It was built to last a thousand years ... but something's gone wrong with the Warren G. Harding Dam, and now nine trillion gallons of water are about to blast across the desert towards the glittery resort town of El Paradisio, stuffed full of tourists, entertainers, and high rollers who have no idea they're three steps from armageddon courtesy THE RAGING FLOOD!
Cheap, fast, and nasty: the setting matches the story, as author Rochelle "R.T." Larkin spins out a stock disaster tale with the sure hand of a seasoned pro. Just read that first paragraph, with our haunted prophet Cordovan three sheets to the wind and cranking out some hard boiled self pity into the bottom of a shot glass. Cordovan has discovered something about the big dam out in the desert, a dangerous weakness brought on by nuclear testing, and he doesn't have much time to warn the authorities ... so Larkin doesn't waste much time! To the credit of her and her characters, once Cordovan gets through to hard nosed Governor's aide Steve Hilliard a gargantuan operation immediately goes underway to tackle the problem. Meanwhile the hottest casino in town, The Conquistadores, is hosting superstar comic Jackie Janssen to a packed house, and we follow him, his agent, assorted guests, and mobbed up owner Danilo Simonetti as they dance the dance of the damned, unaware of the catastrophe brewing miles out of town. Danilo's got a hot new squeeze named Penny, by the way, and she thinks she's found her ticket to the good life in the explosive Capo. But if only they all knew ...
You may have noticed that the setting seems like an obvious alias. For a little fictive distance, Las Vegas and the Hoover Dam have been rechristened El Paradisio and the Warren G. Harding Dam. All the story's geography is based on Nevada - minus the detail of how far the state capitol is from Sin City. Perhaps to keep her timeline tighter Larkin shortens the distance some of her official characters have to ferry back and forth, to 200 miles rather than the real world distance of 400+ miles between Carson City and Vegas.
Like I said, Larkin works fast and hard. She's not afraid to kill her darlings, either. Characters are drawn with depth and sympathy, even jerks like scummy ol' Danilo, and their respective fates remain up in the air until the brief, brutal ending. Some lush farmland outside of El Paradisio gets sacrificed in the operation, and Hilliard is shocked at the venom the salt of the earth farmers have for the people of Sin City - why should they abandon their life's works for a bunch of worthless whores and crooks? But there's twists and turns that shock even the bitter farmers, and some chilling government arithmetic that rings true all these years down. Quotes Cordovan, after the flotsam has settled, "There is a tide, in the affairs of men ..."
There's not a lot of info out there about Larkin, except that she also wrote a mafia series called The Godmother. And speaking of mobsters, did you dig the overheated ad spread for The Marksman series above? Die, killer, die!
Whatever city you're in ... whoever you were, wherever you are R.T. Larkin, god bless ya for this prime piece of disaster sleaze! The Raging Flood blasts its way into a rating of four out of four stacks of waterlogged casino chips:
Belmont Tower Books, 1975
R.T. Larkin’s real name was Rochelle Larkin (RIP) who wrote several books under her real name, and ginned up her share of the Cherry Delight novels under the house name of Glen Chase.
ReplyDeleteI knew her real name was Rochelle, but not about her work as Glen Chase. Trying to google authors who used lots of pseudonyms can be frustrating, thanks for the info.
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