The Satan Sleuth #1 - Fallen Angel

They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover - but in this instance, I'm asking you to not judge a book by its name.  I honestly cannot say how I came across this series.  I don't recall where I first saw it, or what made me look into it; all I know is that once I decided to try and find this series, I was surprised at just how difficult it was to locate all three books!  One would think this is some best-selling rarity that everyone is after (although, more likely, it was simply a series with a low print run, thus making copies harder to find).  After a lot of searching, I was able to locate books 2 and 3, but finding the first book took a lot longer.  But, as always, patience offers its reward, and I came across a copy in fairly good condition on eBay for a price I was willing to pay.  So, once in hand, I figured I might as well read it and see whether it was worth the purchase.

"The Satan Sleuth" is a three-book series written by Michael Avallone.  Avallone was a prolific author who wrote a number of movie and television tie-in books, one of which is a book I would LOVE to find - the original novelization of Friday the 13th Part 3 in 3-D (not the later, revised edition written by Simon Hawke).  Published in 1974 and 1975, "The Satan Sleuth" tells the adventures of Philip St. George, whose wife is brutally mutilated and dismembered by a cult of Satan worshipers - which leads to St. George adopting an alternate persona to not only go after the group of individuals who killed his wife, but to begin a crusade against any and all like-minded people who choose to use Satan, the supernatural, and the unknown as a shield behind which to commit the most heinous atrocities against mankind.  This first novel, Fallen Angel, provides readers with the gory details of just what led St. George to abandon his carefree, millionaire lifestyle to don a cloak, wear a cross, and take up the weapons needed to send the sick, twisted minds of cultists and Satan worshipers to the very hell they claim to serve.

The prose is very much pulp style, with little dialogue and more focus on the characters inner-motivations and their actions.  It is definitely dark and morbid, and while Avallone does not go into explicit gory detail with the ritualistic murder of St. George's wife, the description he does provide is more than enough to create horrific images in the reader's mind - enough to make him or her immediately sympathize with St. George and encourage him on his newfound crusade.  Definitely not for the weak of heart!  Yet, at the same time, without the horrific nature of the crime, St. George's motivation would be lacking.

The book is divided into three subtitled parts - "Fallen Angel," "Devils From Hell," and "The Redeemer."  Each section is basically an act - "Fallen Angel" describes the descent, of St. George learning about his wife's death - seeing it - and then making the decision to do what the police cannot.  "Devils From Hell" provides readers with a glimpse into the four killers - three men and one woman - and the consequences of their actions (for three of them, anyway).  "The Redeemer," the final act, is the climactic showdown between St. George a/k/a The Satan Sleuth and the Wolfman (not literal), the leader of the cult who took his wife from him.  I gotta give Avallone credit, he definitely knows how to use irony, as St. George picks off the killers one by one, putting them in the ultimate torturous situations, saving the best for last.  But the question is - how far is St. George really willing to go to avenge his wife?  Once he answers that question, it sets the stage for the rest of his life!

In a way, this is a much darker version of Dan Curtis' television series, Kolchak: The Night Stalker.  And what's interesting about that is that the Kolchak TV show ran from 1974 to 1975, the same exact years this series was published. Makes you wonder exactly what was going on in American society at that time, that such dark, supernatural stories such as The Satan Sleuth and Kolchak would be written for consumption by the public at large!  Although neither series lasted long - Kolchak lasted one season, and The Satan Sleuth only lasted three books.  Perhaps the timing was off, because I could easily see The Satan Sleuth as a television series today, and it would likely do pretty good (particularly since today's television seems to allow much more graphic violence to be depicted than back in the mid-70s when the series was published).

"Fighting for reason and right against the Devil and his disciples" is what the tagline reads on the front of this first book.  And it's a pretty accurate description of what's inside, although the four killers turn out to be only playing at devil worship - none of them actually believe (which, in my mind, makes what they did all the more terrible, because it simply goes to show just how depraved and twisted their natural being is that they could do what they did for no other purpose than just for kicks!).  We'll see what the second and third book hold in store and whether The Satan Sleuth actually faces down true supernatural or the Devil himself!

RATING:  7 tarot cards left at the foot of the stairs out of 10 for providing fans of mystery, crime, and supernatural with a different kind of dark knight detective!