This book was so bad, I loved it. Of course, I also play in a white trash psycho-rockabilly band that performs murder ballads, so it had a special appeal to me.

William W. Johnstone bases his plot on two myths, the ancient myth of ghosts and the modern myth of snuff movies. For some reason he places the ghosts in old honky tonks that appear from the other side for the ghosts to have a place to hang out and listen to rockabilly music. I say "for some reason", because what at first seemed to be the idea behind the whole story ends up as little less than a chance for the author to name a few songs and artists every once in a while. Similarly, the evil snuff movie ring give the author an excuse to describe outrageous sex scenes with a complete lack of finesse, while hardly contributing to the plot except for fumbling around, killing and getting killed.

The author is unable to give any life, character or purpose to the ghosts, the phantom honky tonks, the bad guys, the good guys, the southern setting; everything he touches end up as mere clichés that could be substituted for anything or anyone else without adding or taking away from the book. And when he tries to add some political/social commentary to this sorry ordeal, it just gets pathetic. Item: A female journalist demonstrates her political guts and rugged individualism by not insisting on calling her cameraman a "cameraperson". Puhleeze. This kind of reversed political correctness is every bit as silly as the original. Likewise, the homogeneity of superficial political comments made by the "good guys" make them all seem like excuses for the author to pout rather than real people of flesh and blood.

So if you like rockabilly, this is not the book for you. If you like horror, this is not the book for you. If you like crime, this is not the book for you. In short, this is probably not the book for you.

- Tom Ekeberg

Rockabilly Hell is the first of two books centered around rural bars. The Devil taunts our hero with rockabilly music and takes the souls of whoever wanders into these taverns. One might believe that Johnstone could have written this book to side with the view of some in the 50's and 60's that rock and roll is a corrupting force, always in combination with alcohol and hell raising. But that is what makes this book so entertaining! Enjoy!

I agree with Morris. In all of his recent books, Johnstone seems to be running out of material and filling out his stories with excessive retelling of what has gone on in previous books in a series. This seems to apply to all of his past series and looks like 30% plus is flashbacks (retelling segments of previous books) where they are obviously used as page fillers.

once again Smoke is off to help a friend. This time its to help his friend monte recover his kidnapped wife. Once again mr johnstone starts out fine with his character but uses too many flash backs it seems like hes writing too much or something and had to have many fill in flashbacks. Since lamour died he has been one of my favortie writers but im starting to get away from his series books and going for his new character books.

I was so disappointed in this book. The charactors are too perfect and have no depth whatsoever. There are no weaknesses to overcome for the good guys and the plot isn't challanging to the reader. It is predictable and promotes every plot/stereotype imaginable. I love post-apocalyptic books that use imagination and honest adult spit fire. This trite piece of work fizzles!

It is very rare I start a book and not finish it no matter how bad it is but I only read about forty pages of this one. I wish there was some way for Mr. Johnstone to give me my money back. About half the forty pages were flashbacks of previous books. I used to love his Mountain Man Series but I quit reading them because he would spent a big part of the book with pages of what happened in a previous book. Now I will quit reading the Last Gunfighter series. I guess you make as much money doing this and you don't have to think up as many new things to write, just repeat what you have already written. In my openion it is bad for an author with this ability to take advantage of people that do not know these thing until they buy the book. It should be noted on the cover of this and other books he has done: BEWARE--ABOUT HALF OF WHAT YOU READ IS IN A PREVIOUS BOOK!!!!

This is a reprint of the previous book in the series - Same plot, same characters, same script and most of the text was lifted from the previous book. Not a book to waste money on.

Ghost Valley was a series of flashbacks from previous books. The story line was almost the same as the last book with different names, even the dialog was the same. I have loved all of William Johnstone's books, but could have saved money by skipping this and just rereading Reprisal. Hopefully the next book will have a different plot and characters.

I have read almost all the Mountain Man Series and for the most part have really enjoyed them. I guess if this book was the first one a person had read from the series it would be great. However, if it isn't you will be sorry to see so much repeated from the other books. It is obvious that Mr. Johnstone has made great use of a word processor to insert portions of other books, word for word in this book. It would be great if he would at least reword the text to make it interesting for the readers that have purchased many of the series books. It is no wonder Mr. Johnstone can publish so many books, if he uses many portions of past books to write them!

