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The Night Stalker #2
The Night Strangler
A Belly Dance of Death
Ethel Parker was a belly dancer. When Ethel Parker moved, men watched and wanted. But now Ethel Parker wasn't moving. She was lying in a Seattle alley with her neck crushed and blood drained -- the victim of unnatural vengeance. In the weeks to come more young women would die the same way. Unearthly terror had struck once more...and once more, reporter Carl Kolchak was on the scene.
Ethel Parker was a belly dancer. When Ethel Parker moved, men watched and wanted. But now Ethel Parker wasn't moving. She was lying in a Seattle alley with her neck crushed and blood drained -- the victim of unnatural vengeance. In the weeks to come more young women would die the same way. Unearthly terror had struck once more...and once more, reporter Carl Kolchak was on the scene.
160 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1974
31 people are currently reading
189 people want to read
About the author
Jeff Rice
43 books23 followersJeffrey Grant Rice was born in Providence, Rhode Island, USA in 1944. He spent his early childhood in Beverly Hills. He has been a Las Vegas resident since 1955.
Jeff Rice is best known as the author of The Kolchak Papers, a novel he finished on October 31, 1970. Rice’s novel was still unpublished when it was optioned for television and adapted for a TV audience as The Night Stalker. It subsequently had a brief print run when the Kolchak: The Night Stalker TV series grew in popularity. In 2007 Moonstone Books released a new edition which also includes the sequel, The Night Strangler.
Jeff Rice is best known as the author of The Kolchak Papers, a novel he finished on October 31, 1970. Rice’s novel was still unpublished when it was optioned for television and adapted for a TV audience as The Night Stalker. It subsequently had a brief print run when the Kolchak: The Night Stalker TV series grew in popularity. In 2007 Moonstone Books released a new edition which also includes the sequel, The Night Strangler.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
June 12, 2023
I don’t write reviews.
You know how most of the time the book is better than the movie? This time the book IS the movie. Rice wrote it based on the Richard Matheson screenplay. I enjoyed the story just as much as I enjoyed the film. Sometimes it’s nice to know exactly what you’re getting.
You know how most of the time the book is better than the movie? This time the book IS the movie. Rice wrote it based on the Richard Matheson screenplay. I enjoyed the story just as much as I enjoyed the film. Sometimes it’s nice to know exactly what you’re getting.
October 13, 2018
This second Kolchak adventure is the novelization by Rice of a script by Richard Matheson, which is a tidy twist on the first book which was the first Kolchak adventure, the one on which Matheson based his famous screenplay. I preferred this story set in Seattle to the first that was set in Las Vegas; the setting was much more interesting, as was the monster and most of the characters. The Kolchak franchise is the famous forerunner for X-Files and others, but this one is from the early 1970's and so contains much of the pervasive sexism of the day. I found it to be good fun, but you can't take it too seriously.
November 14, 2016
Perhaps because this second of The Night Stalker series books was based upon the Richard Matheson screenplay (before changes were made for the second telefilm) it is actually more fun than the original book in the series by Jeff Rice. While keeping most of the pulp style elements of his original book, the tone is a bit less norish, and a little leaner and less meandering. It also has a fabulous ending, and a nice little love story for Kolchak. There are some interesting facts about the history of alchemy too, and some thrills near the end, when our favorite rumpled and grumpy reporter confronts a madman the police refuse — al always — to admit exists. This one is simply pure fun, the only caveat being a technical one, which is the horrendous Kindle version. Nothing has been justified, and incorrect words pop up now an again, and in a few cases are missing (usually a preposition). Proofing errors exist in all books, mainstream and independent, and if minimal, are no biggie. This however, is ridiculous, the frequency staggering. Fortunately, it’s such a fun story to read, it’s a small caveat. I refuse to knock off a star, because this is about the transfer to Kindle, and lack of attention to detail, rather than Richard Matheson’s fabulous fabulous story itself, as adapted by Jeff Rice. Fun stuff!
June 20, 2018
So, following on the heels of my retrospective review of The Night Stalker, here's a (hopefully shorter) review of the follow-up book.
So Rice's unpublished novel, THE KOLCHAK TAPES, spawned an ABC made-for-TV movie starring Darren McGavin as our intrepid reporter - and it was a ratings blockbuster. So huge that a sequel was obviously in order. ABC got stellar talent Richard Matheson to script it, His initial idea - Kolchak versus an ageless Jack The Ripper - he eventually deemed too close to his friend Robert Bloch's classic short story "Yours Truly, Jack The Ripper" and nixed it (that didn't stop them from using the idea as the story for the premiere episode of the KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER TV show, however).
Matheson eventually went with a story wherein down-and-out ex-reporter (and now quasi-crank) Carl Kolchak, in a stroke of luck, happens upon his old editor and "frenemy" Tony Vincenzo, now on staff at the SEATTLE DAILY CHRONICLE. Kolchak has a new job, but unfortunately his very first assignment is covering a series of strangling occurring in the Pioneer Square area of that city. Our hero uncovers the fact that a small amount of blood was removed from the brain of each murder victim and a trail of clues (eyewitness accounts describe the killer as resembling a walking corpse, rotting flesh on the victim's throats) eventually leads him to believe that a century old (if not older) alchemist is dwelling somewhere under the city, rising every 21 years to re-invigorate his body with an elixir of life based around blood. The cops, and Carl's bosses, are not happy, needless to say.
