Continental Contract

The Executioner #5

by Don Pendleton

The largest private gun squad in history follows Bolan to France, only to find the war has started without them, and 20 dead Frenchmen are mute testimony to the profinciency of the Executioner. . .

Genres: Thriller, Action, Adventure, Fiction, Crime, Suspense, Pulp

188 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1971

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

[Edwin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kind of a James Bond vibe to this one as Bolan goes international with an unexpected visit to Paris and the French Riviera, including the casino in Monte Carlo. All this doesn't lend itself well to the established Executioner premise and there are a few times that Bolan acts out of character, some credibility straining coincidences, and more than a few plot holes. I still found it to be an entertaining read although it doesn't quite match up to the previous entries in the series.

[Jake · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm deep into this series and #25 is next. All the same, this one gets two stars. This one was kinda dumb with the 'movie-star look-alike' who happens to be a fan of Mack Bolan. Book #3, Battle Mask is among my favorites in the series, and it was strong enough to hurdle me to #6 Assault on Soho which I also thought was awesome. Didn't like this one.

There were a couple decent action scenes to save this story from getting a '1' status. The end was just stupid, and then the very end, was even dumber still. Oh well, this is pulp, they can't all be great.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Our modern day Man from La Mancha escapes from the Eastern seaboard Mafia on a Paris-bound flight. Also on the trip - Gil Martin, recognizable movie star. On arriving, mistaken identities puts the innocent Gil in danger. Bolan tries to rescue the guy and finds that his Crime syndicate fighting has multiple fronts.

One of five Executioner novels published in 1971, some of the coincidences in this one put the fiction in action adventure to the test.

[Ken West · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read from beginning, this was a thrill ride of a Executioner novel for me. Loved the setting, the characters, the pace of the story. A great Mack Bolan novel from top to bottom, a favorite!

[Dartharagorn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another fun Bolan adventure! If you're a fan you'll enjoy this one as well. The only thing I didn't care for was the broken French that was thrown in. It became annoying to me after a bit. But that's just my opinion.

[Chris Haynes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished reading this book yesterday. Right after finishing I thought it was a really good book but the more I thought about it, I realized there were a lot of things wrong with the story.

One of the scenes that really show how old the book is, is when Bolan walks into an airport, walks up to an international flight podium and bribes the gate agent with $100 to get him on the plane. The agent has them reopen the plane to get him on. That would never happen today! Another scene of the book has Bolan taping a bunch of different types of maps together to make one good map of the area. No Garmin or Google Maps back in those days!!

Another thing that bothered me about the book was Bolan letting Rudolfi go...TWICE!! Why would he do that? In the previous book he shot a mob guy the instant a door was open wide enough to stick the gun through, no questions, no verification of who was opening the door, just blam and on to the next guy. It made no sense to let Rudolfi go, except to fit the narrative at the end of the book.

Other things that bothered me: the Paris police come to Bolan's hotel room just minutes after he killed a dozen guys (right across the street!!) and they don't check his passport because he has a naked woman in his bed and they are embarrassed for disturbing him. Seriously?!?! Cici made several suspicious phone calls that Bolan even thought were suspicious, but he doesn't even ask her about it the first time and the second time she assured him she wasn't betraying him and all he said was "OK"?!? That makes no sense. I know he spent some time in this book thinking about dying but it doesn't make sense to have such a fatalistic attitude that he wouldn't question her until he was satisfied with her answers. The Wilson Brown part of the story line really went nowhere and Brown's sudden change of heart at the end was too convenient.

The parts of the book I really liked were the Bolan character development scenes. He questions what he's doing, he feels he's reaching the end of his road and is going to die soon. He really just wants to take some time off and forget about everything, spending time in Eden with Cici is the way he put it. I thought those scenes showed Bolan's humanity.

I liked his second trip to Madame Celeste’s whorehouse where he started at the top and worked his way down to the street, taking out everybody in his way. I also really liked when he gave the mob an ultimatum that he would kill one mob boss every hour until the hookers were released. It didn't take them long to give in to his demands.

Like I said about the last book, it doesn't pay to be a female friend of Mack Bolan. In this book there are two women who feel the wrath of fate. One is a British hooker, in France trying to find herself and write a book, who gets kidnapped and is on her way to be sold into slavery in Algiers when Bolan convinces the mob to turn her and 9 other hookers loose. The other is Cici, who gets shot in the stomach while she and Bolan are making out. He should really come with a warning label.

