We’ve gone from Dirty Harry to Jason Bourne (or whatever his name ended up being; the camera was too shaky for me to ever tell what was going on). We’ve gone from Humphrey Bogart to George Clooney.  We’ve gone from John Wayne fighting Indians to Na’vi fighting Americans.

But, don’t fret. For there is an answer to our problems, fellow film buffs. I know you’re six feet from that ledge, but let me give you hope…they are called books. They are these contraptions with bindings and pages with words on the inside. Together this all creates a story one hundred times more fulfilling than today’s dim-witted liberal flavor-of-the-month films.

Hollywood has always been a liberal town. They give us anti-Iraq war movie after anti-Iraq war movie despite the fact that they all flop at the box office. But what of the literary world?  They must surely share Hollywood’s contempt for conservatives and enriching stories, right? Wrong. The publishing world seems to get it, for the most part. They like to publish what sells and what seems to sell today are right-leaning stories.

Stephen Hunter, Vince Flynn, Brad Thor, Tom Clancy, Frank Miller, James Ellroy, and Andrew Klavan. These are just a handful of names of today’s top fiction writers. All of them have something in common: they have, admittedly, right leaning politics and philosophies. This does not mean that their books are some kind of weird right-wing propaganda. What it means is that their stories usually make the bad guys who the bad guys really are and their heroes don’t shy away from masculinity or righteous indignation. These writers also have something else in common: they are all New York Times bestselling authors. Try out Stephen Hunter’s new novel Soft Target. It’s a hundred times better and more visually striking than any new action film to hit theaters in the last year. Or try Andrew Klavan’s last adult thriller, The Identity Man. It’s more thought-provoking and more well thought out than any half-baked political thriller cooked up by George Clooney. These writers lead the fiction front in literature today. They put out bestsellers that frequently win acclaim from critics.

As for non fiction…now we are really getting to the heart of the beast. Look at the New York Times bestseller list for non-fiction and you are bound to see a plethora of conservative thought. While Bill O’Reilly and Laura Ingraham are regularly blasted in the mainstream media, they regularly put out bestsellers. Others do too. In fact, most non-fiction political books that hit shelves are written by conservatives. Why this phenomenon and why now? Is it that conservatives have been turned away by Hollywood so they have retreated to the inner workings of books? Or is it because right-leaning artists and right-leaning thinkers need more than a 90-minute film to bring across a message and/or story?

Perhaps films are more representative of a liberal approach to storytelling, while writing is a more conservative approach. Films are a collected effort. They takes hundreds, if not, thousands of people to create, and usually have a vision that is compromised by too many cooks in the kitchen. Books, on the other hand, are a celebration of individualism. It takes one person to sit and put his vision down. Maybe this is the explanation, but maybe not.

But whatever it may be, this much is true: if you hit up your local bookstore or head over to Amazon, you’ll find a world of old school storytelling and right-leaning stories. John Wayne and his films ain’t dead, they just grew up. They exist in an entirely new world: the world of books.

Check out footage from the latest Tea Party rally and you’ll see people holding signs referencing classics like 1984 by George Orwell and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Check out footage of the latest Occupy Wall Street rally and you’ll see people wearing “V for Vendetta” masks. That says it all.

A WORD ON STEVE JOBS…

Jobs was not only a great man who changed the world for the better, he remains an example of how one person is capable of doing extraordinary things when he or she is lucky enough to be born and to grow up in a country that allows you to fulfill your potential.

When I think of a man like Jobs I think of the millions of abortions that have occurred in this country, our own history of slavery, and countries that to this very day restrict human potential, I wonder how many Steve Jobses weren’t allowed to reach and risk and dream. We can’t even begin to imagine the price humanity is paying for snuffing out the man or woman who would’ve cured cancer or ended world hunger or come up with something like the computer — something we haven’t dreamed of that would’ve changed everything.

Rest in peace, Steve Jobs. I don’t even know where to begin to thank you or the country who let you be you.

ANDREW KLAVAN’S ‘VERY SERIOUS COMMENTARY’ DEBUT… STIMULUS II

As some of you may already know, my pal Drew Klavan is now working for Glenn Beck TV where he continues the series of exceptional videos and commentaries he started at Pajamas Media, where he still blogs.

Beck does have a subscriber service, but if you’re not a subscriber Klavan’s GBTV debut can be watched here.

Don’t worry; Klavan’s still writing novels. He is capable of doing two things at once — and the better you get to know him, the more surprising that is. Personally, I think his lovely wife Ellen does the writing. It’s a Remington Steele set up. I’m sure of it.

FOR $59.99 YOU CAN VOD ‘TOWER HEIST’ THREE WEEKS AFTER IT HITS THEATRES

We all know where this is headed… With directors and distributors already screaming about the $29.99 VOD service that allows you to watch a film at home 60 days after the theatrical release, Universal is wisely ignoring all of that and moving forward by closing that window even more to gauge consumer interest.

Imagine a time where for $59.99 you can gather the family around the home theatre to watch the premiere of “Pirates of the Caribbean 5″ the SAME day it’s released in theatres. Imagine a time where studios no longer need to cut theatre owners into a fat chunk of the profits because THE EVENT is now a movie premiere beamed into living rooms throughout the world.

There will always be movie theatres. But this day is coming.

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SCOTTDS’ EPIC LINK-TACULAR

WILL HOLLYWOOD FINALLY GET A MUSEUM?

JULIA ROBERTS IS THE EVIL QUEEN

RARE OPPORTUNITY TO SEE ‘CARL MACEK’S ROBOTECH UNIVERSE’

NEW IMAGES FROM MARVEL’S ‘AVENGERS’

GOTTI MOVIE ON HOLD?

