Monday, February 26, 2018

Trail of The Bat Beasts

Fans of pulp heroes like The Shadow, The Spider, The Black Bat and The Avenger will adore this new pulp magazine inspired series!


Trail of The Bat Beasts (New Pulp)
By Darryle Purcell
Independent Publishing Platform
ASIN # B077GK1XP4
Price $1.99
119 Pages
Rating 4-Stars

Two people in industry are tricked and imprisoned in a hidden stockade on the Amazon River. Industrialist Ralph Thorn and the voodoo priestess, Ayida Patel fall in love, become lovers, and under her training he learns the ability to control men’s minds. They eventually escape, but on the river in a fast moving boat, Ayida is hit by a native’s poisoned dart and falls into the river where a school of piranhas attack her. Unable to help, Thorn’s boat is pulled on downstream. When he returns to California he uses his training to become The Man of The Mist to fight crime.

Thomas Walker, the News Tribune political cartoonist, is hated by the mob and political powers alike, and as he leaves the newspaper one day he is attacked by a flying bat beast and killed in front of a newsstand run by a 12-year-old boy. When Ralph Thorn and his secretary learn of the murder, they feel the boy’s life may be threatened and take him to Thorn’s apartment. While they are away, the bat beast kidnaps the boy, and now The Man of The Mist must find him and bring justice to the criminals.

Overall, this was a good plot, and I really loved the interior art in the book. The criminal behind the case was a little too easy to figure out, but that was okay. The author also writes a lot of westerns in the format of serials and B-westerns, and these get a lot of play in this story, including the old Miracle Studio used in those stories. Although the author compares his character to The Shadow and other old pulp heroes, the closest I can see in the resemblance might be the three 1946 Shadow movies starring Kane Richmond and Barbara Read, from Monogram Pictures, which were more comedy than drama. And for me, there was a little too much comedy in what should have been more drama in this story to really appeal to me. But I think new pulp readers will enjoy it. Highly recommended.

Tom Johnson
Author of THE MAN IN THE BLACK FEDORA



1 comment:

  1. I like his HOllywood Cowboys novels better, but this was pretty good too!

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