Man With Two Faces

In Manhattan, during the depths of the Great Depression, Tokol Tokoloshe, a soldier of fortune, diamond thief, and rum runner, has turned vigilante along with his Amazonian-bred, blowgun-wielding sidekick Diana. Despite his crusade to combat evil, Tokol’s past catches up with him when he’s marked for death by Janus, a former confederate. As the amorously adventurous, sexually equivocal Tokol battles hit men, kidnappers, mobsters, blackmailers, Chinese tongs, spies, and Nazis, he courts celebs such as George and Ira Gershwin, Groucho Marx, Woody Guthrie, Howard Hughes, Orson Welles, Clarence Darrow, and Walter Winchell. Tokol’s battle for truth and justice leads him to an unexpected horror in Algiers on the eve of America’s entry into World War Two.

Man with Two Faces is an extravaganza—a wild ride through Depression-era America with hair-raising escapes, daring capers, and cameos by Clarence Darrow, Orson Welles, Albert Camus, and plenty of others from that unforgettable era. Don Swaim writes with such bravura assurance and rollicking good humor that the readers are carried along from beginning to end with little chance—or desire—to catch their breaths. As pure entertainment it ranks very high.

—S. T. Joshi, author of I Am Providence: The Life and Times of H. P. Lovecraft.