Tuesday, April 01, 2008
 
Book Report: Rambo: First Blood Part II by David Morrell (1985)
As you might remember, I just read First Blood recently and liked the first part of it, but didn't like the ending. I'd bought this book, but later bought that book and read it first so I could follow the story. Not that "the kid" from First Blood, who died at the end, and a character played by Sylvester Stallone would have much in common. This book follows the movie from First Blood.

Well, what can I say? It expands a bit on the movie, giving some interior world to the stock characters from the movie, but it also sexualizes the violence a bit, and Morrell must have worked from an incomplete script, because it doesn't follow the movie exactly. Still, it was 250 pages, and I read it in 3 hours, so it's not as though I spent weeks on it. It was a good break between outings in pre-Victorian English novels.

The author's forward provided a bit of a bright spot. In it, the author said, "Yeah, he died in the first book. But here's where you can buy the cool knife, bow, and arrows from the movie!" Also, another amusing bit occurred when I read about Rambo gearing up for his insertion into Vietnam. I misread a passage, and snorted. "He's putting .45 rounds into an AK-47," I told my beautiful wife. "Everyone knows AK-47s take 7.62mm rounds." "How do you know," she asked, almost like she challenged me when I mocked Spare Change. I mean, I'm a man, aren't I?

Books mentioned in this review:


 
To say Noggle, one first must be able to say the "Nah."