Customer Reviews

Jason Striker Martial Arts Kiai! and Mistress of Death

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The Jason Striker series is one of the best martials arts fiction series (2nd only to Murphy & Sapirs Destroyer series, becasue they are such fun) to come out of the 1970s.

Piers Anthony (yes the famous sci fi writer) and Roberto Fuentes (a Judo master from Cuba) know their stuff! The action on the most part is realistic and the hero human (reminds me abit of J D MacDonald's Travis McGee). The stories have dated somewhat in parts, and the 'sex' sometimes laughable (maybe that was the point), but they are still a great piece of 1970s pulp fiction.

Volume 1 includes Kiai!, the best book in the series and probably the best in Martial Arts fiction.

During the 1970s when kung fu-mania was exploding all over the world, and Americans were finding out that kung fu wasn't something on the menu of a Chinese restaraunt,there were any number of medias trying to exploit the"martial arts fad".There was the KUNG FU television series starring the late David Carradine.There were kung fu movies starring the legendary Bruce Lee and others.There were martial arts comic books.And there were martial arts paperbacks.One of the best of the paperback series was the one featuring Jason Striker,a character created by Piers Anthony and Roberto Fuentes.These books were unique in that the character Jason Striker wasn't a kung fu stylist or a karate practioner.He was a 5th dan judoka.During the 1970s judo was considered passe.But both Anthony and especially Fuentes were judo practioners so they made the star of their series a judoka albeit one who had had training in both karate and kung fu.Actually they created the character before the kung fu craze hit and the character was originally named Caesar Kane.But the first book "Kiai" was rejected by several publishers because they felt there wasn't enough interest in a book about a martial arts hero.Of course that changed when America went kung fu crazy.The hero's name had to be changed from Kane to Striker because Caine was the name of the character Carradine portrayed on his TV series.People would have thought they were ripping off the television show.Who would have believed Kane,the judoka existed before Caine,the shaolin monk?The books are reprinted here and they're a lot of fun. Of course in some places they're dated.Heck, they were written over 30 years ago.But in many ways they're very relevant.For instance in the first book Striker finds himself fighting in a tournament with practioners from other martial arts.Can we say UFC? I can't recommend this series enough.It's a lot of fun and it's a great time capsule look at martial arts in the 70s.I always regretted that these books weren't made into a series of films.The only regret I have with the reprinted series is that the original covers weren't reprinted here.They were great examples of 70s exploitation art.If you're a martial arts enthusiast you should really give these books a try.

This volume combines the books Kiai! and Mistress of Death.

Piers Anthony and Roberto Fuentes began as correspondents and then collaborated on a science fiction novel. "Then Roberto Took Piers to a judo class and the started writing martial arts fiction. Five books were published in the 1970's.... They are republished in three volumes: novels 1 and 2, novels 3 and 4, novel 5 and a collection including half of the 6th and shorter collaborative pieces."

"This is violent, sexy fiction with an occasional fantasy element, perhaps not to the taste of younger readers."