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The Executioner #24
Canadian Crisis
With the help of a Canadian operative, the Executioner defends Montreal
In a grimy bistro on the north side of Buffalo, a few American mobsters are dining with a Canadian contact when death bursts through the door. His eyes icy, his clothes pitch black, Mack Bolan takes out every American at the table but lets the Canadian live. Andre Chebleu is an undercover operative who has come across the border to infiltrate the American syndicate, and Mack Bolan will need his help if he is going to save Canada from the mob.
His endless war against the forces of the Mafia have made most of America unsafe for organized crime, so Bolan's enemies have set their sights on Quebec, where radical separatists have destabilized the local government. Only Bolan and Chebleu can rescue Montreal from chaos and save the Great White North from becoming a living hell.
Canadian Crisis is the 24th book in the Executioner series, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.
In a grimy bistro on the north side of Buffalo, a few American mobsters are dining with a Canadian contact when death bursts through the door. His eyes icy, his clothes pitch black, Mack Bolan takes out every American at the table but lets the Canadian live. Andre Chebleu is an undercover operative who has come across the border to infiltrate the American syndicate, and Mack Bolan will need his help if he is going to save Canada from the mob.
His endless war against the forces of the Mafia have made most of America unsafe for organized crime, so Bolan's enemies have set their sights on Quebec, where radical separatists have destabilized the local government. Only Bolan and Chebleu can rescue Montreal from chaos and save the Great White North from becoming a living hell.
Canadian Crisis is the 24th book in the Executioner series, but you may enjoy reading the series in any order.
185 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1975
About the author
Don Pendleton
1,529 books194 followersDon 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
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
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
June 3, 2023
A big meet of mob bosses from around the world is set for Montreal with the intent of taking it over. Not willing to sit back and watch Montreal become the crime capital of the world, Mack Bolan heads north to bring his style of justice and vengeance to Canada.
While it is fairly action packed this story feels like it’s lacking character or something. It never really grabbed my attention like others have. The characters seems flat and their motivations aren’t interesting to me.
While it is fairly action packed this story feels like it’s lacking character or something. It never really grabbed my attention like others have. The characters seems flat and their motivations aren’t interesting to me.
September 17, 2024
Mack Bolan in Canada fighting the Mafia with a French Canadian agent in tow. All the action you’d expect, but this time with occasional references to Quebecois separatists. Fun.
February 27, 2021
Bolan’s intelligence was not that complete; he did not know the specifics of Mob involvement in Canadian politics or Quebeçois nationalism. One thing was certain, however: whatever was happening in Canada was definitely being exploited by the men with the golden fingers—and they were about to slip Quebec into their hip pockets. So, no, Mack Bolan did not underestimate the enemy. They would go to any lengths to write insurance for this Montreal Meet. They would not want the likes of Mack Bolan crashing their party. With this in mind, his route to Montreal was calculated not primarily for rapid transit but toward certainty of arrival. He had gone west from Niagara Falls, into Ontario and through Hamilton to Toronto, leaving the lakeshore behind at Newcastle to angle into the interior. He reached the outskirts of Ottawa for breakfast, shared hastily with his tense friend from Montreal, then bore north for a circuitous approach to the combat zone. A normal two-hour journey from Ottawa to Montreal, Bolan took it in five—meandering through the back country in a wary advance upon his goal. He had not deluded himself that he would reach Montreal without incident.
July 31, 2022
I’m actually surprised it took 24 books in this series to have its first “dud”but unfortuneatly here we are.
Maybe it’s because of better and more contemporary books in the genre like The Gray Man or On Target. I don’t know. Either way, this entry in the Executioner series never managed to grab me or hold my attention, despite it being one of the more consistently action packed books.
I think it could be the fact that Crisis felt repetitive and incredibly preachy, with Bolan constantly spouting some kind of maxim against evil like some sage anti-mafia yogi or quoting some overrated speech from past great war commanders.
Whatever the case may be, I didn’t enjoy this one and can only hope things are a bit more entertaining in Colorado Kill-Zone.
Maybe it’s because of better and more contemporary books in the genre like The Gray Man or On Target. I don’t know. Either way, this entry in the Executioner series never managed to grab me or hold my attention, despite it being one of the more consistently action packed books.
I think it could be the fact that Crisis felt repetitive and incredibly preachy, with Bolan constantly spouting some kind of maxim against evil like some sage anti-mafia yogi or quoting some overrated speech from past great war commanders.
