Death Draws Five

Wild Cards #17

by George R.R. Martin (Editor), John Jackson Miller

Despite their very different goals and purposes in life, the destinies of a wide variety of individuals--Mr. Nobody, the Midnight Angel, Billy Ray, John Nighthawk, Fortunato, and John Fortune--lead to Leo Barnett's Peaceable Kingdom, where their actions could spell the difference between the Apocalypse and world peace, in an original novel set in the Wild Cards universe.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Superheroes, Fiction, Ebooks, Short Stories, Alternate History

299 pages, Hardcover

First published January 29, 2006

About the author

George Raymond Richard "R.R." Martin was born September 20, 1948, in Bayonne, New Jersey. His father was Raymond Collins Martin, a longshoreman, and his mother was Margaret Brady Martin. He has two sisters, Darleen Martin Lapinski and Janet Martin Patten.

Martin attended Mary Jane Donohoe School and Marist High School. He began writing very young, selling monster stories to other neighborhood children for pennies, dramatic readings included. Later he became a comic book fan and collector in high school, and began to write fiction for comic fanzines (amateur fan magazines). Martin's first professional sale was made in 1970 at age 21: The Hero, sold to Galaxy, published in February, 1971 issue. Other sales followed.

In 1970 Martin received a B.S. in Journalism from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, graduating summa cum laude. He went on to complete a M.S. in Journalism in 1971, also from Northwestern.

As a conscientious objector, Martin did alternative service 1972-1974 with VISTA, attached to Cook County Legal Assistance Foundation. He also directed chess tournaments for the Continental Chess Association from 1973-1976, and was a Journalism instructor at Clarke College, Dubuque, Iowa, from 1976-1978. He wrote part-time throughout the 1970s while working as a VISTA Volunteer, chess director, and teacher.

In 1975 he married Gale Burnick. They divorced in 1979, with no children. Martin became a full-time writer in 1979. He was writer-in-residence at Clarke College from 1978-79.

Moving on to Hollywood, Martin signed on as a story editor for Twilight Zone at CBS Television in 1986. In 1987 Martin became an Executive Story Consultant for Beauty and the Beast at CBS. In 1988 he became a Producer for Beauty and the Beast, then in 1989 moved up to Co-Supervising Producer. He was Executive Producer for Doorways, a pilot which he wrote for Columbia Pictures Television, which was filmed during 1992-93.

Martin's present home is Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is a member of Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (he was South-Central Regional Director 1977-1979, and Vice President 1996-1998), and of Writers' Guild of America, West.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/george...

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Old friends, new friends, the usual semi-ridiculous scenes. Glad to finally fill a gap as this was the final "old" Wild Cards book I had not read before the new generation of characters came in with Inside Straight.

[Jimyanni · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an example of a book that tells an exciting, entertaining tale, with excellent characterization, good pacing and a compelling plot, that is ridiculously poorly written/edited. (Yes, it's the editor's job to fix those sloppy errors, but it's the writer's job not to put so many of them in the manuscript in the first place.) Things like someone wearing an "Armani suite", asking "Did you brought...", having a "guilty conscious", (twice in two sentences). Phrases like, "He swiveled unto his hands and knees...", "There wasn't much too it.", "...he had feelings for her which he weren't at all sure were reciprocated.", "...smothered the air they were trying to breath.", "...the magazine a top the pile...", "The van engine's was idling...", "a human figure, talk and bulky...", "...the ichor that eaten through her jumpsuit..." (what? Not her jumpsuite?), "...listen to a records she had from when she was young.", "...almost over whelmed...", "...no time for idle past-times...", "...gunfire knocked her to her feet...", "...paused on the thresh hold..." -- I could go on and on. These are just FEW of this sort of error that plagues this book. A professional author should have been able to deliver a cleaner manuscript than this by middle school. And a professional editor should have been able to clean up most of them. These aren't obscure, technical errors. These are glaring sloppinesses that should never make it into a professionally written, professionally edited book. I understand that people are human, and mistakes will slip through. Two or three in a book this size and I wouldn't even mention it. But this was ridiculous. The story and characterizations I give five stars. On technical merit, it barely rates one.

[Ch J Loveall · Rating 1 out of 5]

Read the world when younger; liked then, do not like now.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely a good Wild Cards novel, and a strong bridge to the next generation, thanks to its focus on John Fortune, a son of two characters from the early books.

The idea that he is the savior or the Anti-Christ is all kinds of wacky, but Miller makes it work. He also does a great job of really emulating the Wild Cards style as a single author. So we get lots of threads and lots of different characters, and they come together in meaningful ways.

[James Freeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I took a long break from these books as i thought it was off course universe wise. This book has restored my faith and I look forward to trying to get through them all.

