker (pun intended) for a good vampire story, and this one caught my interest, but for some reason or another, I kept passing on it. Maybe because of its length—my paperback copy clocks in at 362 pages—and because it is categorized as Young Adult, my expectations were not particularly high for this novel.

I’m happy to say that THE REFORMED VAMPIRE SUPPORT GROUP more than delivered with an interesting premise, and for the most part, a decent execution. The book’s title is very much an apt one, as the story is centered around a group of vampires in Australia who are not anything like the mythic and powerful creations of Bram Stoker or Anne Rice. In Jinks’ telling, vampirism is really nothing more than a chronic illness, leaving the victim weak, dependent, and with a craving for blood. These vampires don’t age, but that’s about the only benefit of the disease, and if they don’t burst into flames in the sunlight, they still completely lose consciousness during the hours of daylight. The Undead characters in this book have come up with a way to get around their craving for human blood, but otherwise spend most of their time inside, hiding away from the world, watching TV and complaining. Hardly a glamorous existence. The main character, and the one through whose viewpoint we see most of the action, is Nina, who was only fifteen when she was “fanged” in 1973, and who still lives with her aging mother. Once a week she gets together with her fellow blood drinkers in a support group presided over by a sympathetic Catholic priest. They are a sundry group of creatures of the night, including an elderly former nun, a streetwalker, a pompous doctor, and Dave, the former member of a punk band, who might have feelings for Nina, if only he and the others could get past their plight and try to make the most of what life they have. The author makes it clear that they see themselves as a bunch of losers, a ragtag group of misfits, fit only for their own miserable company, that is until a member of the group turns up staked, forcing the survivors to band together and find the killer before he tracks them all down. This requires Nina and the rest of them to venture out into the wider world, where they soon become involved with a werewolf fighting club and some lowlifes who traffic in such supernatural creatures. After rescuing a teenage werewolf, these former losers have to become heroes if they want to prevail.

One of the things this book has going for it is that Jinks is able to give her many characters a distinct voice which separates them from the rest, and the Australian setting also gives the book a vibe that sets it apart from other vampire tales—I like how Jinks retells how vampirism came to the Land Down Under. And I like a story where characters have to rise above their failures and flaws to do the right thing, where underdogs are pitted against powerful antagonists and have to use their wits to survive. There’s not a lot of real horror elements to the book beyond the supernatural nature of the characters, and the plot sometimes feels like a lot of to and fro with various vampires and bad guys on each other’s trail. I thought the ending fell a little short, but that’s a minor complaint. The only reason it seems to have gotten placed in the YA section is because the MC is a teenager, who is really over 50 years old, and there is very little actual romance. Still, the book has a lot of humor that works and plot elements that come together well. It was published back in the midst of the YA teen vampire fad when Stephanie Meyer’s TWILIGHT saga dominated the best seller lists. THE REFORMED VAMPIRE SUPPORT GROUP are definitely a bunch of anti-Edward Cullens, and this is just fine, as Catherine Jinks’ book hits exactly what it was aiming for in and then some.

Get started on my horror trilogy at BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, found on Amazon at: https://amzn.to/3GsBh2E
and on Smashwords at: https://bit.ly/3kIfrAb

My alternate history novel ALL THE WAY WITH JFK: AN ALTERNATE HISTORY OF 1964 can be found on Amazon at: http://amzn.to/2jVkW9m
and on Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/2kAoiAH

Visit my Goodreads author's page at:
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Meeting a vampire for the first time. An excerpt from BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN

In my BIG CRIMSON horror trilogy, a young man named Kyle comes to the aide of teenage Jim when the latter is being brutally beaten by what appears to be a much bigger bully. When the attacker turns on Kyle, he kills him in self-defense, only to discover that he has stepped right into the middle of a feud between two vampires and that now he is a target of the blood drinkers as well. On the upside, he now has a new best friend in a creature of the night, and Jim vows to repay the debt he owes to a mortal.

The following is an excerpt the third book in my vampire horror trilogy, BIG CRIMSON 1:THERE’S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, where my main protagonist, Kyle, has his first encounter with the Undead late one evening after enjoying a beer on his back porch.

An excerpt from BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE’S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN:

With the knowledge that nothing could be accomplished before daylight and with sleep out of the question, Kyle got up and ambled back into the kitchen to fetch another beer. His head was in the refrigerator when there was a loud, metallic crash from the back-yard. Kyle instantly forgot about grabbing another bottle of Budweiser and rushed out the door, hitting the wall switch for the back-yard spot-light on the way. Outside, in the middle of a pool of light, Kyle found the prone figure of a young man—face down in the dirt—arms and legs splayed out, next to the overturned barbeque grill. It appeared as if he’d been running full tilt in the darkness and hadn’t seen the grill right in front of him.

