FFB: The Djinn - Graham Masterton

US reprint paperback, (Tor, 1982)

THE STORY: Not all genies come in bottles. Or djinns either. And not all of these supernatural beings are grateful to be freed from whatever container that imprisons them. The Djinn (1977) in this case is trapped in an ancient piece of pottery, a jar intricately designed with folkloric figures and is of great interest to a Middle Eastern antiquities consultant who would like it returned to Iran from where it was illegally procured. Now the jar is in a sealed room in the home of Max Greaves, a deceased oil tycoon, and his widow and her companion want no one going anywhere near it. Enter Harry Erskine, Greaves’ godson, whose trade is fortune telling and whose curiosity gets the better of him when it comes to the jar and its mysterious contents.

THE CHARACTERS: Harry Erskine is an interesting addition to the collection of occult detectives in supernatural fiction. He’s not a legitimate clairvoyant by any means. He’s nothing more than an opportunistic con artist. Sure he’s taken the trouble to learn the ropes with cartomancy (both tarot and regular playing cards), the Ouija board and, on occasion, reading tea leaves and gazing into a crystal ball, but he has no real powers at all. No talent other than sarcastic banter and bad puns which are very welcome in the otherwise histrionic and often gruesome novel The Djinn.
Erskine stars in one of the more original horror novels to float to the surface of the flood of 1970s supernatural mass market fiction that deluged bookstores following the success of huge bestselling books like The Exorcist and The Other. In fact the marketing team at Pinnacle Books in an effort to attract the insatiable horror crowd liken The Djinn to successful horror works like The Omen and ‘Salem’s Lot neither of which remotely resemble what you find in Graham Masterton’s unusual book. Masterton was never interested in vampires or your standard evil child possessed by the devil or even the offspring of Lucifer. He was more like a 1970s version of Abraham Merritt who penned a handful of horror classics drawing from forgotten ancient cultures and their mythology and folklore. The Djinn is a crash course in all things ancient Persia and the lore of demonic djinns.

UK 1st paperback, (Star, 1977)

Harry teams up with Anna Modena, the antiquities consultant and “America’s foremost expert in ancient folklore and Middle Eastern culture” Professor Gordon Qualt. Together the three combine their knowledge about djinns, night clocks, and the evil sorcerer Ali Babah and do their best to prevent calamity falling upon southern Massachusetts. They have their work cut out for them when they learn that widow Marjorie Greaves seems to have been overtaken by some other-worldly entity and Marjorie’s mousy subservient companion Miss Johnson starts to show an unnatural interest in the jar and what lies inside.

Anna and Qualt remind me of the occult experts you’d encounter in an episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker or The X-Files. The two of them are founts of endless information and both seem to be illogical in their obsession to get at the jar and the djinn inside. Ann more than Qualt is determined to rescue the jar as an ancient work of art. It happens to be decorated with intricate drawings of a mythological horse that has no eyes, the only known remaining illustrative example in the modern world of this particular Persian figure. Qualt astounds Erskine (and the reader) with the true story of “Ali Babah and the Forty Thieves”, which turn out not to be a group of thugs robbing gemstones for their ringleader but a sorcerer and his demon servant. The “forty thieves” are a metaphorical explanation for the two score entities the nasty demon can manifest before it completely possesses a human by stealing its face then inhabiting its body. A surprise is in store when the three demon fighters must contend with Miss Johnson who has a bizarre story of vengeance dating back centuries, one that rivals anything the MeToo movement could ever envision in payback for monstrous sexual assault. And in this case it is both literally and figuratively a monstrous assault. Read the book for the gory details, I’m not going there at all.

UK limited edition reprint - (Telos, 2010)

INNOVATIONS: Whether Masterton researched his story of Ali Babah and the Forty Thieves or he made it up entirely out of his twisted imagination there is no denying that his metaphorical reworking of a well-known Arabian Nights story is ingeniously diabolical. Additionally he seems to have invented a Persian tool of sorcery called a night clock that allows a black magic practitioner to commune with the powers of the moon and summon beings from another dimension. No rubbing lamps and wishing for riches and success in this story. The dead seem to walk, faceless zombies appear from the shadows, all in service of an age old vow of revenge. The Djinn is teeming with a wealth of unusually imaginative supernatural gadgets, lore and incantations making it all the more fascinating for readers who crave genuine supernatural content in their horror novels.

Interestingly, embedded within all the arcane lore, ancient mythology, black magic, demonic possession and manifestations is a bit of a detective story. There is a mystery surrounding Max Greaves' cause of death and why he disfigured himself. Quite by accident another mystery is solved pertaining to the identity of a sinister robed figure that keeps appearing on the grounds of the Greaves estate, Winter Sails.

