The Six Thousand

George Chesbro is my favorite mystery writer. Mongo, the lead character of Chesbro’s books, happens to be a dwarf detective, university professor, and a black belt in karate. Book slut says, "Chesbro created a unique witches’ brew of noir brutality, occult tension, detective science and bizarre villains. Playboy once described it as Raymond Chandler meets Stephen King but it was often more like James Bond on acid." One of Chesbro’s most famous books is The Beasts of Valhalla, which mixes science fiction and detective work in a story dealing with a family of disturbing geniuses who are messing with DNA sequencing, creating eerie creatures, and planning to devolve the human race back to Neanderthals -- in a plot with echos of Wagner's Ring Cycle and Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings"!