R.I.P. CHARACTER ACTOR CHARLES NAPIER

NEW TRAILER FOR STEVEN SPIELBERG’S ‘WAR HORSE‘

‘UNIVERSAL SOLDIER’ TV SERIES IN DEVELOPMENT

BRIEF LOOK AT 32 DVD RELEASES FROM THE WARNER ARCHIVE

INSTRUCTIONAL SIGNS THAT MUST APPEAR IN MOVIES

JOEL SCHUMACHER WANTED NICOLAS CAGE AS THE SCARECROW IN ABORTED BATMAN FILM

SNEAK PEAK OF ‘TRANSFORMERS’ THEME PARK RIDE

HOW SPIELBERG TV SHOWS FEEL LIKE BAD SPIELBERG MOVIE KNOCKOFFS

25 THINGS YOU MAY NOT KNOW ABOUT ‘BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S‘

VIDEO COMPILATION OF EVERY SINGLE CREATIVE INFLUENCE ‘BORROWED’ FOR ‘THE MATRIX’

LADY GAGA BIOPIC HEADED FOR LIFETIME TV

‘SIMPSONS’ PRODUCERS TAKE PAY CUT TO PREVENT CANCELATION

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LAST NIGHT’S SCREENING

The wife and I are now moving into the middle of season two of “The Closer” and like many great television series, now that the characters and their relationships are established, the writers can touchstone those in a few words or even with a look and focus more on the main story. Last night was an episode titled “Critical Missing” and it was one of the most riveting hours of television I’ve ever seen.

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CLASSIC PICK FOR FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7

TCM:

10:15 AM  EST: Till The Clouds Roll By (1946) –  True story of composer Jerome Kern’s rise to the top on Broadway and in Hollywood. Dir: Richard Whorf Cast:  June Allyson, Lucille Bremer, Judy Garland. C-136 mins, TV-G.

A truly bizarre MGM musical with Robert Walker miscast as legendary composer Jerome Kern. There’s almost no plot but let me tell you, the standalone musical numbers are absolute knockouts. Frank Sinatra, Tony Martin, Judy Garland, June Allyson, Lena Horne and Cyd Charisse simply shine and prove that the MGM publicity department wasn’t lying about the studio having more stars than you can see in the sky.

“Till the Clouds Roll By” is like watching MTV in 1946 with “music videos” starring genuine legends singing some of the greatest American music ever composed.

Having read a couple of biographies, I can tell you that in reality Kern led an extraordinary life that would make for a wonderful biopic were it not for the fact that there is no way in hell present-day Hollywood could ever come up with actors to stand in for the immortal stars that were such an important part of the composer’s life. Scorsese’s “The Aviator” proved that.

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--Please send tips/suggestions/requests/complaints to jnolte@breitbart.com

“I had to do something different. I needed a change,“ Klavan says.

What Klavan got instead was a phone call imploring him to get back to work.

“Have you ever thought of writing a young adult novel?“ his publisher asked during an out of the blue cell phone conversation. The only other time Klavan had dabbled in the genre was while living in England. He recalled coming home every day from that gig telling his wife, “it was the most fun I ever had [writing].”

“I instantly said, ‘yes,‘” Klavan told his publisher, and the Homelanders series was born.

“The Final Hour,” the fourth and final book in the series following “The Last Thing I Remember,“ “The Long Way Home” and “The Truth of the Matter,“ finds young Charlie West trying to halt an impending terrorist attack. He’ll have to escape from prison, risk his life reclaiming lost memories and find enough people to believe he holds the key to stopping a jihadist assault on a major city.

Writing for a youthful audience required a different approach, but Klavan says that helped him broaden his range as a writer.

“It changed the vocabulary I used, and a lot of my attitudes … it limited the number of tools I had,” he says. “It’s always an exhilarating experience as an artist. You have these limitations and you have to make them work.”

Klavan, who grew up in Great Neck, Long Island, says he wanted to write for as long as he can remember.

“In those days, the novelist was the culture hero. They had names like Hemingway and Faulkner … I don’t think there’s anybody like that now,” says Klavan, who dreamed of making a living as a mystery crime novelist.

Klavan published his first novel, “Face of the Earth,” in 1977 and found work in print and on the radio. His novelist career eventually took off with titles like “True Crime,” “The Animal Hour” and “Don‘t Say a Word.”

The two-time winner of the Mystery Writer’s of America Edgar Award still loves the genre, but his writing career evolved when he had an epiphany not unlike famed playwright David Mamet.

“I grew up in such a left-wing household,” he says, adding his father considered conservatives “one step” away from the Nazis.

“He literally thought that,” he says. “It didn’t occur to me you could be a conservative.”

At the time, his liberal chums had derided President Ronald Reagan as “a greedy fool and a war monger,” but the president’s check list started filling up with major accomplishments.

“Slowly, it dawned on me everything he was doing was working, while [President] Carter was really a disaster,” he says.

“When the Berlin Wall came down, I thought, ’this is what [Reagan] said would happen. The guy couldn’t have been that stupid,’” he says. “It really opened up all kinds of possibilities … not only was this left wing idea wrong, they were all wrong. It took me years to catch up with that.”

Klavan’s novelist career has attracted Hollywood’s attention, resulting in several movies borne from his imagination including “Don’t Say a Word” and “True Crime“ starring Clint Eastwood (“he was too old for the part,” Klavan notes).

“I never meant to [work in Hollywood]. I almost got dragged into it,“ he says. “I don’t know any happy screenwriters. You have so little power.”

Now, Summit Entertainment has gobbled up the rights to the Homelanders series. But he suspects the stories’ radical Islamic elements might not make the final cut. He recalls a recent article in The Hollywood Reporter saying the studio planned to introduce a science fiction element into the narrative.

“My guess is, they’re removing the Islamo-fascist thing,“ he says, something he notes with little emotion. “It’s always good for you when a film gets made of your book. I’m still a novelist first and foremost.”