[Craig Childs · Rating 4 out of 5]

"You know, I've never shared a motel room with a girl before."

John Fortune's card turns in dramatic fashion one night at a Las Vegas magic show, setting off a chain of events that will probably bring about the Apocalypse. As the only known offspring of two ace parents, everyone is interested in getting their hands on the sixteen year old boy, even as his primary concern is getting his hands on available beautiful women…

"I am the Midnight Angel. Named after the hour of my Lord's Passion in the Garden of Gethsemane."

The Midnight Angel believes John Fortune is the Second Coming of her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Her wild card ability is to wield the flaming sword of Gabriel in His defense. She takes her marching orders from Former President Leo Barnett. Leo's Secret Service bodyguard is Billy 'Carnifax' Ray, who tags along with Angel more for the excitement than out of any sense of duty…

"You live in a strange world… I'm a hundred and fifty years old now. In my time men have walked on the moon and visited the planets of another star. Men can fly. They can read your mind. They can turn invisible and disappear. They can do most anything except bring peace to the world."

John Nighthawk is a former slave whom the wild card has given long life and prophetic visions. He serves an ancient order of the Catholic Church which believes John Fortune is the Anti-Christ. Their plan is to kidnap Fortune, steal the Shroud of Turin, and use Cameo to bring the real Jesus back into the world. Nighthawk is not so sure about this plan, but he is willing to play along for as long as it suits his purposes…

"Tell your children, tell your family, your friends, your loved ones, and those evil ones you fear, that Fortunato is back from the dead."

Fortunato has been enjoying life as a monk these past 16 years in Japan, but when he learns his son is in danger, he comes out of retirement and reclaims his powers in a big way…

John Jos. Miller delivers a fun, zany solo novel in the Wild Cards series with lots of callbacks to earlier characters and events. Readers catch up on favorites like Mr. Nobody, Digger Downs, Bradley Finn, Poppinjay, The Highwayman, Father Squid, Peter Pann, Ti Malice, and Will o' Wisp.

Notable developments include:

Yeoman is now married to Wraith. They have two kids who are guarded by his army of manikins…

The Living Gods return… The entire Egyptian Pantheon is now performing live on stage every night!

Peregrine is married to Josh McCoy, who has mellowed since we last saw him chasing card sharks in Latin America.

Leo Barnett is a less interesting character than he used to be. He runs a Christian theme park and has become a cross between Jimmy Carter and Jim Bakker.

A new character Mushroom Daddy may in fact be Mark Meadows incognito.

Plus, a few key characters don't make it out of this one alive.

Next up is 2008’s Wild Cards: The Hard Call (graphic novel)

[Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the weaker Wild Card books. There are a ton of characters and movement between locations, but there's not much story.

These books need footnotes, a la Jack Vance, when a returning character, item, or location first comes on stage. The footnote should just be a quick power description and history recap. You shouldn't need to have Wikipedia open to figure out who is who.

[Florian Holzner · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fast paced story, but somewhat cheesy to me at times. A good, entertaining read; devoured it in two or three reading sessions, but I don't think I'll revisit this.

[Squirrel · Rating 1 out of 5]

The setup for a conflict between Christian and Egyptian deities is in-your-face from the get-go. Shame the book doesn't go that way, it could have been stellar. Instead you get Christianity and Conspiracy over and over. Who needs Wild Cards for that story?

All as setups for violent battles and explicit sex scenes. If I want those, I'll find better storytellers and more compelling story lines. And why is anyone surprised, in that universe, that top players all have Aces working for them? ~sigh~

The writing itself is so clumsy it interrupts the flow. For example, a character introduction includes, "He moved slowly, almost languidly. He was even more bored than he looked. >paragraph< As the kid approached, Ray looked up from his plate piled high with beef ribs and chicken fried steak with gravy and biscuits, green beans, corn ..." Really? Do bored, slow people order enough food for 3 and then sit bored, moving slowly, before digging in?

Shortly after: "Sometimes that was the hardest thing about being an ace of all." (Proofreader! Editor? What is 'an ace of all'?)

Up next, skirting plagiarism from the get-go (p. 15): "She also didn't much care for skulking. ... She was much too forthright to skulk." It was delivered much better in the movie, Four Weddings and a Funeral. Andie MacDowell as Carrie says to Hugh Grant as Charlie: "I don't usually skulk a lot; but, I suppose I could skulk if skulking were required. Do you skulk regularly?" The tone, the repetition...much too close. Did no one catch this? The editor, proofreader, advance readers?

Also not a fan of the endless 2-page scenes, jumping between locations and characters. So unnatural that the writer has to TELL you each time where you are with bold subheads.

In a way, "Wild Cards" informs on the range of books in the series - this delivered a losing hand from my view.