Masterton is Scottish but nearly all of his books are set in America and feature almost exclusively American characters. One of his greatest talents is his talent for duplicating American syntax in his character’s speech. His dialogue is spot on and his ear for American speech rhythm, slang and colloquialisms is uncanny. More than any other non-US writer Masterton is the king of American dialogue writing.

Inside cover of US 1st edition,
(Pinnacle, 1977) 

QUOTES: Masterton has a lot of fun with Erskine’s irreverent sense of humor. He has mentioned in interviews the necessity for humor in horror novels and can’t abide writing them without someone cracking jokes or uttering a ridiculous pun. Here’s a typical sequence:

Anna: "Professor Qualt was in the newspapers not long ago when they turned up that marble smuggling racket out of Iraq. He’s very keen on keeping treasures in the environment where they were originally created."

Harry: "I agree with him. I hate to see people losing their marbles."

THE AUTHOR: Graham Masterton was one of the leading horror novelists of the 1970s and continues to thrill readers with his ingenuity and innovative storytelling today. He began his career as an editor at Penthouse and his first book was not fiction but one of the most successful sex manuals of all time -- How To Drive Your Man Wild in Bed (1976). He’s written in all popular fiction genres, written for adults, children and teens, and continues to publish at least one new book every year for the past forty years -- in some cases as many as four books in a year. He has recently turned to crime fiction and thrillers and has created at least two series characters. For more on Masterton and his work visit his website.

FFB: Creep, Shadow! - A. Merritt

There is more than a touch of Sax Rohmer's malevolent masters of the occult (notably Antony Ferrar and Trepniak) than the usual brand of high fantasy in this penultimate novel by Abraham Merritt.  And thrown in for good measure a generous amount of a Haggard-like lost race/reincarnated souls romance.

Richard Ralston, friend of Dr. Alan Caranac and Bill Bennett, has recently committed suicide inexplicably.  Ralston's death is the latest in a string of suicides of wealthy young men.  At a dinner party for Dr. Rene De Feradel, a visiting French psychiatrist, and his alluring and mysterious daughter Dahut, Bennett promises Caranac that he will reveal a secret Ralston confided in him prior to his death. That secret is tied to Dahut who Bennett is convinced is responsible for Ralston's death. 

The talk at the dinner party involves all sorts of strange topics. Not the least of which is a reference to the story of Burn, Witch, Burn (another supernatural thriller by Merritt featuring Dr. Lowell as narrator and sole survivor).  DeKeradel implies that he knows that Dr. Lowell was instrumental in the destruction of "the dollmaker" in that other book who we learn was a former lover of the French psychiatrist. The hint of a revenge scheme hangs thick in the air. Throughout Bennett's story Caranac keeps his eye on Dahut, watching for any tell-tale signs of incriminating behavior. Strange disembodied shadows seem to pursue Bennett and he has heard from Ralston's own lips prior to his death of similar shadows that appeared with no person anywhere near him to cast the shapes. Bennett suspects Dahut has some paranormal powers that she used to coerce Ralston and the other men to kill themselves. 

There are echoes of Haggard's She, the classic novel of reincarnation in a lost civilization.  A lengthy section of the book is devoted to a past life regression achieved through Dahut's powers of glamour and hypnotism in which Alan Caranac travels back to the ancient city of Ys and meets Dahut in previous life as the Demoiselle d'Ys.  But when the book completely embraces this mode it turns into a pale imitation of Haggard's masterpiece and becomes laughably bad. The romance is highlighted with hokey stilted dialogue that never manages to sit well with a modern audience.

After all the interesting exposition and talk of African witchcraft, ancient legends and the near parody of She the book diminishes into a predictable thriller. The story is slight and repetitious. Not one of Merritt's better tales.  If you need to sample his work I suggest The Dwellers in the Mirage or The Face in the Abyss for lost race adventures.  Most critics agree that his fantasy masterwork is The Ship of Ishtar, a dream-like timeslip novel of a modern day man who travels back to the ancient city of Babylon.

FFB: Broken Boy - John Blackburn

Readers who enjoy the Peculiar Crimes Unit detective novels of Christopher Fowler and are impatient for the next Bryant & May adventure into the bizarre and macabre should turn to the works of John Blackburn as a more than suitable substitute. His books are amazingly similar in structure and theme to Fowler's work. Blackburn also shares Fowler's interest in arcane legends and folklore as well as the secrets of old London's infrastructure and architecture. I have to thank Mike Ripley for sending me a promo on Top Notch Thrillers, a reprint line he edits for Ostara Publishing. In that email there was some info on Blackburn that prompted me to investigate this writer. Though Blackburn wrote straight crime and straight espionage as well, it is his own special blending of crime supernatural and espionage that has made him according to the Top Notch Thriller publicity "the link between Dennis Wheatley and James Herbert."