Whatever the case may be, I didn’t enjoy this one and can only hope things are a bit more entertaining in Colorado Kill-Zone.
Read
June 7, 2024Plot & Reaction:
Delegations from mob factions all over the world are convening in Quebec to form an international crime syndicate, Cosa di tutti Cosi, the thing of all things. At the same time, French Canadian militants are plotting Quebec’s secession from Canada. The mob figures they can corrupt this separatist movement and make Quebec their own international headquarters. So it’s basically Miami Massacre combined with Texas Storm.
Bolan has a love interest, of course. A young militant who shows him the secret passages in the hotel where all the mobsters have convened so that Bolan can Die Hard his way around the building. Pendleton has her confess to being a virgin, which is kind of gross but a part of this genre I guess. Makes Bolan more of a man to the readers if he’s the first to fuck a woman or something? Not that he does (he’s far too busy Die Hard-ing and killing bad guys), but she leaves with him in his mobile home at the end of the book so the implication is there.
Speaking of the warwagon, the mob learns about it here. So in future books, I guess they’ll be on the lookout for it? It will be interesting to see if that makes it easier for them to track him. They don't really have a sophisticated network to coordinate a search so it might not matter. But if they’re smart (i.e. if the author is smart), they’ll give the info to the cops who could coordinate a nationwide search, and then count on killing Bolan once he’s in police custody.
I found this book mostly enjoyable. Except for a couple of pages where Bolan mansplains the virtues of his “war” versus the vices of the love interest's “terrorism,” the Bolan philosophizing is kept to a minimum. He does try justifying his violence by claiming that all of nature is violence. For example, rabbits killed by coyotes — that’s “real” — so Bolan is just being realistic. He completely ignores that violence in nature is acute, it’s sudden and short-lived. It’s not a way of life, like Bolan’s. But like I said, most of the book is either Bolan using “role camouflage” to infiltrate the mob’s convention or doing some Die Hard action.
One of the things I enjoyed most this time was the prose. Pendleton’s writing is confident, concise, and playful in a way I don’t remember from the previous books. Some examples:
1. A stripper “boredly bounced bared breasts in the background.”
2. The phrase “glazed gazes” tickles me.
3. And Chapter 3 is titled “Engagement at Niagra” playing on the double meaning of engagement (it being common practice to propose at Niagra Falls; and Bolan battling the enemy).
Timeline:
For this book, I dove deep into the quicksand of the Bolan series timeline. There were several clues as to when this book takes place but nothing sufficient to nail it down. Here are the gory details and where I hit dead ends.
At the start, Bolan says he’s been in Buffalo for 3 days. No mention of St. Louis. Concerning the international Mafia Meet, “Bolan had been aware of the situation for some time.” So it seems it’s been a while. Adding to that, Joe Staccio (last seen in Assault on Soho, book 6) had been working on the Canadian convention “ever since he came back from England.” This is meant to convey that he’s invested quite a bit of time but there’s no telling just how much.
We’re also told that Joe Staccio is 58 years old. I went back and perused Assault on Soho but couldn’t find any mention of his age for comparison.
Now here’s where things get a bit more promising. The current militant group, Quebecois Francais (QF) is described as the successor to the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ), which was an actual militant group working for Quebec’s independence. There’s a mention of political kidnappings that led to arrests which meant the “end of a movement…until the QF surfaced a while back.” A trip to Wikipedia places the kidnappings in October 1970, with arrests in December 1970 and more arrests in October 1971. “A while back” seems to only make sense in the context of years. In my review for St. Louis Showdown, I used some references to Johnny Bolan’s age to determine that less than 3 years had passed since book 1. Unfortunately we don’t have an exact year for book 1, just the month August. The assumption is 1968 or 1969 (given the book’s publication in March 1969), but it could be anytime prior to March 29, 1973, when the last U.S. military unit left Vietnam. If March 1969, then we could be say January 1972, which feels too soon for "a while back."
Let’s try another angle. The hotel where the mob is staying was described as being recently renovated in preparation for the 1976 Olympics. Another trip to Wikipedia tells me that Montreal was awarded the rights for the 1976 Olympics on May 12, 1970. Say at least a year for renovations and that puts us later than mid-1971, which we already know based on the references to the FLQ.
