I got an email the other day criticising my ratings of books and my generally negative attitude towards some of the authors and “these books are all crap anyway” (Also had emails before saying I’m a Commie loving b… and another saying I’m a fascist racist anti-Obama c…..) and seriously I do appreciate the emails, at least you take the time to write and more importantly have a viewpoint, but please leave comments instead (click on a google advert would be cool too) as I want to have an open conversation and get others involved. I am happy to publish all comments, apart from those ones I get on a daily basis about pharmaceutical goods that I supposedly need. So if you have a viewpoint, let me and the rest of the world know.
As I’m a sensitive soul, who bites hard to protect my lack of confidence, my {insert supposed self criticism here} and thinks everybody is against me, I’ve decided to take the Fox News route, which I do enjoy watching, especially how here in Australia I can watch Glenn Beck followed immediately by John Stewart on The Comedy Channel. (Do you think Stephen Colbert wasn’t that good this year too?) This Fox news defence means I:

1) Dumb down to my audience level with a hatred for people who are cleverer or different from us.
That means I think you are stupid and that you are too stupid to see that I’m pretending to be stupid so that we can be buddies. The only problem is that I don’t even have an audience. However, I write about Cold War Fiction which is what the literati, the elitists and probably Big Government look down their nose at. Those elitists in {insert your capital city here} would rather I wrote about books such as Vernon God Little (happy to start a collection to pay for someone to hunt down and kill Finlay and professional reviewers. Has there been a good Booker prize in the last 20 years?), Yellow Dog (wtf was that about? How could it even get published?) anything by Dan Brown (why is he published however in fairness you know it’s bad when you pick it up) or Salman Rushdie (Fatwa was too extreme, just cutting off his hands to stop him boring us would be enough), Ian McEwan or Zadie Smith or Gore Vidal or Will Self or Martin Amis or Tom Wolfe (these last six are so far up their own arse that they could not do a decent book between them. Shame on you McEwan as your early stuff was good) or Ben Elton (should have stuck to writing Blackadder you talentless little unfunny man. The amount of money and time I’ve wasted trying to like his stuff. Todays comedy writers need Bush, Elton needed Thatcher as after she left he seemed to have no spirit and became one of those soulless drones chanting “Things can only get better…”) or Ian M Banks (I’m too stupid to have a clue what’s happening in your books)…..
The Nazis ruined the social acceptance of a good book burning party.

2) Become pro-military.
Sometime next year, The Stasi will be donning on some black pyjamas for a month.

3) Becoming pro-God.
God only comes in the Cold War Fiction realm when it’s books written by Tom Clancy and Graham Greene or those books about psychics staring at goats. I’ve neglected Tom Clancy this year, but will do week or so of Tom sometime next year.

4) Take every opportunity to moan about Obama, and raise our fear level on the terrorist threat that all Muslims pose us and the economy.
Simple enough, Obama would never be president during a Cold War and he is probably only a one-term president unless the Republicans pick some complete loony to stand. Muslim terrorists – there are lots of books of state sponsored terrorists during the Cold War, but I shall try and pick a few ones, but to heighten the fear I’ll do a couple of IRA ones so that we are in fear of Catholics too. I’ve covered terrorism before but only briefly as General Midwinter from Billion Dollar Brain was a terrorist, in every sense of the word, but he was a god-fearing patriot so I looked the other way from his shenanigans.
The economy – I’ve made no money from Amazon or those silly google adverts and with the server costs and the costs of keeping in second hand book heaven has left me bankrupt just like the US or the UK.

5) Dumb down.
Mentioned that already but repetition helps it become accepted as fact, and this leads nicely on to where you read a book as it makes a big difference to its enjoyment. For instance, when I was backpacking around Asia years ago, I would have a few Tom Clancys as they were weighty, easily available from second hand book stores and you could pass hours poolside or beach side reading them. Da Nang Diary by Col Tom Yarborough, I will always remember reading in our private swimming pool in Koh Samui and thoroughly enjoying the book, the weather and the lifestyle. Some books deserve a great bottle of red wine as you lie on the over-sized beanbag next to the fire, others are for commuting, where Destroyer by Roy W. West is for reading on the toilet. (We all do it). This isn’t a criticism of the book, it’s the same length of The 39 Steps and follows Buchans classic of a man who is on the run and trying to uncover a spy ring and the toilet is most suitable place to read it as the book is an easy read.

The story follows Victor Kolnikov, a man who was a legend within the US Naval Intelligence as an outstanding investigator, however when he was working on a case to expose his inter-departmental rival Gelman as a mole, the tables were turned and Kolnikov and his two assistants, were framed as Russian spies. Kolnikov, Gruber and Lowell were convicted and has spent the last nine years in prison. Kolnikov is approached by his ex-boss, who needs Kolnikov to find out where Gelman is as for the last nine years Gelman and his two assistants have quietly merged into the background and have completely disappeared just as the USSR are about to swarm over the Turkey border. Kolnikov is the Wests last hope, however he wants payback on the US for putting him falsely behind bars and does that override any loyalty he may feel?

Overall:
According to the book, who would win the cold war: Draw, but the Russians should take Turkey.

Explosives/fight scenes etc.. : All the fighting happened at the end, instead Kolnikov was more interested in stealing and loving rather than fighting.

Believability of the goodies (Kolnikov and his two assistants): This book was all about Kolnikov and his ego. His assistants (Gruber and Lowell) were there just to give Kolnikov a platform to show how great he was and that he knew the answer to everything. Kolnikov, like the majority of spies, was the worlds greatest lover, so good that the woman who prostituted/ honey-trapped for the US Intelligence Services thought so and was happy to give up her ‘patriotic’ duties to stay with him.. It’s a cliché or maybe just lazy penmanship that nearly every protagonist who is a spy is also the greatest of lovers, I exclude Burnside from The Sandbaggers from this as he is a sexually immature creep and I can see him when he retired from ‘bagging that he became The Paedofinder General from Monkey Dust.

Believability of the baddies (Everyone else): Everybody else has a simple back-story summarised in a few paragraphs, but they never really materialised as characters as the book was about Kolnikov.

In summary, I enjoyed the book as it was a simple story and there was no mucking about as he did this and then they did that and they are going to do this… where if you read say Horse Under Water by Len Deighton, it’s also a very simple story but it has a lot of unnecessary literary window dressing and this makes it less enjoyable (or plug and play-like) than Destroyer. Cheap trashy novels are always good for the soul and this book is certainly that.

The front cover I have on my copy is all ripped, but imagine DESTROYER written in a slant from top left to bottom right with 3 Soviet missiles and the words “The missiles are primed. The countdown has begun. Only one man can prevent the holocaust”

Destroyer