This TV-movie was also a hit and so KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER, a fondly-loved TV series, was born, as we'll discuss in my review of Night Stalking: A Twentieth Anniversary Kolchak Companion. But let us stop a moment and look at this specific book, a strange artifact of the second TV movie.
So Richard Matheson writes the teleplay and Pocket Books (which had published Rice's previously unpublished book retitled to tie into the first film), decides that a book is needed to tie-in to the second film as well - and the task naturally falls to Jeff Rice. So while Richard Matheson adapted Rice's novel for THE NIGHT STALKER, Rice is here adapting Matheson's teleplay for THE NIGHT STRANGLER. And, sadly, it shows...
Obviously, Rice did not have the time he probably put into composing the first book. And this is not, particularly, a labor of love, either - he's not writing his own story, he's following a blueprint supplied by someone else. And on top of that, as I went into in some detail in my previous review, his creation was changed in some ways when he was brought to the small screen, and so Rice is now working with that iteration of the character.
So what we get here is a bit of a mish-mosh. Rice tries to take the hybrid character of his novel and the TV movie and stay true to both sides - this is definitely more the Kolchak of the TV movie (his distinctive hat is mentioned in passing) but Rice works in ways to elicit aspects of his original character - Kolchak mentions his out of shape, overweight state as he scales some of Seattle's mountainous streets, and the book opens with him sipping whiskey in a porno parlor (two later lines also confirm a sneaking suspicion I'd always had - Kolchak is essentially an atheist). Vincenzo is still the diminutive figure of Rice's original and not hulking Simon Oakland. The scholar character Matheson creates, Professor Crabwell, is replaced with her prototype from the NIGHT STALKER novel, who never appeared in the TV movie. This mixing and matching isn't much of a bother - Rice might have faced problems making the romantic relationship that blossomed between McGavin and Jo-Ann Pflug (belly-dancer Louise Harper) in the NIGHT STRANGLER seem plausible with his 50-year-old pug-ugly rummy, but he subtly ages the Harper character a bit, placing her in her mid-30's. In fact, I must say that the relationship that Rice sketches between Kolchak and Harper is one of the most psychologically and emotionally honest ones I've read (albeit, still a bit rushed by the short length of the work) - especially compared to the rather perfunctory pass-by it gets in the TV movie (there simply to provide a personal threat to Carl to increase his emotional investment). Kolchak and Harper seem achingly realistic portrayals of two savvy, lonely people from two different generations meeting at that moment in time (the early 70s). Good work there, Mr. Rice.
Other details of the first novel make returns - imbedding the gruesome events in the stream of the nation's headlines is still a good little stylistic trick, and there's a bit of the old "font talk" of old. But, as I said, you can also kind of tell this is work for hire. Kolchak doesn't know the city at all, so there goes local color except where it feels like padding (a long description of the University in Seattle). Rice doesn't seem to to want to put too much time into thinking up pithy & humorous character sketches in the Kolchak style, so there's not much of that (Cotton Mather-esque publisher Lucius Crossbinder being a fun exception, and Rice carries over belly-dancer Charisma Beauty's stereotypical "bull-dyke" husband Wilma, but humanizes her in a short, poignant line later). The action-filled police confrontations with the superhuman, trench-coated, rotting killer - real stand-outs in THE NIGHT STALKER - are clumsy and awkward here, probably because Rice is working from script directions (or possibly the finished movie - I may know after reading the Dawidziak book) - regardless, they're more confusing than exciting (although a smart detail is added by Rice to the "bait" scenario staged by Carl and Louise later - Kolchak explicitly buys a pistol to bring along). Also, and perhaps most tellingly, you can almost see the rivets where Rice has to patch in Matheson's (admittedly sparkling) dialogue - but while those exchanges may be great, the ability to capture them in the actual flow of the novel's text is just not there, leading to more clunkyness.
There are a few other bright points, however. Kolchak's summation chapter on Alchemy, while not as well-justified story-wise as that confab research session I mentioned in my review of THE NIGHT STALKER, is still a good read (and introduces the infamous Comte de Saint Germain as a possible "real identity" for mysterious scientist/alchemist Malcom Richards / Richard Malcolm - something not touched on in Matheson's film, or at least not in the final cut). The extended exploration of the Underground City of Old Seattle, the killer's lair, is exceedingly atmospheric and suspenseful, creating a nice, slow submergence into an old-school Gothic mood of creep, rot, decay and antiquity (a nice real-world, "couldn't-be-done-on-television" detail here - Kolchak is so spooked by his surroundings that when he's suddenly surprised by the killer, he pisses himself in fright!).
Also, surprisingly, Rice brings a bit more character and detail to the enigmatic alchemist (played well by Richard Anderson, Oscar Goldman on THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, for those old enough to remember). Kolchak's tete-a-tete with him hits the points of the script ("21 years? That's all you'll ever have, isn't it?") but some subtle writing sketches some interesting ideas - Malcolm/Richards may keep his body alive, and his intellect focused, but his memory and humanity seem to have seeped away over the years - as if immortality can't be a natural state for man, no matter the time one puts into the alchemy. Asked point blank by Carl if he is St. Germain, Richards seems confused, evasive, dismissive and eventually unsure himself. Good stuff.