The young man let out a groan and tried to push himself up from the dirt. “Hey, buddy, looks like you forgot to put your high beams on,” Kyle said, standing over the intruder. “And wherever you were going, this ain’t the short-cut to there.” He reached down to offer his hand and the young man gripped it tight. Kyle found himself staring into the face of a kid not more than seventeen with a gash ripped over a swollen right eye. Purplish colored blood seeped from the cut and flowed into a rivulet down the side of his face.

“Please, sir, have pity and let me come inside your house,” the kid pleaded. “I’m dead if Locke gets me.”

Kyle had no idea who Locke might be, but the rest he understood on instinct. The swollen eye told him everything, for in his short time at the Harlow Correctional Facility he’d seen more than a few inmates sporting identical wounds and knew they didn’t come from walking into a cell door. “Guess you pissed off the wrong one, dude,” Kyle said as he pulled the kid to his feet. He was quite sure he now understood why the young man was jumping over fences and racing through darkened back-yards. “Who the hell’s this Locke? Her father? Her boyfriend? You’re really screwed if it’s her husband.”

“Please tell me I can come inside, I need to hear you say the words.” Fear was painted on the kid’s face—the kind of fear Kyle had seen in the exercise yard when one of the fresh fish had gotten on the bad side of some muscle-bound Aryan Brotherhood wanna-be.

“Hell, yes, you can come inside my crib, if saying that’ll make you feel—”

His words were cut off by a low snarl, coming out of the darkness beyond the back fence; it instantly put Kyle in mind of the pit bulls his Uncle Roy raised in a pen out behind his house in the woods near Dawkins, West Virginia. No one in the family ever said anything out loud, but it was no secret that Kyle’s uncle made some good scratch selling the pit bulls to dog-fighting rings down in Tennessee.

But it was no dog he was hearing now, of that Kyle was sure. Whatever was making that noise on the other side of the board fence was way bigger than anything on four paws. In and out, a hoarse croaking wheezed in a bellows-like rhythm as one second fell to the next; and all the while, Kyle listened in fascination for something that might give away the identity of whomever or whatever was making such a racket. If I walked over there right now and peeked over the fence, would I be face to face with some Big Ugly that looks like the Predator’s cousin?

“Oh shit,” the kid whispered in a tone laden with dread. “He’s got my scent…again.”

The words were hardly off the kid’s tongue before a shadow flew out of the darkness, arcing through the night air so high it almost collided with the oak’s branches before coming down to earth only an arm’s reach in front of them both. In the glow from the spot-light, Kyle saw a man, six feet in height if he were an inch, a head ringed with black curls atop broad shoulders the length of a fence post. But what seized Kyle’s attention most was the tombstone white face, with two eyes like blazing hot coals, glaring out at them from sockets as deep as a Kentucky mineshaft.

Locke had caught up with his prey.

“Got you now, little cheating cockroach,” said a voice that ground like rusted gears, “and I’m going to stomp you till your guts ooze out.” A huge fist seized the kid and threw him to the ground as if he were a rag doll, then Locke proceeded to raise a huge booted foot and bring it down dead center on the small of the kid’s back. “Hurts good, don’t it,” he said. “And when I’m done, I’m going to take your head.” Beneath him, the kid whimpered like a beaten hound as Locke ground the boot heel into the boy’s spine.

Not wanting to see the kid pummeled to death right in front of him, Kyle reached down and snatched up the empty beer bottle lying at his feet, took a step back, and hurled it with all his strength point-blank at Locke’s head, striking him in the temple with such force that the bottle shattered into a hundred glistening brown pieces. Kyle had heard enough of his daddy’s barroom exploits to know that Locke should have been knocked flat by the impact of a 12-ounce glass bottle to the cranium.

But the results of his actions were far less than desired.

Instead of crumpling to the dirt, as expected, Locke merely brushed away a few stray bits of brown glass from his curls as though batting away a fly, then he turned his full attention on Kyle. “Well, you smell awfully ripe,” he said and stepped forward, taking his boot off the kid‘s back. When Locke opened his mouth and rasped, “And I’m awfully hungry,” two ravenously long fangs gleamed.

Get started on my horror trilogy at BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, found on Amazon at: https://amzn.to/3GsBh2E
and on Smashwords at: https://bit.ly/3kIfrAb

My alternate history novel ALL THE WAY WITH JFK: AN ALTERNATE HISTORY OF 1964 can be found on Amazon at: http://amzn.to/2jVkW9m
and on Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/2kAoiAH

Visit my Goodreads author's page at:
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Cornered by vampires with no escape. An excerpt from Big Crimson 3.

