My last review recommended C. J. Henderson’s Lai Wan: Tales of the Dreamwalker; but I commented that it was one of two books I had picked up from the author last October, and that he was eager to know my reaction to them. The other new addition to my collection was To Battle Beyond. Interestingly, where the Lai Wan stories were a collection of short stories following a character who had previously appeared in a novel, this was a novel built around a character previously appearing in a collection of short stories, Chief Inspector John Legrasse.
Lovecraft fans might recognize the name. He debuted in what is perhaps the quintessential Lovecraft story, The Call of Cthulu. One of Henderson’s previous books was built around Legrasse, beginning with a reprint of the Lovecraft story and then taking the detective back to the mysterious bayous of Louisiana and elsewhere to face similar evils and ultimately to thwart the rising of Cthulu from the depths. (I mentioned before that Henderson’s characters always fight back against the horrors which challenge them, unlike Lovecraft’s which simply collapse in despair.) In that book one of the short stories, So Free We Seem, told the tale of an elderly man found dead in his locked home amidst hundreds of mouse traps and intricate scrawls on the floor, along with a journal in which he recounted tentacles invading and exploring his house at night. That story becomes the starting point for this novel. Seeking answers, Legrasse heads to New York.
At this point he is thrown together with three other characters who might have been familiar to the readers of pulp fiction, comic book heroes of the pre-comic book era. Ravenwood is a mentalist, something similar to The Shadow, able to read minds and project illusions. The Bat will seem most familiar to modern readers; he is undoubtedly the primary inspiration for Batman, a caped crusader with lots of gadgets, but also may have influenced the creation of Daredevil, in that he is a blind district attorney whose compensatory senses enable him to know where everyone and everything is in a dark room. Lady Domino most resembles Electra, orphaned heiress with remarkable skills in gunplay and acrobatics, who also uses her stunning good looks to her advantage. They are drawn together and immediately become targets, as they discover that the recent appearances of tentacled monstrosities from another dimension are due to the efforts of a secret Japanese project intended to cripple America and keep us out of World War II. This allows Henderson to introduce a fifth member to the team, a modern ninja/samurai.
My one complaint about this book is in the editing. There were enough annoying glitches to make me wonder whether it was a stylistic decision, whether the publisher wanted to capture the flavor of the old pulp adventures by incorporating as many typographical errors as those rushed-to-print paperbacks often contained. That would almost excuse it, but still be annoying. I know how difficult it is to catch every mistake in any book, and I know that I am perhaps more sensitive than the average reader (I tried to overlook the persistent use of split infinitives, a personal annoyance, knowing that I sometimes split them myself and it has become quite acceptable in American English to do so). The mistakes here, though, were excessive.
That said, it is an exciting tale, and if one accepts the basic premises of the Lovecraftian-meets-pulp-adventure world, quite believable–my disbelief suspenders never snapped despite the mix of paranormal abilities, supernatural enemies, and incredible physical abilities. Each character is well defined with his own strengths and weaknesses, each at some point saves the day, evil is thwarted, and the central character comes through as a hero.
It is in a sense a sequel to the other book, but it is not the sort of sequel that requires reading them in sequence. Legrasse is an interesting character well worth following in his adventures elsewhere, but everything the reader needs to know about him is captured in the opening pages. The other characters are also adequately introduced in part by Ron Fortier’s introduction. Not even knowledge of the Lovecraftian cosmology is needed here. The reader is drawn into the story and introduced to all the essential elements as needed. Again, C. J. has written a book well worth reading.
–M. J. Young