Fans of the Last Mountain Man series will be very familiar with this book. It seems that a very large portion of this book has been copied from previous works. As readers have noticed in the last few volumes, Mr. Johnstone has been using the "cut and paste" appication of his word processor quite often. In this volume he raises it to an art form. The story line seems to be written only to join these exerpts togehter. One of these exerpts he even repeats. Maybe this is an indication that Mr. Johnstone is getting tired of this series. If so please just stop this series. Refuse to take more money from your publisher. Just end the series. (Or let it sit dormant for awhile.) The rating for this book should have been a quarter star but Amazon has a 1 star limit.

I have read 24 of the Mountain Man books. I usually really like William W. Johnstone.The last few I read had several pages of previous books in them but this one, I believe, is the worst. I think at least half of the book is made up of stories that took place in some of his other books. I would like for him not to repeat so much and go on with his present story line. Don't need to reread what I ahve already read.

I have been a collector of the "Ashes" series for as many years as Mr Johnstone has been writing them,and I own them all. Howeve, upon reading the excerpt pages from "Destiny in the Ashes" I must regretfully agree with the other reviews. Something is wrong here, as Cooper & Jersey never referred to Ben Raines as "Ben" It was always "General" or "Boss". That registered on me right away, and I feel as though this one needs to be withdrawn, and rewritten. If the balance of the book is as far astray as the pages I read. I will dfeinitely save my money for something more worthwhile. This is too bad, because the series was always a captivating,though rather grisly, read.

Mr. Johnstone whats going on here? If you (speaking to the reader now) what good fiction dealing with a world after WWIII then buy every book in this serise up to book number 25#. Then for strange reason the books nosedive. I think johnstone should just bow out of the serise while he has the chance and stick to writting westerns.

Johnstone has lost who he was writing about in this one. He or his publisher printed the book with many statements that were out of touch with the previous books and characters. Example, He contributed the marking of President Claire to Jersey when in fact Jackie Malone did the notching. I found many examples like this and was disappointed. However I will buy the next installment and hope it was all clerical errors and not a sign of things to come with this author.

I've read most of WWJ's Ashes series in the past and recently decided to start from the beginning and read them again from book #1 "Out of the Ashes". I am a huge fan of these books and the series was excellent as it was originally written. However, starting with the book "Flames in the Ashes" the whole series goes to pot. It is as if they were written by someone else. Equipment that was never in the other books is suddenly available, the facts on how the war started change, and there's even references to Bill Clinton! Read all the "ashes" books, but stop before you get to "Flames"

This was my first and last in the "Ashes" series. I had read glowing reviews and gave this one a chance. I don't understand what the attraction is. The storyline appeals to peoples' rage regarding their perceived inequities of society. The writing is manipulative intending to have the reader overlook the sterotypical cardboard characters. There are the white hats and the black hats with no one in between. I enjoy post apocalyptic (after the Great War - apparently any time now) stories but this one is ridiculous. The good guys love freedom and the bad guys are all crazed Nazis. That's it, they're either Rebels (good guys) or Nazis, nothing in between. The Nazi men all enjoy sex with young boys and have frequent temper tantrums. The good guys live in the old United States (Canada seems to have separated itself from the continent), Mexico still appears to exist but the border between the two countries apparently still is recognized although why I can't imagine. The bad guys are combination of Nazis from South (where it is all Nazi) and North America. It seems in previous books there were zombies and other mutant enemies to blow up with delighted zeal. The Rebels must be all shell shocked since they have no compunction about blowing away 30 people each before lunch time.

If you like lots of references to different armament and how many ways they cause carnage (there's lots of that here), you'll love this book. The main characters all lead charmed lives. Bullets hit everyone else and if they ever dare to get near the heroes, body armor deflects any damage.

The main characters live to get into the non-stop battle from Kansas, to Cheyenne to Mexico where the main character is captured and facing a firing squad when the book ends. If that isn't manipulative (buy the next book), I don't know what is.

The main characters drive around in Hummers always getting ahead of their troops but always avoiding injury. They never seem to have to take sanitary breaks, eat or sleep. Their lives are on hold until they conquer the world for the white hats.

Lastly, the endless supply of food, fuel and armament defies reason. Prepare to suspend belief on a major scale.

I used to be a huge fan of the "Ashes" series, and I was disappointed with "Flames in the Ashes", but "Treason" is far worse. The book opens with a story that is totally different then the rest of the series and horribly jumps from one plot to the next. Anyone who is a fan of "Out of the Ashes" will be very upset after reading this novel because it is not what we've come to expect from WWJ.