In my BIG CRIMSON horror trilogy, a young man named Kyle comes to the aide of teenage Jim when the latter is being brutally beaten by what appears to be a much bigger bully. When the attacker turns on Kyle, he kills him in self-defense, only to discover that he has stepped right into the middle of a feud between two vampires and that now he is a target of the blood drinkers as well. On the upside, he now has a new best friend in a creature of the night, and Jim vows to repay the debt he owes to a mortal.

The following is an excerpt the third book in my vampire horror trilogy, BIG CRIMSON 3: BLOOD WILL TELL, where my main protagonists, Kyle and his vampire best bud, Jim, have been cornered on the top of a building by the evil Little Angel and her family of slackers turned bloodsuckers.

An excerpt from BIG CRIMSON 3: BLOOD WILL TELL:


Kyle spied a fourth figure crawling over the edge of the roof just as Jim and he were jointly bemoaning their sudden misfortune in being cornered atop the administration building by Little Angel and her own personal clan. He recognized her as the girlfriend of the store clerk, the one who’d come to Brett’s apartment in the middle of the night looking for a drink, and now here she was back with her main dude and his slacker buds. And Kyle had to admit, joining the ranks of the Undead was a real improvement. He’d seen Beau, Brian, and Lloyd around the Quick Mart at one time or another, seen the dazed and bored looks on their faces, seen the slouching walk and shuffling feet, and caught the attitude of total indifference that came from knowing tomorrow would be absolutely no different from today or yesterday; now their features were honed with desire, their eyes alive with the yearning for blood. Even if they did not move with the experienced litheness of Little Angel, the store clerk, the girlfriend, and the rest now possessed a nimbleness totally absent from their mortal existence.

“You’ve been a pair of bad little boys,” Little Angel purred as she stood on top of an AC unit, “running away like that. I think it’s time somebody got a spanking.” Her clan edged closer, showing their fangs.

To Kyle’s embarrassment, Jim stepped between the vampires and him. “Back off, you shitty little bitch,” he ordered. “You’re in the deep end here, and I don’t think your pack of whining brats has learned to swim with the big dogs yet.”

Little Angel let out a shrill cackle. “Big dogs! You make me laugh. Luther will stake you down in the dirt before dawn and let the sun do its worst.”

The Quick Mart clerk, Jason, advanced like he was ten feet tall. “We can take this bastard here and now,” he said, fangs gleaming. “No need for Luther to get his hands dirty.”

Jim met this challenge by baring his own fangs and snarling. Jason reacted by jumping backward as though a snapping Doberman were going for his testicles.

Little Angel pointed a finger straight at Kyle. “He’s the one we want. He killed my Maker.” There was real hatred in her voice.

Kyle spoke without thinking. “Damn right I did.” But he wasn’t sorry.

This clearly pushed Little Angel’s button. “When Luther guts your carcass,” she shrieked, “I will rip the beating heart from your chest and piss on it!”

Jim turned on her. “You lay one hand on my friend,” he said, “and it’ll be your heart that gets ripped out, right here and now. Hear me, bitch? Do you?”

It was Beau, one of the slackers, who leaped to her defense. “Don’t you talk to Little Angel like that!” he shouted and rushed at Jim. There was a blur of movement, and then Beau was lying on the roof.

Jim glared at the vampires still on their feet. “Who wants to be next?”

To Kyle’s surprise, Carrie stepped in front of Jason and sneered. “I’m not staying up on this fuckin’ Goddamn roof in this fuckin’ Goddamn prison the rest of the fuckin’ Goddamn night. There are four of us, and there’s two of them. Do the math! Stop acting like pussies and get it done.” She was wearing tight jeans and a tee shirt that showed off her high beams, and if it wasn’t for that pair of fangs she was flashing, Kyle would have thought her hot in a trashy way.

Her words seemed to stiffen the spines of her fellow vampires. Beau got to his feet and joined the others as they spread out in an attempt to form a circle, causing Jim to watch himself on all sides. He made a backing motion with his hand, and Kyle found himself retreating to avoid being surrounded. The only problem: they were going to run out of roof very quickly—then what?

The vampires focused their fury on Jim.
“Hey, 1957 called,” quipped Lloyd, “it wants its hair back.” He made a feint at Jim and then ducked out of reach.

“You’ll be playing cards with Elvis soon,” said Brian as he weaved with new-found agility. “You knew he was dead, didn’t you?”

“What you gonna do all day,” said a now-recovered Beau, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet, “when you get to that big American Graffiti in the sky?”

