Michael Hughes - Kommando 55

[killercrab]

Kommando 55 by Michael Hughes - Nel , 1981. Cover art by Tony Masero.


Somewhere in East Anglia.

A disused track , rusting barbed - wire fence , War Department Keep Out sign.

A Dead Place.

But a place that contained a live secret. A live secret that could still kill after forty years' burial. Kill horribly...

Masero's fantastic cover caught my eye ( whilst distant mumblings of disgusting slugs echoed through the shop). Is Kommando 55 a war or horror book , I don't know yet - but it's sounds a mix and I good one at that? Another new Nel horror find I'm wondering ?

Damn that's a great cover innit?

ade

[jkdunham]

Jul 13, 2008 1:05:31 GMT killercrab said:

Another new Nel horror find I'm wondering ?

damn that's a great cover innit?

ade

An undead Nazi masked avenger? On the face of it this one would certainly seem to tick several of the right boxes.

Read on, Ade, and please tell us more!

[killercrab]

Heh - I'm not sure if the mask isn't just a cast shadow from his cap! I'll probably not get to read this for a few weeks yet ( it might be my holiday read in fact!). I'm about halfway through a Sabat novel , but was diverted by Tom Baker's autobiography -lol . Which is why my scintillating (heh) reviews have dried up suddenly!

ade

[benedictjjones]

this looks dope, do tell if it's any good and a review would be wunderbar!

[bushwick]

Found this in a chazza shop recently, coincidentally very soon after this was posted, not heard of it before, nice condition too. Ain't read it yet though. (Have just finished 'Doomsday Warrior 3: The Last American' and am now onto Gerald Suster's 'The Handyman', out of interest)

[H_P_Saucecraft]

Just picked up a hardback copy of this in near mint condition for £3 & it's signed by the author too

I will have to post a scan of it, but I do like the paperback cover better.

[H_P_Saucecraft]

Here's the hardback cover. As I said, the paperback is better.

& here's the signature I found inside when I bought it, genuine as far as I know.

[blackmonk]

Andy and June, a holidaying couple, discover what appears to be a disused military base on the Suffolk coast. Partially buried objects they find indicate there was once an established community on the site. Being journalists, they are intrigued and think there may be a story in it. They ask the landlord of the pub in a nearby village about the place but he insists no such place exists. He tells them he has run the pub for a few years but dated photos the couple see in the premises show he has been there for decades. Later they visit a library to view Ordnance Survey maps of the location and discover that the spot has been edited out with the words “obliterated by order of the Home Office” stamped across it. All maps prove to be the same. The librarian is also intrigued and offers to assist in investigating further suggesting his brother will be able to help so they arrange to meet at a later date. Driving from the library Andy and June are involved in an accident that would have certainly been fatal had it not been for Andy’s quick reflexes. The driver of the Rolls Royce that struck them was clearly at fault yet the police allow him to leave the scene and question Andy and June at length. They are compensated for the loss of their car and holiday but instructed not to pursue the story of the base any further.

Ignoring the advice, later in the week Andy and June return to the area to take photos and see that it has been cleaned up, the road hidden and a new fence has been erected. They return to the pub but the landlord denies ever having spoken to them before. The photos, too, have disappeared. Checking back with the librarian, to their horror, they discover that both he and his brother are now dead having lost their lives in a house fire.

Andy relates the story to his publisher, Mikki. Mikki thinks he’s on to a big thing and encourages Andy to dig deeper. Miki’s contacts discover that a village called Abberley once occupied the cordoned-off area. Andy and June take the items they picked up from the site to a scientist friend to see if he can date them. While they are waiting for results Miki contacts Andy and insists he drop the story and orders him never to contact him again. The scientist warns the couple to the fact that the items they have been carrying around are highly radioactive and they too are likely contaminated. The authorities have to be alerted and Andy and June are taken away to a private hospital to be decontaminated. Following prolonged cleansing they meet the hospital director and learn the truth about what happened at Abberley.