Besides, Klavan can still shape hearts and minds through his other media outlets, from his perch at PJTV (“Klavan on the Culture”) to his commentary at The City Journal.

It took some time before he was able to share his new conservative beliefs.

“As my political opinions changed, I lost the ability to speak. I wasn’t sure what I thought. It made it difficult to write non fiction. Only as my ideas crystallized could I do that again,” he says. And he doesn’t mind working as hard as he did during his 20s today as a result.

“I love the country, and I love standing up for what I think is right,“ he says.

–FINAL CHAPTER OF ANDREW KLAVAN’S HOMELANDERS’ QUADROLOGY RELEASED TODAY–

A very well-written, page-turning adventure series for the kids. God, country and values are treated as good things. On the other hand, terrorism and narcissism are treated as bad things. I think the word we’re searching for in this upside day and age is: Iconoclastic.

You can order the book here. I recommend all four. Klavan’s an amazing talent who also happens to be on our side. What more could you possibly ask for. Did you just say a film based on the series?  Done.

Klavan blogs here and here.

–KEVIN COSTNER UP FOR VILLAIN ROLE IN NEW TARANTINO FLICK–

I’ve always liked Kevin Costner and was sorry to see his career all but derail 15 years ago with the triple-punch of the underrated “Waterworld,” the truly dreadful “Postman” (which even Tom Petty couldn’t save) and the stillborn “Wyatt Earp.”

Costner’s masculine, has a genuinely likable screen persona, and seems like a decent guy in real life — and in the right role he’s a very, very good actor. Try to picture someone else in “Field of Dreams,” “The Untouchables” or “Dances with Wolves.” You can argue he’s no Olivier ( I would counter with his unforgettable work in “A Perfect World), but at the same time he’s always managed to hold his own on screen with some powerful actors: James Earl Jones, Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall, Morgan Freeman, Sean Connery, etc — which is a talent all on its own.

Tarantino has an excellent eye for under-appreciated actors and a real gift for resurrecting those put out to pasture before their time. Now that he has some real age on his face, Costner would be perfect as a sadistic Western villain.  An actor known for being a good guy personifying evil worked out pretty well ofr Henry Fonda in “oOce Upon a Time In the West.” I suspect the same will be true here.

–UNIVERSAL WISELY PULLS PLUG ON STEPHEN KING’S “DARK TOWER” –

King wrote some of his “Dark Tower” series when he could still tell a damn good story and some long after his storytelling tank had ran out of gas. Regardless, even in the good ole’ days when I gobbled up all things King, the story of Roland the Gunfighter was sheer torture to get through and completely forgettable afterwards.

To adapt a film from a book is one thing. At times, it even makes sense to adapt a film from a lousy book if the concept is good and the story itself is somewhat simple (“Bridges of Madison County,” “DaVinci Code,” “Along Came a Spider”). But these Dark Tower books are a real slough; confusing and self-indulgent.

King’s strength has never been in creating layers of mythology. He’s no Lewis or Tolkien and becomes un-readable when he thinks he is. This was a good move on Universal’s part, but you can bet they spent millions just to get to a point where the obvious became apparent.

Only in Hollywood.

–AMEN, BROTHER, AMEN: KYLE SMITH HAMMERS HARRY POTTER–

Sitting unmoved and uninterested through all eight Harry Potter movies over the last decade or so, I often had the thought: Please don’t let this all be leading up to Harry P. and Lord V. standing a few yards apart zapping each other with their wands until one of them buckles.

Kyle and I are pals and share a similar political philosophy, but when it comes to films, oddly enough, we disagree much more than we agree. There are leftist critics I have more in common with in this regard. But when it comes to the uncommonly dull, episodic, and downright unbearable Harry Potter film franchise, we’re darn near soul mates. Here’s Smith’s excellent takedown, which I couldn’t agree with more or written half as well.

Smith blogs here.

–TOTO’S FEELING GUILTY–

When it comes to “Stealth” he should feel guilty. When it comes to the brilliant “Malibu’s Most Wanted,” however, he should feel guilty for feeling guilty.

–CHARLIE SHEEN PLOTS TELEVISION COMEBACK?–

Though it was an awful movie, the concept for “Anger Management” is a pretty good one and you can definitely see it as a workable sitcom.

As far as Charlie Sheen goes, unless he does a John Belushi, he’s here to stay no matter how outrageous his behavior. I’ve always felt he was an underrated actor, most especially a comedic actor, and someone is always going to take another chance on him. Furthermore, his return to television is likely to the biggest thing since Little Ricky was born.

If nothing else, we’ll always have Sheen’s canon of epic B-films, from 1989’s “Major League” to 1997’s “Money Talks,” to remember him by.

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TODAY’S QUICK HITS

–WHO DIDN’T SEE THIS COMING?

–RATINGS FOR “BREAKING BAD” SEASON FOUR PREMIERE ARE SERIES BEST

–AWESOME NEW “CAPTAIN AMERICA” POSTERS

–TRYING TO CARE. FAILING.

–BROODING SUPERMAN EQUALS SUCKY SUPERMAN. SCREW YOU, DC.

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CLASSIC PICK FOR WEDNEDAY JULY 20, 2011

TCM:

6:45 AM EST: Tomorrow Is Forever (1946) — A scarred veteran presumed dead returns home to find his wife remarried. Dir: Irving Pichel Cast: Claudette Colbert, Orson Welles, George Brent. BW-104 mins, TV-PG,

A beautiful and beautifully filmed and acted film that’s essentially the story of a mother (Claudette Colbert) who learns that winning the war means that mothers everywhere must risk making the ultimate sacrifice.

They simply don’t make films like this anymore and for whatever reason this particular one doesn’t get the attention it deserves. On its face the concept may seem a little absurd, but the emotional arc of the story and characters is handled so delicately and with such respect, that you soon forget.

