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Jewel of the Java Sea
Through the tropical heat of the Java Sea, from island to island, from woman to woman, Frisco Dougherty followed the diamond trail. Cockney Jaske knew part of the answer, voluptuous Locheng knew more, a Chinese merchant knew it all. Hard-bitten Frisco had to hit it rich or end a derelict in Java's ports....
245 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1951
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 31, 2022
Frisco Dougherty has been hanging around the islands of the South China Sea, from Singapore to Manilla and to the coast of India ever since the war ended. He’s been hunting for over fifteen years, hunting diamonds, hoping to gain his fortune and enough dough to get him back home to San Francisco. And now he’s found one. A diamond that’s been oddly cut, not so large as he’d hoped but certainly of superior quality. And even better, it appears to be just the start of a group of diamonds, all available for a man filled with enough cunning and bravado to acquire them one way or another.
This is a classic 1950’s-era South Pacific adventure novel. The plot is filled with rogues and villains out to steal that which Frisco has legitimately stolen first. Frisco has allies but he’s never certain he can entirely trust them. Among them is a beautiful native girl named Anna as well as a Cockney named Jaske, a Chinese merchant, and an American going by the name Deering. From some he can gain clues to how to acquire the rest of the diamonds and from others he can make deals to his own advantage. But just who will help and who will hinder remains an open-ended question.
Author Dan Cushman has written a number of novels that take place in the South Pacific as well as the Congo and the Yukon, all based on his own adventurous life and experiences. Later he turned his hand to writing western/historical novels featuring natives and Montana history. He is probably best known for his novel, “Stay Away, Joe” which was turned into a film starring Elvis Presley.
I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. I was in the mood for a good rollicking adventure yarn and this one fit the bill nicely. I managed to learn a little more about the regions where the story takes place as well as some nice details about the provenance of some famous diamonds that found their way through this area. But at its heart, this is a solid novel of back-stabbing, conniving adventurers intent on gaining riches the old-fashioned way. Trading, dealing, stealing, and murdering, all on the way to a satisfying ending.
This is a classic 1950’s-era South Pacific adventure novel. The plot is filled with rogues and villains out to steal that which Frisco has legitimately stolen first. Frisco has allies but he’s never certain he can entirely trust them. Among them is a beautiful native girl named Anna as well as a Cockney named Jaske, a Chinese merchant, and an American going by the name Deering. From some he can gain clues to how to acquire the rest of the diamonds and from others he can make deals to his own advantage. But just who will help and who will hinder remains an open-ended question.
Author Dan Cushman has written a number of novels that take place in the South Pacific as well as the Congo and the Yukon, all based on his own adventurous life and experiences. Later he turned his hand to writing western/historical novels featuring natives and Montana history. He is probably best known for his novel, “Stay Away, Joe” which was turned into a film starring Elvis Presley.
I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. I was in the mood for a good rollicking adventure yarn and this one fit the bill nicely. I managed to learn a little more about the regions where the story takes place as well as some nice details about the provenance of some famous diamonds that found their way through this area. But at its heart, this is a solid novel of back-stabbing, conniving adventurers intent on gaining riches the old-fashioned way. Trading, dealing, stealing, and murdering, all on the way to a satisfying ending.
September 15, 2023
This was a used bookstore find I picked up purely because of an interest in Indonesia, where the book is set. I had never heard of Dan Cushman; a little Googling revealed that he lived in Montana and wrote a couple of dozen novels, mostly westerns. His 2001 obit in the New York Times makes no mention of any travel to Southeast Asia. Somehow I was not surprised.
Published in 1951, this novel is pulp fiction all the way, a steamy tale of an American trader and adventurer, "Frisco" Dougherty, who has been knocking around the islands for fifteen years looking for a big score so he can retire and return to San Francisco. He gets his hands on a priceless diamond, gets wind of where there are more, and spends the rest of the book dodging dissolute Dutchmen and sinister Malays and Chinese, all intent on the same prize. Along the way he spends a good deal of time eyeing and occasionally bedding the comely native women.
It's entertaining enough, with prose only slightly purple, loads of atmosphere, tramp steamers and remote Borneo villages and low Singapore dives, along with a few references to current events, i.e. Indonesia's recent independence from the Netherlands. It's also full of retrograde racial and sexual attitudes: "Do you know how a woman sometimes feels about a man? She wants him to take her. To take her while she fights."
Uh, sure. That kind of thing makes the book a little less of an innocent pleasure, but I kept turning pages.
Published in 1951, this novel is pulp fiction all the way, a steamy tale of an American trader and adventurer, "Frisco" Dougherty, who has been knocking around the islands for fifteen years looking for a big score so he can retire and return to San Francisco. He gets his hands on a priceless diamond, gets wind of where there are more, and spends the rest of the book dodging dissolute Dutchmen and sinister Malays and Chinese, all intent on the same prize. Along the way he spends a good deal of time eyeing and occasionally bedding the comely native women.
It's entertaining enough, with prose only slightly purple, loads of atmosphere, tramp steamers and remote Borneo villages and low Singapore dives, along with a few references to current events, i.e. Indonesia's recent independence from the Netherlands. It's also full of retrograde racial and sexual attitudes: "Do you know how a woman sometimes feels about a man? She wants him to take her. To take her while she fights."
Uh, sure. That kind of thing makes the book a little less of an innocent pleasure, but I kept turning pages.
October 16, 2018
Mediocre South Seas pulp, featuring a hunt for diamonds and lots of running around and random murdering, interrupted by reflections on how our protagonist likes him some naked women, or nearly naked women clad only in a sarong. Some might like the decently conveyed seedy tropical atmosphere. The Big Reveal reveals one of the most prosaic crime methods ever employed, which might have worked well in a better book (as a crowning irony), but here is just par for the substandard course. Good enough to finish, but best not to start in the first place.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews