Gauntlet Run: Birth of a Superhero

Henty's Fist #1

by Andre Jute, Dakota Franklin, Andrew McCoy

HENTY'S FIST 1: GAUNTLET RUN: Birth of a Superhero by Andre Jute, Dakota Franklin, Andrew McCoy

The Gauntlet Run is the toughest race ever run by man: across America with every man’s hand turned against you from the statue of Liberty to the old US Mint in San Francisco. There the prize awaits you: $10 million and a full and free Presidential Pardon.


The Runner is marked for all to see by an indestructible Fist, keyed to his metabolism. If the Fist is removed without the key from the Mint in San Francisco, he dies. Between the Runner and the key stand the ruthless bounty hunters, the Syndicate’s lethal odds fixers, the sinister Organ Bank chasers, the Humble & Poor Hunt, the US Air Force, and mobs of good citizens, all turned into bloodthirsty savages by the magnificent prize for tearing the Fist from the Runner — and the Presidential license that nothing done to the Runner shall be illegal.


Henty needs two million dollars to send her son Petey to the Artie stericlinic for treatment that will save his life. The care of The Caring Society is exhausted, her chicken farm already carries a second mortgage. Hopeless. But beautiful young Texas widows don’t just give up. There is still the Gauntlet Run. To qualify, you have to be a criminal — so Henty robs a bank...
No woman has ever Run the Gauntlet. No Runner has ever survived the Gauntlet.

ebook

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

André Jute was educated in Australia, South Africa and the United States. He has been an intelligence officer, racing driver, advertising executive, management consultant, performing arts critic and professional gambler. His hobbies include old Bentleys, classical music (on which he writes a syndicated weekly column), cycling, hill walking, cooking and wine. He designs and builds his own tube (valve) audio amplifiers. He is married to Rosalind Pain-Hayman and they have a son. They live on a hill over a salmon river in County Cork, Eire. There are around three hundred editions of his books in English and a dozen other languages.

Reviews

[Olethros · Rating 3 out of 5]

-Distopía de acción casi descontrolada.-

Género. Ciencia-Ficción.

Lo que nos cuenta. Henty es una madre que necesita dinero para afrontar los gastos del tratamiento de su hijo y decide asaltar un banco, pero no para hacerse con el dinero de la entidad, sino para que la detengan, juzguen y condenen, para poder usar la curiosa opción que la ley de los Estados Unidos le ofrece: participar en una mezcla de carrera de la muerte y programa televisivo, cuya recompensa es mucho dinero y la libertad, que consiste en atravesar todo el país de Nueva York a San Francisco mientras todo habitante del mismo puede intentar matar al fugitivo libremente, y que por cierto nadie ha conseguido ganar nunca, además de que nunca la ha corrido una mujer. Al participante se le instala un equipo indestructible en el brazo, parecido a un gran guantelete de armadura, con diferentes propósitos. Primer libro de la serie Henty´s Fist.

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[Matt Posner · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's difficult for three authors to write a book together, especially three excellent authors with developed styles like Andre Jute, author of historical and contemporary thrillers, economics textbooks, literary expose, and children's adventure; Andrew McCoy, a man who has been all around the world to many danger zones and lived to tell exciting tales; and Dakota Franklin, an expert in high-stakes professional racing who writes with depth, precision, and expertise. The theme of this triple partnership? The birth of a superhero in a dystopian America. Henty is a country mother, known more for common-sense and folksy sayings than for training and toughness, who needs money to pay for her daughter's life-saving operation and decides to get it by being the first person to cross the United States while being actively hunted with a bounty on her head. Cameras always find her; homing devices are everywhere; the government, private citizens, and the Mafia all stand to benefit from killing her; and even her afflicted daughter is taken hostage. It's a rough situation that any hero would struggle with, let alone Henty, who only cares to do what it takes to keep the girl alive.

With three authors mingling ideas, the pacing and situations change often. There are no low points, but there are a lot of oddities. There is one sequence involving a chase between two cars of uneven size and speed, with the characters switching back and forth between them, that is worth the whole rest of the book. Probably Dakota's, I'm guessing. Also a lesson in helicopter piloting, probably from Andrew, and some detailed analysis of the political system from a hobo professor (definitely Andre's) and some intimidating circus people, and a really goofy escape vehicle, and a blood-soaked (?) garbage truck, and a horde of angry women, and a group of manhunters who act like fox hunters and whose dogs chase Henty's horse, and a bunch of planes full of overeager hard-cases crashing into each other. And that's only about a third of what these three elite authors provide in the playful romp that is Henty's Fist.

I listened to my Kindle read this to me while I was driving from New York City to North Carolina. It proved a good choice as it kept me continuously interested. On the way back, I attempted The Betrayals of Grim's Peak by Sean Quirk, but that book sucked. I wished for Gauntlet Run 2 to give me a continuous pace of interesting ideas. A fascinating combination, this, of The Running Man, Hunger Games, and intelligence.