From here on in the novel switches tack to the history of Abberley up to the Second World War and the infiltration of two German spies into the community. In Germany a psychotic SS commander has devised an insane plot on how to overthrow England. He has learned of the new discovery German scientists have made; they have developed the world’s first radioactive source. Experiments on Poles and Jews have revealed how powerful the radiation is. He puts his plan to Hitler and is given approval to go ahead. Bahrer sets about recruiting a team in a manner similar to plot of The Dirty Dozen. Visiting a hospital Bahrer eyes a potential recruit –

“He had the classic Aryan appearance – blond hair, blue eyes, and a gaze of pure steel. There was something right about him.
‘What was your injury?’ Bahrer asked.
‘My penis was shot off, Herr General!’ the reply was shouted.
‘By whom?’
‘The English, Herr General!’
‘Get dressed. You are herby promoted to SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer.’”

Men are tested by being ordered to shoot themselves in the leg, crawl through filth and barbed wire coils, fight comrades to the death or, as in the case of the female doctor instructed to shoot one of her dying patients in the head.

Construction of a small U-Boat is commissioned and after its completion all those who worked on it are murdered by Bahrer’s crew. When they retrieve the radioactive object from the underground science lab all those present are likewise killed. Despite warnings from the scientist Bahrer deems the lead box that contains the source too heavy for the sub and naively orders crew member Krodel to remove metallic ostrich egg-sized object and carry it aboard the boat.

It is during the undersea journey to England that the crew begin to suffer the effects of the radiation. And dreadful effects they certainly are! Krodel is the first to show signs. A red rash on his chest and hands soon start to necrotise leaving him with exposed ribs and fleshless skeleton hands. Over time similar wounds affect the rest of the crew.

“Sonja snipped away Sucher’s shirt so that Bahrer could see the extent of the wound. Sucher’s back was a mass of boiling red. At Sonja’s touch an entire section of his flesh came away and exposed his ribcage and lungs. Bahrer heaved but forced back his self-control before the vomit reached his mouth. He had never seen anything so gruesome…
‘Patch him up,’ he ordered.
‘With what!’ demanded Sonja. ‘I have used every bandage we have on board.’
‘Sticking plaster will suffice, Herr Reichsfuhrer,’ Sucher said standing to attention, whereupon his lungs oozed their way through the gaps in his ribcage. The tissue seemed to disintegrate into tiny pieces, as if just waiting the command. The look of shocked surprise on Sucher’s face when he felt the remains of his lungs slip over his buttocks was a look even Bahrer didn’t want to see again.

Sucher dropped where he was, stone dead, and as his form hit the floor plates it splashed what was left of his lungs on Bahrer’s trousers… Endel was blistered from his chest to his knees and his groin was no more than a horrible red lump. What had been his penis and reproductive organs were now akin to a bloody sponge. The tops of his thighs were peeling away like saturated wallpaper and his left kneecap was exposed, grinning like a small skull… Kampfe’s thighs no longer resemble thighs. An angry wound travelled between the vale of his buttocks and into his anus, giving his flesh the appearance of a maggot-infested rabbit corpse.”

Regardless of their increasing disabilities the decomposing Nazis succeed in reaching their goal and transferring the radioactive source to England where it is left in the woods to slowly take its effect on the residents of Abberley. British authorities have been monitoring the situation and soon uncover the plot and quickly discover the ‘egg’. Here the story takes on an even more sinister twist as it draws to its disturbing conclusion.

For the most part the novel is set aboard the U-Boat where we witness the slow disintegration of the crew’s bodies and minds but the first part of the novel put me in mind of an enjoyable though clichéd Brian Clemens Thriller episode. The transition between the two didn’t quite work for me. It seems to be the hospital director who is narrating the second part of the story to Andy and June but there is way too much detail, including dialogue between characters, for him to have possibly known. It would also seem a rather overlong and unnecessary explanation to give the couple particularly when one takes into account what becomes of them. It is better to read it as a historical flashback rather than a narrated explanation which is perhaps the author’s proper intention.

Despite a few plot holes that can be overlooked I have to say I really liked Kommando 55 and managed to get through it in two sittings. It has put me in a radiation burns/nuclear catastrophe mood so next on the reading list is Lawrence Huff’s Dome, or perhaps Hans Heinrich Ziemann’s The Explosion. Both NEL. Both 1980.

[dem bones]

After a review like that, i hope you'll share your thoughts on 'em both with us, blackmonk. This all sounds vaguely reminiscent of Robert McCammon's The Night Boat from the same year, or rather a version of same as filtered through the twisted brain of Lawrence James and bad-sexed up accordingly. And surely there must have been less drastic ways of achieving a promotion to SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer than getting your dick love slug gentleman's area blown away?