And so, there it is. The book replicates the wonderful ending of the TV film (Kolchak, Vincenzo and Harper as weary, crabby car-mates, chased out of town by the powers that be) and Carl moves on to Chicago and the TV series (he was supposed to, actually, end up next in a third telefim called THE NIGHT KILLERS, set in Hawaii, where someone was replacing public figures with android duplicates - eventually the plot of the long-forgotten TV-series cum movie-sequel BEYOND WESTWORLD, but I blather... - but that got the hatchet).
(perhaps a minor word here, also, on the damage done by genre's need to replicate itself endlessly. As I said in the previous review, Rice never intended for Kolchak to continue on in any fashion, and so the ominous aspects of the ending of THE NIGHT STALKER novel are undone by the continuation afforded by THE NIGHT STRANGLER. Undone, also, is a certain powerful tone that the original created by being a very realistic look at a very realistic city undergoing a very strange - even if the strangeness was subdued - threat. Here, Kolchak returns to work and, wouldn't you know it!, his very first case involves the unreal and uncanny. Hidden deep in this observation is the root of my theory that the serial form does not actually serve the horror genre well, undermining as it does the very roots of what makes something frightening - uniqueness. But more on this, perhaps, in comments on the next book)
And so, off we go to Chicago, one season, 20 episodes, 20 monsters fought and kids everywhere mesmerized. More on that when we get there. Viva Carl Kolchak!
So Rice's unpublished novel, THE KOLCHAK TAPES, spawned an ABC made-for-TV movie starring Darren McGavin as our intrepid reporter - and it was a ratings blockbuster. So huge that a sequel was obviously in order. ABC got stellar talent Richard Matheson to script it, His initial idea - Kolchak versus an ageless Jack The Ripper - he eventually deemed too close to his friend Robert Bloch's classic short story "Yours Truly, Jack The Ripper" and nixed it (that didn't stop them from using the idea as the story for the premiere episode of the KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER TV show, however).
Matheson eventually went with a story wherein down-and-out ex-reporter (and now quasi-crank) Carl Kolchak, in a stroke of luck, happens upon his old editor and "frenemy" Tony Vincenzo, now on staff at the SEATTLE DAILY CHRONICLE. Kolchak has a new job, but unfortunately his very first assignment is covering a series of strangling occurring in the Pioneer Square area of that city. Our hero uncovers the fact that a small amount of blood was removed from the brain of each murder victim and a trail of clues (eyewitness accounts describe the killer as resembling a walking corpse, rotting flesh on the victim's throats) eventually leads him to believe that a century old (if not older) alchemist is dwelling somewhere under the city, rising every 21 years to re-invigorate his body with an elixir of life based around blood. The cops, and Carl's bosses, are not happy, needless to say.
This TV-movie was also a hit and so KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER, a fondly-loved TV series, was born, as we'll discuss in my review of Night Stalking: A Twentieth Anniversary Kolchak Companion. But let us stop a moment and look at this specific book, a strange artifact of the second TV movie.
So Richard Matheson writes the teleplay and Pocket Books (which had published Rice's previously unpublished book retitled to tie into the first film), decides that a book is needed to tie-in to the second film as well - and the task naturally falls to Jeff Rice. So while Richard Matheson adapted Rice's novel for THE NIGHT STALKER, Rice is here adapting Matheson's teleplay for THE NIGHT STRANGLER. And, sadly, it shows...
Obviously, Rice did not have the time he probably put into composing the first book. And this is not, particularly, a labor of love, either - he's not writing his own story, he's following a blueprint supplied by someone else. And on top of that, as I went into in some detail in my previous review, his creation was changed in some ways when he was brought to the small screen, and so Rice is now working with that iteration of the character.
So what we get here is a bit of a mish-mosh. Rice tries to take the hybrid character of his novel and the TV movie and stay true to both sides - this is definitely more the Kolchak of the TV movie (his distinctive hat is mentioned in passing) but Rice works in ways to elicit aspects of his original character - Kolchak mentions his out of shape, overweight state as he scales some of Seattle's mountainous streets, and the book opens with him sipping whiskey in a porno parlor (two later lines also confirm a sneaking suspicion I'd always had - Kolchak is essentially an atheist). Vincenzo is still the diminutive figure of Rice's original and not hulking Simon Oakland. The scholar character Matheson creates, Professor Crabwell, is replaced with her prototype from the NIGHT STALKER novel, who never appeared in the TV movie. This mixing and matching isn't much of a bother - Rice might have faced problems making the romantic relationship that blossomed between McGavin and Jo-Ann Pflug (belly-dancer Louise Harper) in the NIGHT STRANGLER seem plausible with his 50-year-old pug-ugly rummy, but he subtly ages the Harper character a bit, placing her in her mid-30's. In fact, I must say that the relationship that Rice sketches between Kolchak and Harper is one of the most psychologically and emotionally honest ones I've read (albeit, still a bit rushed by the short length of the work) - especially compared to the rather perfunctory pass-by it gets in the TV movie (there simply to provide a personal threat to Carl to increase his emotional investment). Kolchak and Harper seem achingly realistic portrayals of two savvy, lonely people from two different generations meeting at that moment in time (the early 70s). Good work there, Mr. Rice.