One of the most intriguing of Blackburn's thrillers is his fourth book, Broken Boy, published in 1959 in his native England and released in the US in 1962. The melding of crime, detection, and the supernatural ranks with the best of not only Fowler but groundbreaking genre-benders like Dennis Wheatley, A. Merritt and the stories of Seabury Quinn. While Blackburn is not shy to indulge in pulpy thrills like those last three writers he is more interested in the psychological motivations of characters who employ the occult and supernatural for their own selfish purposes.

The book begins as any standard detective novel with the investigation of a crime. What at first seems like a brutal murder of a prostitute dumped beneath a bridge by an angry and savage john will prove to be something far more complex. General Charles Kirk and his fellow Home Office agents, Michael Howard and Penny Wise, are called in when the prostitute is identified as Gerda Raine, a former East German spy, with a particularly callous and sociopathic nature. She is linked to the selling of British government secrets in exchange for a British passport that would allow her a freer life. But while the reader may think this will morph into a spy novel he will be dead wrong. When Kirk visits Gerda's apartment he meets her very strange landlady and the landlady's son. He also finds a weird idol in her room.

Queen Ranavalona I - a nasty piece of work

The title refers to that idol - a disturbing figurine of apparently African origin with blind eyes and unnaturally disjointed arms and legs. It is this object that leads Kirk and his team to the discovery of a strange cult in the town of Minechester. With the help of an anthropologist and a medical doctor Kirk learns that the idol is tied to ancient black magic studies with their roots in the French Revolution era that made their way to Madagascar where purportedly they were adopted by the very real historical figure of Ranavalona the Cruel. 

Mothers and sons play a big part in the story. Each mother Kirk and his team encounter has the odd habit of referring to her no longer living husband in this fashion: "My husband? Oh, he...died." In each case a slight pause before the word "died." Kirk only realizes this strange speech pattern very late in the book. It's a subtle clue to a larger and nightmarish revelation.

There is a point in the book where one of these women reveals her true nature and the entire book shifts in tone. It's a real "Aha!" moment for the reader. What seems like just another detective story with some bizarre plot elements instantly transforms itself. From this point on I kept thinking of the old TV series The Avengers. The finale, however, is something straight out of a 1960s Hammer horror movie or even the weird menace pulps of the 1930s. There is a perfect scene where one of the villains shouts out "You fool. You wretched, interfering, foolish fool." And she punctuates each adjective by slapping her bound captive across the face. How's that for a throwback to the pulp era?

Broken Boy is the kind of book I crave. It has the perfect blend of action and detection, the surreal and the supernatural, and the utterly bizarre. When I come across something as weird as this I want to find every other book the writer has written and read them all. As a matter of fact I've already ordered four more Blackburn supernatural thrillers and eagerly await their arrival in my book crammed house.

Reviews of other John Blackburn thrillers on this blog are hyperlinked in the lists below.

The General Charles Kirk Supernatural Thrillers
  # also with Marcus Levin and Tania

John Blackburn, circa 1959

A Scent of New-Mown Hay (1958)
  US paperback reprint title: A Reluctant Spy
A Sour Apple Tree (1958)
#Broken Boy (1959)
The Gaunt Woman (1962)
#A Ring of Roses (1965) US title: A Wreath of Roses
Children of the Night (1966)
Nothing But the Night (1968)
#The Young Man from Lima (1970)
The Household Traitors (1971)
#For Fear of Little Men (1972)
#The Face of the Lion (1976) - Marcus Levin only
#The Sins of the Father (1979)
A Beastly Business (1982) - crossover book features Bill Easter & Peggy Tey (see below)
The Bad Penny (1985) - with Bill Easter

Other Supernatural & Bizarre Thrillers
   * feature Bill Easter & Peggy Tey
Bury Him Darkly (1969)
Blow the House Down (1970)
Devil Daddy (1972)
*Deep Among the Dead Men (1973)
Our Lady of Pain (1974)
*Mister Brown's Bodies (1975)
*The Cyclops Goblet (1977)
A Book of the Dead (1984)

Crime, Espionage & Suspense
Dead Man Running (1960)
Blue Octavo (1963) US title: Bound to Kill
Colonel Bogus (1964) US title: Packed for Murder
The Winds of Midnight (1964) US title: Murder at Midnight
Dead Man's Handle (1978)