EARTHBLOOD 3 AURORA QUEST BY JAMES AXLER

Copyright 1994.

The survivors of the USSV Aquila continue north on their quest for the mysterious Aurora. Their General Zelig leads a government group that could rebuild the Earth after the devastation of the Earthblood blight. The various groups have their run ins with the dangers of this lawless world. They eventually link together and continue on. Only the Hunters of the Sun lead by the sadistic Margaret Trabor are still hot on their trail. She mounds an expedition after them as Zelig mounts one to intercept them. A traitor in the group exposes their location and it ends with a big battle in Oregon.

The final book in the trilogy comes to an end. After the Soviet Union collapses there was a scramble to come up with new ways the world could end. Lawrence James crafted a unique and enjoyable scenario. As I said before the books aren’t dated at all and you can still believe this world of 2040 thirty years later. It had a diverse range of characters that were believable. A great villain that gets her comeuppance at the end. Some people die and some live but it ends on a hopeful note.

EARTHBLOOD 2 DEEP TREK BY JAMES AXLER

Copyright 1994.

Some of the surviving crew members of the USSV Aquila have made it to Calico on November 15. A Chinook helicopter arrives and tells the group they are going to go to the secret base Aurora. Before they can land though the helicopter is shot down by men with a symbol of a silver arrow through the sun. The helicopter only told them that the base was located north. Speculating the base is located somewhere in the Pacific Northwest the group splits up into three and heads off to search for it. Along the way they find out the mysterious group that shot down the helicopter are called The Hunters of the Sun. A secret cabal of powerful individuals that formed the group to take over the world. Lead by Margaret Tabor a psychopath that enjoys killing they hunt the members of the Aquila. Henderson McGill a member who found his extended family safe in Connecticut has have to fight off the various raiders. They decide to also head out to California. Soon all groups have various adventures with the various inhabitants and Hunters of the Sun.

The second book establishes what the survivors goals are in this new world. Namely their old general is in charge of a secret government project to rebuild the world. They also have the main opposition. The Hunters of the Sun lead by a completely evil villain. A woman who in collage killed some of the men who made fun of her middle name Dildow. This is what brought her to the attention of the head man. She eventually became his lover than killed him with poison to take over the organization. Some other main characters that stand out are Nanci Simms the sixty year old CIA agent that joined up with the crew. Jim Hilton the commander with his surviving twin daughter. Henderson McGill who finds his family and takes them on the journey. It has a diverse cast of characters that seem believable with their own strengths and weaknesses. Also can’t believe how this book still doesn’t feel dated after all these years. Could have been written yesterday.

EARTHBLOOD BY JAMES AXLER

Copyright 1993.

The year is 2040 and the USSV Aquila is returning from a two year mission in deep space. The crew of twelve is in suspended animation. As they approach Earth the computer revives them. Only their is no response from the Earth. One of the crew has died in suspended animation and they wonder why mission control didn’t do anything. The Earth also has a red color to it. So they are forced to land by themselves at the base in Nevada.

The ship crashes and kills half the crew. The survivors find the base in ruins. Soon they discover that while out in space a plant cancer used as a weapon in the Middle East has devastated all plant life on Earth. Known as Earthblood it kills all plant life and turns it a reddish color. With the collapse of the food chain civilization has totally collapsed. They find a cryptic message from their commander General John Kennedy Zelig that they should rendezvous at the small California town of Calico on November 15. The crew decides to split up into groups and find out what happened to their families. So the crew have various adventures in this post-apocalyptic world. They find some of their family. Some die. The survivors gather at the town of Calico to await what happens next.

This was a trilogy by Lawrence James who wrote in many genres. He is best well known for the Deathlands series that he developed and wrote the first thirty some books. Using the same house name James Axler he crafts an enjoyable and believable new apocalyptic world. There is probably nothing more scary than starvation. He has a very scary world in this series. Also one that isn’t dated. Considering its still twenty years in the future it has no stuff that would date it as written in the nineties. Making it a story still believable and relevant after almost thirty years. The first book sets up this world and the characters are established. A good start to this trilogy.

