FFB: The Coordinator - Andrew York (a holiday rerun)

We were Christmas shopping last weekend and I saw this new holiday item being shoved onto the consumers. It's a special copper mug intended to serve a Moscow Mule. Amazing how some alcoholic beverages becomes trendy and manufacturers create ways for you to think you absolutely must join the latest bar trend by buying an item that you absolutely must use in order to drink it. Bah humbug! Anytime I see the words "Moscow Mule" I immediately think of fictional superspy Jonas Wilde and his penchant for odd cocktails. So here's a rerun from years ago (Oct 8, 2011) on one of my favorite spy novel series. Though this title has not been reissued, three other books in the series have been reprinted by Top Notch Thrillers, an imprint edited and coordinated by crime writer and all around good guy Mike Ripley. The Top Notch Thrillers are available through all the usual bookselling sites as well as direct order from Ostrara Publishing.

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The second in this series featuring Jonas Wilde, an assassin in the employ of a secret British espionage unit, is just as good as the first. The book peripherally comments on the action of the first book (see my review here) but does so without spoiling the first book making it fine to read out of sequence. Wilde is assigned to eliminate Gunner Moel, a Danish swimwear designer, who in the Hitler years was an operative for the Allied powers and is now playing a pivotal role in communist espionage. As with The Eliminator this book is divided into two sections: Part one is called “The Bait” and the other is “The Trap.” Based on those structural clues it should be obvious that Wilde’s assignment will turn out to be more than he expected it to be.

Prior to his visit to Copenhagen we know that Kaiseret, one of the villains from The Eliminator, attempted to have Wilde assassinated. It failed when Jonas caught the hit man on board his boat, fought with him and delivered the usual fatal karate blow. When Wilde reports to Mocka, his superior in the covert unit, he informs his boss of the blundered assassination. Mocka claims to know nothing of that plot.

Once again York has created in Mrs. Inger Morgan-Browne one of his strong woman character portraits. She is every inch a match for Wilde in determination, job focus, and ruthless survival. Steely and cold as ice Inger doesn't even have a sense of humor something Wilde thinks is essential to staying saner in the spy world. She turns out to be the Irene Adler of the piece succeeding masterfully where all others have previously failed in overcoming the seemingly invincible Jonas Wilde. She is assigned as his partner in an elaborate escape plan once he kills Moel. But when the original assignment backfires and Wilde needs to escape sooner than planned he makes his way to the hotel and discovers that Inger’s husband has been murdered and Stefan, the chauffeur/thug in Moel’s employ who shot him, is waiting for Mrs. Morgan-Browne. Wilde surprises Stefan in the Morgan-Browne's hotel room, he fights and subdues him tying him up and waits for Inger. When she shows up she wastes no time in putting a bullet in Stefan's brain. A new plan must be improvised and Inger rises to the occasion defying Wilde’s preconceptions and taking matters into her own hands with a handy hypodermic syringe loaded with a potent narcotic cocktail. She captures Wilde, keeps him drugged, and returns to Copenhagen to bargain with the group that Wilde thought was the enemy but who she assures him are the good guys.

The second half of the book displays York's usual spy/adventure novel wizardry. Double and triple crosses, numerous fight scenes with the two women characters proving themselves to be as tough as the men, a ghoulish torture sequence involving rats, and even a cameo from a mad scientist all serve to make this fast paced and very smart book a thrilling read.

Something different about this book is the addition of Bond-like gadgetry and fiendish deathtraps. Gunnar Moel was blinded in a flying accident and he manages to navigate his way through this house via "sonic torch principle." He wears a pair of glasses outfitted with a sound transmitter that sends out a beam which reflects off of solid objects and the signal is picked up by a transmitter behind his left ear. As the beam reflects a different tone for different materials. Much of the furniture in his house is made of glass or chrome to distinguish from the plaster and wood of the walls and doorways and help him find himself around. It also makes for a scenically bizarre home.

Later, in an over-the-top pulpy climax, Wilde and Inger become human guinea pigs in an early form of cryogenic experimentation. They race against time trying to escape from an apparently foolproof glass chamber as the temperature gradually decreases from 20 degrees Celsius to -70 degrees. It's a deathtrap designed by a mad scientist who might have escaped from the pages of Doc Savage story and worthy of a James Bond movie or even the campy Batman TV series though it might be difficult to film (even these days) since both of them are completely naked at the time.

A refreshing Bijou - newly trendy in bars.