Overall, I liked the book but I thought it was pretty weak compared to the previous 4 volumes.

[Monica Willyard Moen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Executioner wasn’t planning to go to France. However, when a reconnaissance mission in Washington DC went wrong, he had to make a quick exit. A jet preparing to fly to Paris was the trick. He thought Paris might offer a brief reprieve, some time to rest and get perspective. Instead, he found that the mafia had extensive networks in France, and they were willing to hunt him down just as eagerly as the mafia United States. When 10 young women were trafficked and sent to Africa to be sold into slavery, he realized it was time to teach the spoiled playboys in southern France some hard lessons.

[Theophilus (Theo) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great excitement. After you read this you might wonder what the inspiration was for all of those shoot-em-up video games. Mack Bolan is the original action hero. After his family was murdered by mafioso while he was serving the country in Vietnam, Mack Bolan declares war on the Mafia. He travels wherever they are to do battle. His relentless vendetta take him to France (mostly by accident) where he lets them know there is no hiding place on Earth where they are safe from him. He discovers a white slavery ring in Paris and the battle is engaged. Easy to read and to the point: good will triumph over evil, at least through this chapter of his private, and very personal war.

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Mack Bolan guy seems like kind of a nut.

[Davidus1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enjoyed all of the early Executioner books. All of Pendleton's are very good.

[Joe Nelson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Don Pendleton's Executioner hits France in this somewhat disjointed entry in the series, with moments of clever brilliance diminished by a curtain of mild stupidity.

Mack Bolan, one-man army against the mob, makes a quick escape from the opening chapter, which sees the Mafia trying to spring a trap on him at Dulles International Airport, and he finds himself in France, embroiled almost at once in more mob shenanigans when they snatch a lookalike actor who has the misfortune of being on the same plane as Bolan. He doesn't let this stand and goes on a blitzkrieg through the heart of Paris, rescuing the actor, wrecking a brothel, and learning of a white slave operation out of the south of France.

Sounds reasonable, right? Yeah, there's nothing wrong with the setup here. It's the details where things get shaky.

Pendleton continues to demonstrate that he really can't write women by including Cici Carceaux, a mysterious French actress who instantly rings warning bells for our man Bolan by knowing way more about this sordid affair than any spoiled actress should...but he ignores all of these signs and even admits he could be falling in love with her! Despite meeting her...um...twenty-four hours earlier.

For some reason Pendleton also decides to write Carceaux's dialog in a faux French "accent", dropping the 'H' and making her sound like a cartoon caricature from a Pink Panther movie. This is annoying.

Also annoying is that everyone in the book who isn't a Mafia hardcase immediately falls under the Bolan spell and offers all kinds of help. The actor who has suffered torture at the hands of the mob? Gives Bolan his identity and credit cards. The British hooker he meets in the brothel? Provides him with an alibi for the police without a moment's hesitation. Heck, even the petty criminal who knew Bolan in 'Nam, and who the Mafia intend to use to lure him out, changes his mind when he realizes just what a cool dude Mack Bolan is.

Aside from these eye-rolling decisions, the book does pick up in the middle with some splendid action sequences, especially the brothel hit, and the Executioner's ultimatum to stop the sale of innocent women.

The end fumbles the ball by making our normally intelligent hero do some stupid stuff, but despite all of this, it's still Pendleton and it's still better than the average action novel of the era.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book continues Mack Bolan’s war against the mafia. At the beginning of the book, Bolen is surrounded and escapes onto a flight to Paris (there were a lot looser flight rules when this book was written). In Paris, he takes his war to the French Mafia, who are related to the American Mafia, but have their own organization and rules of engagement.

Things get a little silly in Paris as Bolan switches identities with a film star. He then clears out a fancy brothel that is owned by a sophisticated mobster named Rudolfi. Rudolfi at first appears to be a businessman who is not very ruthless. In fact, Bolan spares his life initially. However, he turns out to be the main villain of the book. He kidnaps the prostitutes that Bolan just saved, which sends Bolan into a rage where he vows to kill a mobster every hour until the prostitutes are released. This becomes the main action of the book, as Bolan starts picking off mobsters one-by-one.

Bolen tags up with a French actress named Cici as a partner. He tries to keep his distance, but her beauty and style tempt him. An old Vietnam War buddy attempts to collect the reward money for Bolan. This creates a lot of tension as there is a setup waiting to capture Bolan with the help of this old friend.

