St. Louis Showdown (The Executioner #23) by Pendleton, Don(January 1, 1975) Mass Market Paperback

The Executioner #23

by Don Pendleton

The show-me state of Missouri sees war in the streets of St. Louis when the Executioner arrives to do battle with the local Mafia. And the New York mob has already sent reinforcements to aid the St. Louis boys in their campaign to grab control of the states political machinery. The odds for survival tip dangerously . . . for justice and Bolan. Then more hit-men and assassins from the country are dispatched to trap Bolan in St. Louis. The Mafia moves in for the final kill.

Genres: Fiction, Adventure, Thriller, Action

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Don Pendleton was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, December 12, 1927 and died October 23, 1995 in Arizona.

He wrote mystery, action/adventure, science-fiction, crime fiction, suspense, short stories, nonfiction, and was a comic scriptwriter, poet, screenwriter, essayist, and metaphysical scholar. He published more than 125 books in his long career, and his books have been published in more than 25 foreign languages with close to two hundred million copies in print throughout the world.

After producing a number of science-fiction and mystery novels, Don launched in 1969 the phenomenal Mack Bolan: The Executioner, which quickly emerged as the original, definitive Action/Adventure series. His successful paperback books inspired a new particularly American literary genre during the early 1970's, and Don became known as "the father of action/adventure."

"Although The Executioner Series is far and away my most significant contribution to world literature, I still do not perceive myself as 'belonging' to any particular literary niche. I am simply a storyteller, an entertainer who hopes to enthrall with visions of the reader's own incipient greatness."

Don Pendleton's original Executioner Series are now in ebooks, published by Open Road Media. 37 of the original novels.

Wikipedia: Don Pendleton

Reviews

[Bill Riggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A shift in the mob power structure is starting to happen in St. Louis. When Mack Bolan and Able Team blow into town to put a stop to it, the body count begins to blowup. Great characterization in this one- the interactions between Bolan and his friends in Able are refreshing and entertaining, as are the reactions of the local police force as they try to understand and keep track of the Executioner and his friends as they roll through their town.

[Oliver Clarke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Definitely not my favourite in the series, but this one does have some nice interplay between Bolan and the regular supporting cast of characters.

[Jordan Anderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like this is one of those "it's not you, it's me" situations in that St. Louis Showdown is probably one of
the better of this era of Executioner books, except for some reason it just didn't resonate with me.

If that doesn't make sense, it doesn't to me either. This particular escapade has some of the best action peices, and some of the most emotional and actual realistic motivations for our dear old friend Mack Bolan.

Honestly, I think that after reading 9 of these this month alone, I'm just getting a little tired of the same story
over and over again.

A new coat of paint over an old fence doesn't
change the fence, just makes it look pretty for a while and it’s like these books are becoming that old fence.

What I'm saying is that even with some new sides of
Mack Bolan, I didn't feel like this one stands out or feels any different and l think I need a short break from Mack the Bastard Bolan.

[Jake · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series has been tremendous fun. I had challenged myself to read the entire original series up to book 38, but after this one, I've decided read something different for a little while.

This is true pulp. The series was very popular in the nineteen-seventies and early eighties. I heard that Harlequin took over the series and ... well, you know. I don't think I'll be reading any of those.

The hero, Mack Bolan AWOL Army Sniper, who has brought hell to the Mafia, has become a bullet-dodging, cop-fooling, one-man army and demolition team. With that said, he gets some help from old Vietnam Vet buddies in the 23rd chapter of the bigger story.

There are some great action scenes in this book. Some of the descriptions are as close to perfect as any author could ever want. It was a fun read. I'll pick up #24 after a few books down the road.

[Little Timmy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent men's adventure series from the 60s, 70's and 80's. The first 38 books are outstanding but then the series is taken over by a bunch of new writers writing under the name of the original creator and they take the series into a new direction I did not care for. The first 38 books are very recommended

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bolan senses a mobile build up in Saint Louie, and he uses reverse English on the baddies.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bolan comes to the town that the Mob seems to have forgotten. Some long-in-the-tooth crime kingpins have been taking it easy, but the big Bosses think some new blood should be injected in the local scene. Our hero works his magic, setting the bad guys against each other, and trying to balance a well formed crime task force from stopping him too early.