Honestly, this one is not to be missed. A truly under-rated classic I promote at every opportunity.

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Please send tips/suggestions/requests to jnolte@breitbart.com

First off,  I would be remiss if I did not thank Associate Editor Alex Marlow and all the contributors who gave me great peace of mind during my cross-country move. Big Hollywood didn’t miss a step while I was away. A great job was done by all.  Also, a big, BIG thanks to Andrew Breitbart and his business partner Laurence Solov for simply saying “yes,” when I asked about moving home and, most importantly, for creating the kind of work environment I was eager to return to.

The Morning Call Sheet is planned as a new Monday through Friday feature that will be a sort-of summary/round up of the day’s big news from Hollywoodland, as well as other things as they come up. While the marquee is mostly devoted to the intersection of pop culture and politics, the Morning Call Sheet will give you a rundown of that as well as the day’s straight entertainment news. The hope here is to eventually turn this into a regular newsletter. With help and input from others, the Morning Call Sheet is likely to change and evolve over time. Meaning: tips and suggestions can either be noted in the comments or emailed to jnolte@breitbart.com.

But for now, it’s inauguration time…

–BOX OFFICE:

Transformers, Horrible Bosses, and The Zookeeper are doing well. As if movie stars aren’t already having enough trouble (see below), two star-driven vehicles have flopped miserably. The duo of Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks has already collapsed in week 2 and Jim Carrey’s latest is DOA in week 4.

–ANDREW KLAVAN’S FINAL CHAPTER OF HIS “HOMELANDER” SERIES, “THE FINAL HOUR,” IS ALREADY AVAILABLE AT AMAZON. SOME EARLY REVIEWS HERE.

The Homelander trilogy is not only an exciting, extremely well-written, page-turner of a series (even though they’re written for young adults, I read the first two with little difficulty), it’s the rare fiction novel any parent who believes in God, America, and the evil of terrorism can hand to a child without worrying that after they close the back cover, they will demand you throw away your 100 watt light bulbs.

Conservatives looking for quality entertainment that fits their values, need look no further. Read chapter one here. Even better news … a film version is in the works.

–CUBA SHOOTS ITS FIRST ZOMBIE MOVIE ‘JUAN OF THE DEAD‘

Supposedly the story has something to do with immigration, which is probably the least of Cuba’s worries.

In the film, Havana is overrun by Zombies while’s Cuba’s Commie leaders insist it’s just a plot by US-backed dissidents to bring down the government. It is up to the hero Juan to rid the island of the undead for money. But as the zombie outbreak begins to spread, he is left with no choice but to fight for his own survival.

According to Bruges…

“It’s a zombie film but it’s about Cubans and how we react in the face of a crisis because we’ve had a lot of them here over the last 50 years[.]“ 

“It is a social comedy, it has a bit of everything. It has horror, it has action and it pretty much laughs in the face of problems.”

In other words, hilarity ensues.

Watch the trailer here.

–OH-SO LIBERAL HOLLYWOOD UNDERCUTTING UNIONS?

Say it isn’t so:

Judging from this summer’s output of star-free studio movies, the major difference between the sports world and Hollywood is that showbiz moguls have actually found a way to promote their product without having to rely on the costliest element in the talent equation — the star. “X-Men” and “Transformers” are saleable brands, even without a big name on the marquee. The studios are operating a lot like small-market sports teams like the Tampa Bay Rays — they’re building box-office behemoths using younger, comparatively underpaid talent. …

“It may not be as dramatic as what’s happening in sports, but we’re seeing a steady effort on the part of the studios to erode the status and union power of writers, actors and directors,” he said. “In the feature-writing business, quotes don’t mean anything anymore – -now the studios work backwards from what they’re willing to pay for a job, and if you don’t take the offer, they move on. The size of writing staffs are smaller. The studios are chipping away at everything involving talent.”

More proof, that the era of the movie star is coming to an end. Other than Adam Sandler, Will Smith, Denzel Washington, and Sandra Bullock, stars are no longer the draw. Concept is. One reason for this is that America simply doesn’t like their movie stars as much as they once did. It’s just a fact that they lack the powerful charisma and mystery stars of the past possessed in ways that made them immortal. There are many reasons for this, but just for starters, rather than simply advocate for their own beliefs, too many of today’s celebrities openly insult those who dare disagree — which has done permanent damage to the overall brand.

John Garfield might have flirted with communism, but he never called me a Nazi.

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QUICK HITS

–TRAILER FOR THE NEW ADAM/MADAM SANDLER FILM? OR… IS SANDLER PUNKING CRITICS?

–PRODUCTION VIDEO FROM “THE HOBBIT”

--”DARK KNIGHT RISES” TRAILER TO SCREEN AHEAD OF “HARRY POTTER”?

–COOL POSTER FOR “SHERLOCK HOLMES” SEQUEL

–INTERNATIONAL TRAILER FOR STEVEN SPIELBERG/PETER JACKSON “TINTIN”

–ANOTHER IMMORTAL PIECE OF CINEMA HISTORY SCHEDULED TO BITE THE DUST

–THE SITUATION HAS A SITUATION

–‘GI JOE 2′ HAS A VILLAIN: FIREFLY

–HAVE WE REACHED THE END OF ‘TRANSFORMERS’?

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CLASSIC PICK FOR TUESDAY JULY 12TH

Turner Classic Movies:

6:00 PM  EST Jailhouse Rock (1957) –  After learning to play the guitar in prison, a young man becomes a rock ‘n roll sensation. Dir: Richard Thorpe Cast: Elvis Presley, Judy Tyler, Mickey Shaughnessy.  BW-96 mins, TV-G, CC, Letterbox Format

Tomorrow evening, Turner reminds us that before celebrity and narcotics and Hal B. Wallis got a hold of him, once upon a time Elvis Presley was not only a promising young actor but also the coolest man on the planet. Marvelous soundtrack, and it’s been reported that Elvis himself choreographed the immortal title number.

