When I was a kid, my mom got one of those book of the month club things that was popular in the 80s. She got a one year subscription for me of a series called Mack Bolan. The first book I received was “The New War” book #39.

Over the next 8 or 9 years, I read a new book each month. Learning about state of the art weaponry. A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned Bolan to a friend that had never heard of the series. Tonight, I noticed Jack Carr had posted a Bolan/Don Pendleton (original author) tribute on his Instagram account.

Most kids my age were reading The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. I was reading about Bolan’s counter terrorism missions and the Beretta 93R and .44 Automag

Long live the Executioner.

Anyone else a Bolan/Able Team/Phoenix Force fan?

I remember reading those as a teen in the late 70's.
My mother was not amused by my reading selections.
The cover art was "eye catching."

I listen to the Paperback Warrior podcast every Monday, and they did one early in their run on the Mack Bolan universe:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/...6892?i=1000446173543

Enjoy!

I read a few of the original 1970s The Executioner novels by the original author. Even then I found the use of a .444 Marlin as a long-range sniping rifle to be laughable. How much hold-over does this need to hit a man at 800 yards? I'd guess around 25-30 feet. But Executioner was a lot better than another book series about the same time, The Death Merchant.

It's been a few decades since I read those.
Stuff like that was about all I read when I was a kid.
My Grandpa read a lot and always had those by his chair along with other great stuff like Edgar Rice Burroughs and such.
I always went home with bags of cool stuff to read.

Oh yeah.... Mac Bolan. Good reading as a kid. I am drawing a blank in the Navy SeAL guy. Richard Marcinko? Those were good books too.

Yup, Mack Bolan, Phoenix Force and Able Team!!!

Yup, read a bunch of them as a teenager. Then ran into them again about thirty years ago as my father in law had quite a collection. Definitely created some bad days for some mobsters. Leo Turin, Yakob (sp?) Katz, Bear, etc. Good times. Particularly liked that the good guys always won.

I read those in the 80’s as well. 44 Automag was the shiznit

I'm waiting for the movie.

I was a Clancy, Harold Coyle kind of reader in my youth.

My “schlock” was the Wingman Series by Mac Maloney.

Yep, I remember reading those and since I was a martial arts nut, The Destroyer series. Got into some of the old classics like The Shadow and Doc Savage.

Yep, Mack Bolan was some of my favorite book series but I’d all but forgotten until you mentioned them.

Remember reading many of them. I do recall him using the .444 Marlin. Owned one for a while later. But those Bolan paperbacks are kind of like Harlequin 'novels' in that the plot lines are pretty similar. But I did enjoy reading several of them many moons ago.

Yes, Mac Bolan, the Executioner. I also read almost all of the first 100 books as a teenager, in French here down in Switzerland !

Yup, The Executioner, The Destroyer and the e.e. "Doc" Smith Lensman series.

Pure schlock, but passed MANY a slow mid-watch reading them.

Yep, first was The Executioner. As I recall, there was almost always one episode of implied sex too, right?

When I was in the USMC 1979-1983, I went on three Med Cruises and read a ton of the the Mack Bolan “Executioner” series. Wish I would have kept all those paperbacks.

Also read Conan the Barbarian series.

I read them riding freight trains in the Army in Korea. Good stuff!

I have always wanted an RV with a rocket launcher on the roof.