Most of my recreational reading is non-fiction. Iโ€™ll make an exception for a handful of gun-savvy novelists such as Stephen Hunter.  I made the mistake at the local library of picking up a novel about an independently wealthy FBI agent who stays in the Presidential Suite at the Fontainebleu hotel while on official assignment.  He carries a Les Baer Custom 1911 pistol, generally works alone, and is the Bureauโ€™s version of Sherlock Holmes. In this particular book, he is assigned to a partner who carries a Browning Hi-Power.  In the course of a single encounter he kills multiple alligators with his pistol, at least one while underwater with it, and while under fire determines โ€œfrom the sound and the character of the rifle, that the man was firing a scoped Winchester 94, .30-30.โ€  Guy has one hell of an ear, huh?

Just for the record, there was a brief window long since closed in which a member of the highest speed, lowest drag FBI special unit might have had a Les Baer 1911, and the elite Hostage Rescue Team was once issued Novak Custom Browning Hi-Powers, but neither fictional agent was assigned to such a team in this 2018 novel.  The two co-writers had obviously done a bit of research, but not enough. And, it should be noted, lone wolf agents donโ€™t fit the FBI protocol.

Oh, and by the way, the ultimate bad guy turns out to be a cop. Who is about to kill the hero when he himself is hatchet-chopped in the head by a serial killer.  Ah, the realism.  One gets a sense the authors donโ€™t like cops much. At the end they comment in narrative,โ€œโ€ฆthe police tended to close ranks around their own, even the rotten applesโ€ฆโ€  Uh, yeah, sure. Thatโ€™s why they have internal affairs units, I guess. Good Lord.

Crappy research does not make good fiction.  Even when thereโ€™s a good plot and solid characters, neither of which I saw in this novel, poor research destroys the โ€œwilling suspension of disbeliefโ€ required for fiction to work well.  Itโ€™s like seeing an actor in a Robin Hood film with a wrist watch: it kind of blows the whole effect.

39 COMMENTS

  1. You should real some sci fi by author Larry Correia. He’s a huge gun guy, trainer, competitor. Very accurate with his firearm use in his books.

      • But more than a decade before Larry started writing, Laurell K. Hamilton acknowledged Mas in one of *her* monster hunter books…

        She had a sizeable following among gunheads before she went off into vampire porn.

    • Mike, if you read the MHI series by Larry, you’d see that Mas is quoted on the covers as endorsing them ๐Ÿ™‚

    • You just beat me to the plug for Larry Correia. And considering that your reading time is limited, I strongly recommend listening to the Monster Hunter International books on Audible. Oliver Wyman’s performance is awesome.

      • Mas is friends with the ILOH Larry Correia. Larry stopped in during a MAG80 class I attended in Utah in 2015 or so.

  2. Mas,

    I imagine the authors wanted to write a spell-binding action novel, sell it to lots of people, and make as much money as possible. You are a tough customer because you know more about the subject than the authors do! I imagine Ben Carson sounds like you when he watches a medical TV show.

    I agree with everything you wrote. However, one reason for making the villain a cop may be because such an educated villain might be able to hold out longer against the good guys, increasing the drama. But, because of what you quoted, I do believe the writers share an anti-cop bias.

    Fantasy can be close to reality, but it is still different.

  3. Why do we seem to hear so little about the church shooting in central Texas earlier this year……and its immediate aftermath…..seems like a big deal to me….

  4. Years ago Mas recommended Larry Correia, which is when I started reading Larry.

    Larry is a wonderful writer and technically accurate when it comes to firearms.
    I will leave it up to the reader to determine his accuracy regarding werewolves, etc.

    Another writer who gets it right is Jonathan Maberry and his Joe Ledger series.

      • MsLiz,

        Maybe he feels peaceful inside, or, he realizes he is on TV, and every word he speaks will be recorded for retrieval in future eons, so he doesn’t want to mis-speak. Even if he is boring, he is still a great man in a lot of ways.

  5. About reality, several years back you did a piece about NYPD shooting records which I found very interesting. Is similar info available today?

    • I believe NYPD still publishes their annual SOP-9 report, but I think you have to be current LE to get a copy. I could be wrong.

      • The NY ACLU has/had the yearly NYPD FDRs on their website for quite some time. They’re usually a few years behind. I used to mine them for training items and hidden gems.

        Over the years there have been a few thumb nail reports on various incidents that I’d love to find out what REALLY happened. Some of the ND reports are most educational.