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Again, the Morning Call Sheet is going to morph and change over time. Please drop a comment or send any tips/suggestion to jnolte@breitbart.com.

So I rejoiced—and I also sympathized. Breaking free of leftism while working in show business is like escaping from “The Matrix” only to find oneself in “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.” You wake to a risky but bracing new reality of individual liberty, limited government and free markets and are instantly beset by zombified statist dreamers determined either to make you rejoin their ranks or to destroy you. Mr. Mamet reports that a certain prominent left-leaning newspaper actually panned his first openly conservative play not once but twice for good measure. (Libertarian humorist Greg Gutfeld has introduced a “Mamet Attack Clock” on his late-night cable show to measure just how fast critics will now downgrade their opinions of the playwright’s work.)

Under such circumstances, it is natural that Mr. Mamet would develop the urge to cry out, like Kevin McCarthy in the famous last scene of “Body Snatchers”: “Listen to me! Please listen!” From that urge, no doubt, arises Mr. Mamet’s new work of nonfiction, “The Secret Knowledge.” It is his attempt to explain and disseminate the thinking behind his conversion to the right.

“Liberalism is a religion,” he writes. “It affords a feeling of spiritual rectitude at little or no cost. Central to this religion is the assertion that evil does not exist, all conflict being attributed to a lack of understanding between the opposed. Well and good, but this does not accord with the experience of anyone.”

Full article here.

You can purchase “The Secret Knowledge” here.

He drove north through the empty city.  He drove slowly, careful of the storm.  The pavement was slick where it was level and there were troughs and hollows where deep puddles gathered, where the water thundered against the undercarriage and gripped the tires of the old car as they passed through.

As he got away from downtown, the streets grew even darker around him.  It took him a while to notice it:  the electricity here was out.  He looked past the laboring wipers.  He saw rainswept boulevards empty as alleyways, storefronts boarded against the tempest.  He was glad to be inside and warm with the heater on.  The unreasoning urgency in him—the anxious conviction that he had just been in some kind of danger—was already beginning to recede.  Maybe he’d just spooked himself.  Maybe he’d just let his nerves get the better of him.

He turned on the radio.  Hoping for some news, some voices for company.  Nothing came out but static.  He pressed the scan button and listened as the tuner automatically ran the band.  Still nothing but that hiss, end to end, that hiss with broken fragments of words in it like men sending messages from the belly of a snake.

Look at this.  Look at this.

The hollowed brownstones.  The vacant businesses.  The broken windows like phantoms’ eyes.  He was in the north now, at the edge of the neighborhoods.  He was thinking:  The wages of sin.

Because it was all the Country of King Penis, wasn’t it?  The country of misused women and abandoned sons.  That was exactly the message Reverend Skyles had been trying to bring to them, that was exactly why his fall was such a disappointment, such a tragedy.  He was a good man, a true man of God, the lone voice of truth against the silken temptations of Augie Lancaster.  Augie Lancaster telling folks he would give them back their dignity.  How do you give a man dignity if he doesn’t have it for himself?  Reverend Skyles told them they had to be dignified, had to do right…

Peter Patterson was lost in philosophical thoughts like this and so he didn’t notice the water rising.  It was pouring in fast from the east where the river had broken through the levies.  It was burbling up out of the sewers with such force that manhole covers were being lifted and rattled aside, one after another, as the deluge crossed town.

Peter Patterson began to feel the grip of the flood on his tires, the steering wheel tugging at his hands, but he was distracted.  He figured he was just going through another puddle.

Then his headlights picked out the body of a drowned man.

Oh, it was an eerie sight to see.  It was so unreal, he felt a stutter of disbelief between the moment he understood what it was and the moment the terror began to rise in him.  Peter Patterson stared through the windshield, open-mouthed.  The corpse’s ballooning shirt gleamed white in the headlights as he floated face down through the silent intersection up ahead.

“Holy mother of God,” Peter Patterson whispered.

An instant later, the tide was on him.

He felt a soft jolt against the side of the old Chrysler.  He turned and was startled to find the water outside was suddenly lapping at the bottom of the car’s door.  The next moment, with one low, electric groan, the New Yorker stalled.  It stopped and sat there, dark and dead, a motionless hulk around him.

Peter Patterson reflexively reached for the keys, but the shutdown had such a finality to it that he didn’t even bother to try to restart the engine.  He just pulled the keys from the ignition.  He knew he had to get out, get free, as fast as he could.

He tried to shoulder open the door.  It gave a little—just a little.  Then the pressure of the water held it.  Through the windshield, in the wavering glow of a fire nearby, he could still see the white shirt of the drowned man as he floated, slowly revolving, down the street.  A little zap of fresh panic went through him.

You could get caught in here.  You could be that guy, he thought.

He shouldered the door again, harder this time, with a little of that I-don’t-wanna-die adrenalin pumping through him.  It was no good.  The weird, living gelatin of the flood pushed back against him.  He hit the door again, even harder, even more afraid.  At last, it gave way.  The water poured in over his feet and ankles, shockingly cold.  The door slid open just enough—just enough for Peter Patterson to force himself desperately through the gap.

He stood up in the street.  The water reached his knees and was still rising.  Shockingly, shockingly cold.  Insidious in its swiftness.  He could feel the force of it, trying to nudge him away from the car, trying to coax him into the arms of the current.  The cold seeped into him like a seductive whisper, trying to weaken his resolve.  It was the voice of the storm.  The storm wanted to kill him.  He could feel it.  It wanted him floating and turning down the street like the drowned man.  He was already shivering, already growing weak with the cold.