CIVIL WAR II BY DON PENDLETON

Copyright 1971.

The year is 1999. America has reverted to a rural and predominantly agricultural nation. The racial situation is not very good. Blacks are mostly confined to the cities that are left called Towns. There have been two paths of advancement for black. The federal bureaucracy and the military. In fact the military is totally made up of blacks from the generals to the enlisted men. Michael Winston is the commissioner for Urban Affairs sort of the federal agency that takes care of the Towns. He stumbles on a military coup that the blacks plan. When he tries to warn his superiors including the President he gets ignored. The corrupt President has he own plans to use this coup to solidify his power.

Anyway the coup starts and the United Negro Army seizes power and occupies the country. Their demands are that America has to come up with a more equitable arrangement for its twenty million blacks. They appoint a provisional government headed by Michael Winston. Winston has some success at first with reversing the more authoritarian policies of the past regime. Yet old hatreds still flare out and threaten to derail any peace. Blacks in the south have decided to take out payback on past injustices and soon go on a rampage. Winston is forced to detonate nuclear explosions over the south to stop the fighting. Soon their is a reconciliation of the races and America emerges as a positive force in the world.

Don Pendleton is best know for the Executioner series. Probably the most successful men’s adventure series ever. He is probably the grandfather of that genre. He also did some stand alone novels. This one is a very odd little take on the future. It has a future 1999 filled with flying cars. Commuter planes with their own private rooms equipped with showers and the optional sex with the stewardess. There are also Federal subsidized sex clubs. (Does something like that really need a subsidy to stay in business?) There are pay churches with tradition, non-denominational and new age services. It is definitely dated and feels weird with all the goofy stuff that was envisioned for the future from a seventies perspective.

Still this book is a fascinating read. The future it envisioned didn’t quite turn out. It did though have a very upbeat ending with the races reconciling. A good book to read if you want to see how they envisioned the future back than.

C.A.D.S. #12 TECH ASSASSINS BY JOHN SIEVERT

Copyright 1991.

The C.A.D.S. under Colonel Dean Sturgis have successfully rescued President Williamson from The Lenin. What they didn’t know is he has already been brainwashed while a prisoner. Programmed to find the nuclear reactor at Hardbase Alpha and then wait for the miniature nuclear bomb implanted in him to go off. So Sturgis and his men must fight other guards at the base who were ordered by the President to stop them. After a whole bunch of fights that take up the first third of the book they manage to stop the President. They get the bomb taken out of him and have him deprogrammed. This incident has given the President the idea that a new Continental Congress should be convened to declare a second Declaration of Independence.

Needless to say evil Supreme Marshal Veloshnikov goes nuts over this idea. Aboard his new super sub The Leonid Breshnev he begins an all out attack on the free communities scattered across a devastated post-nuke America. Such units as Supreme Soviet Death Division, Black Raskolnikov Brigade and my favorite- Sergeivitch Ivanovsky Bolkenskvo Spetnaz Brigade for the Utter Destruction of American Freedom and National Sovereignty. Yow what a mouthful. So the C.A.D.S. have to come to the rescue. They meet the Soviets in a big endless battle that takes up the second half of the book. After endless fighting the C.A.D.S. come out victorious. At the end the congress meets and broadcasts via a giant holographic image up in the sky. Veloshnikov sits in front of the TV glowering and thinking up his next brilliant plan to destroy America.

We never do find out his brilliant plan for this was the last in the series. It’s a bit ironic that the books ends with him saying “Death to America. Long live the Soviet Union.” This book came out December of 1991 the year that the Soviet Union was officially dissolved. So that event pretty much sounded the death knell for books like this. In this case it was probably a mercy that the series was finally put out of it’s misery. Although it may have been heading there anyway. I gave up on this series with the last book. Only recently did I find this book at Half Price to complete my collection. I didn’t miss anything all those years.