Other details of the first novel make returns - imbedding the gruesome events in the stream of the nation's headlines is still a good little stylistic trick, and there's a bit of the old "font talk" of old. But, as I said, you can also kind of tell this is work for hire. Kolchak doesn't know the city at all, so there goes local color except where it feels like padding (a long description of the University in Seattle). Rice doesn't seem to to want to put too much time into thinking up pithy & humorous character sketches in the Kolchak style, so there's not much of that (Cotton Mather-esque publisher Lucius Crossbinder being a fun exception, and Rice carries over belly-dancer Charisma Beauty's stereotypical "bull-dyke" husband Wilma, but humanizes her in a short, poignant line later). The action-filled police confrontations with the superhuman, trench-coated, rotting killer - real stand-outs in THE NIGHT STALKER - are clumsy and awkward here, probably because Rice is working from script directions (or possibly the finished movie - I may know after reading the Dawidziak book) - regardless, they're more confusing than exciting (although a smart detail is added by Rice to the "bait" scenario staged by Carl and Louise later - Kolchak explicitly buys a pistol to bring along). Also, and perhaps most tellingly, you can almost see the rivets where Rice has to patch in Matheson's (admittedly sparkling) dialogue - but while those exchanges may be great, the ability to capture them in the actual flow of the novel's text is just not there, leading to more clunkyness.
There are a few other bright points, however. Kolchak's summation chapter on Alchemy, while not as well-justified story-wise as that confab research session I mentioned in my review of THE NIGHT STALKER, is still a good read (and introduces the infamous Comte de Saint Germain as a possible "real identity" for mysterious scientist/alchemist Malcom Richards / Richard Malcolm - something not touched on in Matheson's film, or at least not in the final cut). The extended exploration of the Underground City of Old Seattle, the killer's lair, is exceedingly atmospheric and suspenseful, creating a nice, slow submergence into an old-school Gothic mood of creep, rot, decay and antiquity (a nice real-world, "couldn't-be-done-on-television" detail here - Kolchak is so spooked by his surroundings that when he's suddenly surprised by the killer, he pisses himself in fright!).
Also, surprisingly, Rice brings a bit more character and detail to the enigmatic alchemist (played well by Richard Anderson, Oscar Goldman on THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, for those old enough to remember). Kolchak's tete-a-tete with him hits the points of the script ("21 years? That's all you'll ever have, isn't it?") but some subtle writing sketches some interesting ideas - Malcolm/Richards may keep his body alive, and his intellect focused, but his memory and humanity seem to have seeped away over the years - as if immortality can't be a natural state for man, no matter the time one puts into the alchemy. Asked point blank by Carl if he is St. Germain, Richards seems confused, evasive, dismissive and eventually unsure himself. Good stuff.
And so, there it is. The book replicates the wonderful ending of the TV film (Kolchak, Vincenzo and Harper as weary, crabby car-mates, chased out of town by the powers that be) and Carl moves on to Chicago and the TV series (he was supposed to, actually, end up next in a third telefim called THE NIGHT KILLERS, set in Hawaii, where someone was replacing public figures with android duplicates - eventually the plot of the long-forgotten TV-series cum movie-sequel BEYOND WESTWORLD, but I blather... - but that got the hatchet).
(perhaps a minor word here, also, on the damage done by genre's need to replicate itself endlessly. As I said in the previous review, Rice never intended for Kolchak to continue on in any fashion, and so the ominous aspects of the ending of THE NIGHT STALKER novel are undone by the continuation afforded by THE NIGHT STRANGLER. Undone, also, is a certain powerful tone that the original created by being a very realistic look at a very realistic city undergoing a very strange - even if the strangeness was subdued - threat. Here, Kolchak returns to work and, wouldn't you know it!, his very first case involves the unreal and uncanny. Hidden deep in this observation is the root of my theory that the serial form does not actually serve the horror genre well, undermining as it does the very roots of what makes something frightening - uniqueness. But more on this, perhaps, in comments on the next book)
And so, off we go to Chicago, one season, 20 episodes, 20 monsters fought and kids everywhere mesmerized. More on that when we get there. Viva Carl Kolchak!
April 16, 2018
Someone is knocking off belly dancers and other fit young women in the city of Seattle, and draining a small quantity of blood from their brains. Investigative reporter Carl Kolchak, freshly arrived after having been run out of Las Vegas at the end of The Night Stalker, does what he does best: annoy just about everyone in sight, become rather quickly involved in a love affair with a woman far younger than he is, and discover the truth underlying the murders. It seems the alchemical elixir of life -- or, at least, one formula for it -- requires the blood of young women. Furthermore, the elixir lasts only so long -- about twenty or twenty-one years, in fact. Deep beneath the streets of modern Seattle there lurks a century-old alchemist who, every couple of decades, must harvest blood from a half-dozen young women.
Can Kolchak persuade the authorities to entertain his seemingly madcap theory as to what's going on before the would-be immortal kills again?
Of course not . . .
It seems rather back to front to have the lesser of two writers create the print adaptation of the other's screenplay -- the book's based on Richard Matheson's screenplay for the 1973 TV movie The Night Strangler -- and I confess that, having read Rice's earlier Kolchak novel, I didn't have the highest of expectations for this one. In the event, I liked it quite a lot more.