An added bonus to reading these stories is learning the names and ingredients of esoteric cocktails. Can a cocktail be  really be described as esoteric? Just ask for a Moscow Mule, a Bijou or a Frisco from your local bartender and I'm sure you'll get puzzled looks and a sarcastic comeback. Either that or an honest "What's in that?" While Jonas tends to favor Bacardi laced drinks he is known to sling back a few gin concoctions as well. A Bijou, for instance, is equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, green chartreuse, orange bitters and a twist of lemon. Some enterprising marketing person should've come up with the Jonas Wilde Cocktail Handbook to help promote the series. If these books were published today you can be sure there would be something along those lines sitting right next the scantily clad women on the covers of "The Eliminator" series.

A Collaborative Act

Nick Jones, who writes the Existential Ennui  blog and is one mad book collector I'd like go shopping with if I ever get to the U.K. again, asked me to participate in an interview with Christopher Nicole, author of numerous historical novels and as "Andrew York" is the writer of the Jonas Wilde spy novels. I came up with some rambling, harebrained questions about his spy fiction that go on and on in my avidly curious and probing fashion while Nick came up with some more pertinent and streamlined questions that address Nicole's entire career as a writer. Nicole's answers are surprisingly terse and in some cases disappointingly prosaic. But the entire interview makes for great reading. It's always fascinating to get inside the head of a writer, I think.

Please visit Nick's blog here to read the interview. You'll learn more about Christopher Nicole's work outside of the spy novels (a very small portion of his prolific output), discover his personal favorites among his books, and many other interesting tidbits including why Jonas Wilde stopped drinking Bacardi.

The Predator - Andrew York

1st US paperback (Berkley, Oct 1969)

Here's the book in which Jonas Wilde is forced to use a gun instead of his hands to deal with his enemies. It's a survival tactic and he must resort to firing a Derringer (of all things) to take out one of three pursuers in the final pages of The Predator (1968). This is only the third book and Wilde came close to being eliminated himself three times in the course of another plot that delivers action and thrills and the usual Yorkian surprise twists.

But I'm starting with the end first, aren't I? Sorry.

At the start we learn that Wilde has been officially retired from the Elimination Sector formerly known as "The Route." (see my review of The Eliminator) Yet only one day later he is picked up by trench coat wearing men who refuse to identify themselves and take n to the Five Star Photography Studio. This was formerly the front for the offices of Mocka, his much younger commander. Now it is the scene of three violent murders. One of the victims is Julia Ridout who gave Wilde his walking papers the previous night then proceeded to give him a farewell in her bedroom. Wilde was just getting over the murder of the first woman he fell for and now he's faced with a another murdered lover. The rage within him can hardly be contained.

Mocka provides Wilde with the background. It all seems to be tied to the disappearance of a CIA agent, Charlie Klaeger. Klaeger was following up leads related to the arranged prison escape and subsequent murder of Alfonso Torrio, an Italian mobster with ties to the American underworld. Klaeger, Mocka reports, must have been tortured and given the location of the photography studio and some hoods from Torrio's syndicate then infiltrated the studio trying to find out what Klaeger was after.  They finished the job by killing everyone on site. Mocka hints that Wilde may be able to find the killers in Rome who have been placing personal ads in English language European newspapers hoping to lure in unsavory types for an underground academy specializing in mercenary skill.

1st UK paperback (Arrow, 1969)

With the help of some of his criminal contacts he obtains some phony ID and becomes "Johnny Foxley" – a London thug who is interested in becoming a killer for hire. He travels to Italy and answers the ad and discovers the he has enrolled in an assassination academy run by a woman with the spectacular name of Glorious Torrio, the daughter of Alfonso Torrio. Along the way he also meets a Antonia Del Rivia, a heroin addicted would-be painter with pansexual tastes, her brother Cesare he is second-in-command at the killer academy, and Paul Sanger, the primary teacher in the art of murder.

Something I have started to note in this series is that Wilde ages chronologically. In this book age and youth are always on his mind. He is bothered by the fact that at only 37 years he is already an "old man" in the spy game. Mocka, his boss, is ten years younger than he is. The students at the assassin academy also are all considerably younger than Wilde. And then there's his troublesome sciatica and muscle problems; they are his greatest weakness at a time when he must be in peak physical condition. His bad back is his undoing on more than one occasion in The Predator and it makes him seem less of a comic book superhero or a mindless athletic killing machine. A spy with chronic back problems is real. I'll take that over the old gunshot to the shoulder cliche which seems to be the only thing that tends to slow down the rest of the fictional spies I've encountered.

