The Penetrator #30: Computer Kill

The Penetrator #30: Computer Kill by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1979
Price I paid: $1.50

Electronics wizard Hector Lattimer has at last figured out a fool-proof way to beat the system. Using his ingeniously designed portable computer terminal, Lattimer can tap into any programmed bank and authorize payment to his account. Then, in a flash of a diode, all data is wiped out—with no one the wiser…and Lattimer the richer.

Even the Penetrator is baffled—until he learns that the engineer is an embittered ex-employee of an electronics firm; a madman whose attempts at extortion have failed, who is now planning to destroy the entire works by automating a deadly device that will trigger an explosion.

It’s a touchy situation, and Mark Hardin’s number may be up—unless he can stop the bomb before it blows!

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The Penetrator #24: Cryogenic Nightmare

The Penetrator #24: Cryogenic Nightmare by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1978
Price I paid: $1.50

Preacher Mann is too much for the FBI and the CIA. He has dual citizenship and friends in diplomatic circles and he’s too powerful for the regular legal channels. He’s come a long way: from a pimp in Harlem he’s worked his way to the top―of the rackets. He’s into international dope, espionage―and now, in his orgy palace off the Florida coast he’s onto a new wrinkle!

The most beautiful women in the country are systematically vanishing. And Preacher Mann is holding them on ice―literally. He’s freezing them until needed―to be shipped to the highest bidder.

Only one man can defrost the situation―the Penetrator. He must succeed where others have failed. One man on a mission that’s too cool to handle!

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The Penetrator #4: Hijacking Manhattan

The Penetrator #4: Hijacking Manhattan by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1974
Price I paid: $1.50

Mark Hardin…

…is prepared for trouble in New York City, but he’d hoped to arrive in time to prevent it. The first subway station blew up while he was still en route from California, piloting a sleek new twin-engine plane. It was fast, but not fast enough to get him there in time to stop the 72nd Street IRT station from caving in, carrying a large section of Broadway with it.

A Third World group, an alliance of Afro-Asian students, the Eusi Dhahabu, has been formed in Harlem. It says that they are working for racial equality, but they are asking for money. Lots of it. Exactly two million dollars in unmarked, used twenty-dollar bills. If they do not get the cash promptly, twelve more subway stations will go. During rush hours. With thousands of people in them.

Responsible blacks cannot infiltrate the group. They have tried. How, then, can the Penetrator? Honkies stand out in Harlem. Somehow Hardin must reach back into his Indian past for a disguise that will work…and fast. There are forty-two subway stations in New York City, and time is running out.

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The Penetrator #18: Countdown to Terror

The Penetrator #18: Countdown to Terror by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1976
Price I paid: 60¢

The message: “Liberty for Puerto Rico or death to all Gringos. Viva el F.A.L.N.” The terrorist tactics of the Fuezas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional Puerto Riquena were being stepped up.

The bombings would increase each day, culminating in the big blast, Operation Luz. Racing against the clock, Mark Hardin stalks the streets of Spanish Harlem—his quarry, El Chico, ruthless leader of the fanatic F.A.L.N. Each step brings him closer to the creations of this time table of death and destruction. One by one, he manages to pick off the terrorist troops, slowly decimating their forces and equalizing the kill count of bombing victims.

But the deadline for Operation Luz is explosively near. Seconds ticking away like tiny bombs…

This is the eighteenth book in the Penetrator Series. The police blotters of cities across the nation and even as far away as Japan contain evidence of Mark Hardin’s handiwork—the deaths of corrupt hogs at the public table, deaths of men who kill, maim, or cause suffering among the innocent. The Penetrator is a warrior without uniform or rank, pledged to fight anyone—on either side of the law—who seeks to weaken or destroy the American way of life. Follow the Penetrator as he travels from place to place, leaving his personal symbol of retribution, a chipped blue flint arrowhead, on the bodies of society’s deadliest enemies.

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The Penetrator #12: Bloody Boston

The Penetrator #12: Bloody Boston by Chet Cunningham
Book Margins, Inc., 1976
Price I paid: $1.50

The Penetrator wanted nothing more than to destroy the Mafia. But when his college roommate Tony Rossi, the son of Boston’s most powerful Don, asked him for help, Hardin couldn’t refuse. Somebody was masquerading as Mark’s buddy, trying to take over the drug trade in Boston, and if the fake didn’t succeed, Rossi’s wife and son would lose their lives. Whatever it took, the Penetrator swore he would save the innocent—and make sure the corrupt could never harm anyone again.

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The Penetrator #10: The Hellbomb Flight

The Penetrator #10: The Hellbomb Flight
Book Margins, Inc., 1975
Price I paid: $1.50

Once second in command at NASA, Dr. Orlando Fitzmueller built a secret computer base in the Nevada desert. Through careful planning, diligent calculations, and sheer brilliance, he had developed a strategy that would help him realize his impossible dream of controlling world atomic power. It was up to the Penetrator Mark Hardin to stop Fitzmueller—and time was running out. For if the scientist’s demands weren’t met, he would ignite a holocaust from space that would kill 150 million people in the first thirty seconds.

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The Penetrator #38: Hawaiian Trackdown

The Penetrator #38: Hawaiian Trackdown by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1980
Price I paid: 60¢

Big men are making big money off little children, and the Penetrator has found an explosive new cause!

From the sleepy suburbs of the San Fernando Valley, to the smut-ridden streets of Hollywood, and over to the island paradise of Hawaii, Mark Hardin draws his deadly leash tighter and tighter around a vicious pornography ring bent on the sexploitation of innocent children.

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The Penetrator #11: Terror in Taos

The Penetrator #11: Terror in Taos by Lionel Derrick
Pinnacle Books, 1975
Price I paid: 60¢

Mark Hardin is known to his enemies as The Penetrator. He penetrates in several ways: by fighting his way in, by easing in…or by dropping in via parachute.

He’s half-Cheyenne and half-Welsh. In quest of his warrior heritage, Mark Hardin has learned Indian skills: to track a man, but to not leave tracks; to use a crossbow, a garrote, a spear, a knife; to live on the land; to speak his native tongue.

As a child he grew up in orphanages, boarding schools, and foster homes. He’s seen all sides of life. He knows it is too often evil, and it has become his mission to eradicate crime and lawlessness in any way he can. His ancestors bequeathed him special knowledge in these things.

Now, as he dropped through the air, scanning the desert for David Red Eagle’s smoke signal, his mind flashed back to similar jumps in Vietnam. Another time, another enemy. In the fetid rice paddies and rubbled hamlets the enemy had a yellow skin and slanted eyes. Today Hardin would be fighting foes of his own kind, men of white skin and red skin.

It all started with the theft of some valuable turquoise and silver relics and the murder of an Indian holy man. It would accelerate with the entry of militant young indians, State Troopers, the National Guard…and the Mafia.

It would climax in a desert bloodbath!

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