Peter Patterson held on to the car door with one hand, with all the strength that was left in his freezing fingers.  He looked around him and behind him, searching for the best way out, praying to God to help him find it.  The glow of the fire to the north lit the intersection with an eerie brightness.  He could make out the shapes of buildings silhouetted against it.  The dark grew thick in the near distance, though, with the electric down.  Hard to find my way, Lord. 

He remembered the keychain gripped in his free hand.  There was a small flashlight on it.  He lifted it.  Had to be careful not to drop it—his hand was getting so stiff—his whole body was shuddering with cold.  He pressed the button and shot a thin blue beam in different directions, this way and that.  It picked out patches of water, black and boiling on every side of him.  He had to pray some more to fight his rising panic.  He turned the unsteady beam over the buildings around him.  There was a promising one, about a block away.  He might be able to break into that.  It was blackened brick, about six stories tall.  There were boards on the ground floor windows but he was sure he could tear them off.  There’d be stairs inside.  He could climb up to higher ground.  Thank you, Jesus.

He took a deep breath for courage and reluctantly let go of the car.  He began wading through the water toward the intersection.  The drowned corpse turned and floated past the corner to his left, like a taunt, like a threat, like an omen.  But Peter Patterson tried not to look in that direction.  He told himself he was going to make it, he was going to be all right.  He kept praying.

The flood was up to the bottom of his thighs now but he was still stronger than the current.  He could still push through.  Only the cold worried him.  Wicked cold.  It ate into him, ate away his strength.  It made his arms quiver, as he pressed them tightly against his sides.  The rain lashed his face and his sodden overcoat clung to him.  Every stride through the thick flood was an effort.  He felt heavy and was getting heavier.  He felt like a man made of soft, wet clay trying to reach his goal before the clay dried and hardened so that he became a statue on the city street.  His teeth began to chatter.  He made shuddering noises, battling to take another slow step and another.  Don’t let me die.

He reached the intersection.  The light here was bright and startling, drawing his attention to the west.  He turned to look and stopped where he was, stood still, letting out a tremulous breath as the water washed around him.

The flames were bright here, the city on fire.  You wouldn’t think it could burn like that in all this rain.  Only a block away, beyond the revolving corpse in the foreground, jagged lashings of livid orange burst through a broad storefront and scarred the black night.  The store’s low white roof gleamed red.  The taller brownstones on either side of it loomed darkly above the burning.  The water flowed and rose on the street out front, reflecting the fire in places or sometimes swallowing its light or sometimes sending up flickering splashes as people kicked through it.  The human figures appeared in silhouette, running into the flaming shop and out again, carrying their boxes of plunder.  They were busy as insects, but now and then the fire caught the face of a man, his eyes weirdly dead and bright at the same time, dead with the mindless passion of his hunger and bright with the hunger at the same time, dead and bright like the white shirt on the back of the corpse revolving in the current.

Appalled, Peter Patterson stood there for a moment, watching.  But only for a moment.  The flames were vivid and hot to the eye, but they gave no heat really.  The water still had him in the clutches of its cold, numbing him and urging him into its flow.  He had to fight it.  He had to move.  He had to keep moving.  Help me, God.

He turned to go on—and there was Ramsey towering over him.

—–

“The Identity Man” is available for purchase today at Amazon.

It is hard to choose where to begin because there is so much to praise in this deftly plotted and incredibly well written thriller. 

What grabbed me from the start was Andrew’s style.  It’s smart, hard, slick, gritty and real.  When he sets his scenes, he does so with a brilliant economy that puts the reader right there, right then.  A perfect example comes at the very beginning of the novel: 

“The rain spat and whispered against the madcam as if it were falling in an empty field.  At moments, when the wind subsided, you could hear the stoplights changing color.  You could see them swaying there above the intersections, one gleaming circle of red after another in the storm-streaked dark.” 

While his descriptions of what’s happening outside his characters are superb, Andrew is just as talented when describing what is happening inside those figures – their angst, their panic, their cynicism and hope. 

At its rapidly beating heart, this intelligent, fast-paced novel is about redemption and those who lie beyond it.  

From John Shannon, a career criminal given a new face and new shot at life, to Brick Ramsey, a disillusioned cop in a post-Katrina”esque” New Orleans, Andrew Klavan takes us on a dark and twisting existential ride that will keep even the savviest of thriller readers guessing right until the very end. 

Powerful, compelling, chilling and captivating; The Identity Man is part film noir, part modern morality tale, and one hundred percent entertaining.  One can almost hear the Hollywood bidding war revving up as this exceptional novel hits store shelves.

“The Identity Man” is available for purchase today at Amazon.

A floorboard creaked on the landing.  Shannon tensed, his hand frozen reaching for the cash.  He turned to see Benny’s dark shape likewise frozen by the door.  In their silence, they heard light footsteps running on the hall carpet.  All the pieces—all the half-acknowledged thoughts—fell into place in Shannon’s mind and he understood:  There was someone in the house.  There had been someone in the house all along.  That’s why he’d seen a glow at the door.  The someone must have heard them break in.  The someone must have turned the light off in order to hide his own presence.  Now the someone was trying to get to the stairway and escape.

For another second, Shannon hoped things might still turn out all right.  All they had to do was let the someone go.  Then they could grab the money and get out of here before the police showed up.  Even with Benny’s supercharged engine roaring for all the world to hear, they might still get away without being spotted.

But then Benny moved—and he moved so fast Shannon had no time to stop him or even call out.  His shadow flashed through the door like a streak of black lightning.  When he flashed back he had the someone in his hands.

It was a woman.  Benny was gripping her by the throat.  He shoved her up against the wall hard, hard enough to make the room shudder.  He shone his flashlight in her face and then down the whole length of her.  She was in her twenties, very pretty, with a curvy figure pressing through her blouse and skirt.  In the outglow of the flashlight beam, Shannon could see Benny’s bright eyes and the teeth in his fierce smile as he breathed over her.  His breath was a low, laughing growl of triumph and desire.