Get started on my horror trilogy at BIG CRIMSON 1: THERE'S A NEW VAMPIRE IN TOWN, found on Amazon at: https://amzn.to/3GsBh2E
and on Smashwords at: https://bit.ly/3kIfrAb

My alternate history novel ALL THE WAY WITH JFK: AN ALTERNATE HISTORY OF 1964 can be found on Amazon at: http://amzn.to/2jVkW9m
and on Smashwords at: http://bit.ly/2kAoiAH

Visit my Goodreads author's page at:
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Fairy Tale, one of Stephen King's best in a very long time. My review.

Stephen King started writing FAIRY TALE during the worst of Covid, saying that he simply wanted to write a story that made him happy, to take him away from all the bad news of the real world. And the title is truth in advertising as this is the story of a magical kingdom beset by a great evil that is vanquished by the arrival of a prince, a hero, who saves the day. I have been a constant reader of King for decades, loving his horror thrillers the best, but also enjoying his forays into other genres as well, especially his recent Bill Hodges trilogy, which was mostly a straight up detective thriller. And if making it to the end of his epic fantasy series, THE DARK TOWER, was a challenge, those books also contained some of his best writing in my opinion. FAIRY TALE is certainly in that genre, but it’s a story rooted very much in the tradition of The Brothers Grimm and OZ, with a big helping of Lovecraft when it counts instead of Tolkien or George RR Martin.

FAIRY TALE is very much a portal fantasy, a long-held trope of the genre where a protagonist from the “real” world travels to a magical land and has an adventure, good examples of this is the aforementioned WIZARD OF OZ and ALICE IN WONDERLAND. Such stories always begin with the protagonist, and in this story that is Charlie Reade, a 17-year-old high school kid living in a town in the American Midwest. Charlie has been through a lot in his young life, losing his mother in a horrible car accident when he was a child, and then losing his father to alcoholism for many years after that. When his father dries out with the help of some friends, Charlie believes God has answered his prayers, that he has received help when he needed it, and now owes a debt to help others when he can. Charlie comes to the aid of an old recluse in the neighborhood named Howard Bowditch, when he suffers a bad fall and a broken bone. Through helping the old man in his recovery, a deep friendship is forged between the boy and the very senior citizen (just how senior is revealed in the book). Charlie also forms a bond with Mr. Bowditch’s equally elderly dog, Radar. Really this first third of this book is the story of Charlie and Howard Bowditch, and how their relationship comes to be, is Stephen King at his best, taking his time to build up his characters, let seemingly mundane events happen, and set the stage without (almost) anything supernatural occurring. When Mr. Bowditch dies and leaves everything to Charlie, he becomes heir to not only Radar, but an old house with a locked shed in the back. Through a tape recording left to him, Charlie learns the truth about Mr. Bowditch’s life, and that inside the shed is a well with a staircase leading down into the earth, or so it seems. In truth, this is a portal to another world, another universe, and it is now Charlie’s responsibility. In an effort to help the ailing Radar, Charlie and the dog, go through the portal to the land of Empis, where there is a magical sundial in a ruined city that can rejuvenate the dog. Charlie’s adventure here takes up the remaining two thirds of the book, one where we travel through a ravaged land and encounter among other things: a flesh-eating giantess, undead soldiers, over-sized crickets who can communicate with people, a foul dungeon full of doomed prisoners, blood sports where combatants fight to the death, an evil dwarf (that’s a trope for sure), a princess in need, a corrupted prince, and a monster whose name no one dares speak. Of course this being a Stephen King book, somebody breaks wind. Some of the choices King makes in this part of the story are debatable, but for me, most of it worked, and what didn’t, did not detract.

I think FAIRY TALE is one of King’s best books of the 21st Century, up there pretty close to 11-22-63, and far superior to REVIVAL or BILLY SUMMERS. One reason for this is the main character, Charlie, who is a classic “good kid,” tall and athletic (which comes in handy for him when he gets to Empis), but still compelling just the same. King has always had a talent for creating great child and adolescent characters, and giving them distinctive voices. The book is told in the first person through Charlie’s eyes, and he is quick to remind us that he has not always been an angel, and feels regret for things he did in the past when acting out because of the anger he felt over his mother’s death. This only makes us like Charlie more. Some have pointed out that he doesn’t sound or act much like a 21st Century teenager (the story is set in 2013), that he sends emails instead of texting, doesn’t seem to play video games, and often references old B/W movies on TCM. You could chalk all this up to Stephen King being over 70 years old, but nothing dates faster than what is cutting edge at any given time. Besides, despite what pop culture portrays, not every teenager and young adult lives their life glued to a smartphone. I cut King some slack on this.

