Still > Recent Status Updates

Had a family emergency. Hospital visit via ambulance for my wife at 3 in the morning.
Had to put the book down for 6 days. Rejoined -action in progress- last night.

This new one by Jason Bovberg is such a compelling read. Not a wasted line to be found. Super tight writing.

Jason ain’t no amateur. This is exciting stuff!

I was all set to reread a bunch of Dan Marlowe thrillers and a couple of Donald Hamilton non-Matt Helm standalones.

I needed to read something featuring a remorseless protagonist operating outside the bounds of law and then I received this new one by Jason Bovberg.
Can’t express enough my gratitude for a new thriller reminiscent in tone to the lethally professional loners of 60s paperback originals.
Brilliant.

I can’t finish this.
Life is too short.

I’m not rating this book because it would be unfair.
Not for me.

I can’t understand why I am NOT enjoying this novel yet. Might be a hangover from a high caliber, fast-mover of a crime thriller I just finished a couple of days ago.

Riveting.

Hard to put this sucker down. Man -I’m hooked into this one bigly.

It’s really hard to express how good the first hundred pages have been.

Willeford’s only Western - to my knowledge.

Originally published as Hombre From Sonora this is Willeford’s original tale and original title.

So far?
Lots of dialogue between a couple of the characters.
Our protagonist might possibly be one of those psychotic “unreliable narrators” -

Too soon to tell.

Had to take a break from the despair I find all but inescapable in this disheartening history of the Bluff Town, founded on booze, Blues, dope, and high-stepping backsliding heifers & the not-so-square johns who enabled if not empowered them.

It’s the 20’s & old Boss Crump has seized more power than he’d ever imagined. He’s buffalloed the whites into thinking he’s anti-vice. He’s the Baron of Bullshit.

Exhausting account of Memphis’ shady origins. Great anecdotal color by the author as he relates the growing pains of Memphis as she moves from a an 1860’s Mississippi river port to a growing metropolis by 1915.
All thanks to booze, dope, wild wild women, and barrelhousing.

I have found Real Horror tales imbedded in the history of the United States. Especially during the era between the end of the war against slavery and the Gilded Age in America.

There were some genuine heroes -brave men and women- of various races who valiantly fought injustice and inhumanity and I’m proud to read that many resided in the city of my birth - Memphis.

Took a few days off to watch a war or two. Two more clever tales down I found a bit too clever for my enjoyment. Beautifully written, though.

These tales reverberate throughout the mind once you come to the end.
It’s like one sustained “wow!” upon finishing each story.

These little twist endings Kersh adds to his vaguely ominous tales are absolutely delightful.

The characters - Mona Lisa and an ape, circus freaks stranded on an island, a giant from out of time - are haunting and unforgettable.

Brilliant.

Purchased this recent reprint (Valancourt Books) of the original paperback anthology containing some of Gerald Kersh’s unsettling tales as chosen by Harlan Ellison who also supplies the introduction.

Truly marvelous stuff!

Entertaining throwback to mid-20th century hardboiled paperback originals.

I’m ready for this adventure to be over now.

The zany here is exhausting.

Wish I was having as much fun reading this as the characters I’m reading about are having.

So far the bad guys are zany - not incapable of violence-just kind of zany.

It’s ridiculous that I can’t seem to be able to set this book down for more than 45 minutes at a time. Must be pretty good.

Haven’t put this down all afternoon except for a few chores. Surprised.

Well. I’m reading this I guess. Picked it up earlier and I’m still reading it.

Forced pause for evening. This is fast-paced reading with lots of violence.
Loving it!

Terrific stuff!