# Action-Adventure Book Series **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 31, 2002, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678 "2002-05-31T03:29:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2002, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/1 "2002-05-31T03:29:43Z")
I started reading the _Destroyer_ series by Sapir and Murphy back in th mid-70’s, continued with the _Executioner_ series by Don Pendleton, then read a bit of every series out there. My favorite was the _Smuggler_ series by Paul Petersen(the SAME Paul Petersen that played “Jeff Stone” on _The Donna Reed Show_, btw), but I can’t find them anywhere. Which ones do you remember and/or collect? ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2002, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/2 "2002-05-31T05:41:39Z")
Wasn’t there a series called _The Butcher_? About a Mafia type trying to get out of the business. When I was in Korea there was a used bookstore in the little town outside of our post. A lot of the stuff was series like that, and comic books, because, let’s admit it, the average soldier wasn’t reading Shakespeare. It was so easy to get hooked on that sort of stuff though. I kept going back to look for issues of _Thor_. (Hangs head in shame) ---
**Author:** ![tetsusaru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f14d63/32.png) [@tetsusaru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tetsusaru)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2002, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/3 "2002-05-31T11:49:31Z")
Remo Williams - The Destroyer. I got to the point where I could speed-read one of those in 45 minutes - I used to steal them off my brother and read them in the bath. About the only thing I remember now about them is the wise old Asian mentor who was addicted to soap operas. Anyone remember the movie they made of it? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2002, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/4 "2002-05-31T12:29:19Z")
Baker, your info on _The Butcher_ is correct. tetsusaru, there was a moving based very loosely on the first _Destroyer_ book. ---
**Author:** ![LurkMeister](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3da27b/32.png) [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2002, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/5 "2002-05-31T15:50:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Czarcasm \* > \*\*Baker, your info on _The Butcher_ is correct. > tetsusaru, there was a moving based very loosely on the first _Destroyer_ book. \*\* [Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins](http://us.imdb.com/Title?0089901) There was also a 1987 TV movie with Roddy McDowell & Jeffrey Meek as Chiun and Remo; IIRC it was intended as a pilot for a series which (unfortunately IMHO) never got picked up. I was a **Destroyer** fan and used to haunt used bookstores looking for missing titles. Somewhere in my library I have a copy of _The Assassin’s Handbook_, supposedly written by Chiun. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/6 "2002-06-01T00:32:45Z")
Other series I remember: _The Inquisitor_, a secret agent of the Vatican that had to do penance after every assassination. _The Enforcer_ by Andrew Sugar. He was recruited against his will, and lived from clone body to clone body. _Malko_, a European millionaire count that dabbled in secret-agentry. _The Penetrator_, a cross between the Destroyer and the Executioner, Mark Hardin killed Commies with machine guns and studied martial arts under an ancient Indian medicine man. ---
**Author:** ![dr\_hermes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dfb087/32.png) [@dr\_hermes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dr_hermes)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/7 "2002-06-01T01:14:02Z")
The Remo Williams TV plot only aired once, but luckily many fans happened to have a VCR warmed up that night. ``` For a review of that pilot, as well as one of the rewrite of the first Destroyer book, not to mention the book where Remo and Chiun meet Fu Manchu and Kato (no, really!), may I refer you to my web site: ``` [http://community.webtv.net/drhermes/ForbiddenKnowledge](http://community.webtv.net/drhermes/ForbiddenKnowledge) ``` There's also reviews of the Doc Savage, Fu Manchu and Avenger series, old-time radio, cliffhanger serials, and much more, so if you like adventure series, there's likely to be something there you'l find interesting. ``` ---
**Author:** ![tallinu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6de8d8/32.png) [@tallinu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tallinu)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/8 "2002-06-01T04:20:29Z")
Oh wow, hadn’t thought about this series in years. I just went and dug through my book boxes, I have about 40 Destroyer books, 1-20, then scattered, up to 101, somewhere along the line, Sapir and Murphy stopped writing all of them, I have some by other writers. Have a few of the Executioners as well, haven’t touched in 15 years (no, I never get rid of books), never really got into his second career after taking out the entire American mafia :rolleyes: Heh, and the last series of men’s adventure books I found is the _really_ men’s adventure, _ **Blade** _. The continuing series of a British secret agent deminsionally travelling to barbaric worlds and chopping up bad guys with big ole broadswords and then -ahem- graphically getting down with some lovin’ Man, just looking at these books are making feel 15 again… ---
**Author:** ![Drastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Drastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drastic)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/9 "2002-06-01T07:14:56Z")
I enjoyed the **Endworld** series, set in post-WWIII America. The heroes were all Warriors of the Family, which was sort of the inbred remnant of a population pool that was likely somewhat inbred in the first place, who survived in a compound built and planned by a very wealthy survivalist fellow. Among other things, they had an indestructible SUV with rocket launchers and flamethrowers and such. There were an awful lot of scenes of characters about to have sex, but then not having it because they weren’t married yet, and then generally killing the hell out of something shortly afterwards. Lots of displacement anxiety going on in that series. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/10 "2002-06-01T12:14:42Z")
I’ve read a couple of the **Casca** series by Sgt Barry (Ballad of the Green Berets) Sadler. They’re bad. They’re very, VERY bad. But far worse than those, (and I’m talkin’ MST3K level bad) is the **Survivalist** series by Jerry Aherns. What was weird, is that it was just a book about a mercenary type (IIRC) until, about halfway through the series, the character gets “Buck Rodgers”-ed into the future…very VERY weird. Did I mention that the writing was **Bad**? From a handy backcover: > [@](#): > > World War Ill left America a toxic wasteland, its proud civilization buried in the poison ruins of nuclear attack. Its spirit all but destroyed, the small tribes of desperate nomads crushed by Soviet conquerors and their troops had little hope for freedom. Until one man dared to challenge the terrible Russian war machine: John Thomas Rourke, ex-CIA Covert Operations Officer, weapons expert and warrior, the ultimate Survivalist. > > After his brilliant attack on the combined forces of the Soviet and Fascist armies outside of Eden, Rourke and the rebels retreated to relative safety in the lush Rift Valley. Or so they thought. Ruthless mercenaries known as Land Pirates attacked them deploying their huge mobile arsenals of mega-particle beam antipersonnel weapons in a bloody surprise raid. Forced to run, Rourke and his troops were surrounded on all sides by hostile armies. The cause of America’s freedom seemed doomed forever But out of the flames of bitter defeat, democracy’s greatest warrior rallied to snatch his most decisive victory! Really. I doubt that much could be weirder or worse. Fenris ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/11 "2002-06-01T12:41:24Z")
Wanna bet? _Gor_. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/12 "2002-06-01T12:55:21Z")
Amateurs – all you need know is Mack Maloney’s **Wingman** series. It started as your pulp post-World War III baloney ([very popular with New Order conspiracy theorists](http://www.geocities.com/blackjac21a/)): > [@](#): > > "Disarmed and leaderless, the United States is united no longer. The capital city of Washington has been reduced to a smoking pile of radioactive rubble. In weeks a proud nation is decimated in a deadly rain of treachery and deceit, driven to the depths of chaos and madness under the brutal heel of the evil Soviet warlords. > > Out of the blasted ruins of a once great land emerges a hero for the ages, Hawk Hunter, the brilliant ace fighter pilot. A fearless man of extraordinary abilities crossing a war-blackened landscape, a nightmarish breeding ground of fanaticism, slavery and unspeakable carnage. A savage lone warrior on the bloody road to retribution, keeping alive the indomitable spirit of a forgotten dream called “America”." And is currently in 7200AD: > [@](#): > > Earth is the center of a vast galactic empire—a militaristic state governed by stern repression. The Specials, an extended family that has wielded power for nearly two thousand years, control the Galaxy with ironfisted zeal. After generations of genetic manipulation they are virtually immortal—as is their rule… > > On an isolated planet on the very fringe of the Galaxy lives a pilot named Hawk Hunter. He designs his own ships, using strange technology—but he can not explain his abilities or his knowledge. His past is a mystery, even to himself… > > Hunter has won the Earth Race and has been given a commission in the Empire’s far-flung military. But just as quickly, he has gone AWOL from the Emperor’s elite X- Forces in order to search for the mythical Home Planets. After battling his way across the most dangerous regions of the Galaxy, Hawk believes he may have finally found the secret of the long-lost First Empire, and of his own identity, on a place called “Planet America . . .” ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/13 "2002-06-01T13:08:11Z")
Does _Hardy Boys_ count? ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2002, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/action-adventure-book-series/111678/14 "2002-06-01T15:25:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Czarcasm \* > \*\*Wanna bet? > > _Gor_. \*\* I conceed. Did you know that Norman wrote a non-fiction book called **Imaginative Sex**? He tells you how to improve your sex-life with your wife and offers up about 75 role playing scenarios to put the spice back into your enchelada. so to speak. They’re all VERY different too. In one case, you’re a tired camel driver and your wife/girlfriend is your caravan’s slave girl. In another, you’re a warrior, and your wife/girlfriend is your platoon’s slave girl. In a third, you’re a rich arab sheik and your wife/girlfriend is your slave girl. SO there’s quite a variety. It gets really creepy in one of the appendixes where he talks about how to go to the Sudan, etc. to _really_ buy a slave. How to find a slave-market, what to look for when buying, etc. As far as I can tell, he’s completely serious. Yuk. Fenris