York's strength once again is in the creation of hypnotically fascinating woman characters like Glorious (or Glo to her friends). The women are always the most complex and intriguing characters in the Jonas Wilde books, but in Glorious Torrio York seems to have outdone himself. Smart and deadly, she is an Amazonian athlete with a heart of steel, a teasing sexual allure, and a bloodlust to match her carnal appetite. She is the closest to being Wilde's female match as a ruthless emotionally detached killer. It'll take some imagination to surpass this woman in viciousness and cunning. She nearly succeeds in sending Wilde to his great reward on more than one occasion.

Then there is Jonquil Malone, the redheaded American girl Wilde meets on the plane trip down to Rome. She has a habit of turning up unwanted in the most surprising places. She seems to be nothing more than an slightly ditsy tourist looking for a fling with a handsome Brit and she dislikes having been stood up by Wilde not once but twice. She comes off as a stalker and her curiosity gets the better of her. But is she more than just a tourist? Is it all coincidence? Is she just an incredible actress and really a spy?

Writer Christopher Nicole (AKA "Andrew York")

The Predator is a return to a straight thriller. None of the pulpy, quasi-science fiction elements found in The Coordinator are present. Jonas seems to have entered a vigilante stage and appears to be acting entirely on his own until the usual Yorkian twist in the final pages. The expository beginning is a bit to trudge through, but once Jonas lands in Italy the book is nothing but action scenes. And darn good action scenes with little of the requisite monologues that York's characters (mostly the villains) like to indulge in.

This would make a a fantastic movie. Better than Danger Route, the only film version of the Andrew York books. Any action movie producers or screenwriters out there? Here's a book screaming to be adapted into a money making screenplay. It would do phenomenally well at the box office.

UPDATE ON NEW EDITIONS OF ANDREW YORK BOOKS
From an email I received from Mike Ripley, editor at Top Notch Thrillers and overall good guy:
"…we are doing [The Predator] as a Top Notch Thriller in about two weeks time! I’ve enclosed our cover and in fact Pretty Sinister Books is quoted on page 2 in the before-the-title page. We are also doing The Deviator (which I think is better) and have plans to do The Infiltrator."

I've become part of the blurbing world! Very cool.

The entire line of Top Notch Thrillers – a variety of reissued action adventure, spy and crime novels – are available through amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, bookdepository.com (always free shipping!) and a few other online dealers.

To pre-order a copy of The Predator (release date is mid-March 2012) go directly to Ostara Publishing by clicking here. On that page you will see there is already a link to my review of the book. Thanks, Mike!

The Coordinator - Andrew York

The second in this series featuring Jonas Wilde, an assassin in the employ of a secret British espionage unit, is just as good as the first. The book peripherally comments on the action of the first book (see my review here) but does so without spoiling the first book making it fine to read out of sequence. Wilde is assigned to eliminate Gunner Moel, a Danish swimwear designer, who in the Hitler years was an operative for the Allied powers and is now playing a pivotal role in communist espionage. As with The Eliminator this book is divided into two sections: Part one is called “The Bait” and the other is “The Trap.” Based on those structural clues it should be obvious that Wilde’s assignment will turn out to be more than he expected it to be.

Prior to his visit to Copenhagen we know that Kaiseret, one of the villains from The Eliminator, attempted to have Wilde assassinated. It failed when Jonas caught the hit man on board his boat, fought with him and delivered the usual fatal karate blow. When Wilde reports to Mocka, his superior in the covert unit, he informs his boss of the blundered assassination. Mocka claims to know nothing of that plot.

Once again York has created in Mrs. Inger Morgan-Browne one of his strong woman character portraits. She is every inch a match for Wilde in determination, job focus, and ruthless survival. Steely and cold as ice Inger doesn't even have a sense of humor something Wilde thinks is essential to staying saner in the spy world. She turns out to be the Irene Adler of the piece succeeding masterfully where all others have previously failed in overcoming the seemingly invincible Jonas Wilde. She is assigned as his partner in an elaborate escape plan once he kills Moel. But when the original assignment backfires and Wilde needs to escape sooner than planned he makes his way to the hotel and discovers that Inger’s husband has been murdered and Stefan, the chauffeur/thug in Moel’s employ who shot him, is waiting for Mrs. Morgan-Browne. Wilde surprises Stefan in the Morgan-Browne's hotel room, he fights and subdues him tying him up and waits for Inger. When she shows up she wastes no time in putting a bullet in Stefan's brain. A new plan must be improvised and Inger rises to the occasion defying Wilde’s preconceptions and taking matters into her own hands with a handy hypodermic syringe loaded with a potent narcotic cocktail. She captures Wilde, keeps him drugged, and returns to Copenhagen to bargain with the group that Wilde thought was the enemy but who she assures him are the good guys.

