Friday's Forgotten Book: Carter Brown: The Flagellator

I thought this would be more fun, but at times it felt almost a serious PI novel, which is a pity, since this is not what we expect from a Carter Brown novel, is it? And as a serious PI novel The Flagellator just doesn't work. It's not very well plotted, the solution comes and goes a bit too quickly, and there's just too much talk here and there. And the point where Rick Holman seriously thinks about raping a woman who seems to be resisting his suggestions is just plain awful. (Wouldn't have necessarily to be, but hey, Holman is a clean-cut hero!) It's great, though, that Carter Brown has come up with a name Theo Altman for a well-known art film director! There's not much, if any, flagging in the book.

Great cover, though, as one would expect from Robert McGinnis. Even the post-expressionistic painting on the background is good! The cover was used in Finland in a Nick Carter book, here's a link to the Finnish translation of The Flagellator. Might be the original Australian cover, for all I know. The Finnish title: "The Queen of Sex".

Here's a site on Carter Brown, better than his Wikipedia entry. More Forgotten Books here.