Some will no doubt be disappointed that King wrote a fantasy novel and did not set it in THE DARK TOWER universe, that there were no outright references to Roland or Randal Flagg in Empis or that Charlie didn’t come through the portal in Delain, the country where EYE OF THE DRAGON is set. But if King didn’t feel he had anything new to say about those magical realms, then I’m glad he didn’t try. I’m happy he gave us something new, and at just under 600 pages, it is just long enough to tell the story. Salute to the artists who did the great illustrations that begin each chapter.

And if Amazon Prime, Netflix, or some other streaming service wants to spend some money on a Stephen King adaptation, then they couldn’t do any better than FAIRY TALE, one of the best fiction books I’ve read in a very long time. It made this Constant Reader very happy.

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Alien: Romulus: My review.

I am a die-hard monster movie and creature feature fan, so of course I’m going to want to see a new Alien film, though for a lot of us, the franchise began in 1979 with Ridley Scott’s ALIEN, and ended in 1986 with James Cameron’s ALIENS. The former is one of the greatest horror and scifi mashups ever, while the latter is an action masterpiece. The subsequent films, including the ones directed by David Fincher and the returning Ridley Scott, along with the crossovers with the Predator franchise, never reached the high bar set by those first two in the series. But the franchise remained profitable, and in Hollywood’s creativity starved 21st Century, that is more than enough to mandate more films.

The latest one, ALIEN: ROMULUS, has been promoted as a return to the down and gritty roots of the series prominent in Scott’s first foray, not bothering with any of that “expanding the universe” or “going in a new direction” nonsense. That proves to be ROMULUS’s strength, and very much its weakness. The central characters are a group of orphan twenty-somethings who escape their prison like mining colony in deep space by sneaking aboard a derelict space station with hopes of finding a way to a sanctuary on another colony nine years away. The space station, and colony, are owned by Weyland-Yautai, the infamous all-powerful corporation from earlier films, and they are still trying to find a way to use the nasty xenomorphs to make a profit. It becomes apparent that something bad has gone down on the space station, and not long after, the kids are in the middle of a free-for-all for survival with the creatures (a lot of them) running wild. It’s a familiar plot turn as one by one, the main characters are picked off in gruesome ways until there is a sole survivor. Yes, this sounds familiar, and so will much else from the film, as lines of dialogue, plot points, and whole scenes from Scott and Cameron’s films are re-created verbatim without a wink to the audience or any sense of irony whatsoever. Screenwriter and director Fede Alvarez is the one most responsible for this Greatest Hits tour, which becomes distracting after awhile, and will surely take many viewers out of the film as it is a constant reminder of better work.

A few other takeaways from ALIEN: ROMULUS: it is no spoiler at this point to reveal that Sir Ian Holm has been resurrected by way of CGI and plays another synthetic science expert, this time named Rook instead of Ash. Though his character plays a pivotal role in the film, I found it very off-putting considering that Sir Ian passed away in 2020. He should be allowed to rest in peace, same for Peter Cushing from ROGUE ONE, as there are many fine and talented actors very much in the flesh who should be given the opportunity. There is a third act development hinging on some xenomorph DNA that I won’t reveal, which should have been far more scary, but just isn’t, in fact it’s almost downright ludicrous looking. And if this film is set a couple of hundred years in the future, why are there mining colonies on distant planets filled with human beings resembling company towns from West Virginia and Pennsylvania circa the early 20th Century? Surely, computer and robotic technology would be advanced enough to make all that drudge labor unnecessary, especially with the existence of synthetic humans.

Still, director Alvarez, who made DON’T BREATHE, does know how to wring the suspense out of a story centered on a small group of characters trapped in an isolated location and stalked by a malevolent antagonist. And the cast consists of some fresh faced actors seen other projects—Cailee Spaeny, Archie Renaux, Isabela Merced, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu—really give it their all, with the standout being David Jonsson as a damaged synthetic named Andy.

All in all, I would say ALIEN: ROMULUS is one for the fans, a film that takes no chances, and stays very much in a well trod lane. But it still leaves you wanting much more.

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"They're gonna make him do this till he's 90." My review of Deadpool & Wolverine

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been in trouble post AVENTERS: ENDGAME, with each succeeding film from Disney/Marvel managing to alienate more fans, while not being able to build a compelling narrative or develop characters with whom audiences could get invested in. And the writing declined seriously, something I took note of in THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER, and seemed to reach bottom with ANT-MAN AND THE WASP: QUANTUMANIA. Compelling stories had given way to snarky jokes and characters who often felt like parodies of their former selves. All the while, Disney/Marvel was acquiring the rights to the X-Men and Fantastic Four from 20th Century Fox, which turned a possibility into a certainty that the mutants and the First Family of Marvel would be united at last on the screen with the other great Marvel heroes.