The second half of the book displays York's usual spy/adventure novel wizardry. Double and triple crosses, numerous fight scenes with the two women characters proving themselves to be as tough as the men, a ghoulish torture sequence involving rats, and even a cameo from a mad scientist all serve to make this fast paced and very smart book a thrilling read.

Something different about this book is the addition of Bond-like gadgetry and fiendish deathtraps. Gunnar Moel was blinded in a flying accident and he manages to navigate his way through this house via "sonic torch principle." He wears a pair of glasses outfitted with a sound transmitter that sends out a beam which reflects off of solid objects and the signal is picked up by a transmitter behind his left ear. As the beam reflects a different tone for different materials. Much of the furniture in his house is made of glass or chrome to distinguish from the plaster and wood of the walls and doorways and help him find himself around. It also makes for a scenically bizarre home.

Later, in an over-the-top pulpy climax, Wilde and Inger become human guinea pigs in an early form of cryogenic experimentation. They race against time trying to escape from an apparently foolproof glass chamber as the temperature gradually decreases from 20 degrees Celsius to -70 degrees. It's a deathtrap designed by a mad scientist who might have escaped from the pages of Doc Savage story and worthy of a James Bond movie or even the campy Batman TV series though it might be difficult to film (even these days) since both of them are completely naked at the time.



A refreshing Bijou - newly trendy in bars.

 An added bonus to reading these stories is learning the names and ingredients of esoteric cocktails. Can a cocktail be  really be described as esoteric? Just ask for a Moscow Mule, a Bijou or a Frisco from your local bartender and I'm sure you'll get puzzled looks and a sarcastic comeback. Either that or an honest "What's in that?" While Jonas tends to favor Bacardi laced drinks he is known to sling back a few gin concoctions as well. A Bijou, for instance, is equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, green chartreuse, orange bitters and a twist of lemon. Some enterprising marketing person should've come up with the Jonas Wilde Cocktail Handbook to help promote the series. If these books were published today you can be sure there would be something along those lines sitting right next the scantily clad women on the covers of "The Eliminator" series.

FFB: The Eliminator - Andrew York

It's 1966. Spies were hot -- both in the bookstores and the movie theaters. Matt Helm was a sensation. He had already appeared in ten books and Dean Martin played him (in a very different guise) in two movies.  All 13 James Bond books had been published, were in multiple printings in paperback, four movies had been released, and the final book Octopussy & The Living Daylights was about to be released posthumously. Then mid-year in 1966 Jonas Wilde appeared on the scene. Who? Exactly.

Although a few insightful reviewers took notice Wilde and his creator Andrew York never really got the attention they were due. This is a series just as brutal and true to life as Donald Hamilton's books and filled with irresistible female characters like the Fleming books. Additionally, they are intelligent, literate, populated with fully realized complex characters and crammed with action-packed scenes that rival any contemporary thriller of the past ten years.  Luckily, for those who missed Wilde back in the late 60s and early 70s readers now have a new edition from the excellent Top Notch Thriller line (selected by hip Mike Ripley) available from Ostara Publishing.

Wilde is a hired assassin who works for a nebulous branch of British intelligence known only among its elite members as "the Route." He's not your typical brawny, sociopathic, professional killer. Sure Wilde is an expert in deadly martial arts and can deliver a lethal karate chop to his intended target. Sure he has an admirably athletic body that arouses the attention of the women he encounters on the job. But he has a few traits you don't normally associate with a macho hired killer. Like for instance his fondness for rum and brandy laced cocktails like the Frisco, Daiquiri and the Alexander. To sharpen his mind and teach himself patience he plays chess and spends a lot of time sailing. His cover is as co-owner of a charter boat company in the Channel Islands. They call him "the Nobody Man." He adopts so many new identities and appears and vanishes during his assignments with the ease of a prototypical Jason Bourne that no police authority has ever traced him to the several accidents he's arranged as part of his elimination assignments.

At one point in the novel a character talks about the claustrophobic, ultra secret world of the Route:

"You belong to the tiny core within the core, within the box within the trunk within the huge shuttered mansion. You are part of the network that makes it possible for Jonas Wilde to operate."