I think I’m ready to officially conclude that Pendleton isn’t tracking the timeline at all. Which makes sense. It’s kind of like how the Simpsons never age. Despite all my confusion from obsessively trying to make the timeline make sense, it’s certainly less confusing for the casual reader if the plots line up with the times in which they are published. In this case, the publication date is December 1975, which lines up very well with all of the references to actual historical events.
Returning characters:
Leo Turrin, a series regular at this point.
Joe Staccio, boss of upstate New York last seen heading a Bolan peace delegation in England.
Augie Marinello: We find out what happened to him in New Jersey (he lost both legs and barely survived). Similarly, we learn that Pat Talifero is a vegetable from his last encounter with Bolan.
Georgette Chebleu returns from the dead in a sense. We meet her brother who is the one who recommended her for the undercover job that got her tortured and killed in Detroit Deathwatch.
Book cover:
I’m a big fan of this cover but it’s totally bogus. Bolan doesn’t hold a mobster by the neck as a shield at any point in the book.
Final interesting note:
During my timeline research into the FLQ, I deduced that the QF is fictional, a creation of Pendleton's, as is it’s support from Vichy-Nazis. But I discovered this fascinating factoid, quoted here from Wikipedia: "The KGB was concerned that the FLQ's attacks could be linked to the Soviet Union. It designed a disinformation campaign and forged documents to portray the FLQ as a CIA false flag operation. A photocopy of the forged 'CIA document' was 'leaked' to the Montreal Star in September 1971. The operation was so successful that Canada's prime minister believed that the CIA had conducted operations in Canada. The story was still quoted in the 1990s, even among academic authors."
Delegations from mob factions all over the world are convening in Quebec to form an international crime syndicate, Cosa di tutti Cosi, the thing of all things. At the same time, French Canadian militants are plotting Quebec’s secession from Canada. The mob figures they can corrupt this separatist movement and make Quebec their own international headquarters. So it’s basically Miami Massacre combined with Texas Storm.
Bolan has a love interest, of course. A young militant who shows him the secret passages in the hotel where all the mobsters have convened so that Bolan can Die Hard his way around the building. Pendleton has her confess to being a virgin, which is kind of gross but a part of this genre I guess. Makes Bolan more of a man to the readers if he’s the first to fuck a woman or something? Not that he does (he’s far too busy Die Hard-ing and killing bad guys), but she leaves with him in his mobile home at the end of the book so the implication is there.
Speaking of the warwagon, the mob learns about it here. So in future books, I guess they’ll be on the lookout for it? It will be interesting to see if that makes it easier for them to track him. They don't really have a sophisticated network to coordinate a search so it might not matter. But if they’re smart (i.e. if the author is smart), they’ll give the info to the cops who could coordinate a nationwide search, and then count on killing Bolan once he’s in police custody.
I found this book mostly enjoyable. Except for a couple of pages where Bolan mansplains the virtues of his “war” versus the vices of the love interest's “terrorism,” the Bolan philosophizing is kept to a minimum. He does try justifying his violence by claiming that all of nature is violence. For example, rabbits killed by coyotes — that’s “real” — so Bolan is just being realistic. He completely ignores that violence in nature is acute, it’s sudden and short-lived. It’s not a way of life, like Bolan’s. But like I said, most of the book is either Bolan using “role camouflage” to infiltrate the mob’s convention or doing some Die Hard action.
One of the things I enjoyed most this time was the prose. Pendleton’s writing is confident, concise, and playful in a way I don’t remember from the previous books. Some examples:
1. A stripper “boredly bounced bared breasts in the background.”
2. The phrase “glazed gazes” tickles me.
3. And Chapter 3 is titled “Engagement at Niagra” playing on the double meaning of engagement (it being common practice to propose at Niagra Falls; and Bolan battling the enemy).
Timeline:
For this book, I dove deep into the quicksand of the Bolan series timeline. There were several clues as to when this book takes place but nothing sufficient to nail it down. Here are the gory details and where I hit dead ends.
At the start, Bolan says he’s been in Buffalo for 3 days. No mention of St. Louis. Concerning the international Mafia Meet, “Bolan had been aware of the situation for some time.” So it seems it’s been a while. Adding to that, Joe Staccio (last seen in Assault on Soho, book 6) had been working on the Canadian convention “ever since he came back from England.” This is meant to convey that he’s invested quite a bit of time but there’s no telling just how much.
We’re also told that Joe Staccio is 58 years old. I went back and perused Assault on Soho but couldn’t find any mention of his age for comparison.