Shannon jumped to his feet.  He shone his own flashlight on Benny, the blue beam crossing with the white beam in the dark.

“What the hell’re you doing?  Let her go,” he said in a harsh whisper.

“Shut up.  Get the money,” Benny said.  He shoved his flashlight in his back pocket.  He held the girl by the throat with one hand and tore open her blouse with the other.  The buttons of the blouse pattered on the carpeting.  Benny grabbed hold of the girl’s breast.  The girl struggled, crying out in anguish and pain.

“I called the police,” she managed to say.  Then her voice ended in a gasp as Benny squeezed her hard and pressed himself up against her.

“Damn it, there’s no time for this shit!” said Shannon.

“Shut up,” Benny said.  He was crazy.  “Get the money.”

Shannon hesitated.  His blue flashlight beam played over the girl’s face.  He could see her terror and then her despair as Benny’s hand started fumbling under her skirt.  Tears streamed down her cheeks.  Her eyes went up and her lips moved silently.  Shannon could tell she was praying.

His heart went out to her.  He was surprised by the force of the feeling.  It was just one of those things you didn’t know you would feel so much until you were in the situation.  Now he was here and he was looking right at her, looking at her tear-streaked face.  He could see her praying and choking, helpless in Benny’s hands.  And he felt awful for her.  He knew he ought to forget about it, ignore Benny and just grab the money so they could get out when Benny was done with her.  He knew if he started trouble now, they were sure to get caught.  That meant prison for Shannon, prison for life.

But look at her, he thought.  An image flashed in his mind of the girl getting dressed for work in the morning, turning this way and that in front of her mirror, pleased because her blouse looked pretty on her.  And now Benny had torn the blouse and her face was twisted in fear and agony.

Shannon had one more moment of indecision.  Then he thought:  Shit.  Then he thought again:  Shit!  Because he realized there was no way he was going to just stand there and let this happen.

Shannon had fought characters like Benny a couple of times in prison, and this is what he knew:  there was no talking involved in it.  Benny was big and mean and drugged out of his mind.  There could be no threats or poses or hard-guy exchanges with him because by the time you got through with that garbage you’d be dead.  So he simply bent to his roll and slipped his crowbar out of its pocket.  It was small but it was heavy enough.  He stepped around the desk and took half another step and he was next to Benny.  Benny was choking the girl hard and mashing her hard with his hand under her skirt.  Shannon could hear strangled phrases of her prayer:  “Santa Maria…  Madre de Dios…”  That settled it for him somehow.  Without another thought, he brought the crowbar whipping around in a low Laredo sidearm and shattered Benny’s kneecap.

Benny did a sack of potatoes, dropped right down to the floor, boom, clutching his leg and shrieking like a woman in a horror movie.  All of which was fine with Shannon because what a piece of garbage this guy was.

The girl, meanwhile, staggered away from the wall, clutching her throat with one hand and the front of her skirt with the other.  She straightened and glanced at Shannon, confused.  Then she looked down at Benny.  Benny was writhing on the floor.  His shriek had sunk away to a series of gibbering sobs.  What a piece of garbage.

The girl looked up at Shannon again, hesitating, uncertain.  Even in the dark, he could see she was trembling violently.

“My knee!” groaned Benny Torrance.

“Aw, shut up,” said Shannon.  Then he turned back to the girl.  “Go on, sister, get out of here.  No one’s gonna hurt you now.”

He didn’t have to tell her twice.  She stumbled to the door and out onto the landing.  But just as she got there, the long, urgent cry of a siren came to them through the night outside.  The police.  She really had called them, like she said.  By the sound of it, they were turning off the street, coming down the drive to the house.  Shannon’s heart just about broke when he heard them.  He was finished.  He was going to grow old in slam.  He’d always known this was going to happen if he kept at it and it was his own stupid fault, but that didn’t make it any easier now that the time had come.

“You broke my knee!” cried Benny Torrance.

“Shut up, I said,” said Shannon sadly.

The girl was still on the landing.  She had halted there at the sound of siren.  As the siren drew closer, she looked back at Shannon.  He could see the whites of her eyes in the shadows.  She tilted her head down the hall.

“There’s a back way,” she told him.

Shannon gaped at her.  The sudden rush of hope gave him vertigo.  The siren stopped.   He could hear the police radio right outside the door.

“Hurry,” the girl said.

Dumbfounded, Shannon glanced back at the money in the safe, at his tools on the floor.  He glanced down at Benny.  Benny writhed and held his leg and went, “Ah God.  Ah God.”

“Hurry,” the girl said again.

Shannon let the crowbar slip from his fingers.  He took two long steps and was out on the landing next to her.  Instinctively, she recoiled from him, her arm pressed protectively against her breasts.  He was close enough to smell her fear and her sex and her perfume and the vomitous smell of Benny on her.

“Thanks, baby,” he said.

Still recoiling fearfully, she nodded.

Down the stairs, he saw the flashing red and blue lights of the police cruiser playing over the beveled glass of the door.  He saw the shape of a lawman approaching.

“Don’t leave me here!” cried Benny Torrance, clutching his knee.

Shannon took off down the hall.

—–

 Another excerpt will publish tomorrow morning.

 “The Identity Man” is available for purchase today at Amazon.

Empire of Lies is Klavan’s fast-paced, gritty novel that features a conservative Christian protagonist who uncovers an extremist Muslin plot to kill hundreds, but can’t convince a duplicitous media of the terrible truth. Think of it as a kind of North by Northwest meets the War on Terror.  The 2008 political thriller was a daring poke in the eye to the elitist New York and Hollywood left. His flawed heroes are part of what sets his writing apart. They’re made of flesh and blood with their own personal failings. “That’s my nature, I can’t write them any other way.”

