When ten billion filthy drug dollars' worth of heroin pollutes the Jersey shore and threatens to make the Mafia a second Evil Empire, the president knows there's just one man who can stop a Jersey Kingpin from destroying the country and that's an ex-Jersey cop resurrected and nicknamed the Destroyer. Remo Williams is on a mission to mainline death and destruction into the Cosa Nostra before Main Street gets stuck. But how will Master Chiun's masterpiece of a human killing machine score? Will history's biggest drug score go bust? With Remo on the mission you know he'll sniff out the swine and cover his tracks but when he gets to the top will he find he's gone too high and realize that the Mafia fix is in?
Warren Murphy was an American author, most famous as the co-creator of The Destroyer series, the basis for the film Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. He worked as a reporter and editor and after service during the Korean War, he drifted into politics.
Murphy also wrote the screenplay for Lethal Weapon 2. He is the author of the Trace and Digger series. With Molly Cochran, he completed two books of a planned trilogy revolving around the character The Grandmaster, The Grandmaster (1984) and High Priest (1989). Murphy also shares writing credits with Cochran on The Forever King and several novels under the name Dev Stryker. The first Grandmaster book earned Murphy and Cochran a 1985 Edgar Award for Best Paperback Original, and Murphy's Pigs Get Fat took the same honor the following year.
His solo novels include Jericho Day, The Red Moon, The Ceiling of Hell, The Sure Thing and Honor Among Thieves. Over his career, Murphy sold over 60 million books.
He started his own publishing house, Ballybunion, to have a vehicle to start The Destroyer spin-off books. Ballybunion has reprinted The Assassin's Handbook, as well as the original works Assassin's Handbook 2, The Movie That Never Was (a screenplay he and Richard Sapir wrote for a Destroyer movie that was never optioned), The Way of the Assassin (the wisdom of Chiun), and New Blood, a collection of short stories written by fans of the series.
He served on the board of the Mystery Writers of America, and was a member of the Private Eye Writers of America, the International Association of Crime Writers, the American Crime Writers League and the Screenwriters Guild.
Χρονολογικά είναι το τέταρτο βιβλίο της σειράς, αλλά όταν το βρήκα σε παλαιοβιβλιοπωλείο πριν αρκετούς μήνες, είχα ήδη προχωρήσει στα επόμενα. Πάντως δεν έπαθα και μεγάλο κακό που το διάβασα εκτός κανονικής σειράς.
Η ιστορία είναι αρκετά απλή και έχει ως εξής: Ο Ρέμο Ουίλιαμς ή αλλιώς Εξολοθρευτής, καλείται να βρει ένα πραγματικά τεράστιο φορτίο καθαρής ηρωίνης, που ανήκει στην Μαφία και το οποίο είναι έτοιμο να διαμοιραστεί σε πολλές πόλεις των Ηνωμένων Πολιτειών, με αποτέλεσμα τον εθισμό χιλιάδων νέων και τον θάνατο εκατοντάδων από αυτούς. Ο Πρόεδρος της χώρας επικοινώνησε με τον υπεύθυνο της μυστικής οργάνωσης CURE, στην οποία ανήκει ο Ρέμο, και έτσι δόθηκε εντολή να βρεθεί το φορτίο και να σκοτωθούν οι βασικοί υπεύθυνοι. Ο Κορεάτης δάσκαλος του Σιναντζού θα βοηθήσει, έστω και λίγο, τον μαθητή του.
Δεν χρειάζεται να μπω σε τεχνικές λεπτομέρειες για την πλοκή, είναι αυτή που είναι, δεν απαιτεί ιδιαίτερη σκέψη από τον αναγνώστη και έχει σκοπό απλά να τον ψυχαγωγήσει με την δράση της. Η γραφή κατά την γνώμη μου είναι καλή, με το γνωστό ειρωνικό χιούμορ, που σε σημεία σατιρίζει θεσμούς και συνήθειες, ενώ καταφέρνει να περάσει στον αναγνώστη την ατμόσφαιρα της δεκαετίας του '70.