All in all a pretty good novel with enough new characters to make it different and interesting. Bolan is now trapped in Europe and probably wants to find a way back to America to continue his crusade.

[ShanDizzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Battle for Britain was on.

Bolan’s war thus became a holy war, good versus evil, and he clung to this battle philosophy as his only buttress against a disapproving society. And as the war waged on, from front to successive front, his growing familiarity with the syndicate served to intensify this certain feeling that he was fighting the most vicious enemy to ever threaten his nation. The mob was everywhere, in everything controlling, manipulating, corrupting, wielding an influence such as no political party had ever dared dream. Invisibly they reached out to touch every man, woman, and child in the country—stealing more from the poor than from the rich squeezing the working man with invisible taxes and tributes, demoralizing and enslaving the young with drugs and insidiously corruptive pleasures, cannibalizing industry and victimizing both retailers and consumers, seizing the reins of government through blackmail and the exploitation of human greed—and everything they touched turned rotten and spoiled and ugly and corrupt. This was Mack Bolan’s vision, and his sustaining truth, and his reason for living when often the most pleasurable thing possible would be to merely die.

In the final analysis, Bolan realized, this was the last significant difference between himself and his enemies. He had not yet lost a reverence for innocent lives. To surrender that distinction would place Bolan in the same category as the scum he sought to eradicate—it would, in a sense, mean the loss of Bolan’s war, the end of meaning, and another loss for an already losing world.

Read this book on Scribd: https://www.scribd.com/book/244680523

[Curtis]

It's very interesting to read these books again, now with an adult perspective, and a writer's perspective too. Pendleton by book five is showing some confidence in his handling of the serialized nature of his writing. The first four seemed to aspire to somewhat self-contained storylines, where Bolan had a clear objective he was building to by the end of each book. This book on the other hand feels like a chapter in a larger story.

Bolan is more reactive here than in previous installments. Even his big blitz at the end is a response to events put in motion by his adversaries. He is passing through France, storywise -- breaking out of the Bolan-targets-a-specific-mobster formula.

He also seems to be learning from his mistakes. His pattern of endangering the lives of innocent people culminates in the injury of Cici, his main ally in this book. The last few pages suggest a shift in attitude regarding the involvement of others in his "war." It will be interesting to see if this change sticks -- more specifically, if Bolan's character is in fact shaped by the events of each book or if he "resets" to allow for more formulaic storytelling.

[Silver James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well. I've come to an end of my trip down Nostalgia Lane. The rest of the original Bolan books aren't in audio. Hopefully, they will be at some point. When they are, I'll come back to it because...yeah. Until then, I bid Bolan a fond farewell and hope to cross paths with him again sometime soon.

Due to circumstances and on account of because, Bolan finds himself in Paris. Friends are enemies and enemies are friends and trying to do the right thing can get a man dead. Bolan runs the gamut in this book and the trail of the dead...well...that would be a spoiler, wouldn't it now? Live on, Bolan, and fight another day!

Note: I have vision problems so reading digitally is hard and in print, it takes a magnifying glass. I'd much rather listen to books and tend to "inhale" them much like I did when I could read easily. Anyway...I may have to try reading the e-versions because right now, I kinda like being in Bolan's space.

[Viva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lots of violence and a little sex - pulp fiction style. If this is what you want, this is what you'll get.

This book is part of the Mack Bolan series and thank goodness that you can start with any book in the series because they have a prologue that kinda sets the stage.

When I read the other reviews, a word some reviewers used is "addicting". I never thought about it this way but it's true. I like these books and they are addicting in the fact that you want to read more.

Spoiler synopsis: Bolan escapes to France with the US government's unofficial blessing and cleans up there. The US Mafia tries to get their French affiliate to do the job with dozens of hardmen flown in. He befriends a couple of ladies. One is a lady of the night and when the whole brothel is punished by being sent over to Africa, Bolan saves them by killing one head baddie per hour until they are returned. Another lady falls in love with Bolan and helps him accomplish his task in Nice.

[Steven Jr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Executioner goes international with Continental Contract, the fifth entry in Don Pendleton's iconic action-adventure series. After dealing the Mafia a bloody nose in Miami, Mack Bolan is looking to skip town. The only way out leads him to Paris, where he quickly learns that the Mob is not solely an American problem. The Bolan Blitz is on in short order as France gets a taste of the pain that The Executioner can dole out.