It is certainly fitting that the first MCU film featuring the Marvel Mutant Universe would team up its most popular, with fans and at the box office, characters, thus we get DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE, re-uniting Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman in the roles they have truly made their own.

What I liked about DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE:

It fully leans into letting Reynolds and Jackman commit totally to their iconic characters. Deadpool is the motor mouthed mutant killing machine with a joke for all situations, and Jackman is the surly Wolverine, hard-bitten and damaged by a violent past. These two characters are not a perfect match, and that generates great tension. Twice in the film, they really square off, and it is everything that fans could hope for.


Disney/Marvel wisely kept the film in the R rated territory staked out by the first two DEADPOOL films, which means plenty of foul language and graphic sex jokes, along with a lot of CGI gory violence. The humor is rude and crude, and the action comes fast and relentless, and though the film does slow down to get serious at a few points, it never seriously threatens the fun vibe the movie has going for it.

The plot, such as it is, is something of a cut and paste job, as Wade Wilson a.k.a. Deadpool tries to adjust to life post DEADPOOL 2 only to discover by way of the Time Variant Authority that his particular earth and timeline is destined for destruction because its Wolverine has died (as seen in LOGAN). Determined not to let that happen, Deadpool sets out across the timelines to find another Wolverine to take the place of the one killed, happening upon a particularly dark and despondent one, who is very reluctantly pulled into the scheme, where ultimately both heroes wind up in the Void, a purgatory where the TVA throws cast off remnants from various timelines—which includes characters from various other Fox and New Line produced Marvel franchises, including some that never quite got off the ground. And there are some great in-jokes, especially at the expense of Fox, acknowledging that during the years it was putting out Marvel films, the stuff that was going on behind the scenes was every bit as dramatic as anything onscreen.

Superhero films rise and fall on the quality of their villains, and in this DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE more than meets the bar. The Void is ruled by Cassandra Nova, the Big Bad of the film, the mutant twin sister of Charles Xavier, who has near God level mental powers. Nova was the creation of Grant Morrison, and this incarnation does justice to Morrison’s vision. Emma Corrin really nails this character, and hopefully, she will turn up again to square off against the X-Men onscreen sometime in the future. The secondary villain is Mr. Paradox, a mid-level manager for the TVA, played by Matthew Macfayden—who will forever be Tom on SUCCESSION. He brings a lot to the film perfectly playing the kind of boss whose ambitions far exceed their competence.

The other great thing about DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE is the cameos by a lot of characters from the Fox and New Line era, plus a few from the MCU’s glory days—it’s always good to see Jon Favreau’s Happy Hogan. Of course a lot of this is just fan-service, but that beats the “subvert expectations” trope that has become too much of a thing in itself. And it really is a kick to see some of these actors back for an encore after all this time, and in the case of Channing Tatum, a look at what might have been. Chris Evans returns to the MCU, but not as the character you would think. Good to see X-23 again, along with appearances from some of the regulars from the first two Deadpool films, including the always beautiful Morena Baccarin, Rob Delaney, Leslie Uggams, Stefan Kapicic, and Karin Soni. And there is one cameo that is just way too good to spoil. For me it doesn’t quite rise to the level of SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME, but that is because I am a huge Spidey fan to start with.

What I didn’t like about DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE:

Most of my problems are minor ones, like how they short changed the Juggernaut yet again in an X-Men film. There were some pertinent cameos from the Fox X-Men films that should have been here, but weren’t, though I understand some were filmed and then cut from the final print. The far too over used trope of the multiverse and alternate timelines rears its head yet again. Audiences have to be sick to death of this plot device because it totally lowers the stakes, where no resolution is final since if a main character dies, a replacement can just be plucked from another universe. Enough of this already.

My biggest fault would be that DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE does not really give us any guidance on where the MCU goes from here, or what role the mutants will play in it going forward. The director, Shawn Levy, who directed Reynolds in the okay comedy, FREE GUY, knows how to deliver a joke or two, or a couple of hundred, but Marvel fans want far more, and it’s doubtful that he’s the guy to deliver it. It’s going to take talent, vision, and confidence to bring the MCU back, and to successfully integrate the X-Men universe into it is going to be no small feat, and from what I’ve seen out of Disney/Marvel lately has not convinced me they can pull it off.

All in all, DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE hits what it aims for, and is as good as it needs to be. Despite all the jokes at Fox’s expense, it bids farewell to that era with affection. It has been nearly a quarter of a century since an unknown Hugh Jackman became an instant icon by playing Wolverine in that first X-Men film, and he is still getting it done. “Disney brought him back. They're gonna make him do this till he's 90.”

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One of Peter Straub's later books: a review.