Σίγουρα δεν είναι το καλύτερο της σειράς, αλλά επειδή πέρασαν αρκετοί μήνες από την τελευταία φορά που διάβασα ιστορία με ήρωα τον Εξολοθρευτή και επειδή η γραφή μου έφτιαξε το κέφι, θα πάρει τέσσερα αστεράκια στο Goodreads, αδικώντας ίσως λίγο κάποια άλλα στα οποία έβαλα τρία. Αλλά πάνω-κάτω όλα είναι το ίδιο διασκεδαστικά.
Remo is sent to find out about an incredibly large shipment of heroin. The Mafia is planning on new forms of the drug to sell at very low cost.
This book is more serious than most. There is some humor but very little. A lot of killing goes on by Remo and Chiun.
Favorite tidbits: Makes fun of crime fighters from other countries who come to help. The English one is James Bond. The other two I'm not sure, a Hercule from France, and a Japanese man with thick glasses.
“Mafia Fix” is the fourth book in the Destroyer series (instead of me rehashing the series, just follow the link for an explanation of it). If you’ve seen the movie “Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins,” then you know the character (even though the movie, while fun doesn’t do justice to the character).
In this installment, the Mafia has brought in a huge shipment of heroin (four truckloads) via ship, which could bring in billions of dollars. While the government knows that the stuff came in, they are unable to intercept it, and now they don’t know where it is being kept, and if that amount of heroin were to hit the streets, the results would be catastrophic. So the President calls on CURE, the super-secret agency that nobody but he knows about, to get the situation resolved. What follows is typical Destroyer: Remo goes in, figures out what’s going on and takes care of things—however they need to be taken care of (usually with much violence).
The series is a men’s adventure series, and it is a lot of fun if you like dumb action movies. The novels are short, all plot and the villains are cardboard cutouts. You go in knowing what to expect, turn your brain off and have some fun. And the interplay between Remo and his Korean mentor Chiun is priceless.
Need a break? Pull out the eReader (unless you can find an old paperback), curl up on the couch, and enjoy.
This is a solid early entry in The Destroyer series. It's inspiring to see how quickly the authors, Murphy and Sapir, took the first Destroyer book and molded the series into a shape that held it together for 150+ books. Here, in the fourth book, the formula is almost complete.
Briefly the plot is about a Mafia don who figures out a way to smuggle in to the U.S. and distribute the largest shipment of heroin ever. Remo is tasked by Smith to track down the heroin and destroy it.
There's not as much humor in this one as in #3, which was a bit of a letdown. This time, Remo takes on the mob's attempt to create a nation-wide heroin ring. As usual, there's a lot of action, some satire, and a LOT of non-politically correct adventures.
Murphy and Sapir keep this one moving, and it's another entertaining popcorn read, as long as you're willing to check your brain at the door and just go with it.
It's clear that the writers still haven't quite found the sweet spot that eventually makes The Destroyer the great series it is. Also, this book is definitely a product of its time. If political correctness is important to you, this is not the book for you. That being said, if political correctness is all that important to you, this is probably not the series for you anyway.
I really like the Destroyer series. It's a lot of fun. One thing that I regret about this novel was the use of racial stereotypes as humor. I didn't like that very much. This book is my least favorite Destroyer novel. It is still fun to read.
In Mafia Fix, President Nixon (confirmed with a random football reference) tasks Harold Smith of the secret agency Cure to track down a historic fifty-ton drug shipment, after a botched sting operation failed to intercept the four trucks transporting the $50,000,000 in 98 percent pure heroin. All that is known is that the heroin is still somewhere in Hudson, New Jersey, and Remo's strategy for discovering the secret location is doing what he does best; annoy everyone until the bad guys try to kill him.
Four books into the Destroyer series, and we can see the framework for the series' narrative structure coming into shape. In the first chapter, we are introduced to the villain's backstory, usually involving the cruel death of several innocents. In the second chapter, we are introduced to Remo ("His name was Remo...") either in training, completing a mission, or in this case, both.
Nixon is still president, and the author still treats him with kid gloves, portraying him as a sincerely concerned and somewhat competent, a far cry from the openly derisive lampooning he would treat Jimmy Carter in later novels. Revisiting these novels nearly forty years later, I don't recall how warren Murphy handles Nixon's disgraced resignation - if he does at all - but I'm looking forward to finding out.
