But you perfected your technique for pitching tents in the boy scouts ,Right?


Ken

Technically I wasn't a boy scout. I crossed over the arrow of light but never went any further. I technically was a "weblo scout".

Then in the Army I was a cavalry scout.

Now I am just an overweight homo who works for FTD. <sighs> I coulda been a contendah!

Technically I wasn't a boy scout. I crossed over the arrow of light but never went any further. I technically was a "weblo scout".

Then in the Army I was a cavalry scout.

Now I am just an overweight homo who works for FTD. <sighs> I coulda been a contendah!

Keep your eye on the tiger! It's not over till the overweight homo sings (hopefully not in drag:o ) Anything but drag, please!!!

Ken

Technically I wasn't a boy scout.

Technically, I was in the Boy Scouts . . . but I actually scouted girls.

Ken V.

One of my dearest friends got me addicted. It was back in 97 or 98 and he loaned me the entire adversary (entire at that time) cycle. I read The Keep, The Tomb, The Touch, Reborn, Reprisal and Nightworld in around 4 days. I have been a hopeless addict ever since. John, darling, thanks for the withdrawl pains I have had to experiece for 1-2 years at a time waiting for my next RJ fix. I think of you every time I am laying in a corner, in the fetal position; quivering and sucking my thumb!!!

Back in 1986 I helped a friend paint their three story high townhouse. This entailed climbing rickety scaffolding and leaning out into thin air to reach some of the overhanging trim. As payment, I chose a couple of boxes of books rather than cash, but I was young and ignorant, or they had a huge library. Along with some books on philosophy and economics I got some Robert Heinlein pbs, and one of the other books happened to be "An Enemy of the State." I've bought virtually every FPW book since then, inlcuding the AC series when they first were published by Dark Harvest, plus "The Keep" and "The Tomb" in paperbacks (and later, hardcovers). Probably the only FPW book that I have not read is "Virgin." After reading "Harbingers" I don't know if I can keep reading RJ since it sucked a lot of emotional investment right out of me, perhaps the opposite effect of what FPW intended. I'll still buy 'em, but I might have to set them aside for a while until I recover.

A good friend handed me The Keep in 1985. At that point my most enjoyable reading experience........until I read The Tomb months later.

I'd had a battered Jove paperback of The Keep in my room for several years, something I'd found in a used store somewhere with a bunch of others. Then one day in...mmm, June? of 2000, I found it suddenly, and I started reading it...and I read a bit more...and more...and then my most favorite combination of four words leapt out at me as a dark presence leapt out of the crumbling wall before Otto: "The horror had begun." I was hooked for life.

My first one was CrissCross a couple months ago. I was shopping at Barnes and Noble and came across it and decided it looked like a good read. It was and I found a couple others in the series and read them too. After that I went online and bought the remaining ones and read them in order. I'm still trying to find an inexpensive copy of The Tomb.

Now maybe what I'm going to say may not sit well with long time RepairmanJack series fans but I feel that the protagonist is losing his edginess and becoming too much of a wimp and a new age guy. There's so much time spent on his relationships with his family and with his girlfriend that the crucial parts of the stories for me - Jacks career as a fix it guy - is being neglected. Crisscross actually held me spellbound precisely because there was so much focus on the capers he was involved in - the "church" and the nun being blackmailed. There was practically no external family forces pushing him.

The last novel I read - Infernal (which was the final one of all the Jack novels I read) - actually bored me and also got me thinking about how Jack's character in this novel did things that he never would have done before. He went off on a boat trip out of the country with no ID and knowing his brother was being investigated. I really found that hard to believe. This is a guy who could barely use the airport to visit his ill father in Florida.

And some of the dialog in Infernal was downright corny. Jacks attempts to make the dying Muslim believe that Jack was sent by Ayatollah Khmomeni. Ouch. That was simply painful for me to read. And what about the fact that he knew that the spell could only be transferred twice? It was plain as can be that was a fact but he spent the last few hours of his life trying to get someone else to take it? Not believable. Lastly, the almost impossible to believe coincidence that the book was still there in the cellar of a burned out cabin - one that the Feebs would have gone through with a fine tooth comb - was the icing on what was a poorly conceived cake.

OK, I'll stop harping on this for now. I'm hoping that maybe the author will go back to the style of the first half dozen or so Jack novels now that his whole family has been killed off. After all, a spear has no branches, right? Or are Gia, Vicki, and the newborn to be more branches?

My first one was CrissCross a couple months ago. I was shopping at Barnes and Noble and came across it and decided it looked like a good read. It was and I found a couple others in the series and read them too. After that I went online and bought the remaining ones and read them in order. I'm still trying to find an inexpensive copy of The Tomb.

Now maybe what I'm going to say may not sit well with long time RepairmanJack series fans but I feel that the protagonist is losing his edginess and becoming too much of a wimp and a new age guy. There's so much time spent on his relationships with his family and with his girlfriend that the crucial parts of the stories for me - Jacks career as a fix it guy - is being neglected. Crisscross actually held me spellbound precisely because there was so much focus on the capers he was involved in - the "church" and the nun being blackmailed. There was practically no external family forces pushing him.

The last novel I read - Infernal (which was the final one of all the Jack novels I read) - actually bored me and also got me thinking about how Jack's character in this novel did things that he never would have done before. He went off on a boat trip out of the country with no ID and knowing his brother was being investigated. I really found that hard to believe. This is a guy who could barely use the airport to visit his ill father in Florida.

And some of the dialog in Infernal was downright corny. Jacks attempts to make the dying Muslim believe that Jack was sent by Ayatollah Khmomeni. Ouch. That was simply painful for me to read. And what about the fact that he knew that the spell could only be transferred twice? It was plain as can be that was a fact but he spent the last few hours of his life trying to get someone else to take it? Not believable. Lastly, the almost impossible to believe coincidence that the book was still there in the cellar of a burned out cabin - one that the Feebs would have gone through with a fine tooth comb - was the icing on what was a poorly conceived cake.

OK, I'll stop harping on this for now. I'm hoping that maybe the author will go back to the style of the first half dozen or so Jack novels now that his whole family has been killed off. After all, a spear has no branches, right? Or are Gia, Vicki, and the newborn to be more branches?

Welcome to the board, shmoolie.

Hmm.....you couldn't get into "Infernal"? Well,then, you should read next RJ book, "Harbingers". Very shocking but that's first style. You'll get Jack's excellent fix-it job, ultimate terror(almost gory), Adversary vs. Ally, etc etc...

I feel that the protagonist is losing his edginess and becoming too much of a wimp and a new age guy. There's so much time spent on his relationships with his family and with his girlfriend that the crucial parts of the stories for me - Jacks career as a fix it guy - is being neglected.

Welcome to the board, Shmoolie. I do have to disagree though. I think Jack's relationships humanize him - he could have become a shallow two-dimensional character. His interactions with Abe, Gia and Vicky allow Jack to show human weaknesses. Therefore when he overcomes evil, he is doing it as a human not as a superhero action figure.