Fight Card: Monster Man

Greetings,

Our latest offering Fight Card: Monaster Man from Jason Chirevas (writing as Jack Tunney) has just hit the virtual shelves.

FIGHT CARD: MONSTER MAN

Albuquerque, 1947

A fighter on the rise despite a growing illness, Ben Harman is on-track for a heavyweight title shot until one disastrous night in New Mexico ends his chance at glory, and his pro career, in one overhand right.

Mamaroneck, 1953

Along with Pete – his manager and fellow refugee from Chicago’s St. Vincent’s Asylum for Boys – Ben lands north of New York City in the harbor town of Mamaroneck. This will be the latest underground boxing hot spot to fall victim to Pete and Ben’s scam. The scam is simple – it keeps Pete and Ben ahead of what happened in Albuquerque and, hopefully, ahead of the acromegaly twisting and weakening Ben’s body by the punch. Move and scam, move and scam, has always been their plan.

Then Ben meets Vicky, a fallen Hollywood day player able to see past Ben’s monstrous exterior to the man inside. As their romance grows, Ben and Vicky threaten to derail the perfect meal ticket Pete’s concocted, and Vicky’s connection to the man running Mamaroneck’s illegal fights – and the secret they share – puts everyone in danger.

Time is running out. With only so many punches left in his distorting hands, Ben Harman will have to decide how to use them – as a monster or as a man.

A copy of the manuscript is attached for your enjoyment as is a copy of the beautiful cover by Carl Yonder ... Any mentions on your blogs or social networking sites are very much appreciated.

Coming up next month, and due to debut in paperback at the upcoming Howard Days convention, Fight Card: The Adventures of Tom Sharkey from Mark Finn...a collection of short stories that will have Howard's Sailor Steve Costigan looking to his laurels.

Keep Punching!

Paul

GELEN

GELEN (SF)

By Colleen Drippe

ISBN #978-0991195817

Rafka Press http://rafkapress.com

Price $12.54

400 Pages

Rating 5-Stars

“Steeped In Dialogue And Description.”

Humans have ventured into space, settling on other habitable planets, soon becoming the lost races. Many have reverted to idol and sun/moon worship. One such lost colony is the gelens on Fen. The Star Brothers send missionaries to attempt to convert them back to God once more. Father Ruiz is one of the priests. They must also deal with the planet’s politics and social problems.

This is their story of trials and hardships on strange worlds, among alien people with loves, fears, and hatreds that can be found in any community. The author’s Catholic background and beliefs come to the forefront in this well-written science fiction story. I had to smile at the priests’ living conditions in this lost colony. Outhouses and well water reminded me of my own childhood, not on some far distant world.

Colleen Drippe builds her universe with a fine touch of the brush, steeped in dialogue and description, and just the right amount of action that pulls the reader into her world, and sets them among her people in the play. Setting the stage for what may chance befall them. These are real people and communities on alien worlds, in primitive surroundings, with racial hatreds for people who are different. There are space ships, air cars, and pychic power, as well as alien fauna and flora. It’s all here for the reader; so don’t be afraid to venture into the author’s world for a few hours of reading pleasure. Highly recommended.

Tom Johnson

Author of PANGAEA: EDEN’S PLANET

STEEL ROSE Tour Blitz by Barbara Custer

STEEL ROSE Tour Blitz by Barbara Custer

The denizens of hell attack. The zombies feed. She’s their meal.

Sometimes they come back. At least the Kryszka aliens do. Their leader injects captured humans with a drug, turning them into zombies. Yeron escapes the Kryszka Colony, hoping to practice medicine on the humans who fear him. Alexis—a patient—is afraid too, until his seductive attentions arouse her. Despite his experimental drug, severe arthritis leaves her too weak to handle most guns. The Kryszka troops and zombies who break into the hospital are hungry. Very hungry. How will she fight them?

EXCERPT

Shattering glass. Plodding footsteps. IV poles crashed to the floor. Glass shards tinkled, punctuated by low-pitched groaning from the rear elevator, the exit Hoffman had claimed to seal.

“Dear God, help us.” Alexis reached for her gun.

“What are you doing? Guns are forbidden on this floor, and…Oh, my God!” Ms. Grese cupped her hands over her mouth. Her authoritarian demeanor vanished, replaced by horror-stricken pallor. “Where are the officers?”

“You think our visitors give a shit?” Alexis scuttled toward the door, feeling vulnerable. The vest didn’t protect her face or hands, but the intruders wouldn’t care about that either. She shoved Ms. Grese ahead of her, pushing with her mind, Yeron beside her. “Run!” she hollered.

As the creatures poured through the ward, a stench crawled down her throat, the stink of things many days dead. Moaning drowned out the sound of Ms. Grese’s cries, a continual chant of “hungry.”

Skeletal figures in tattered rags skirted around Mark, who fired at any who got too close. Their tendons flashed gray against cold cobwebs of rib and knuckle. The flesh that quivered through widened skin tears had the sheen of rotting meat. The skin resembled cracked leather. Weeds sprouted on some of the figures’ necks and hair, the way they did in her nightmares. They made their way to the desk, where two nurses sat. The two women jumped up, both screaming. One of them opened fire with a Glock.

The armed woman was her mother.

I’m offering a $10.00 Starbucks gift card to a random commenter.

The War Makers

The War Makers (Doc Savage)

By Kenneth Robeson (Will Murray & Ryerson Johnson)

ISBN #978-1618271495

Altus Press www.altuspress.com

$21.89

322 Pages

Rating 5-Stars

“The Action Never Slows Down.”

The story starts out with Webster Neff test-driving a shiny green roadster from Huron Motor Company out of Detroit. He almost ran over a small child who had followed a bouncing ball into the street. However, his car stopped of its own accord, as if hitting an invisible wall.  Webster learns that this is happening all over the US, and most accidents involve Huron vehicles. He is heading back to Detroit when again encounters the invisible wall; he is heading for a head-on collision with another vehicle when both cars slam into an unseen structure. The driver and passenger of the second automobile just happen to be Ham Brooks and Monk Mayfair; they, too, are headed for Detroit.

The story flies at break-neck speed, as Doc, Monk, Ham, Long Tom, and Pat race off to Florida, then D.C., and finally to the Canadian Arctic. Doc also visits his Fortress of Solitude. The episodic adventures never lack for action, as something is going on from beginning to end.

For Doc Savage fans, this is a sequel of sorts to several prior stories; one in particular is THE MOTION MENACE, from May 1938. I won’t divulge the others, as it might reveal some of the mystery. THE WAR MAKERS is based on an outline by Doc Savage ghostwriter, Ryerson “Johnny” Johnson. In fact, the use of cellophane cigar wrapping as one of the escape scenes in this adventure was also used in Johnny’s Phantom Detective yarn, THE SILENT DEATH, December 1936. THE WAR MAKERS thus contains writing by Lester Dent, Ryerson Johnson, and Will Murray.

The series has yet to falter under the hands of Will Murray and Altus Press, and I know readers and fans of Doc Savage can look forward to many more years of The All New Wild Adventures of Doc Savage, The Man of Bronze! Highly Recommended.

Tom Johnson

Echoes Magazine