The plot is straightforward, with the typical "Secret Crime Boss" hook with a somewhat unsurprising reveal in the third act. Murphy plays the criminal and political in-fighting for comic effect quite well, and keeps the colorful supporting characters flowing. Special attention should be paid by the last-minute cameo of three other men's adventure novel series characters, a nod to the fact that The Destroyer is now a part of the genre, and literally more effective than the three of them put together.
HIS NAME WAS REMO: "His name was Remo. He tried very hard not to be bored, as if the threat were very real." Almost there.
THE BAD GUY: MAFIA! That's right, the Italian Mob, the gold standard for organized crime, is behind the massive heroin shipment that Remo is tasked with exposing. Crime Boss Dominic Verillio is the crime boss in question this go-round, with other mafioso types such as Pietro Scubisci, Francisco Salvatore, and Filemeno Palmucci, along with colorful middlemen like the perpetually ill Willie the Plumber, and the doily-knitting behemoth of a hitman Gaetano Gasso. Organized crime is an easy target for this kind of secret agent crime fighter series, but Murphy keeps the plot moving and the humorous asides frequent enough to prevent the book from descending into a lame Godfather rip-off.
REMO & CURE: Harold smith meets with Remo in the field again, and while the animosity between the two is still strong, but this book's focus on heroin distribution provides them both with something in common: an unflinching desire to protect the innocent. Remo is still a cop at heart with a strong sense of good and evil, and the reader is secretly informed that Harold Smith has a daughter who is currently undergoing rehab on a farm in Vermont. For both men, this mission is intensely personal.
REMO & CHIUN: Chiun's appearance in mafia Fix is kept down to a minimum, with him only showing up in the second chapter for some training exposition, and then a few times later as comic relief involving his beloved soap operas and Remo's attempts at babysitting and cleaning up after the elderly Sinanju master. Remo's supposed reincarnation as Shiva the Destroyer comes up several times, but only in passing, as if the author just wants to remind the readers that it is still a relevant subplot.
REMO’S LADIES: Remo is still a one-gal-guy in Mafia Fix, and still the hopeless romantic at heart despite his rapey approach to seduction, which in at least two scenes involves him tackling the woman from across the room. The woman in this case is the intelligent and voluptuous Cynthia Hansen, daughter of and and assistant to Hudson, New Jersey Mayor Craig Hansen. As usual, Remo's hormones and emotions cause more trouble than good for him, as his newfound love interest becomes more involved with his mission than intended. They also have sex. A lot.
BODY COUNT: The body count is a tad lower than in the previous novel with only nine kills, six by Remo and three by Chiun. When, oh when, will the bad guys learn not to interrupt Chiun's soap operas?
Murphy and Sapir continue to catch their stride in this fourth book in the series, bringing it closer to the feel of the series as a whole. Remo and Chiun banter (or is that bicker?) humorously, and Remo’s fighting skills are building into the superhuman Sinanju abilities that help to make these books so distinctive. Yet the best thing about this book is the first of many times that the bad guys make the mistake of interrupting Chiun’s beloved soap operas. Chiun, the Master of Sinanju, is in his eighties and believes the soap opera to be the greatest expression of American art. Nothing can be permitted to interrupt them. Therefore, it is always with humor that the reader watches some poor fool intending to do Chiun harm make the mistake of coming between him and his beloved programs.
The plot is rather straightforward with very little genuine mystery. The mafia has managed to import four tanker truck loads of pure heroine into the country—a six-year supply at current U.S. usage rates—and Remo and Chiun must find the drugs before they are dispersed across the country. Not being much of a detective, Remo takes a very direct approach designed to make the criminals come to him. There’s no heavy thought in this book, but it’s still a lot of fun.
Just as Murphy and Sapir discover the secret to the Destroyer series in the third book, they crash and burn in the fourth. Yes, Chiun is around this time, but not nearly enough. What’s worse, the authors likely bowed to pressure from their publisher who had to remind them that men’s action adventure pulp novels needed to contain a fair amount of sex. Murphy & Sapir, as was their wont, took that to the extreme. It’s not that they went pornographic, just the amount and the, umn, athleticism of it all.
The plot centers around a huge heroin shipment into the US by the mafia in order to crash the drug market and drive out all those little dealers who kept popping up, basically to then corner the market. Some of the elements are surprising, such as putting the four container trucks into cold storage. But mostly it’s just Remo killing his way through the usual suspects until he finds the mastermind behind it all, and if you understand the way this series works, it’s pretty obvious who that person is.