  6. Forgive the “off topic” comment; but it’s important to let readers know:
    You mentioned “The Law of Self Defense” by Andrew Branca in a prior blog entry.
    It’s fabulous, an easy read, concise, packed with VERY useful information, and a complete section that covers individual state laws.
    Frankly, Andrew being an attorney does a better job than even you on the key subjects related to proper and legal actions, both “at the moment” and afterward.
    My sincere thanks for pointing out this must read (often) manual of essential information.

  7. What Mike in KC said. Larry Correia portrays firearms accurately, but they’re secondary (and complementary) to the world-crafting and storytelling. I’m a huge fan of his Monster Hunter series.

    Keep an eye on Amazon: he’ll sometimes put the Kindle version of the first book, “Monster Hunter International,” up for $0.00. Can’t go wrong at that price. ๐Ÿ˜‰

    • Speaking of fiction & firearms, let’s not forget the ne plus ultra…The Warren Report. Where a purportedly ” lone- wolf” assassin,LHO; not engaged in a conspiracy, manages to secure employment a few months before, in a building that just happens to directly overlook a presidential motorcade the route of which was changed days before. There are thousands of buildings & businesses in Dallas , TX. This supposed doofus,alledgedly managed that,Russian life, American reentry,& everything else without assistance? The pathetic orndance used, that no sniper needs to physically stick the firearm out of a 5th floor window unless it’s a diversion, etc, makes the Warren report my pick. All the best Mas.

  8. The author is about as well-informed about firearms as politicians. The Fontainebleu brings back memories- and I believe the only hotel by this name is in South Beach. So I am thinking about Florida.

    Hopefully novels such as the one Mas described will not become even more far fetched in the not-to-distant future; especially those novels that might speak about the use of semi-automatic long guns in Florida. It seems there is a ballot initiative there to outlaw all semi-auto long guns.

    I read that the Florida AG is attempting to put a stop to it. But, geez- FLORIDA! It scares me to think that such a ban might be left in the hands of a misinformed public. This 2020 ballot initiative needs about 750,000 signatures to proceed to a statewide vote and they have about 100K so far. I’m not sure if signatures are the only thing needed- but there is over a year to go.

    My wife and I are planning to move from New York to Florida real soon (escape from New York). And just when you think you are on the road to real freedom… Hang tough Florida.

    • from whar I’ve seen about that Florida ballot piece, its the tired olf BloomingItioniBurg bag of trash that Oregon did not allow to be on the ballot, thus killing it, but Washington’s corrupt Supreme Court did allow it, and the maggotbux of the likes of Bloomie, Hanauer, Allen, etc, bought a bunch of sleazy false adverts, swept the unconstitutionality of it under the rug, and convinced enough of the public to vote it into law. Now under challenge as unconstitutional and bad law.. I went to bed Tuesday night last November not owning any “assault weapons and woke up in the morning owning eight or ten, not having done anything. I won’t be buying any more semi0automatic long guns, or handguns either for that matter, in Washington until this is overturned.

      • If it’s the ballot measure I’m thinking of, Oregon Firearms Federation (OFF) challenged it and got it removed on a technicality surrounding the “initiative summary”, so don’t celebrate too much.

        In WA, one key takeaway is this: We’re always told that “98% of Americans support stronger background checks” and “90% of Americans want stronger gun laws.”

        Bloomberg (and assorted anti-gun PACs) outspent pro-gun groups 7-to-1 (10-to-1 by some estimates), but the initiative passed (IIRC) 59-41%.

        MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS of dollars funneled into “gun-safety” propaganda designed to mislead voters, and it still couldn’t even get 60% support. How is that possible, if 90% (or 98%) supposedly already support these things?

        This is proof positive that the “90%” (or “98%”) line is pure B.S.

  9. Jack Carr, former SEAL, has two novels, so up to date that he swapped his EDC G43 for a Sig P365 like I just did!

  10. I gave up on Hunter after the Ray Cruz in the shopping mall novel. Cruz sticks a potato for a “silencer” over the muzzle of an AK, and fires a round right past the head of one bad guy, who never even notices a supersonic bullet slamming past him, and kills the terrorist farther back.
    Been there, felt the shock wave. Don’t need to waste my time or money on something that ridiculous.

  11. I’ll second Mike’s comments about Larry Correia, who I believe Mas has actually met, his books are a lot of fun too.

    I guess the main thing with writing about guns, or indeed anything with technical details, is not so much getting it right, but not getting it wrong e.g.