Great action/adventure series from the 70s and 80s.

[Davidus1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Living near St. Louis I appreciated the research of the city that Pendleton had done for the writing of this book. Another good one!

[Douglas Fugate · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you like Mack Bolan you will love it. It is another installment of the series. Character development takes places through several volumes. Action is almost non-stop.

[ShanDizzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Able Team. Their business was espionage, sabotage, demoralization, death—in a highly personal reference...Mack Bolan, The Executioner, declared war on the Mafia...His old Able Team partner and Death Squad survivor, Rosario (the Politician) Blancanales, had spotted the play in Missouri and sent word to perhaps the one man in the world who could add a meaningful dimension to the
game. The flash had not come as a particularly surprising development to Bolan. He had known for some time of ambitious movements in the Show Me State. But he had been wary of St. Louis. A steady infusion of hardline torpedoes had been stiffening the area ever since the Texas hit. There had been noises to the effect that Jerry Ciglia’s St. Louis boys were the nucleus of a new, national stop-Bolan effort, and there had been various indications from other quarters to support that notion. Bolan had recently tangled with Ciglia—but in another territory and with the advantage on Bolan’s side...Bolan’s steely blue gaze flicked toward the lights of the motel. “Been here most the time. Checked in Wednesday. Left the warwagon parked in Burke City while I reconned the situation here.”
“Am I clean?” Blancanales grunted.
Bolan grinned. “I wouldn’t be here if you weren’t. So what’s with the SOS?”
The Politician scowled as he replied, “They’re getting ready to take over this town. They could do it, too—they’ve got the kicker. And there’s visions of a Capone-era Chicago transplanted to old Saint Louie. Your buddy Ciglia is the guy with the franchise.”
“Is Newman a client of Able Group?” Bolan inquired.
“Yeah. He learned about us via the New Orleans publicity. Contacted me a couple of weeks ago. Wants me to get those damned films. Hell. It’s an impossible assignment, Sarge. Except, maybe, unless …”

[Tim Deforest · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun entry in the series. This is the second book in a row in which Bolan--who is normally a lone wolf--teams up with allies to blow up the bad guys. In the previous book, he had made a temporary alliance with some cops and federal agents (all of whom he'd encountered before) to smash a Red Chinese/Mafia operation. This time, he teams up with the two only other survivors from the book "Death Squad" to stop a Mafia takeover of St. Louis. The premise of his misison in this one is interesting. Rather than destroy the Mafia completely and leave a power vacuum that would make things worse in the long run, he figures out a way to take out the factions moving into the town and make it look like a aging local Don is responsible. That way, Bolan keeps the lesser of two evils in charge. It's too bad Pendelton didn't ever do a sequel to this one before handing the series off to ghost writers and changing the premise to fighting terrorists. A return visit to St. Louis to see the consequences of this campaign would have been interesting.

[Josh Hitch · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a solid entry in the series but none of the Pendletons are bad. This one fills in a few holes about certain people in Bolan's life. Also has 2 of the 3 members of the soon to be formed Able Team helping out which is always good. In this one Bolan is sent for by his friends cause of a case they were working got really big. It looks like St. Louis was in line to be a major mafia player and its up to Bolan and friends to stop that in a strange fashion. This might be a slight slower then normal but its still solidly written and entertaining and after this many volumes you need a bit more backstory I think.

Recommended like all of the Pendleton written ones but it be terrible to start with though it does try and explain the stuff you need to know from other books.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

St.Louis feels the skockwaves

I enjoyed the action and could easily picture the different parts of St. Louis as Mack Nolan kicked butt and took names. I especially liked the interaction between Pol Gadgets
. I loved the ending with the old boa. A fun read.

[James Hein · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another reasonable one in the series.

[Carl Nelson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good book lots of action.

[Graeme Hunter somerville · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Stuff

Son Pendleton does it again plots lines adventure action carnage itches it all. Sometime romance although Nolan doesn't have much time for that sort of carry on

[Eddie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always read Executioner for escape and adventure... got kind of sad there.