The fact that it's about one-third shorter certainly helped. That sounds like a snide jibe, but isn't. One of the aspects I disliked about the earlier novel was that it sort of meandered, with long passages of what seemed little more than padding -- as if Rice had been given a wordcount and told he had to hit it to produce a marketable novel. Here, although there's an infodumping section on alchemy in general and the Comte de St. Germain in particular, the narrative is far tauter. There's a passage of extreme silliness, presumably intended as comic relief, where Kolchak and his managing editor, Tony Vincenzo, each maddened by what he sees as the pigheadedness of the other, throw items of office equipment around, like tantrumming toddlers do, but aside from that Rice devotes himself to telling his tale like grownups do.
And it's the actual telling that marks the real difference, for me, between the two novels. Of course, Rice was able to lift chunks of Matheson's writing (especially dialogue) directly from the screenplay, but it's as if the influence of Matheson went way beyond that -- indeed, I briefly speculated that Matheson might have played some mentor role, or at least had editorial input to the final text. Whatever the truth of the matter, if what you're looking for is an all-out Matheson novel you should be looking elsewhere, but The Night Strangler, and its telling, definitely do have a strong Mathesonian feel to them.
Which is, of course, no bad thing!
As I say, I was very pleasantly surprised by The Night Strangler, and I was rather regretful as I reached its end that there weren't more Rice/Kolchak novels to read. Although there's the occasional reference back to the events of The Night Stalker, I don't think it's necessary to have plowed through the earlier novel in order to enjoy this one.
Can Kolchak persuade the authorities to entertain his seemingly madcap theory as to what's going on before the would-be immortal kills again?
Of course not . . .
It seems rather back to front to have the lesser of two writers create the print adaptation of the other's screenplay -- the book's based on Richard Matheson's screenplay for the 1973 TV movie The Night Strangler -- and I confess that, having read Rice's earlier Kolchak novel, I didn't have the highest of expectations for this one. In the event, I liked it quite a lot more.
The fact that it's about one-third shorter certainly helped. That sounds like a snide jibe, but isn't. One of the aspects I disliked about the earlier novel was that it sort of meandered, with long passages of what seemed little more than padding -- as if Rice had been given a wordcount and told he had to hit it to produce a marketable novel. Here, although there's an infodumping section on alchemy in general and the Comte de St. Germain in particular, the narrative is far tauter. There's a passage of extreme silliness, presumably intended as comic relief, where Kolchak and his managing editor, Tony Vincenzo, each maddened by what he sees as the pigheadedness of the other, throw items of office equipment around, like tantrumming toddlers do, but aside from that Rice devotes himself to telling his tale like grownups do.
And it's the actual telling that marks the real difference, for me, between the two novels. Of course, Rice was able to lift chunks of Matheson's writing (especially dialogue) directly from the screenplay, but it's as if the influence of Matheson went way beyond that -- indeed, I briefly speculated that Matheson might have played some mentor role, or at least had editorial input to the final text. Whatever the truth of the matter, if what you're looking for is an all-out Matheson novel you should be looking elsewhere, but The Night Strangler, and its telling, definitely do have a strong Mathesonian feel to them.
Which is, of course, no bad thing!
As I say, I was very pleasantly surprised by The Night Strangler, and I was rather regretful as I reached its end that there weren't more Rice/Kolchak novels to read. Although there's the occasional reference back to the events of The Night Stalker, I don't think it's necessary to have plowed through the earlier novel in order to enjoy this one.
September 8, 2010
As enjoyable as the first. Carl Kolchak is great character.
December 22, 2023
Well, this is just bizarre. The first book isn't a novelization, but I liked the movie better. This one is definitely a novelization, yet I liked the book better...
Novelizations aren't allowed to be better than the movie. Isn't that like illegal or something? Parts of this were seedier and darker than the film version, and the villain was definitely a bad dude, no question about it, and the story is much better because of it. In the movie, he's doing his dastardly deeds with the betterment of human society as his main goal. In the book, he just wants to keep on living and he doesn't really care about the damage he does or how it affects other people. He uses the "this will make mankind better" as an excuse, but that's all it is. I really appreciated that twist, and I'm not sure why the producers didn't roll it out that way. There was also a lot of extra history provided that enriched the tale.
Kolchak is still a fantastic character, and watching him butt heads with every-damn-body is a lot of fun. It's a shame everyone he has to work with is hard-headed as hell. I really don't have a lot to add that I didn't say in my review of the first book. I guess that makes this one of the shortest reviews I've done in recent memory, and we all say hallelujah.
Novelizations aren't allowed to be better than the movie. Isn't that like illegal or something? Parts of this were seedier and darker than the film version, and the villain was definitely a bad dude, no question about it, and the story is much better because of it. In the movie, he's doing his dastardly deeds with the betterment of human society as his main goal. In the book, he just wants to keep on living and he doesn't really care about the damage he does or how it affects other people. He uses the "this will make mankind better" as an excuse, but that's all it is. I really appreciated that twist, and I'm not sure why the producers didn't roll it out that way. There was also a lot of extra history provided that enriched the tale.
Kolchak is still a fantastic character, and watching him butt heads with every-damn-body is a lot of fun. It's a shame everyone he has to work with is hard-headed as hell. I really don't have a lot to add that I didn't say in my review of the first book. I guess that makes this one of the shortest reviews I've done in recent memory, and we all say hallelujah.
