When push comes to shove in deciding which book to buy, a pretty lady on the cover wins every time. Plain and simple: Sex sells. Hell, they could put out a copy of ATLAS SHRUGGED with a photo of some sleazy-looking lady on the cover and I’d proudly add it to my collection. All the books featured in this column may all be of the crime/spy genre, but I was not very concerned with what would be inside the pages.

COME EASY – GO EASY by James Hadley Chase – A prolific British author called René Brabazon Raymond – who used the Chase name as one of his pseudonyms – was in the same vein as Hank Janson in that he would use American slang within his books for appeal. What sold me on him is that his novels have ’70s photo covers featuring girls in some sort of undress, which have absolutely nothing to do with the stories inside. Shocking, isn’t it?

This 1960 number deals with Chet Chesterson, who was sent to a work farm in California for a failed safe robbery he helped commit. Through it all, Chet took the blame, never ratting out his partner. He escapes the prison with a clever plan, but while on the run, he has no idea where to go … until he meets Jenson, a very kind gas station owner who offers him a job at this last-stop service station where all stop before heading over the mountain pass.

Now operating under a fake name, Chet figures he can bide his time working there. Well, there is one worry right away: Jenson’s young, gold-digging wife Lola, who doesn’t want anyone else working there. This causes immediate tension within the trio, and then Lola reads a newspaper with a story of an escaped con whose picture matches Chet’s. She figures she’s finally found her ticket out of this dump, using Chet as the perfect patsy.

Chase weaves a well-crafted story with the setup, only to drop a knockout punch of a surprise for Chet. It plays a bit like James M. Cain’s THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE, but don’t be too concerned, since Chase varies it up enough with added characters and various scenarios thrown into the mix. The novel might be a bit formulaic in plot, but still, with a cover like that, I was not going to pass it up.

MALKO: SPYMASTER NO. 13 – DEATH IN SANTIAGO by Gerard de Villiers – This 1975 paperback is a huge step up from the truly awful cartoon cover of the series’ first book, which I’m thankful I read before, since you get absolutely no character introduction to Malko. Such a thing can be a major problem for folks who might just pick up a book in the series that’s not the first.

SANTIAGO starts with our hero already in Chile on a mission that is never made clear until halfway through the story. (This is what I’d like to refer to as a bit of frustration that can easily be avoided. I mean, a small paragraph at the start wouldn’t hurt.) The first two chapters introduce us to every major player, which will make most readers’ heads spin. I felt like the book should have come with a scorecard to keep everything straight.

In Chile, Malko is trying to find a leader of a rebel group, while also dealing with the current government, which believes torture is the best way to get any kind of answer, even if the victim is on their own side. That includes Malko, who is beaten twice within an inch of his life. But he is also beaten by the group of rebels he is trying to get in touch with. There’s also a corrupt CIA operative and action sequences that go by so fast, you don’t realize certain people have been killed until it’s all over a few pages later.

On the plus side, the book reads so quickly, and it’s pretty much forgettable once you’re done, so you won’t feel as though time was squandered. Just be mindful to at least start off with the first book in the series, or you’ll just feel as if you walked into a movie an hour after it started.

DEEP SEA DEATH by Nick Carter – The last Carter covered here was so straightforward and believable, we had to go the exact opposite for this entry. Nick is vacationing in Hawaii, only to be called upon to search for a Canadian research ship gone missing off the coast of some uncharted isle. That’s about as much reality that will fit here.

If you have ever seen either of the James Bond films THE SPY WHO LOVED ME or THUNDERBALL, then you can pretty much skip this 1989 book. It’s so blatant exactly where they got the major idea for this one. Did the author figure no one has ever seen a 007 movie?

Nick goes scuba diving to search for any clues and comes across a fantastic-looking undersea base run by a fanatic named Xanax Zendal. Of course, Nick and his companion – a woman from the lost ship – make a joke about how he sounds like some comic-book villain. (Dr. Doom is a lot cooler-sounding in my book, not to mention a whole lot more original.) Zendal has made this place his own personal wonderland, with drugged scientists doing his bidding and a clone army of drones who do menial work and act as security.

Zendal’s ultimate plot is to sink a new, experimental Navy ship holding nuclear missiles he plans on using for his evil nefarious schemes – oooh, so scary! I know it sounds like I’m just slamming this one, but it’s Nick Carter; we’re not talking high literature – just mindless action, which this book is packed with. I mean, the last 50 pages read like one of the coolest action flicks ever made: underwater sea battles, gunfights, tidal waves and shark attacks. There is just so much fun, it reminds you why you read Nick Carter books in the first place.

Next time: Nothing can kill Grimace! –Bruce Grossman

Buy it at Amazon.

OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF NICK CARTER:
• DEADLY DOUBLES by Nick Carter
• THE GOLDEN BULL by Nick Carter
• HIDE AND GO DIE by Nick Carter
• ICE TRAP TERROR by Nick Carter
• MACAO by Nick Carter
• THE OMEGA TERROR by Nick Carter
• STRIKE FORCE TERROR by Nick Carter

OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF GERARD DE VILLIERS:
MALKO #1: WEST OF JERUSALEM by Gerard De Villiers