I'm enjoying reading through the original Pendleton novels (aka the Mafia Wars) and I'm looking forward to the next entry in the series.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was free on Audible, and sometimes you really do get what you pay for. Granted it is pulp fiction from back in the day (1971 in this case) so the quality is marginal, but they’re entertaining enough and short at 4 hours each.

Battle Mask and Miami Massacre were my favorites out of the first five books, but this one was a stretch with the protagonist escaping capture overseas after running into his doppelganger who happens to be a movie star. The book ended with a fizz, and since additional books in the series aren’t free, I’ll go ahead and call it a wrap.

If you like long-running series and are a fan of pulp fiction, this series includes 464 books at its stopping point in 2020.

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe it's just that it's still quite early in the series, or maybe it's the international flavor, but in either case, I can't help but feel that there's a certain joie de vivre that raises this outing to be a cut above the average Bolan adventure. In comparison to the latter day Pendleton books that somewhat soullessly toured their way through every major metropolitan center in North America, this book actually feels like it takes advantage of its setting to provide some variety. The formula has not yet solidified, and it's nice to see Pendleton still playing with what an Executioner novel can be.

[Gilbert Stack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mack Bolan escapes his problems in Miami by flying to Paris and almost getting the jump on the Mafia who do not expect him to cross the ocean. On the flight, he discovers his new face has a reasonable resemblance to a Hollywood actor and when the Mafia moves in for the snatch, they grab the wrong man. Bolan wants to just go on with his life, but that’s not the sort of person he is. He hunts down the bad guys, rescues the man, and gets into a huge and interesting problem in France. There are people being punished for his actions and he needs to make it clear why nobody messes with the Executioner.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think with this series you either like it or you don't. I'm not seeing a whole lot of shift in quality between volumes, but that's both a good thing and a bad thing. In this one we see Bolan in Europe battling both the American and European mafia. This one did have more of a James Bond flavor then previous volumes, mostly due to the setting. Overall a good action adventure read. You sorta know what to expect, and you get it.

[Josh Hitch · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best men's adventure series there is, all the others are copies of varying degrees. This one was an above an already high quality average of the Pendleton books. Great action and maybe a slightly more vicious Bolan but with the same concern for innocents. Probably the best ending fight in one up to this point.

Nothing more to say this is the series to read in the men's adventure genre. Highly recommended.

[Luke Sims-Jenkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite as strong as Battle Mask or Miami Massacre, but nevertheless this is a fine continuation. Bolan gets out of some tricky situations in ways that are a little contrived, but for novels that are usually under 200 pages I don't mind so much. Especially when the characters and the action is done so well.

[Chris Hulme · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easy reading mens adventure

I have been reading the series for 20 years. The more recent ones are ghost written and don't have the same storylines and plots that the original writer did. I found these on Amazon, taking me back to how it all started. These are well-written easy to read books. Great action edventure, easy reading.

[Dennis Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Long ago friend

Read Don Pendleton many years ago, and when this book popped up I had to revisit. Mack Bolan hits France to continue his war against the Mafia. He meets several ladies who want to save him from himself but his hatred of the Mafia won’t let him be tamed. France will never be the same! ENJOY.

[Call me Jeeves · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mr badass himself! Not sure what year these books were written but in my opinion it is pre2000 . With today’s camera technology and saturation a guy doing this kind of work would have a hard time sneaking around.
The Don Pendleton executioner series was written by men for men who want serious action.

[Bill Riggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bolan’s French vacation turns into a bloody, violent tour of France from Paris to Monte Carlo. Full of bullet riddled action that can be expected from the Executioner series as the Mafia falls body after body from Mack’s blazing guns.

[Jon Koebrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Executioner series is a testosterone soak of vengeful violence and action. Continental Contract is an able representative of the series. A 3 star early 1970s less sophisticated Jack Reacher and a page burner.

[Duncan McCurdie · Rating 3 out of 5]

The worst one in the executioner series I have read so far and the first one where the action takes place outside of the US. It was a bit episodic and boring in parts, the ending was fun in a lame way but did rescue the book for me. On to the next…!

[David Patsel · Rating 4 out of 5]

fun book

Don Pendleton has a good series with these Mack Bolan books. He’s out for justice and usually gets it completed. Kinda crazy but fun reading. Quick stories with lots of shootouts. Recommend these!