July 14, 2025
I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the first in the series, (KOLCHAK: THE NIGHT STALKER), but I think I enjoyed this one a touch more, only because it kept all the good from the first one (the slowly building mystery, Kolchak's sarcasm, overall narrative tone) while letting some of the longer-winded info dumps go.
What results is a nice, tight, well-written adventure with Kolchak once again in the hotseat. If there's anything missing, it's that we really don't meet the titular Night Strangler until pretty much the end.
But this was a fun one. Both these books are absolutely worth the read.
What results is a nice, tight, well-written adventure with Kolchak once again in the hotseat. If there's anything missing, it's that we really don't meet the titular Night Strangler until pretty much the end.
But this was a fun one. Both these books are absolutely worth the read.
April 4, 2025
Good, but not as good as the first one.
This was a good read, and a quick one. But it wasn’t as good as the first of these books.
This was a good read, and a quick one. But it wasn’t as good as the first of these books.
February 22, 2022
A quick read, this novelization of a movie was adapted by Jeff Rice (the author of the original Kolchak story) from a screenplay by Richard Matheson. Surprisingly, I haven't seen the film in question. I especially enjoyed the role Seattle history and geography played in this story.
While Carl Kolchak saw a lot of things other people didn't, it was nice for the police to see something he didn't here. There is considerably less infodump in this book than in the first one. I liked the strong character of Louise Harper.
Near as I can tell, Jeff Rice didn't write anything more in this genre. Other novels, comics and collections of stories are available from Moonstone Press, who published the two combined Jeff Rice books as The Kolchak Papers: The Original Novels.
While Carl Kolchak saw a lot of things other people didn't, it was nice for the police to see something he didn't here. There is considerably less infodump in this book than in the first one. I liked the strong character of Louise Harper.
Near as I can tell, Jeff Rice didn't write anything more in this genre. Other novels, comics and collections of stories are available from Moonstone Press, who published the two combined Jeff Rice books as The Kolchak Papers: The Original Novels.
October 1, 2021
Unlike the first novel which was a completely original work, Jeff Rice wrote this from a screen play. It’s not quite as strong a book as the first one, but much of what I loved about that novel can still be found in these pages. Kolchak is still getting himself into trouble because he can’t keep his mouth shut. And he’s still unable to let go of a story even after it is obviously in his interests to do so. In record time he gets a whole new city angry at him, but he does get his man.
The mystery here is solid and Kolchak gets himself into a very tight situation by the end of the book. It’s fun from start to finish. I wish Jeff Rice had written more of these.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
The mystery here is solid and Kolchak gets himself into a very tight situation by the end of the book. It’s fun from start to finish. I wish Jeff Rice had written more of these.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
July 5, 2017
Still Classic
Brought me back in time to when I watched Carl on TV and enjoyed his bumbling ways ... If you read it before and saw the movies/and show this will be enjoyable BUT if you are a different generation and new to Kolchak it is worth the journey ....
Brought me back in time to when I watched Carl on TV and enjoyed his bumbling ways ... If you read it before and saw the movies/and show this will be enjoyable BUT if you are a different generation and new to Kolchak it is worth the journey ....
February 19, 2021
Where the Night Stalker was a Richard Matheson movie based on Jeff Rice’s book, The Night Strangler is a Jeff Rice book based on a Richard Matheson movie. I think that improves the book, as it means starting with a more coherent plot and characterization. Because Matheson had Louise Harper get involved with the investigation, she also got to see Tony Vincenzo. Vincenzo always came across as a sane man assailed by an insane Kolchak, but Harper explicitly states it:
It also helps that, since he didn’t write it himself, he doesn’t have as much research to dump on us, although he did add in a bit about the Count de St. Germain, including the possibility that this legendary figure still exists. I’m pretty sure that wasn’t in the movie.
Something that was, sort of, in the movie but is only highlighted because Jeff Rice records their specific ages, is that Kolchak’s new love interest follows the lower limit of the old dating age rule: half the male’s age plus seven. Darren McGavin was 50 in 1972; JoAnn Pflug was 32. Rice assumes that these are also the ages of Carl Kolchak and Louise Harper.
Kolchak is always right. Even when he’s wrong, he’s right. Matheson played with that in the movie, when he has Kolchak completely miss something obvious about a witness description. The police, who are professionals, don’t miss it. That is the kind of thing a great writer sees about their characters and incorporates into the story. This is the sort of thing that I suspect makes Strangler a better book, by having Rice work off of a better writer.
Besides Kolchak and Vincenzo, two other characters show up from Las Vegas. Vincenzo brought Janie Carlson with him to Seattle, though she doesn’t play much of a role. But Dr. Kirsten Helms has also moved, to “a town as different as a place could be by virtue of weather, industry, and people.”
She’s a more important character because Helms is a counterexample to Kolchak. Like Kolchak, she sees reality for what it is; unlike Kolchak, she recognizes that other people do not see those patterns. John Berry, the archivist in the basement is similar: he knows how to research the patterns; he knows what they mean; and he is unwilling to act on that knowledge. It would separate him from what he’s comfortable with. He’s satisfied with knowing that someone else is dealing with the evil of the world.
The book follows the plot of the movie fairly closely, and is a much shorter book than the already short Night Stalker. While a better book, it’s less interesting because it doesn’t offer much new. The first book gives us a glimpse into aspects of Kolchak and the surrounding world that changed from the book to the film. This does not. And it’s still a book that can probably best be enjoyed by fans who have already seen the movie, which means there’s less reason for reading it other than seeing the same information in a written rather than visual format.
