Nick Carter: Web of Spies: Award Books, 1966. I
picked up this early incarnation of the long-running Nick Carter series years
ago but only now got around to reading it. This is volume 11 in a series that
broke 260 volumes. The standard cover is below but my cover is different. It's purple for one thing.
The
header gives this away as essentially a James Bond knock-off. It’s “A
Killmaster Spy Chiller.” The character is definitely a James Bond type, a
lady-magnet with incredible skills but dapper good looks—when he wants to show
them. In this particularly tale, Carter is supposed to save an English woman
scientist who has knowledge crucial to all sides in the Cold War. The woman is
a lesbian and the Russians have sent in a beautiful female spy to seduce her and
bring her over to their side. There’s a lot of action and a considerable amount
of sex, which is quite tame by modern standards but was probably pretty risqué for
the times. The sex definitely puts this into the “Men’s Adventure” category.
This
series didn’t list the authors but simply used “Nick Carter” as the house name.
A little research revealed that this particular volume was written by ManningLee Stokes. Stokes was an accomplished pulp writer who wrote for many series,
including the Jeffrey Lord series, of which I’m a fan. I’ve got half a dozen of
his books in that series and have generally enjoyed them. Stokes wrote a number
of other Nick Carter books as well.
Although
competently written, this story didn’t do a lot for me and I don’t see myself
grabbing another dozen of these for future rainy days. It’s just not my genre
of reading choice. If you like this sort of book, though, then I’m sure you’d
like this particular one quite well.