It's a highly structured organization with only four outside members involved. Wilde receives his orders from Antony Canning, Peter Ravenspur provides new identity documents and weapons, and Stern and Bulwer help him with travel on their yacht Regina A. "The Route" has been a smooth covert operation but now Wilde wants out. Like Junior in Charles Willeford's Miami Blues he has a hankering for a normal life and longs to settle down with his girlfriend Jocelyn and forget his past. The higher level people have learned of this before Wilde has submitted his formal resignation and are planning to send him on one final assignment from which they hope he will not return alive.

Wilde learns that he must eliminate a Czech biologist who has perfected a method of germ warfare. When he receives his instructions there's something all too strange about the assignment. They want him to travel to England to do the job and he's never eliminated anyone in the country before. He usually gets a few days to prepare but they want him to leave in 24 hours. And his target will be surrounded by bodyguards and an American agent. All of it is very out of the ordinary to Wilde, but he agrees to do the job then disappear on his own afterwards.

Nothing, however, goes as planned. No one can be trusted. No one is who they appear to be. It's classic spy stuff. And it's done exceptionally well here. Even the sex scenes are sexy as they should be and not sleazy as is the usual case in books of this type.

Surprisingly, in a book so hypermasculine and testosterone pumped it is the supporting female characters who are the most interesting and best realized. There is Rhoda Gooderich, a housekeeper at the estate where he must kill the Czech scientist, who Wilde must charm and seduce in order to get in and around the household. Wilde gives her several nights she will long remember (in more ways than one) even if she may lose her job for all the attention. Marita is a woman who claims to be Peter Ravenspur's niece, but who knows far too much about Wilde and his real work and calls him "Her Majesty's government's executioner." Most fascinating of all is Barbara Canning, his boss' wife, who at first appears to be nothing more than another example of the prim, neglected British spouse but who when forced into becoming Wilde's cohort takes to the spy life with an amazing hidden aptitude for the life of an adventuress. All three women are strong characters vital to the story who hold their own against a virile and wily man and are willing to risk everything to help him escape the clutches of some sadistic and ruthless villains.

York went on to write eight more thrillers with Jonas Wilde. I had never heard of any of these books prior to learning of the Top Notch Thriller reissue. The first book is such a superior example of the spy/assassin subgenre that I plan to read all the books. There are relatively affordable paperback editions of most of the Jonas Wilde books. I suggest you start with this one and decide for yourself. I guarantee you'll want to read at least another. He's every bit as good as Jason Bourne and in some respects Bourne owes everything he is to Jonas Wilde.

The Jonas Wilde Series
The Eliminator (1966)
The Coordinator (1967)
The Predator (1968)
The Deviator (1969)
The Dominator (1969)
The Infiltrator (1971)
The Expurgator (1972)
The Captivator (1974)
The Fascinator (1975)

And if you haven't already seen it, be sure to check out yesterday's post about the movie adaptation of this book that was called Danger Route starring Richard Johnson, Carol Lynley, Barbara Bouchet, Diana Dors, Sylvia Sims, Harry Andrews and Sam Wanamaker.  I've included two video clips:  the original movie trailer and the opening five minutes which includes the entire title sequence (and a drippy wannabe James Bond style theme song) as well as the first two scenes of the movie.

COOL FLICKS: Danger Route (1967)

Here's a sneak preview for my post on the neglected book I've chosen for Friday's Forgotten Books coming tomorrow. The book was adapted for the screen and made into an equally forgotten spy movie.

It was retitled Danger Route with Richard Johnson (the original choice for James Bond) starring as super spy and hired assassin Jonas Wilde, and Sam Wanamaker and Harry Andrews in other spy roles. The women are played by Sylvia Sims, Carole Lynley, Diana Dors and Barbara Bouchet (Johnson's former girlfriend). There is an excellent review here that goes into great detail about the film and also mentions that it can be viewed in streaming video format at Netflix. But when I went to watch the movie I found that Netflix had inexplicably removed the film. It had only been up for three or four months. Copyright issues? Who knows.

You can, however, watch the trailer for the movie below. (God bless the cinephiles who flood YouTube with these treasures!) The scenes depicted tell me that the adaptation is very faithful to the novel. I also posted the only other film clip available from the movie. It includes an edited montage of action scenes taken from a German version of the movie accompanied by the odd theme song by Lionel Bart (composer/lyricist of the musical Oliver!) and sung by Anita Harris. Bart tries his best to emulate John Barry's Bond sound and falls short of the mark. Trumpets blasts aren't enough. And those lyrics!

"To stay alive in this violent world a man has to have an edge. His is the edge of his hand!"



"A man has to travel on the danger route / A man has to toy with life and death..." Just a sampling of the not so memorable lyrics.