Books Review – Double Threat/Double Dose by F. Paul Wilson

F. Paul Wilson is a fantastic author, know for his Secret History of the World books, most notably the Repairman Jack novels.

Many of his books (and especially those in the Secret History) are thrillers with some kind of supernatural/interdimensional antagonist with cosmic implications from the plot (or the ongoing plot, in the case of the Repairman Jack novels).

While there is some humour in there (at least the Jack books, which I’ve read almost all of), I wouldn’t necessarily describe them as “funny.”

Double Threat and Double Dose, a 2-book series (called the “Duad Series”) that is vaguely part of the Secret History, is funny as hell, though it’s also kind of a terrifying thriller too.

That’s almost solely due to the relationship between Daley (the main character) and “Pard” (a self-named entity that kinda/sorta entered her head).

Daley is a grifter who grew up in a family of grifters. Even though her mother and (after she died) her Gram and uncle try to shift her out of that life, her Family upbringing continues to guide her.

On the run from a scam that went bad, she’s suddenly (and I won’t explain how) plagued with a voice inside her head.

That won’t shut up.

After tests show nothing wrong with her internally, she finally starts to accept it and discovers that, with the symbiote’s help, she can cure some otherwise incurable medical conditions.

Which of course is going to completely remove her privacy when it becomes known.

Retreating to a remote town in the California desert, she works on honing her healing powers.

But Nespodee Springs is the home of the Pendry clan, a religious cult family from Wales that has some cosmic plans for the return of interdimensional beings called “the Visitors,” and Daley might just get in the way of all that.

Even though she has no idea what is going on.

The Duad (I’m just going to call both book by the entire series name unless otherwise required) contains a bunch of quirky characters and situations that walk that thin line between hilarious and thrilling.

Daley and Pard form a great relationship, bouncing off of each other with witty retorts and conversations (some vocally, to Daley’s chagrin when somebody hears her, and some internally). Pard can only see through Daley’s eyes, but he can also manipulate her body when she’s sleeping so he can browse the Internet and teach himself (he’s sexless but mostly appears as a male avatar when he’s actually manifesting in front of her) things.

Of course, once he knows something, Daley knows it too, so she also is learning things.

One minor fault in the series that I just now realized as I was typing is that, other than these nocturnal reading activities, there is no other indication that Pard can actually do anything with Daley’s body.

It would have been good if it had been useful elsewhere as well, or at least mentioned.

But anyway, these two characters form the backbone of the series and make the series truly funny.

The other reason the series is funny is the utter absurdity of some of the other characters (but in a good way).

Elis, the patriarch of the Pendry clan, has been using ancient scrolls as investment advisors, skillfully building up his family’s fortune to build the Tesla Tower as he also uses the scrolls for advice on how to bring the Visitors back.

Rhys is one of the Pendry sons who manages the family finances (though under Elis’ direction) and also is tasked with finding out just who this newcomer to the town is and whether or not she can disrupt everything (even though he doesn’t believe any of this mystical claptrap).

Cadoc is Rhys’ brother. All of the Pendry clanfolk have a dark, scaly patch on their skin somewhere. Cad had it spread all over his body, eventually affecting his ability to speak as well. He hides in his room, roaming the town at night when nobody can see him. His interactions with people are just him writing notes to them (and then he insists on collecting them all at the end of the conversation).

Juana is a Native American woman who has some inkling of what happened to Daley. Not exactly, but enough to know that she has to be around to serve and protect Daley from whatever may come because of her sudden dual nature.

She’s always popping up when Daley doesn’t want her to be, but she ends up being very useful to the plot and is a quirky character in her own right as well.

And so many more minor characters just running in and out of the book, all of them great.

One thing the Secret History books generally have, and Duad is no different, is that events in the book almost seem preordained.

This can be a good or bad thing depending on your taste, but the end results aren’t. The characters still have agency to deal with the preordained things that are happening to them.

It feels like Pard and Daley meeting is written in the stars, but how Daley reacts to all of this is fully in character for her.

While everything in the book is good, it’s really Daley and Pard that make it worth reading. They’re relationship is just so fresh and wonderful to see develop.

First Daley is reluctant to concede that this entity is inside her head. Then she does, but is still really annoyed by it (especially when he becomes very anal about her grammar).

She still resents having this “person” inside her, but she can’t do anything about it.

But for a brief period during the series, he’s abruptly taken away from her…and she misses it.

Misses him.

As the climax to the series comes, using the Tesla Tower that the Pendry clan has built to bring their plans to fruition (I won’t go into any more detail here because I don’t want to spoil it for you), the final book ends in a super-long chapter with many shifting viewpoints that brings about the ultimate fate of the Visitors and all of the other characters.

While the climax is thrilling, I do have to say that the introduction of a brother and sister character in the second book is not really interesting at all. I didn’t really like them that much and they only seem to be in the book to explain a bunch of things to the reader and then to give a viewpoint character for one aspect of the finale that wouldn’t otherwise have any.

Without them, we wouldn’t actually see half of the events.

They’re useful in that sense, but they’re just so abruptly introduced and otherwise superfluous that I wish Wilson had found some other way to do that.

Also a warning for those of you who might pick up Double Threat without hearing otherwise (though if you’re reading this review, I guess you’re already aware of it!), the first book is labelled as a “standalone novel” but then ends on a cliffhanger.

Double Dose picks up immediately after the first book ends, but if you’re picking the books up piecemeal, be aware that you do not have a self-contained story in the first book.

Buying the book when it first came out, it must have been jarring to have no real ending.

You can read Double Dose without reading the first book, because Wilson pretty much explains everything necessary that happened in the first book (which can be a bit jarring if you’re reading them back to back!), but you have to read both books to really enjoy them, I think.

Finally, the series does have a definitive conclusion, though it’s left wide open for a sequel, or at least a continuation for some of the characters.

I have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of Daley and Pard.

You don’t have to be familiar with any of the other Secret History books to read this series. The Pendry plan has a lot to do with events in Wilson’s Wardenclyffe, but everything you need to know about it is in this series.

It doesn’t really matter whether the exposition that characters spout is completely made up for this book or if it’s relating the events of another, does it?

It’s still exposition.

I highly recommend the Repairman Jack series (it’s been so long since I’ve read them that I can’t really review them), but The Duad series is an excellent read, highly recommended as well.

Especially since you don’t need to have read any of the other books to enjoy it.

It’s funny, it’s creepy at times, and the characters are just top notch.

Give this series a try if you can.