Dead Man Running

by John Blackburn

The Russians want Peter Carlin for his top secret weapons plans. The British want him for the murder of his wife - a crime he didn't commit. Now he must find a way to flee Soviet Russia and return home to find the real killer - without being killed or arrested on the way. But he may not be prepared for the shocking truth he will discover about his wife's tragic demise ...

John Blackburn's fourth novel, Dead Man Running, is a gripping Cold War thriller that will have readers on the edge of their seats.

"Swift, sure, and exciting ... harrowing escapes, devious characters, black villainy and a friend in need make an absorbing book." - Boston Sunday Herald

"A neat little package of horror - beautifully sustained ... frighteningly realistic. Don't start reading too late in the evening, especially if you're alone." - San Francisco Examiner

"Blackburn's choicest work of contemporary horror ... a frontrunner in the mystery field and well worth the hour or two it takes to read it." - Pensacola News Journal

Genres: Espionage

167 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1960

About the author

John Blackburn was born in 1923 in the village of Corbridge, England, the second son of a clergyman. Blackburn attended Haileybury College near London beginning in 1937, but his education was interrupted by the onset of World War II; the shadow of the war, and that of Nazi Germany, would later play a role in many of his works. He served as a radio officer during the war in the Mercantile Marine from 1942 to 1945, and resumed his education afterwards at Durham University, earning his bachelor’s degree in 1949. Blackburn taught for several years after that, first in London­ and then in Berlin, and married Joan Mary Clift in 1950. Returning to London in 1952, he took over the management of Red Lion Books.

It was there that Blackburn began writing, and the immediate success in 1958 of his first novel, A Scent of New-Mown Hay, led him to take up a career as a writer full time. He and his wife also maintained an antiquarian bookstore, a secondary career that would inform some of Blackburn’s work, including the bibliomystery Blue Octavo (1963). A Scent of New-Mown Hay typified the approach that would come to characterize Blackburn’s twenty-eight novels, which defied easy categorization in their unique and compelling mixture of the genres of science fiction, horror, mystery, and thriller. Many of Blackburn’s best novels came in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with a string of successes that included the classics A Ring of Roses (1965), Children of the Night (1966), Nothing but the Night (1968; adapted for a 1973 film starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing), Devil Daddy (1972) and Our Lady of Pain (1974). Somewhat unusually for a popular horror writer, Blackburn’s novels were not only successful with the reading public but also won widespread critical acclaim: the Times Literary Supplement declared him ‘today’s master of horror’ and compared him with the Grimm Brothers, while the Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural regarded him as ‘certainly the best British novelist in his field’ and the St James Guide to Crime & Mystery Writers called him ‘one of England’s best practicing novelists in the tradition of the thriller novel’.

By the time Blackburn published his final novel in 1985, much of his work was already out of print, an inexplicable neglect that continued until Valancourt began republishing his novels in 2013. John Blackburn died in 1993.

Reviews

[Melisende · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a prefectly fine espionage / crime thriller for its time. There is - in spades - deception, espionage, betrayal, murder, gunfights, fisty-cuffs, plots, escapes, captures, chases. Yes, some of the action beggars belief, but quite honestly, who cares, it was fun read.

"Sensitive" readers may be offended - tough - pull up your big-person pants and suck it up!

[L J Field · Rating 5 out of 5]

It has become apparent to me that for the fullest enjoyment of Blackburn’s 28 novels, they should be read in order. It isn’t necessary, but will only add more charm to his offerings. I come to this conclusion by finding that a whole host of characters return from book to book. Most especially is General Kirk, who doesn’t make an appearance in this book, but may be present in more than fifteen of the novels. General Kirk has at his disposal a group of people who aid him in his search for truth. In one book he meets a character named Molton Mott, an adventurer, a world traveller having gone on safaris, travelled amongst the Middle Eastern countries as well as throughout Asia and South America. He’s much larger than life—an intrepid explorer. Mott is central in this novel and another further into Blackburn’s works, though I can’t remember which book he’s in. Howver, he is an engaging person, not easily forgotten.

In this book the lead character is Peter Carlin. We find him first in the Soviet Union. He is a representative of a firm that specializes in electronics. He has just found out that immediately upon leaving London, his wife had been murdered. The press is certain that Carlin is responsible for the death. Russia has taken him into custody, but not for the crime. It happens that his business partner—an inventor—has invented a design that will offer any country that owns it a leg up in the Cold War. Carlin is in the hands of Gregor Radek, a person of murderous intent.

This thriller takes us along as Carlin escapes from Russia and returns to England to find the actual murderer of his wife. And a thriller it is. As Carlin becomes acquainted with with Mott, the story explodes into action.

[Doug Bolden · Rating 4 out of 5]

Content Warnings: Blackburn has racially questionable scenes. It is very much a 1960s British novel in this regard.