[Jamieb · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some of the ideas for this book were decent enough. Bringing back Fortunato and giving him a good send off for example, as well as introducing John Fortune. What I don't understand is why Barnett, the type of 'love the sinner but hate the sin' Christian who regularly used his faith to justify attempts at setting up concentration camps for Wild Cards, would view the Wild Card son of two Aces as being Jesus reborn. It doesn't fit the character and even though they have him still say bigoted things and attempt to explain his reasoning, it falls very flat and just comes across as the author desperately trying to convince you that this really is in character. Having a sect of the catholic church be involved and instantly decide John is the Antichrist was also very forced just to have an antagonistic force in play. The book was also littered with spelling and grammar mistakes and the usual 'this young woman is a professional/working/uninterested/going through trauma/generally just can't stand this man 20-30 years older than her but will jump in bed with him by the end of the novel' plot that all the male Wild Cards writers can't stop themselves from adding in. Perhaps if the different POV's had been written by other writers, or if someone else had written the story entirely, it could have been saved but as it is I can only see it as a waste of a read.

[Nicholas Whyte · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/death-draws-five-by-john-jos-miller/

A full-length novel in GRRM’s Wild Cards series, which I got in the same Humble Bundle as the Amber prequels. The setting is a roughly contemporary America decades after thousands were infected with a virus that gave them varying superhero powers. A former President and a dissident wing of the Vatican believe that the child of two such “Aces” is the Messiah reborn, or possibly the Antichrist. It’s tricky to handle this topic in pulp format, but Miller makes a good fist of it.

Unfortunately I’m going to complain again about the formatting of the electronic book. Most of the chapter headings have been displaced to the end of the book, as a weird appendix, and that means the text is not broken up helpfully for the reader. The publisher, iBooks, folded before the paper version of the book went on general release, but that’s no excuse. It’s not as bad as the Zelazny collection, but it’s not good. Hopefully the recent Tor re-release won’t have the same problem.

[Johan Dariel · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yeah, wild cards has a mediocre writer its j.j. The book itself reads as a mix of the worst traits of a YA book and the fetishes of the author.

The new characters go on to become fleshed out an a good addition to the series over all, but here you'll only find several stories that could've been great if they were taken seriously or not a throwaway location to drag the characters along.

I understand that this was supposed to be 1 book but the scope of the story is something that should've been planned better. As a result we get fast paced nonsensical scenes where a lot of nothing happens and tension that you'll only feel if you're not annoyed at the pacing and constant miracles that hold the story together.

Unfortunately It does expand on the lives and stories of beloved characters and the lore of most of the teleporting wild cards.

At the end of the day, I could recommend the book only if you like the authors writing or if you wanna read all of the wild cards books.

Otherwise this is the that I skip every time I read the series.

[Alasdair King · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the Wild Card series. Although this is unusual for the series as it isn't a mosaic with a number of authors, Death Draws Five is able to hold its place on the shelf and is a deserving part of the group. There are some cameo roles from a few of our old favorites, and it is nice to meet them again.
It's a an adventure romp with quite a bit of action, something to expect when Billy Ray is involved. In fact the handling of Billy Ray is done well, and to me he develops into a more rounded character, this is possibly the best I have ever liked him. Having read some of the later books (I am out of sync because not all are available on the Kindle) I knew how some things would pan out but it was still enjoyable to read how it all happened.
I am left wanting to find the next one.

[Victor Ng-Thow-Hing · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Wild Card series started in 1987, and I’ve been reading the books ever since. Death Draws Five is a standalone book, not really part of a trilogy, but readers will benefit from previous books for the background of several characters and better understanding of various references from previous book. It’s a quick read and has some good page turner moments. The adversaries start out strong, but kind of disappoint at the end.

You do become attached to some characters but I think their arcs could be developed more that you fear for their jeopardy a bit more. Its a bit of a different take from the MCU, and I like the series for that reason, but some stories are better than others. This one is kind of in the lower half.

[Gary Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent continuation of Wild Cards storyline

This was one of the better books in the series, maybe partly because it had only one author and wasn't a series of short stories.

The plot consisted of rescuing the son of Peregrine and Fortunato from those who wanted to cause him harm (and in a way, from those that wanted to protect him, too). Main characters consisted of Billy Ray, The Angel, Nighthawk, Jerry Strauss and the welcome return of Fortunato. My only disappointment was with the ending, which seemed a trifle too abrupt.

[James Ronholm · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm new to this "universe" (read one short story anthology before this novel) but if they are all as good as this book I will probably read some more of them. A very enjoyable read with some outlandish super-hero type characters.

