The Long Vendetta

by Jonathan Gant, Clifton Adams

Buck Coyle couldn't ride himself of the feeling that that accident that had landed him in the hospital hadn't been an accident at all, but a deliberate attempt to murder him. So far as he knew, he didn't have an enemy in the world. Why would anyone try to kill him?

Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

Reviews

[Michael Schramm · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my ninth novel by Clifton Adams (aka Jonathan Gant, Clay Randall and a few other pseudonyms). By no means his best work, (that I reserve for “Death’s Sweet Song” “A Noose for the Desparado” and “The Last Days of Wolf Garnett”) this is a serviceable suspense thriller with noir like overtones. Adams wrote 5 crime thrillers (being primarily a Western writer of considerable talent) and this is the weakest of the 4 that I have read. A notch below “Whom Gods Destroy” and “Never Say No to a Killer”, average Adams is better than nothing as there is an economy of words contained within, good character development and solid pacing.

[Ron Zack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hits the Target
The Long Vendetta, written by Clifton Adams under his Jonathan Gant pseudonym, is suspenseful, exciting, and original. Was it an error in judgment during war, or cold-blooded murder? The smoldering hatred of a madman blossoms and almost reaches fruition after 15 years. Or was it a madman? “Jeanie, rigid and trembling, shouted back: ‘Who do you think you are! You’re not God!’ And the voice answered serenely: ‘How do you know?’” The mystery unfolds layer by layer and the reader is drawn along this tightly written, well-developed plot. Characters are brilliantly created and the reader acutely feels their personal struggles.

The violence is portrayed in typical Clifton Adams fashion: “Right through Nurse Flagg’s shoulder and into Deegan’s throat and out the back of his head. That was a Luger for you.” Profound philosophical topics are delivered, contemplating the tragedy of war and its aftermath, and how different individuals cope. In modern terms, this is a story of post-traumatic stress disorder carried to the extreme. The recurring theme is death and the novel is saturated with it: “Death was so close that I could almost hear them shoveling dirt on my coffin.” Death, violent death, and murder seem to be hovering throughout the novel. The book opens with a murder attempt, moves on to flashbacks from the war, and death continues to follow the protagonist, Buck Coyle. Will his luck run out?

I have not yet been disappointed by anything by Clifton Adams. He has managed to master more than one genre and he certainly produces high-grade pulp fiction.

[Tilak Raj Kaushik · Rating 2 out of 5]

A below average thriller.I figured the killer half way into the novel.started with a promising note but than fades into dull and predictable ending.Avoid if you can,better go for Ed Lacy or Charles Williams for much more satisfying pulp fiction novel.