This was a really bad book. I mean it is filled with a constant stream of such cringe worthy dialogue as “Attack these putrid Yankee scum suckers, brave comrades,” or “Your doltish American taunts fall on deaf ears, craven imperialist lackeys.” Now this series started out pretty good. A solid if absurd little post-nuke action adventure. Now like most of these series they tend to go off in some very weird tangents. Which it was doing under it’s original creator Ryder Syvertson. It took the replacement with David Alexander to bring the series to a whole new level of crap. Still his crappy writing was good for a few laughs. Although it was probably good that the series ended before my brain turned to complete mush from reading too much of this.

C.A.D.S. #11 DEATH ZONE ATTACK BY JOHN SIEVERT

Copyright 1991.

The C.A.D.S. under Colonel Dean Sturgis are on the offensive. They attack Fortress Kerensky which lies on the ruins of St. Louis. After defeating the invaders by creating an artificial tornado they take the fortress intact. Seems the Soviets are not doing well. So Marshal Veloshnikov the evil leader decides to hold a bogus peace conference. President Williamson goes to meet the puppet Soviet premier at Colonial Williamsburg. Williamsburg has been converted to the first Communist theme park called Stalinland. Sounds like something the Antifa crowd would enjoy. Anyway it turns out to be a set up. The puppet premier had a small nuclear bomb implanted in him. The President escapes but is captured and taken to the giant saucer sub Lenin. Also the Soviets launch a two prong attack from Siberia into Alaska and Mexico into the Southwest. C.A.D.S. manage to stop both. Then they go to the Lenin and rescue the President.

OK so this book was just nuts. It had the typical endless scenes of fighting with high tech helicopters, jet fighters and hovertanks with lasers and missiles against the super C.A.D.S. Also a special appearance by the Greysuits who are clearly inferior. There is very little wasted on plot and character development. The President’s capture is casually devoted one whole sentence. Don’t want to get too wordy about stuff not involving high tech fights. He does have a moment where Veloshnikov stops on an island in Nova Scotia with the President to have a talk. Its whole purpose seemed to show how truly evil Veloshnikov is. He takes the time to bash a baby seal to death with a rock. Then takes an assault rifle and slaughters all the others just for fun. Yes this guy kills baby seals for the fun of it. How evil can you get? Also the giant sub Lenin has all of a sudden lost it’s traditional sub shape and become a giant saucer. The C.A.D.S. easily manage to destroy it and free the President. Of course evil Veloshnikov escapes in his mach 20 escape craft and plots how to destroy the evil Amerikanski.

Now surprisingly the editor must have woken up for the glaring grammatical errors weren’t present in this book like the past two. In fact this had some of the most glorious passages to date. For instance the description of the deaths from the artificial tornado.

First their eyeballs squirted from the sockets of their skulls. Then their teeth flew out of their gaping mouths. Finally all the blood in their veins emptied out through their noses, eyes, dicks and assholes.

Wow what a visual. There’s more.

Clapping his hands on full servo power, Sturgis send a miniature sonic boom thundering in their direction. The supersonic clap shattered the Russians’ eardrums and made blood squeezed from their rupturing brains spurt from their nostrils with such fantastic pressure that it blew their noses clean off their faces in a shower of sticky red glop.

But wait. There’s still more.

A second supersonic clap and the eyeballs of the hapless Russians squirted from their socket, hanging uselessly down their faces on twisted white nerve threads. A third and final thunderclap from Sturgis and their hearts exploded in their chests, causing their bodies to explode.

Well nothing like being thorough. The book had writing like this throughout. It was glorious to read such incredible descriptive writing. Oh and one final little quote I enjoyed. A Greysuit has one final curse before he buys it.

The colonel muttered a Ukrainian peasants oath that damned the American to a thousand lifetimes in hell picking dirt from between the devil’s toes and sucking the eternally shitting assholes of the damned.

Now there is a curse that is creative. Go ahead and use it instead the more pedestrian “Go to Hell” or “Fuck you”.