I was a huge fan of Peter Straub’s horror novels back in the day. Reading GHOST STORY and FLOATING DRAGON were incredible experiences, and his collaborations with Stephen King, THE TALISMAN and BLACK HOUSE, are must reads for anyone who loves horror and fantasy. I also very much enjoyed Straub’s earlier forays into the supernatural, JULIA and IF YOU COULD SEE ME NOW. The man had a way with words that really pulled a reader into his world, and unlike most authors in the genre back during the horror novel boom of the ‘80s, he did not go in for the grue and gore prevalent in most of the paperbacks on the shelf in the drug store book rack; Straub didn’t rely on such tropes as the “creature on the loose” or the “evil child.” Instead, his horror was more subtle and supernatural; his books were filled with vengeful ghosts, and malevolent entities whose nature could not quite be determined except that they held a grudge against the living. His best stories were puzzle pieces where the legacy of some crime or atrocity in the past collides with the present day. Where his friend, Stephen King, was clearly influenced by the old EC horror comics of the ‘50s, Straub’s inspirations were Poe, Hawthorne, and Henry James. In the ‘90s, Straub shifted gears somewhat, and began writing thrillers and mysteries where there were hints of horror, but it was not the primary focus. Most of these books had the central character of Tim Underhill, a Vietnam veteran and bestselling author. In all honesty, I can’t say I liked the Underhill books as well as his earlier horror works.

LOST BOY LOST GIRL is a Tim Underhill book which came out in the early 2000s, the last decade of Straub’s writing career and it sat on my shelf for quite awhile before I got around to reading it. I was prompted to pick it up after all this time because unlike the other Underhill books, this one had a much more distinct supernatural element to the story. The book is set in the small mid-western town of Millhaven, the place where Tim and his brother grew up, and where his sibling and his family still live. Tim returns to his boyhood home when his sister-in-law, Nancy, commits suicide, quickly followed by the disappearance of his fifteen year old nephew, Mark. The disappearance of Mark is the mystery Tim tries to solve, and compounding the problem is a serial killer on the loose whose victims are young boys.

My feelings on the book: There is a narrative that jumps from one POV to another, including that of Mark, and it sometimes requires attention as to who is speaking at any certain point in the story. Also, information is given to the reader outside of chronological order, which also demands attention. Some familiar tropes and themes from Straub’s earlier work appear, including heinous crimes committed decades in the past that were covered up or just unknown, an old house filled with grisly secrets, inquisitive teenage boys, an apparition that appears to some people and not to others, and who might be The Big Bad. Straub has a knack for crating distinctly unsympathetic characters, like Tim’s brother, who could easily win a Bad Husband and Dad of the Year contest, and is equally at adept portraying teenagers such as Mark, and his best friend, Jimbo. Some of the plotting feels lifted from Serial Killer 101, and the police seem to be particularly dense when it comes to an important clue that would have easily put them on the trail of the killer. As has been noted in other reviews, Straub is not much on giving women prominent voices in his narratives, and this book is no different, though I take exception to those who called him a misogynist. As with any contemporary book written in the early years of the 21st Century, some of the tech used is now totally obsolete. My paperback copy comes in at 336 pages, so this is a fairly short read, and some other reviewers have expressed that they wish it was longer, and delved into the back story more, and expanded on the conclusion. And the finale might be a bone of contention for some, as it does suggest a strong supernatural element with the existence not only of ghosts, but of other realms and worlds beyond this one. A number of things are left unexplained, so much so that a reader might surmise that we have been left with the words of an “unreliable narrator” and that there is another explanation of events altogether.

But that is what makes reading Peter Straub both interesting and challenging. At his best, I thought his horror writing actually surpassed Stephen King, and I’m sorry they never got to collaborate on a third book. On the cover of LOST BOY LOST GIRL, King provided a blurb that stated he thought it “May be the best book of his career.” I would not go that far, but still concede that LOST BOY LOST GIRL contains many of the elements that drew us to Straub in the first place, and is well worth reading.

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The making of Midnight Cowboy is quite a story.

As I have stated in many other similar reviews, I am a huge fan of a subgenre of film books that can best be described as “The Making Of (insert title).” These books are essentially a biography of a movie, the story of how the creative team came together, made it, and then put it before the movie going public. Glenn Frankel has excelled in writing these kind of books; I really enjoyed the ones he wrote on the classic westerns, THE SEARCHERS and HIGH NOON. His latest takes on another classic, one that has a western archetype in its title, but is as about as far from those films in style and theme as one could get: MIDNIGHT COWBOY, the only X-rated film to not only receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture, but to go on and win the Oscar itself. Its full title is SHOOTING MIDNIGHT COWBOY: ART, LONELINESS, AND THE MAKING OF A DARK CLASSIC, and it is a real look back at a moment in time when American popular culture undergoing a revolution, and taking a look at aspects of that culture which had been deliberately long ignored.