Now here’s where things get a bit more promising. The current militant group, Quebecois Francais (QF) is described as the successor to the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ), which was an actual militant group working for Quebec’s independence. There’s a mention of political kidnappings that led to arrests which meant the “end of a movement…until the QF surfaced a while back.” A trip to Wikipedia places the kidnappings in October 1970, with arrests in December 1970 and more arrests in October 1971. “A while back” seems to only make sense in the context of years. In my review for St. Louis Showdown, I used some references to Johnny Bolan’s age to determine that less than 3 years had passed since book 1. Unfortunately we don’t have an exact year for book 1, just the month August. The assumption is 1968 or 1969 (given the book’s publication in March 1969), but it could be anytime prior to March 29, 1973, when the last U.S. military unit left Vietnam. If March 1969, then we could be say January 1972, which feels too soon for "a while back."
Let’s try another angle. The hotel where the mob is staying was described as being recently renovated in preparation for the 1976 Olympics. Another trip to Wikipedia tells me that Montreal was awarded the rights for the 1976 Olympics on May 12, 1970. Say at least a year for renovations and that puts us later than mid-1971, which we already know based on the references to the FLQ.
I think I’m ready to officially conclude that Pendleton isn’t tracking the timeline at all. Which makes sense. It’s kind of like how the Simpsons never age. Despite all my confusion from obsessively trying to make the timeline make sense, it’s certainly less confusing for the casual reader if the plots line up with the times in which they are published. In this case, the publication date is December 1975, which lines up very well with all of the references to actual historical events.
Returning characters:
Leo Turrin, a series regular at this point.
Joe Staccio, boss of upstate New York last seen heading a Bolan peace delegation in England.
Augie Marinello: We find out what happened to him in New Jersey (he lost both legs and barely survived). Similarly, we learn that Pat Talifero is a vegetable from his last encounter with Bolan.
Georgette Chebleu returns from the dead in a sense. We meet her brother who is the one who recommended her for the undercover job that got her tortured and killed in Detroit Deathwatch.
Book cover:
I’m a big fan of this cover but it’s totally bogus. Bolan doesn’t hold a mobster by the neck as a shield at any point in the book.
Final interesting note:
During my timeline research into the FLQ, I deduced that the QF is fictional, a creation of Pendleton's, as is it’s support from Vichy-Nazis. But I discovered this fascinating factoid, quoted here from Wikipedia: "The KGB was concerned that the FLQ's attacks could be linked to the Soviet Union. It designed a disinformation campaign and forged documents to portray the FLQ as a CIA false flag operation. A photocopy of the forged 'CIA document' was 'leaked' to the Montreal Star in September 1971. The operation was so successful that Canada's prime minister believed that the CIA had conducted operations in Canada. The story was still quoted in the 1990s, even among academic authors."
August 11, 2025
One of four Executioner books Pendleton wrote in '75, this heads North of the border. Bolan encounters a Quebec gent who could be friend or foe, as he may also be in a terrorist group looking to separate the French people from the English government.
Most of the action takes place in a historic hotel, re-designed for nefarious purposes with the Montreal Olympics in mind. Good crime action tale.
Most of the action takes place in a historic hotel, re-designed for nefarious purposes with the Montreal Olympics in mind. Good crime action tale.
May 30, 2012
How I rate--
FIVE – the story has changed my life, the way I view the world, or has altered the way I write.
FOUR – the story has exceeded my expectations, this was truly a fabulous weave.
THREE – I liked it, my expectations were met, I got exactly what I paid for.
TWO – I was disappointed by this story and it wasn’t what I’d hoped for.
ONE – I’m not going to save this one from any Nazi Bar-B-Ques.
This one was great. This is two in a row, a record for this series. (Not really, but #22 was really bad, and #21 wasn’t anything special.)
This one is a lot like #15 and #4 being merged, and it worked real well. In #15 Mack acts like a ‘Black Ace’ to bring subterfuge to the Philadelphia Family, and in #4 Mack interrupts a big Mob convention in Miami. This time, the convention is in Montreal and he’s got ‘em all trapped like rats in a cage. I could easily see where Marvel's 'The Punisher' got its influence in this chapter of the bigger story.
I read this one in one sitting – it was that good.
FIVE – the story has changed my life, the way I view the world, or has altered the way I write.
FOUR – the story has exceeded my expectations, this was truly a fabulous weave.
THREE – I liked it, my expectations were met, I got exactly what I paid for.