    “Jack Hardman drew his pistol and stepped forward into the light hoping to find the answers to all the questions that had been plaquing him for so long, what was Nielson’s real agenda? Why had his partner left him in the middle of the biggest case they had ever had? What was the secret of the Grey Box which so many had lied, betrayed, killed and died for? And perhaps the biggest question of all, did Mary really love him?”

    Will hopefully keep the readers interest.

    But, OTOH, if we read:

    “Jack Hardmen drew his Colt Chief’s Special nine-millimetre . . .” I think the reader will loose interest in finding the answers to all those questions PDQ.

  12. Stories like the above keep me wondering why I can’t get my fiction published.

    Picked up a novel in the library where the good guy, on the first page, “drew his concealed .357 Magnum Smith & Wesson Python, flicked off the safety, and…” It went back on the shelf.

    Read one by a famous, usually competent writer where the hero picks up a spent case from the deck of his boat, but it was too dark to tell whether it was a .38 Special or 9mm Parabellum.

    [sigh]

  13. So the novel’s FBI character could determine from the sound of the shot that the bad guy was using a scoped Winchester 94 in 30-30? Sherlock Holmes or James Bond could hear the same sound and state that the 30-30 round launched a 150 grain Hornady flat point bullet at approximately 2250 fps using a CCI 200 primer from a distance 125.75 yards, and from the smell of the smoke blowing downwind to him, that the cartridge was handloaded with about 36.5 grains of Winchester 748 powder, lot #12345. If the character was really good, he could even figure out the ammunition was loaded using RCBS dies and the powder weighed on an Ohaus scale, then poured into Remington cases. I watched a movie a few years back where someone was firing a H&K MP5 on full auto and the cases falling on the ground looked to be .38 Special brass.

  14. I like some of the novels by Kurt Schlichter. Specifically, I can recommend his novels entitled “People’s Republic” and “Indian Country”.

    However, his latest novel, “Wildfire”, goes off-the-rails too much for my taste. As Mas notes about the novel above, it loses touch with reality.

    Nevertheless, the first two novels, that I listed above, are very good reads. Especially for anyone who despises “Political Correctness”. ๐Ÿ™‚

  15. Who scopes a Winchester 94 anyway? And to be able to tell it was sloped whilst the hearer was underwater? Yeah, and I gots me a pet chikkin can fly to the moon and back in a week.

    Some take a fistful of words, toss them into a hopper, turn the handle, pick them back up as they come out the chute, type them in that order and think they are an author. Sigh…… Sometimes I wonder whether the writer is trying to tell astory or is merely getting paid to sell a Colt Python by making them seel so KEWL eveyr reader has gotta go out and get one

  16. Yeah, unless a rifle is bolt-action you won’t be able to tell from the sound of the shot whether or not it had a scope.

  17. another gun-savy writer who was a Navy vet is J L (Jim) Curtis – he writes the Grey Man series as well as some military sci-fi. You might enjoy them, Mas. He’s got a blog that’s a nice read, his books are shown on the sidebar. (go to oldnfo dot org)

  18. Thanks commenter ARCHER for the headsup on AMAZON offering Larry Correia’s MONSTER HUNTER on KINDLE for FREE. I just downloaded now to my Android smartphone for $0.00 @ 6:50pm EST. Be safe.phil

  19. The only authors who consistently get gun stuff right were W.E.B. Griffin (Pen name) and Tom Clancy. I give up when a character checks the safety on his revolver or is shooting “steel jacketed” bullets. I guess they sound more scary or lethal that way.

    One fairly successful British writer (I forget his name because he lost my interest quickly) had a Navy SEAL sniper firing aimed shots and killing terrorists out of the back of a deuce-and-a-half truck as it “flew down the rutted jungle trail.” Puh-leeze.

  20. Larry Correiaโ€™s MONSTER HUNTER is always available free on Baen.com along with a lot of other Been authors books, short story collections, and nonfiction. Check out Baen.com and hit the Free Library link. I prefer to buy any Baen authors from their site since they sell w/o DRM. If they can do that the least I can do is buy direct.

  21. I remember, 45 years ago, Skeeter Skelton did a column in SHOOTING TIMES objecting to John D. MacDonald’s 14thm Travis McGee novel THE SCARLET RUSE (1972) on two grounds.

    (A)An anti-gun rant in which hero McGee concluded that handguns were no use to normal people for self-defense, but hero McGee himself would keep using them.
    (B)MacDonald’s belief that the Browning P-35 was double-action on the first shot, probably because of the pivoting trigger, which resembled the Smith & Wesson Model 39.

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