Diamondback: It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time by Derrick Ferguson

Diamondback: It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time
by Derrick Ferguson
2021, Pro Se Productions

Believed dead, gunman Diamondback Vogel returns to the gang run city of Denbrook and inserts himself into a war of organized crime and corrupt police. It has a near future setting, just enough to account for societal decay and the occasional technological advancement. Solid action, but too many pages of gangsters telling each other what happened in other scenes.

There's a subplot involving a wife looking for her missing husband and whether Vogel is who he thinks he is, but that will sadly be left dangling.

From Amazon

Dillon And The Pirates of Xonira by Derrick Ferguson

Dillon And The Pirates of Xonira
by Derrick Ferguson
2012 Pulpwork Press

Dillion is hired to investigate his old friend Lord Chancellor C'jai of Xonira, accused of piracy. We get submarine battles and swordfights, but not near as over-the-top as other entries. 

Available from Amazon

Dillon and the Bad Ass Belt Buckle by Derrick Ferguson

Dillon and the Bad Ass Belt Buckle
by Derrick Ferguson
2011

After Dillon and Eli rescue a kidnapped actor in the jungles of Burma, they come across a bandit settlement called Cheap Prayer. Dillon challenges the leader to a deadly concentration course for their freedom, and for the Bad Ass belt buckle. Fun short.

Available in the Dillon Annual Collection 2018, from Amazon

Dillon and the Legend of the Golden Bell by Derrick Ferguson

Dillon and the Legend of the Golden Bell
by Derrick Ferguson
2010 PulpWork Press

Mercenary with a heart Dillon is hired to locate the Golden Bell, and ancient artifact, to unify the people of a pirate nation. I've read a couple of Ferguson's stories, including the first Dillon, but this one is on another level.

Dillon faces jetpack assassins, a feline shape shifting femme fatale, a bungee jumping lost race, and an entire army. Longer than most new pulps, Ferguson keeps up the pace throughout without getting tiresome or episodic as is the tendency for the genre.

Dillon is described by others in the story as cocky and arrogant, but he's less Ashley Williams, more Fred Williamson as far as confidence levels. The story is populated with other colorful characters and references to past adventures which give the feeling the series has gone on much longer than it has.

I think there was a reference to the 70s being 60 years ago, setting this in the near future, but all the cultural elements are contemporary, or earlier. There's some advanced technology and a little bit of the supernatural.

Dillon and the Legend of the Golden Bell has some of my favorite action sequences put to print. It has just enough detail to paint the picture, but gives room for your imagination to fill in the spaces. Probably the character I would most want to see on the screen.

Kindle ebook from Amazon

D.C. Jones and Adventure Command International by Jim Beard

D.C. Jones and Adventure Command International
by Jim Beard
2020

Basically a novelization of these ads for 70s GI Joe..

...or Action Man in the UK

The folks at Adventure Command find an Egyptian tomb in the New World, fight sharks, go scuba diving, and fly in helicopters. The team prefers non-violent solutions, but can mix it up when needed. Fun concept, taken better as a novella with a couple of bonus stories rather than a cohesive whole. We leave the leader Jones at the end of the novella, heavily implied that he would be turned into the Bionic Man, and he doesn't show up for the two shorts. 

In ebook, audiobook, and paperback from Amazon