How does a man who is wanted for murder and espionage manage to get revenge for his wife's murder while also being hunted by Soviet agents who think he has the secret to a new technology? Not easily, naturally, is the answer. Blackburn's early-ish "pure" thriller Dead Man Running starts out strong with Cold War-logic that drains a bit over time while shifting towards his sense of more fantastical action and exposition. Blackburn is a treat even when the overall vibe misses a bit and here the vibe mostly hits. While there is a stack of Blackburn novels I would recommend before you get to this one, it is still interesting to see him eschew all of the horror/weird/science-fiction elements that he is better known for today. I was sort of hoping for some kind of super-laser or ancient curse by the end, but it is nice to see that Blackburn can keep the story moving along with just bad men, geopolitical theater, and guns.

Something like 4.25 stars, rounded down.

The opening half or so of this novel is almost impossibly tense. Peter Carlin is framed for the murder of his wife and has been set-up by Soviet agents who think he has secrets for a guidance system (he does not). The agents are willing to cut him a deal if he can just provide the information, which he cannot, so he is subjected to torture and threats. If he escapes - which of course he does - his flight back to Britain is most likely to end up with him in prison or executed because the evidence against him is really tight and damning. His goal is to somehow get back to London, find out who killed his wife, find out who framed him, and exonerate himself while enemies on both sides of the Curtain are tracking him down.

It is in the second half (more like last 60% but that's a middling difference) where the novel becomes much more Blackburn, for we are introduced to one of Blackburn's main stock characters: J. Moldon Mott. Now, I am not 100% sure this is Mott's introduction (maybe he came from a short story or an aside in Sour Apple Tree, information is sparse) but I think so [please correct me if I'm wrong]. It is fascinating to see such a Blackburn-esque character - explorer, author, and big game hunter who is boastful and proud and yet aims to be heroic and investigative like a bad pulp Sherlock Holmes written by an H.R. Haggard imitator - in a novel that is so out of whack with the kind of pompous heroics Mott is generally written to do. This improbable blend, though, essentially makes the novel possible. How could someone so earnest and out-of-his-depth as Carlin hope to have any luck with some sort of intervention? I just would have bet good money that said intervention would have come from Blackburn's standard stock character to this point in his career: General Kirk.

It is an oddity of Blackburn's novels that his re-used characters - General Kirk, J. Moldon Mott, Bill Easter - tend to be quirky and somewhat unlikeable while also larger than life and humorous. Then his main characters who show up for a novel or two tend to be much more standard fair: attractive, professional, hopeless, a bit romantic, and probably doomed but willing to go down fighting.

Once it becomes effectively a Mott novel, the rest follows with a much more bombastic flair (and said flair is why we read Blackburn). Plots are laid. Schemes are uncovered. Plans are foiled. There are shoot outs, fist fights, and big anecdotes (and a lot of waiting while a woman in a blue trench coat gets mentioned several times). Hapless Carlin does very little from this point besides exists and stays alive so that the plot can continue. The twist, when it comes, is perfectly functional and adequate but nothing like what might have happened in Bury Him Darkly or Devil Daddy. It is just the sort of twist that might be the denouement of any other detective novel. You can easily see Tom Barnaby solving the murder of Susan Carlin with the same conclusion (and I am pretty sure there is some Midsomer Murder episode with the same basic answer).

There are some scenes that might catch more contemporary readers off guard. Mott has an African warlord he killed and stuffed like a big game trophy (a scene treated as grim but ultimately humorous). There is a Jewish character who is likeable but also hits every Fagin-esque Jewish stereotype: dirty, indolent, greedy, penny pinching, sensitive to physical discomfort, and criminally minded. There are others (including the Soviet agents who, with one exception, are less characters and more cardboard villains). Blackburn is rarely cruel with it (the stuffed warlord being an exception) but he draws a line between his white/euro/British folk and everyone else.

There is at least one plot point that is weirdly handled (I mean, more weirdly handled than having Mott investigate a murder). A character that was involved in the early stages of the plot is proven to have a connection to another character...but this connection just does not matter? It is like Blackburn half forgot or changed his mind about that twist.

You want to read stuff like A Scent of New Mown Hay and Children of Darkness first, for sure, but once you've made it through a dozen or so even more bombastic Blackburn novels come back to this one to see him try to pretend to play it straight before giving up and leaning into his own sense of Blackburnness.

[Ross McClintock · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dead Man Running is by far the most straightforward novel by John Blackburn I've come across. This begins as a typical man on the run type thriller, filled with bold deeds and daring escape. However, halfway through we get introduced to the comic character of J. Molden Mott, a recurring character in Blackburn novels, who definitely adds a unique flavor to the proceedings. Imagine if you will, a Bourne Identity type thriller with Ignatius J. Reilly from Confederacy of Dunces randomly thrown in, and you'll have a sense of the bizarre enjoyment John Blackburn provides here.

[David Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent page turning thriller. Businessman Peter Carlin accused of the brutal murder of his wife has the misfortune to be simultaneously kidnapped while on a sales trip in Moscow and tortured by the KGB to reveal the wiring diagram of a rocket guidance system his firm has developed.
Being both innocent and ignorant doesn’t help him but his anger and grief enable him to escape and begin his own investigation into just who has got it in for him. Returning to his London flat he meets the man who might be his only chance of surviving.
“As it is, why give yourself up now - when you’ve reached the very place you wanted to be, where the real work can start; the hunt for your wife’s killer?”