As with most of these books in this subgenre, the story starts with a creative person who latches onto a premise or an idea, and then, with great perseverance, makes something of it, and in the process, draws in other creative people, who add their talents to the mix. Frankel’s book starts with two such special talents, the author James Leo Herlihy, and the British film director, John Schlesinger, both of whom were discreet homosexuals in a time when society was hardly accepting of them. Herlihy, who had some moderate success as an author and playwright, penned the original novel the film was based on, published in 1965. It was the story of Joe Buck, a poor, but handsome young man from Texas who fancies himself a stud with the ladies, and who journeys to New York City in hopes of supporting himself by servicing lonely, but wealthy, older women. Things don’t go as planned, and the big city is not kind to the country boy, but he does strike up a friendship with a crippled street hustler named Ratzo Rizzo, who walks with a distinctive limp; it is the relationship of these two men living on the margin of society that is the heart of Herlihy’s story. Schlesinger was a film director whose specialty was telling dramatic character driven narratives on screen. He’d had a big success with the film, DARLING, which made a huge star of the gorgeous Julie Christie, and Hollywood came courting, but Schlesinger’s next film was a box office disappointment, and he was looking for a project that might restore his reputation. I really like how Frankel portrays MIDNIGHT COWBOY as something of a redemption project, not just for Schlesinger, but for Jerry Hellman, the producer who had suffered professional and personal setbacks before taking on the film, and for Waldo Salt, the screen writer who penned the final script, who had been on the McCarthy era blacklist. All these people came together, along with a casting director (who didn’t get the credit she deserved), a costume designer, cinematographers, and the executive artists at United Artists, who all availed their best talents for a film that included male and female nudity, blatant homosexual acts, sexual assault, and an unflinching look at the underside of NYC in a way never seen before in a big budget Hollywood production.

There was so much in Frankel’s book that I really liked, especially how he recreates the movie industry of the late ‘60s, when the old Production Code was no longer in force, but where movie makers were not sure what to do with all this new found freedom, and very unsure of themselves in what the public would accept. The drama and friction of the creative process are at the heart of much of the book. The tension between the insecure gay British director and his boyfriend, who got a job on the film, and the American film making crew during the shoot during the hot summer of 1968 makes for an interesting section. The casting process is discussed in detail, and I learned just how Jon Voight, a relative unknown, and Dustin Hoffman, fresh off the smash success of THE GRADUATE, were cast as Joe and Ratzo respectively. I loved reading about some of those considered for parts in the film, but were passed on, including the very talented, but now nearly forgotten, Michael Sarrazin for the part of Joe, along with the Six-Million Dollar man himself, Lee Majors. The tension between Voight and Hoffman, two very intense actors (very much so in Hoffman’s case) is recounted and how it contributed mightily to the success of the final product. More surprising to me was some of the other names considered for parts in the film, actors no one would ever associate with an X rated film. I’m glad Frankel pays respect to John McGiver and Bernard Hughes, two fearless character stars who contributed memorable moments, along with Sylvia Miles, whose portrayal of one of Joe’s would be clients would win her an Oscar nomination. There is much detail about late ‘60s NYC, which is very much a character in its own right in the film, and the state of decline it was in by then. But the part I found most enlightening was just how MIDNIGHT COWBOY got its X rating from the MPAA. A lot of myths have been associated with this piece of Hollywood lore, and Frankel helps set the record straight. It was interesting to read about the critical reception to the film, which was mostly acclaim for its daring honesty, but more than one major critic in a mainstream publication did little to hide their disdain for homosexuals, and clearly considered it a “gay film,” which it is not. There’s an epilogue at the end that I found sad in some parts because success, no matter how great, is so often fleeting, and in some cases, no amount of it can the heal the wounds inflicted by choices made.

While reading Frankel’s book, I re-watched MIDNIGHT COWBOY online to see how well it holds up. It is certainly a film of its time, but that is ultimately what makes it great because it is filled with the energy of an America leaving the past behind and pushing onward into uncharted territory. Schlesinger’s direction is daring and challenging, while the lonely heart that was at the center of Herlihy’s novel is very much in evidence. The performances of Voight and Hoffman still shine bright, this might just be Hoffman’s best acting ever, but this is really the young Jon Voight’s film. He is simply stunning in it, and when you see the older man he is today on social media and cable news channels, you really have to ask what happened?

In the end, Frankel’s book brings it all together in the story how a most unlikely film classic got made in a Hollywood that was still willing to take risks, and dare mightily in the pursuit of both art and profit. Shame we don’t see more of that these days.

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