Given that they wrote these books in a month or two, at least in the few years, a few clunkers should be expected. Definitely skippable, except for the insane like me.
Finally in book four Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir came to the logical conclusion that Chiun needed to be an integral part of the series. So here, for the first time, he is allowed to accompany Remo without any real explanation. We are also treated to a fun scene in which Chiun dispatches three men by himself while trying to watch one of his beloved soap operas.
This time out Remo does battle with the Mafia. This leads to a lot of fun, and Murphy and Sapir's mob world is an entertaining one in which characters have names like Willie the Plumber and Tony the Rock Palumbo, and where there is a crotchet-loving hitman named Gasso whose entire body is covered in hair like an Italian Captain Caveman.
There is also a brief but fun side-plot in which a former CIA operative attempts to blackmail Remo and CURE. This attempt goes pretty much how you would expect it to...
Fun book. Easily the most entertaining of the books up to this point (book four) in the series.
First of the series ive read in a long while and they were ones in the late 80s that I did read not the early numbers from the early 70s. So couldnt remember how crazy they are, more like slap stick Bond parodies with Dick Tracy like villains. Also an 80 year old Korean teacher who can take care of himself quite well even if he is addicted to soap operas.
If you take them as parodies then this one was fun enough, definitely wasnt boring just a lot on the ridiculous side. Recommended if you can turn your brain off while reading and find the humor in it.
I love the interaction between Chiun and Remo. A light read when life seems to be pressing you down. I kick up my feet and read these easily, enjoying the banter between the main characters and the way the 'bad guys' are dealt with. No chance of coming back! If only real life could be somewhat like this.
The story of Remo and Chiun keeps getting better and better. I’m on to the next one. These are quick reads but so entertaining. Highly recommend this series to anyone that likes action adventure novels.
Excellent book. I read the series many years ago and find it just as enjoyable now as I did them. If you are looking for a good escape from reality this is the series to read.
My Rating Scale: 1 Star - Horrible book, It was so bad I stopped reading it. I have not read the whole book and wont 2 Star - Bad book, I forced myself to finish it and do NOT recommend. I can't believe I read it once 3 Star - Average book, Was entertaining but nothing special. No plans to ever re-read 4 Star - Good Book, Was a really good book and I would recommend. I am Likely to re-read this book 5 Star - GREAT book, A great story and well written. I can't wait for the next book. I Will Re-Read this one or more times.
Times Read: 1
One of the first series I read consistently. This series and the Executioner series are responsible for my love of reading and stories.
Characters - Looking back to my younger reading days, I loved Remo Williams and thought he was one of the coolest characters in history. I still think Remo is a good character. Unique in a number of ways even today.
Story - The stories are average and fairly typical. Bad guys going to kill or hurt, Remo is going to kill them first (no way he is going to die not with Chuin as his teacher). Not much in creativity but it really worked for me as a male teenager. I started learning Judo and Karate partly because of Remo.
Overall - I started reading these when I was 16. I enjoyed them up until about age 19. My tastes changed from Military intrigue to Fantasy / SciFi. I would recommend reading these especially for younger males.
NOTE: I am going to rate these all the books in this series the same. Some of the stories are a bit better or a bit worse but I can't find one that I would rate a 2 or 4.
Although we must forgive the authors some lack of knowledge, forty years ago, of Asian culture, what they have produced is nothing short of brilliance.
None of today's sympathy for Communists and criminals; the authors' understanding of society's ills and the philosophy of violence makes their writing eternally relevant.
Moreover, their ethical proxy (Remo Williams) is no mere brute, but a highly-intelligent and dutiful force of nature.
Not a complicated read, but a rewarding one for the thoughtful reader.
One of the big men's adventure series from the 70's than ran an impressive 145 books. An interesting main character and the sarcastic mentor makes this a funny action/adventure read. This book is where the series begins to take the form it will follow for the rest of the series. The heroes must stop a huge Heroin shipment before it reaches the hands of the Mafia in America. Recommended
Хорошая книга, все эти мафиозные дела 80-х годов, поцелуи рук, доны, все замешаны и мэр и его дочь . Как всегда очень затягивает. Такая криминальная романтика - ретро.