This is the first in the long-running fantasy/action series "The Destroyer," a series full of mind-bending violence and side-splitting hilarity - if you like this sort of thing! The premise: one Remo Williams, cop, is appropriated by a secret government agency (the best kind); his death is faked so no one will look for him, and he is sent to be trained as a top-notch assassin, to be used by the President's order only. His trainer is a wizened little Korean man named Chiun, last living master of Sinanju, "the sun source of all martial arts"... and Chiun, fussy curmudgeon that he is, makes the series. [I hope he's still around; I haven't really followed the series past book #60 or so, and they're well into the 100's now!] Since this is the "origin" book, it takes a while for the pieces to come together; we don't even meet Chiun until a third of the way through - but it sets the pattern for what follows. There will be some hideous criminal conspiracy, usually involving bloody massacres; Remo will be summoned; he will, reluctantly, turn up, though sometimes he has to be coerced; he and Chiun will commit reverse mayhem, Remo will fail to listen to Chiun and get in trouble, Chiun will rescue him and never let him forget it, more mayhem ensues, and the bad guys either perish in gasping, bloody heaps, or retreat to fight another day. [The film version of this - "Remo Williams: the Adventure Begins," with Fred Ward as a respectable Remo and Joel Grey as a marvelous Chiun - was pretty entertaining, although it didn't include some of Remo's bloodier stunts. This is the flick with the chase scene on the scaffolded Statue of Liberty.]

Prior-to-BC-historical-note: I got hooked on "The Destroyer" circa 1974, but didn't find a copy of #1 until the early '80s. I've had this battered little paperback on my bookshelf ever since. This is the reissue edition, with a foreword by Chiun himself, in which - among other rants - he points out that the book's real title should be "Chiun Meets Pale Piece of Pig's Ear" [for the uninitiated, that's what he calls Remo]. He finishes his foreword with: "When you are done with what I say, THROW THIS BOOK AWAY. It will do you no good. With moderate tolerance for you, I am forever, Chiun, Master of Sinanju."

So I guess I'll "throw" the book away now; it's always wise to do what Chiun says.

Released on Monday, October 21, 2002 at Bus Stop on Spit Brook Rd in Nashua, New Hampshire USA.

Left on the bench in the bus-stop shelter.