The Dead Man: Ring of Knives – James Daniels

© 2011 Adventures in Television, Inc.

The second installment of the new DEAD MAN action/adventure/horror e-series is available at your favorite on-line bookstore now. (For some background on the series originated by Lee Goldberg and long-time writing partner William Rabkin click on this link.)

Picking up where Goldberg and Rabkin left off from episode one, Daniels takes us into the mind of Matt Cahill as he struggles to make sense of all that is happening to him. He’s found reports of another person who has exhibited some of his hallucinatory (?) episodes that were chronicled in Face of Evil. In this installment, we follow Cahill for one long and scary night. He finds, not the other tormented soul, but his psychiatrist who has now become a patient at the Carthage Mental Health Center. The good doctor advises Matt to confront his demons with the right question at the right time or else it might be too late.

During the night, Matt encounters a sadistic nurse with an almost unpronounceable name, another nurse (ally or enemy, who ever knows?), a gaggle of gruesome aides, and an obligatory damsel in distress. We follow along as he trips down memory lane trying to recapture the memory of his deceased wife, as well as another frightening outing for our hero come back to life.

Daniels does a very good job tying his story to the foundational story of the series creators. One thing that I miss is the attachment to his grandfather’s axe which gets only a cursory mention at the beginning of the story. Otherwise, if you like action, adventure, horror, blood, and gore, you’re destined for one of your favorite stories. I’ll give it four out of five reading glasses, for the sake of the missing axe.

—Benjamin Potter, April 13, 2011

The Dead Man: Face of Evil – Lee Goldberg & William Rabkin

© 2011 Adventures in Television, Inc.

When I found out that noted author Lee Goldberg had produced another idea that he intended to work on with other great writers, and then that he was offering a limited number of prepublishing ebooks for review, I made contact. What I received was an eARC (?) for the new THE DEAD MAN series debut.

Matthew Cahill, or rather his frozen body, is discovered beneath tons of avalanche—the victim of a snow-skiing tragedy. When the ME starts to do an autopsy, the lumber mill sawyer begins to bleed. This impossibility after three months of burial under a mountain of snow leads to a variety of twists and turns.

Cahill learns to live again, romance again, and even fight again. This adventure story has engaging characters, elements of finely tuned horror stories, and some fun thrown in for good measure. I’m looking forward to future installments to see where Cahill’s adventures take him. This for several reasons—not the least of which is the reasonably priced packaging in ebook format (which this gem of a story is available in from Kindle to Nook to every ereader in between). You’ll want to get a copy today because the story is fast-paced, enjoyable, and short enough to read in a single afternoon or two. What else can I give this made for electronic age adventure story (and series, I expect) but five reading glasses.

—Benjamin Potter, February 28, 2011