Just remember one thing, Carl. You are not alone. Call Vincenzo whatever you want to, but he could have fired you. He may not be long on guts, but he still gave you your chance.
It also helps that, since he didn’t write it himself, he doesn’t have as much research to dump on us, although he did add in a bit about the Count de St. Germain, including the possibility that this legendary figure still exists. I’m pretty sure that wasn’t in the movie.
Something that was, sort of, in the movie but is only highlighted because Jeff Rice records their specific ages, is that Kolchak’s new love interest follows the lower limit of the old dating age rule: half the male’s age plus seven. Darren McGavin was 50 in 1972; JoAnn Pflug was 32. Rice assumes that these are also the ages of Carl Kolchak and Louise Harper.
I was once told as a lad, when still very new in this news game, that I had a modicum of courage, an innate honesty, unbridled idealism and absolutely no sense of proportion.
Kolchak is always right. Even when he’s wrong, he’s right. Matheson played with that in the movie, when he has Kolchak completely miss something obvious about a witness description. The police, who are professionals, don’t miss it. That is the kind of thing a great writer sees about their characters and incorporates into the story. This is the sort of thing that I suspect makes Strangler a better book, by having Rice work off of a better writer.
Besides Kolchak and Vincenzo, two other characters show up from Las Vegas. Vincenzo brought Janie Carlson with him to Seattle, though she doesn’t play much of a role. But Dr. Kirsten Helms has also moved, to “a town as different as a place could be by virtue of weather, industry, and people.”
She’s a more important character because Helms is a counterexample to Kolchak. Like Kolchak, she sees reality for what it is; unlike Kolchak, she recognizes that other people do not see those patterns. John Berry, the archivist in the basement is similar: he knows how to research the patterns; he knows what they mean; and he is unwilling to act on that knowledge. It would separate him from what he’s comfortable with. He’s satisfied with knowing that someone else is dealing with the evil of the world.
The book follows the plot of the movie fairly closely, and is a much shorter book than the already short Night Stalker. While a better book, it’s less interesting because it doesn’t offer much new. The first book gives us a glimpse into aspects of Kolchak and the surrounding world that changed from the book to the film. This does not. And it’s still a book that can probably best be enjoyed by fans who have already seen the movie, which means there’s less reason for reading it other than seeing the same information in a written rather than visual format.
October 8, 2018
Kolchak Stumbles into another Supernatural Mystery
This is the novelization of the second television movie of the original Night Stalker films. This story and the first Night Stalker were very popular shows that begat the short lived Night Stalker series. Those of us old enough to remember them, this will be a find trip down memory lane. To newbies, this is an example of the series that inspired Chris Carter to create the X-Files. Actor Darren McGavin who played Kolchak appeared in an episode of the X-Files as a tribute.
This adventure features more of the hallmarks of the classic storyline. Supernatural events that only Kolchak could stumble into. His tenacity, dogged determination and sense of humor make him a great lovable character who never seems to win. At least he does get a break here, meeting a lovely lady. Not quite as good as the original Night Stalker, but still a great read. Johnny Heller is brilliant as Kolchak on the audiobook version.
This is the novelization of the second television movie of the original Night Stalker films. This story and the first Night Stalker were very popular shows that begat the short lived Night Stalker series. Those of us old enough to remember them, this will be a find trip down memory lane. To newbies, this is an example of the series that inspired Chris Carter to create the X-Files. Actor Darren McGavin who played Kolchak appeared in an episode of the X-Files as a tribute.
This adventure features more of the hallmarks of the classic storyline. Supernatural events that only Kolchak could stumble into. His tenacity, dogged determination and sense of humor make him a great lovable character who never seems to win. At least he does get a break here, meeting a lovely lady. Not quite as good as the original Night Stalker, but still a great read. Johnny Heller is brilliant as Kolchak on the audiobook version.
September 9, 2022
This is an audible reading by. It seems to take forever with all the prologues. Finally,
Chapter 4 "the Night Stalker'. A good story. Very small cast despite big storyline. It's told through the eyes of Karl Kolchak, a journalist, who investigates a series of murders for his paper and comes up with one conclusion: a vampire... or perhaps is it a vampire-wannabe? It's so easy to get drawn into the murky world that author Jeff Rice conjures up. And narrator Johnny Heller is on top form as the voice of Kolchak. Naturally, we are given a real answer as to whether the serial killer is a vampire or not. 8/10
Chapter 27 'the Night Strangler'.
The Night Strangler
In the audible audio 'The Kolchak Papers' starts at Chapter 27. 8/10
Scoring: 0 bad; 1-3 poor; 4-6 average; 7-9 good; 10 excellent.
Chapter 4 "the Night Stalker'. A good story. Very small cast despite big storyline. It's told through the eyes of Karl Kolchak, a journalist, who investigates a series of murders for his paper and comes up with one conclusion: a vampire... or perhaps is it a vampire-wannabe? It's so easy to get drawn into the murky world that author Jeff Rice conjures up. And narrator Johnny Heller is on top form as the voice of Kolchak. Naturally, we are given a real answer as to whether the serial killer is a vampire or not. 8/10
Chapter 27 'the Night Strangler'.