TWO – I was disappointed by this story and it wasn’t what I’d hoped for.
ONE – I’m not going to save this one from any Nazi Bar-B-Ques.
This one was great. This is two in a row, a record for this series. (Not really, but #22 was really bad, and #21 wasn’t anything special.)
This one is a lot like #15 and #4 being merged, and it worked real well. In #15 Mack acts like a ‘Black Ace’ to bring subterfuge to the Philadelphia Family, and in #4 Mack interrupts a big Mob convention in Miami. This time, the convention is in Montreal and he’s got ‘em all trapped like rats in a cage. I could easily see where Marvel's 'The Punisher' got its influence in this chapter of the bigger story.
I read this one in one sitting – it was that good.
May 12, 2015
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
May 7, 2021
An interesting entry in the original Executioner series. Most of the action is set in a hotel in Montreal, where an international cadre of Mafia dons is meeting with the idea of manipulating French-speaking seperatists break away from Canada and then setting up an independent crime kingdom. It's an unlikely premise, but if you go with it, the action sequences are unique for the series. Posing as a top Mafia assassin, Mack Bolan is also staying at the hotel, but using secret passages to spread death and terror among the gangsters.
It is, both in the plans of the bad guys and the set-up at the hotel, perhaps the most unlikely and arguably contrived plot in the series, but it is still a lot of fun in its execution.
It is, both in the plans of the bad guys and the set-up at the hotel, perhaps the most unlikely and arguably contrived plot in the series, but it is still a lot of fun in its execution.
September 1, 2018
Canadian province of Quebec has always seen it’s self is having a separate identity from the rest of Canada. From time to time, they have considered separating themselves from Canada to become an independent country. In this novel, the organized crime families decide to use the desire of the people of Quebec to help them take over and establish a power base to control the flow of drugs and other illegal goods throughout the North American continent. If they succeed, they believe their power base will be nearly indestructible.
June 14, 2021
Closer to a 3.5, this was a weaker one for me from Pendleton. I liked the ideal behind it and even what Bolan does towards the end but a lot of other stuff seems to get in the way. Basically it's an international meet of mafia throughout the world in Quebec and they have took over a hotel. Which gives the Executioner a great hunting ground.
Any volume from Pendleton is recommended by me but again not my favorite by any means.
Any volume from Pendleton is recommended by me but again not my favorite by any means.
October 23, 2023
Absolute insanity-for some reason it paints Montreal as some sort of warzone.
Every Bolan book is so odd, paranoid, and incredibly violent- which is also underscored with the fact that the author never seems to have been to the places where the story takes place.
The paranoia usually just means that every Mob plan involves taking over the world- something I think no member of organized crime wants to do...
Every Bolan book is so odd, paranoid, and incredibly violent- which is also underscored with the fact that the author never seems to have been to the places where the story takes place.
The paranoia usually just means that every Mob plan involves taking over the world- something I think no member of organized crime wants to do...
July 31, 2018
Another quick read to clear the way for the next one
May 25, 2019
Little too much nobility not enough story.
May 31, 2019
Good read
Bolin is moving on, becoming more acclimated to his stationing in the world he has created for himself. No more deep questions, he is now aware of his destiny.
Bolin is moving on, becoming more acclimated to his stationing in the world he has created for himself. No more deep questions, he is now aware of his destiny.
December 13, 2021
Canadian conundrum
Well he did it again breakpoint action and storylines. Set this time in North America . As usual Nolan finds time for another kind of action .
Well he did it again breakpoint action and storylines. Set this time in North America . As usual Nolan finds time for another kind of action .
June 30, 2024
Once again Mack Bolan gets the job done. In this story Mack Bolan has to stop the Mafia from taking over Canada and expanding their influence
March 11, 2017
Reads like a romance novel. Not adventure
Boy (bolan) meets girl terrorist. Boland kills bad guys in a hotel with no real outside adventures. Boy changes Girl from terrorist to woman, and they ride off to the fishing hole together. Not the usual rugged and dangerous Mack Bolan type of he-man adventure.
Boy (bolan) meets girl terrorist. Boland kills bad guys in a hotel with no real outside adventures. Boy changes Girl from terrorist to woman, and they ride off to the fishing hole together. Not the usual rugged and dangerous Mack Bolan type of he-man adventure.
August 3, 2016
Another good one from Don Pendleton.
November 15, 2018
read some time in 1980
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews