Friday, October 13, 2017

FFB: Bloody Vengeance -- Jack Ehrlich

Jack Ehrlich wrote a lot of dandy paperbacks, both westerns and crime novels, although he's almost entirely forgotten now.  One of the most amazing of them is Bloody Vengeance.  I think I wrote once that I didn't know if Ehrlich was serious in this book or if it was a parody of the series like The Executioner and its many imitators.  Either way, reading it is quite an experience, and it's just as relevant now as it was back in 1973.

Here's the premise.  Some cops decide to take the law into their own hands.  If the law's not convicting the scum on the streets, why not just kill them?  What if this worked out so well that other cops took up the idea?  What if it became a movement that spread across the country?  What if the instigator if the whole thing became a powerful political figure and the head of a powerful political movement?

There are a couple of ways to take the book, as I said, but whichever one you choose, I think you'll agree that the book is very well done and pretty dang scary.  You can tell yourself that it can't happen here, but don't you have to wonder a little?  Check it out and see what you think.

3 comments:

August West said...

Didn't he write a series of books that featured a Parole Officer as the main character?

mybillcrider said...

Yes. Named Flick, I think.

Jeff Meyerson said...

I read one of the latter, I think, or at least one of his books. This one sounds almost Trumpian.