The Night Strangler
In the audible audio 'The Kolchak Papers' starts at Chapter 27. 8/10
Scoring: 0 bad; 1-3 poor; 4-6 average; 7-9 good; 10 excellent.
June 23, 2025
While not quite as good as the Night Stalker, the Night Strangler is still a great bit of fiction. It's interesting that while Matheson adapted Rice's book for the Night Stalker, here we have Rice adapting Matheson's screenplay. I think that this may account for the small drop in quality. Because, even though Matheson is fantastic, I would think it would have been awkward for Rice to adapt a story for a character he created.
Still, it's a good book (probably more of a novella based on the length) and the movie (again not quite as good as the first one) is very watchable.
Still, it's a good book (probably more of a novella based on the length) and the movie (again not quite as good as the first one) is very watchable.
October 19, 2025
I loved the original tv series with Darren McGavin. Spooky and there's always a reason that he has no proof of what incredible creature he found.
This ain't it. The pacing is just too slow and the words is out all over town about the nature of the beast.
If you are nostalgic about the old series, don't read this.
This ain't it. The pacing is just too slow and the words is out all over town about the nature of the beast.
If you are nostalgic about the old series, don't read this.
August 24, 2022
The Night Stalker (book #1) is slightly the better of the two but this is still an excellent book by Jeff Rice. I definitely recommend fans of the movies and tv show read both The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler.
September 22, 2019
Tv tie in
Written by Jeff Rice the original creator of the book that inspired the series. Well.written its a interesting story. Well worth a read.
Written by Jeff Rice the original creator of the book that inspired the series. Well.written its a interesting story. Well worth a read.
May 23, 2020
Good read
Loved this book! Would suggest to anyone that loves Kolchak series. Great for anyone that wants a good thriller story.
Loved this book! Would suggest to anyone that loves Kolchak series. Great for anyone that wants a good thriller story.
May 20, 2023
A bit cheesey. A bit overblown. A bit silly. Yep! It’s everything Kolchak is and should be.
July 1, 2023
Sequel to The Night Stalker.
March 9, 2024
...another happy read!!
October 9, 2024
3.5 Not as good as the first one, but still a decent story and the TV movie follows this pretty closely.
March 14, 2025
Good story, interesting character. I will definitely be reading more.
December 7, 2018
It's a pity there weren't more of these written by Jeff Rice, but this is a good read so there's at least that. The story is that Rice owned literary rights to the characters in his original book, Kolchak, The Night Stalker but couldn't use any of the ideas expounded in the TV series.
This one has a better structure than the first one, presumably because it's based on Richard Matheson's screenplay., but it still shows many of the features that made Kolchak such a good character. He's still meticulous in his research, still contacts the forgotten experts in society, is still up against the powers that be to somehow tell the truth at whatever cost.
In this novel he also shacks up, if I may be pardoned the old slang, with an unlikely partner, a 32 year old go-go dancer, who is a bit stereotypical. but no more so than real women were in the early 1970's.
This is also a good rad if you're interested in what Seattle was like before the tech boom. It was run-down but affordable. Koklchak rents an apartment for $87.20 a month and the hereintoforementioned go-go dancer lives on a houseboat! I wish I could afford a houseboat in Seattle, but I suppose these days nobody would wnt to see my pole work...
This book has also interested me in other Kolchak stories, which Moonstone apparenlthy produce for the Kindle, so this book and its prequel are good intros to those stories - I hope.
This one has a better structure than the first one, presumably because it's based on Richard Matheson's screenplay., but it still shows many of the features that made Kolchak such a good character. He's still meticulous in his research, still contacts the forgotten experts in society, is still up against the powers that be to somehow tell the truth at whatever cost.
In this novel he also shacks up, if I may be pardoned the old slang, with an unlikely partner, a 32 year old go-go dancer, who is a bit stereotypical. but no more so than real women were in the early 1970's.
This is also a good rad if you're interested in what Seattle was like before the tech boom. It was run-down but affordable. Koklchak rents an apartment for $87.20 a month and the hereintoforementioned go-go dancer lives on a houseboat! I wish I could afford a houseboat in Seattle, but I suppose these days nobody would wnt to see my pole work...
This book has also interested me in other Kolchak stories, which Moonstone apparenlthy produce for the Kindle, so this book and its prequel are good intros to those stories - I hope.
March 5, 2014
This book was better than the prequel, probably because Richard Matheson was involved. However, it still suffers from much of Jeff Rice's atrocious writing. Anyway, the story is familiar: Kolchak has decamped to Seattle after wearing out his welcome in Las Vegas. Someone-or thing-is stalking and strangling Seattle’s young women and drawing small amounts of their blood for mysterious yet no doubt nefarious purposes. Kolchak immediately hooks-up with a houseboat-dwelling UW co-ed who also moonlights as a stripper (!) as he proceeds to make enemies of the entire Seattle PD who refuse to believe his theories about the “Strangler” and continues to vex his long-time editor Vincenzo, who coincidentally is working at the same Seattle newspaper as Kolchak. The TV movie is available and is much better than this book, although hilariously dated as well.
April 21, 2013
Although not as good as the first book, it was still an enjoyable read. It corresponds to the movie quite well.
July 30, 2016
I loved the tv series so biased in my review, but enjoyed this book. I have voted Seattle numerous times and have even taken the Underground your.
October 26, 2018
I prefer The Night Stalker but both books were fun.
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