BEFORE I WAKE

Morrell’s (Ruler of the Night, 2016, etc.) third
collection, largely consisting of works from the past decade, ranges from eerie
tales to CIA narratives to stories featuring literary legends.

In “The Companions,” one of the stories inspired by
events in Morrell’s life, a screenwriter and his wife have a series of strange
life-changing encounters with a monk and his elderly friend at the Santa Fe
opera house. In “Blue Murder,” one of three stories featuring
Cavanaugh, a top-rated security firm director known as the Protector, a female
thriller writer is said to be targeted for the rumored anti-Islamic passages in
her forthcoming novel. There are also stories about the torture of a
renditioned Iraqi prisoner in Uzbekistan and an infamous battle during World
War II pitting two units of the French Foreign Legion—one controlled by the
Allies, the other by German-controlled France—against one another. Among the
famous authors Morrell imagines are Arthur Conan Doyle, who needs a visit from
his creation, Sherlock Holmes, to solve his own painful mysteries, and J.D.
Salinger, who, fictionalized as R.J. Wentworth, is pursued by a young editor
working for a conglomerate that sees a gold mine—but little else—in the
reclusive author’s unpublished works. Morrell, who provides personal
introductions to each of the stories, openly acknowledges the influences of
such writers as Hemingway and Ray Bradbury. Now in his mid-70s, he is old-school
in a good way in terms of his craftsmanship and his emphasis on story and
character. But by today’s standards, his ironic twists can be rather mild or
unconvincing. And some of the tales feel dated in other ways.

Readers of a certain age will
enjoy these recent stories by the author of First Blood (the
novel that inspired the Rambo movies).