Customer Reviews

The Phantom's Phantom (The Phantom Detective Agency)

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THE PHANTOM DETECTIVE pulp ran monthly from the early 1930s to the early 1950s, and here experienced author Robert Reginald has given the semi-retired Phantom a new adventure occurring just after the close of his pulp career, in the fall of 1953.

There are a number of anachronisms in slang and cultural reference, and some odd misspellings of words (e.g., "Lugar" for Luger). The murder plot is a bit simplistic and the Phantom solves it by what amounts to pretty routine police work, carefully questioning witnesses, etc. I think you'll identify the murderers before the Phantom puts them on the spot, since the clues are fairly planted, and that you'll also identify the Phantom's nemesis, who has been persecuting both the Phantom and his old pal Frank Havens with mailed threats and seemingly random physical attacks, long before he and his large, equally deranged family make their ultimate play.

There is no mention or use of the Phantom's supernatural skill at disguise and impersonation. Most all the characters have goofy names along the lines of Zinc, Dastrie, Zed Lepplin, etc. I lost count of the number of bystanders who are gunned down whilst standing right beside the Phantom, in the course of the "action" (to use the word loosely), yet he never gets the third degree, or even the first or second, from the cops.

Most incomprehensibly, he reveals to a large group of hangers-around that he, middle-aged playboy Curtis Van Loan, is indeed the Phantom Detective, suicidally setting himself up for hundreds of revenge attacks by hundreds of embittered relatives of the hundreds of bad guys he has mercilessly gunned down over the years... just like the revenge attack that is the subject of this novel!

Finally, the action takes place in California, new to the Phantom, which allows the author to expend about 50% of his pages in uninteresting local color and tedious travelogue.

I got through it, but by about halfway through, my sense of enjoyment had plunged to a fairly low level.

It was a great idea to "resurrect" the Phantom Detective, and Robert Reginald was the right man to do it. He uses the familiar "book-within-a-book" device to achieve his purpose, but handles the plot mechanism with deftness of touch and a soupçon of irony.
His Phantom is older, wiser and sexier than the original, changes which are discussed in an Author's Note at the end of the novel. He solves his case - several cases, in fact - and unmasks the sinister killer who has been murderously pursuing him. We learn the identity of the eponymous villain, but then, in a twist that it would of course be quite wrong to reveal to you, we learn something new about the true nature of the "Phantom's Phantom", and the novel gains considerable depth.
There is a lot happening on the surface, too. Like Robert Reginald's other fiction, "The Phantom's Phantom" is full of juicy linguistic jokes. Perhaps it's time to coin the term "Reginaldian"! No doubt some postgraduate student will be offering a thesis someday soon on "Multilevel language use, puns and wordplays in the fiction of R.R."
You don't need to be familiar with the original Phantom Detective stories to enjoy this one. It's a good read, so get your copy now, and let's hope that there will indeed be a sequel, as is hinted in the Author's Note.

Tongue firmly in cheek, Reginald has managed to retain the spirit of the old pulps while updating the 30's - 40's Phantom Detective, "a killing machine," to a more credible 50's sensibility. Lots of fun for all who remember the pulps fondly, and a perfect doorway for younger readers into a world of retro writing.

The author Robert Reginald, in one guise or another, has been on the publishing scene for almost as long as I have, and his long list of credentials in the back of this, his latest book, goes to prove it [112 books, 13,000 (yep, that is three "0's") short pieces]. Off hand, I can only think of one other author of our old-boy trilogy (Victor Banis -- I see he's managed to review this book before I have) who has been quite as prolific for such a long time.

Robert having cut his teeth on pulps, it's no surprise he, here, so successfully takes on The Phantom (one of "the" stars of the litter of pulps from the past), and does so with such relish, flair, and (most importantly) such enjoyment for the reader (whether that reader is familiar with the long line of Phantom books that have come before it, or whether merely making the acquaintance, here and now, for the very first time).

If Robert, who lives in sunny California, has, possibly for the convenience of providing environs immediately most familiar to the author, shifted The Phantom's usual haunt from the dingy Big Apple to the sun-bright West Coast, it doesn't make this book any the less a really good read (in fact, the shift, offers a decidedly welcome contrast to the usually large dollops of dark NYC streets and that city's garbage-strewn alleys).

Certainly, whether bathed in golden sunshine, or not, there's no lack of murder and mayhem to keep the reader's interest. There's a pile up of bodies, one after the other, as Richard Curtis Van Loan (who has been forced to hang up his mask), is drawn out of retirement by the sudden murder of his longtime friend, publisher Frank Havens. The tables definitely turned, as The Phantom becomes the one pursued (by The Phantom's phantom?) by a vicious unseen assailant.

This is the first Phantom novel in over 50 years, and it's a genuine pleasure to have the character back in this new adventure, taken under the loving hand of an author who definitely is familiar enough with the genre and with the character to successfully take up the mantle of predecessors who have made this protagonist such a long-lasting literary icon.