[Liam Coyne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again the Mack Bolan Series explodes with awesomeness

[Scott Kuffel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve jumped around in the entire series but Mack Bolan never disappoints. Touching little reunion with his younger brother in this one. And enjoyed the details of the St. Louis geography.

[Curtis]

Another enjoyable read that I will credit at least partially to my recent attitude shift. I'm sure it helped that Pendleton happened to include some of my favorite returning characters as well as another team mission.

The survivors of Bolan's ill-fated "death squad" (see book 2) -- Gadgets Schwartz and Pol Blancanales -- are back and looking much better than they did the last time we saw them a few books ago in New Orleans Knockout. Also back is Pol's sister, Toni. Just like in Hawaiian Hellground, we get more Bolan attacks coordinated by radio transmissions. The cops listen in on these coded exchanges between Bolan's team, trying to figure out where they are and what they're hitting but always just behind enough for Bolan and the gang to get away. It's a fun way to add tension to action scenes that by themselves are not anything we haven't seen before.

Other recurring characters of note include Leo Turrin (Massachusetts mobster, undercover fed, and Bolan's best friend) and Johnny Bolan, our protagonist's younger brother (last seen when Bolan rescued him in Boston Blitz). Johnny has demanded an audience with his older brother to tell him he's ready to join him in his holy war against the mob -- a pipe dream that Bolan squashes immediately. It was a strange deviation from the main plot in a book with such a limited word count, something I can't remember ever happening before in the series. I wonder if it's setting something up for a future book.

The plot here is much more down to earth than the past few books. The ruling council of mafiosi (La Commissione) has sent in a new generation of mobsters to usurp the old guard in St. Louis, a territory that's flown under the radar mostly due to the relative lack of ambition of the 90-year-old don. The bigwigs in New York believe there's opportunity to exploit, especially because they "own" the leading candidate for Missouri's governor (they're blackmailing him and his wife). Gadgets, Pol, and Toni are in town because their agency has been hired by the dude to find the blackmail goods and destroy them.

What's different about this story is how Bolan teams up with the old guard mafiosi to drive back the invading force and send a message to New York that St. Louis is off-limits. Bolan figures if he kills everybody, he'll just create a vacuum for New York to send more goons to take over the minute Bolan leaves town. His war strategy seems to be changing. It will be interesting to see if this idea continues in future books and how it develops.

One strange approach to storytelling that I've seen in some of these books recently but haven't commented on yet is how Pendleton will tell the same event from multiple characters' perspectives. In one example from this book, we see the same event unfold three times (from the cops' perspective, from the crooks' perspective, and from Bolan's team's perspective). It feels redundant (the first telling from the cops' perspective was genuinely thrilling and I'm not sure what the retellings added really), and in a book this short it seems like an inefficient use of valuable page space.

Finally, we have another clue as to the timeline of this series. Johnny Bolan is referenced as being 16 at the time of this story. A bit of literary forensics uncovers these references in book 1:

In her letters to Mack in Vietnam, his mother "often enclosed snapshots of Cindy, Mack's pretty 17-year-old sister, and of Johnny, the kid brother just turned 14." And: "Cindy Bolan, at the time of the tragedy, had only recently graduated from high school." [The tragedy in question being murder/suicide that wiped out Bolan's family, save Johnny -- established to have occurred on August 12 or a day earlier (Bolan is notified of the event on August 12 and we can presume that the notification came almost immediately afterwards).]

Even if Cindy was 18 at the time of the murders, the oldest Johnny could have been was 15. So it seems Bolan's adventures have spanned at least one year but less than three. In a previous review, I struggled to explain the timeline of these books, and it's still a little baffling to me. I suspect I've given this significantly more thought than the author or publisher.

[Pops · Rating 1 out of 5]

I had never read a book from this ubiquitous series. I had seen dozens of different titles over the years, but had never noticed the St.Louis entry. As someone from the region, how could I turn down a book that reads, "St.Louis Blows!" across the back cover. I'm not sure if the author has ever been to St. Louis. It could have been set anywhere with a river with only a few cosmetic changes. I'll never understand how this series became so successful.

[Brad Theado · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was way too slow. Probably skimmed 50% of it.

[Ronald · Rating 4 out of 5]

read some time in 1980