One comment about the editing - there were A LOT of mistakes where a word was spelled correctly but it was the wrong word. Very clearly this was a case of something like "autocorrect" gone wrong. I didn't actually keep track, but it seemed like it might be as high a rate as one for every couple of pages.

[Shannon Grant · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed it a lot more than the previous few WC books. Necessarily marked down due to ongoing misogyny (I’m not surprised anymore given who writes these but I’m excited to see if this changes in the 2006+ books) as well as the fact that every attractive female who is introduced in this series has sex with a main character by the end and it’s just a little predictable. Felt like the original ones though so that’s cool.

Also, I’ve never seen so many typos in a published book.

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jumped back in here


I stopped reading this series with book 12 back when that was new. This was a fine re-entry point, with old characters in New situations alongside fresh faces, but without much confusion at all for this lapsed fan. I now plan on forging forward to the next book!

[Wai Kit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fast paced plot, with good characterization, Billy Ray who deals a lot of ass kicking, Midnight Angel who struggles with her faith, original characters like mushroom daddy and the Witness aka "The Bigger Asshole".

[Elliot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Faaaaabulous story

[Leonel Esteban]

excelente, muy emocionante el regreso de algunos personajes, los giros de la trama y el final no decepciona. Me gustó mucho como fueron madurando al personaje de Billy Ray en estos últimos libros.

[Nan Silvernail · Rating 4 out of 5]

When two Aces love each other very, very much... or in this case just once but too well, the child has the Wild Card virus. Worse, the child is almost certain to draw the black queen called Death when their card turns. So, the beautiful Ace, Peregrine has been futilely guarding her child, conceived with the Ace, Fortunato trying to keep him as safe as possible from stresses that could turn his card and probably take him from her sooner than later. But what she and Fortunato don't know is that two wildly fanatical religious cults are waiting for that card to turn as well. One thinks he will become the Antichrist and the other thinks he will become the Christ, literally! Maybe the kid should have followed his famous sire to that Buddhist monastery...

[Theresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Death Draws Five (Wild Cards, #17)
by John J Miller (editor)

Continuing the story of the wild cards through the millennium, how those affected by the wild card survive, and live through the tragedy and self-struggle. Fortunato returns to find his son, only to find a greater mystery involving religion and the wild card virus. Is he able to sacrifice everything for another person, and who would he finally sacrifice everything for.
Highlights of the book, Cameo’s channeling of Cole Porter, and Nighthawks old friend. Ti Mace Pun and conclusion together…Wrap of the controversy of Finn’s position. Jon Fortunato meets his famous father and coming to terms with his heritage.

[Iain · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good fun romp, with an undercurrent of anti-Catholicism that marks it down a star for me. An excellent mix of familiar and new characters, with the rather-too-bodacious babe Midnight Angel and the enigmatic John Nighthawk mixing well with the gone-too-long Fortunato, Jerry Strauss and (the highlight for me) a newly-sympathetic Billy "Carnifex" Ray. Some excellent cameos (including the tieing-up of a loose end) keep the interest of the long time reader but might be a bit confusing for a newbie. There's also an unexpected developing love story that has you rooting that these kids make it work. An equally unexpected ending is nevertheless satisfying. Good fun all round.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

This 17th Wild Cards book is a single-author (John J. Miller) novel, not a mosaic or collection as almost all of the others have been. It may well the most obscure book of the series, being published by ibooks shortly before they went out of business. It's different in that there's less action and more of a sustained romance. It does a nice job of bridging the early books into a new century, and paving the way for a new generation of cards. I especially liked his portrayal of the character Cameo. It's worth looking for this one before starting the Tor sequence.

[Daniel McGill · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great book like all in this series but this is one of the single author volumes rather then the more common mosaic novels and suffers a bit like the others from the author's writing of characters he didn't create. I've never heard of the publisher iBooks before and assume that is the reason it suffers even more from a LOT of misprints.

[Samuel Lubell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unlike all but one other Wild Cards book this is not an anthology or Mosaic novel but a traditional novel, by one author, set in the world of Wild Cards. It is sort of a transition between one age of the series and another. Much of the book focuses on the son of Fortunato, so a second generation book, but Poppinjay and Fortunato and Billy Ray play major roles too.

[Steven Morton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This started out the story of the Committee which rolls out in the next series of Wildcards books. I love Carnifex as a character I enjoyed the focus on him and that he could actually find his version of love fially with Angel. One of the more action packed books in the series.

[Shannon Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good with some great moments and characters. But it took a while to get everything straight and not having read earlier Wild Cards books I was a bit confused by more than a few moments. Definitely however left me wanting to read more about these characters and this world.

[Mark Hartman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Starts out really slow and then speeds up to end. Poor font choice for text makes reading a pain. Overall not bad seems like it could have been a short story instead of a novel with some filler throughout.