Klavan’s erudite style and gutsy prose in books and screenplays like True Crimes, Don’t Say a Word, The Animal Hour, Corruption, Dynamite Road and the recently released Identity Man have earned him dazzling reviews, incredible sales, prestigious writing awards and international acclaim. His popular and no-holds-barred young adult series The Homelander, deals with the exploits of a teenager who wakes up to find himself in a radical Muslim United States and fights back.     

“As a writer you’re artist and business man. You are your business, but you have to speak the truth, too.  In the past I’d get two-hundred reviews on any of my other books, all great. Empire of Lies got one major review, which accused me of being a right-wing crackpot. Can I prove that happened because the central character is a conservative Christian and the bad guys are the media and Islamic jihadists?  No, but it all seems pretty strange.” 

Last year Klavan caused more than a few Hollywood lefties to choke on their morning croissants when he published a Los Angeles Times opinion piece dealing with the liberal blacklisting of film industry conservatives. Several so-called Hollywood journalists attacked Klavan demanding proof with a snooty attitude of, “We all know that conservative writers and filmmakers are just not as creative as liberals.” 

A necessary tenet of most conservatives in Hollywood, besieged by a camouflaged brand of liberal fascism is not to out one of your own that has spoken in confidence. Klavan’s guarded list of those who have suffered left-of-center prejudice is indeed long,  so instead he speaks openly of his own experiences.  “Besides my novels, I’ve made a good living writing scripts for a number of years.  I remember giving probably the best pitch on a project I’ve ever given.  Afterward the producer was making small talk and said something about that ‘evil bastard (President) Bush.’  When I’m in a meeting and someone says America is stupid or evil I won’t let that pass.”

Klavan is an innately polite individual, so I can tell firmness, but not rudeness was inherent in his reply.  “I let this producer know I was on other side and the whole mood changed to an obvious ‘don’t let the door hit you in the… on the way out.’  Then the phone stopped ringing.”

The successful writer actually wants everyone to have his say, even if he disagrees with your take on matters.  That’s the American way, which makes it Klavan’s way.  Not because it’s blind adherence, but because it’s fair, decent common sense.  “Hollywood has made something like fifteen movies where the American military and the CIA are the bad guys in the War on Terror.  None of which were successful.  They made these movies for the acceptance of the liberal elites, who they want to associate with and get praise from. Where are the movies with Americans as the good guys? We’re at war, but Hollywood is still stuck in Vietnam.” 

Klavan observes that these films have squandered hundreds of millions of dollars. “In how many other businesses are you not punished for your bad acts?  These films flop here, but provide comfort to the enemy by bashing America and our troops. The studios sometimes make up the difference on foreign distribution and sales, so everyone looks the other way.  A really great HBO film like Taking Chance, about the escorting of a fallen Marine’s body back to his native Wyoming was one of the networks most successful films last year.  The old studios actually serviced their audience, the average American.  These industry people today look down their noses at the average American, and it’s costing them millions.”   

Klavan isn’t venting either. I can tell that he’s thought this all out very, very well. “I’ve read the same books the left has read. And I’ve read the books that they pretend that they’ve read. The Hollywood elites thinks there is virtue in their culture of lies that America is evil and that Islamo-fascism somehow has a moral equivalence to Western values. After all, they’re the ones who invented Islamo-phobia. You can be completely politically correct and still be absolutely evil.  What is so wrong about thinking that these guys are really bad when they want to kill me for not worshipping Allah?  A guy who flies a plane into the World Trade Center, isn’t he a bad Muslim?” 

 Witness Hollywood’s most royal left-winger, Bill Maher, and his recent conversion on the subject of radical Muslims versus Western culture. Has he been reading his Klavan?

Two years ago the then fifty-two-year old writer managed to get embedded with a combat unit in Afghanistan for several weeks. “I wasn’t there to be a ‘macho war correspondent,’ but I needed to assure myself that what I was writing was the truth.”  He found the American troops and the loyal Afghan Muslims fighting the Taliban and Al Qaeda some of the most dedicated people he’d ever met.  “I was only there for two weeks, I was never in the military and I kept thinking ‘Am I nuts, I could get shot.’  But those troops were some of the best people I’ve ever known, they really believe in what they’re doing. Every day our perimeter was protected by Muslim cops and troops.”       

Klavan might almost be considered a conservative and literary “Man for All Seasons.” His novels hopscotch between elegant ghost stories to hardened modern detective noir and ground-breaking political thrillers, including his just-released Identity Man that deals with the real costs behind a second lease on life.  He has published numerous insightful opinion pieces in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post, as well as the Los Angeles Times. Who else but Klavan could so skillfully show that the plot of Toy Story 3 really does represent a celebration of conservative values and ideals?  His popular Klavan On The Culture feature on PJTV always hits the mark with smart and incisive humor on such left-wing taboo subjects as “Does Islam Suck?” and “Political Correctness Kills.” 

Loony, elitist liberals are always easy prey in the sights of this rational thinking, UC Berkeley and real-life educated writer who is matter-of-fact about his own deeply held conservative values and Christian beliefs.  “It kind of started for me during the Reagan period. I identified myself as a liberal, but I found certain things didn’t make sense. When I looked at the conservative side, I found there were a number of things I agreed with.” 

Klavan does point out with some optimism that, “Things are getting better for conservatives in Hollywood. It started with films like 300, then The Blindside, Grand Torino and now Taken.  We have a long way to go, but my phone has started to ring again.”

One thing does bother him though, “The one place conservatives in the arts fall down is in building a body of reviews, awards and creating our own grants. Writers and filmmakers are part of the arts community and we all crave recognition. That recognition is what will help us reclaim the culture, and that’s where the real battle that matters is.”

[Ed. Note: Tomorrow look for a Brad Thor's "Identity Man" review and the first part of two exclusive excerpts.]