The Savage Horde

The Survivalist #6

by Jerry Ahern

John Thomas Rourke, M.D., ex-CIA Covert Operations Officer, weapons expert, and survival authority is on the move again - searching for a cache of eighty megaton warhead missiles secreted on the New West Coast.

Genres: Post Apocalyptic, Fiction, Adventure, Action, Science Fiction, Dystopia, Ebooks

Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Jerry Ahern (born Jerome Morrell Ahern) was a science fiction and action novel author best known for his post apocalyptic survivalist series The Survivalist. The books in this series are heavy with descriptions of the weapons the protagonists use to survive and prosecute a seemingly never-ending war amongst the remnants of the superpowers from pre-apocalypse times.

Ahern was also a firearms writer, who published numerous articles in magazines such as Guns & Ammo, Handguns and Gun World.

Jerry Ahern passed away on July 24, 2012 after a long struggle with cancer.

Ahern also released books under pseudonym Axel Kilgore.

Reviews

[Craig]

Despite the Nathan Filion-looking head and shoulders that always wears mirrored aviator glasses with something weird in them (a submarine this time around) on the cover, in fact The Survivalist is John Thomas Rourke, a doctor and ex-CIA agent and weapons expert. The Savage Horde is the sixth volume in what would become the longest and most successful of the series in Zebra's "Men's Adventure" line of the 1980s. This sixth one is just another step along the way. Rourke and his wife Sara had been spending some time apart when the nasty Russkies peppered the U.S. with atomic bombs, nuclear destruction from the skies, but luckily no one was more prepared than JTR. Since then, he had picked up a sidekick named Paul Rubenstein when their flight crashed, he started working with a beautiful Russian double-agent, which makes him angsty and conflicted, he started working for the new U.S. government, and, in his spare time, he looks for his family. He helped Paul find his family before Florida fell off the bottom of the continent, but Sara and the kids are still missing. (They're having adventures of their own, and Michael looks like his Dad, we're frequently told.) JTR catalogues his weapons collection quite frequently, too, which always seems to take a hundred pages; they're skimmable and skippable, like you'd ignore commercials on tv or skip over advertisements in comic books. Anyway, meantime, unfortunately, the population had rapidly dropped into Mad Max mode and the Russians have moved in and taken over key areas. It's turning into a vast and glorious cartoon serial comic book story. This time JTR is looking for nuclear bombs on the left coast when he's surrounded by the titular savage horde so he and Paul and Natalia (who's injured but still pretty) take refuge on the submarine and... Sex and violence... Rourke's wife Sara seems to be doing okay fighting Russians on her own, soap opera time.... There's a bit too much description of guns for my tastes (apparently the author owned the company that marketed the brand that JTR preferred), but it's a pretty well-told and fast-paced story, a quick read peopled with clear cut good guys and bad guys. I read the first ten in a week when the company for which I worked at the time sent me out of town to help set up a new distribution center in a small town and I had nothing much else to do after hours. I didn't agree with much of the political philosophy, but Ahern was a great storyteller and Rourke's family dynamics was a compelling soap opera.

[Carl Timms]

Glorious trash. This book has almost zero plot: Roueke gets on a submarine and then ends up fighting 'wildmen', like brigade but with more animals skins. That's the entire plot. Sure there's a few bits of set up for the grander sci-fi elements of this mental series, but that is it otherwise and it just ends, as if Ahern simply rab out of page to write on. Not even a cliffhanger.

one realisation though, there's a potential drinking game here that could get you mote drunk than you've ever been in your entire life if you were so inclined so here it is:

Drink every time you read the following:

- Brigand
- Detonic .45
- Sting IA
- CAR-15
- Mag-na-ported
- Ahlessi shoulder rig
- Pachmyr grip
- Rourke ejects the top round of a magazine for good gun safety
- Rourke thinks about how he's in love with two super hot women
- Sarah thinks about how manly her husband is
- Paul yelling 'counterfeit rebel yell'
- someone says 'Night of the War' with caps
- Varakov wiggles his toes
- Varakov looks at mastodon
- Varakov eyes up his pretty secretary

Guaranteed to get you blind drunk in 20 pages!

[Steve]

Typos galore

The number of typos, from converting to digital format, is very distracting. This should be an easy fix on the publisher’s part. These books continue to be what they are, full of unnecessary weapon descriptions and bad dialogue. ‘Pumping’ a trigger is not how a firearm is fired.

[Jan]

Old school pulp fiction at it's best. Bad dialog, over the top characters and plot holes you could drive a truck through. Very enjoyable!

[Mick]

Very good series

I have enjoyed reading this series since it first came out. I did notice a lot of grammatical/spelling errors this time rereading.

[Anna]

Część szósta przyjemnego odzwierciedlenie kina akcji w klimatach postapo z czasów filmów na kasetach wideo.

[DC Lascelle]

Absolute fucking shit. Skip this one.

[Jessica]

Michael gets MVP of this series and he’s only 10.

[Joseph B]

The Savage Hoard continues the Survivalist series; reuniting our trio and delivering a thrilling escape that includes nuclear submarines, savage zealots, and plenty of action. John, Paul, and Natalia are together once more and opted by U.S. 2 for a mission to retrieve nukes. During this mission, they encounter "Wild Men" in the area and have to deal with that threat. John's family also has a subplot; with Sarah thinking she has found temporary safety only for it to be shattered. Overall this entry does shift things forward and feels like we are building towards something.

Solid 3 out of 5 stars. 4 out of 5 stars for pulp fans.

Note: This review was edited in 2024 after a re-read with expanded perspective and a clearer critique.

[Nicholas]

Not too much to say about this one. Rourke still looking for his family, stupid apocalypse getting in the way, his family is still boring as hell to read about, and he's still stuck with the Russian lady that he also loves but won't (rightly) do anything with. Engaging enough read, but not anything heavyweight for sure.

[Little Timmy]

This is my favorite adventure series. Dr John Thomas Rourke leads his family and friends through a post apocalyptic world fighting ever step if the way. Fantastic characters and plots. Very detailed weapon descriptions. Excellent series. My highest recommendation

[Charles]

See my review under "Total War," Survivalist Book 1.

[Ron]

Post-apocalyptic pulp goodness.

[Kurt Vosper]

see book 1

[Dan Panke]

And so, the series continues... This book seemed rather pointless as there's simply a lot of killing and not much happens.

[Keith]

Was fun easy reading in my teens. Would actually like to pick one up again and see what I think now. :D

[jayne flatt]

Briliant

Read nearly all the books I can find about six times and still enjoying reading the again . I can't get enough of them . Found new ones on kindle cannot wait to read them