ELLIOT CARR

Elliot Carr is an agent with IMPACT.

That organization's name is an acronym which breaks out to the International and Metropolitan Police Air Control Team.

[Note: the Team part is given us on the back cover of the first adventure but it is never used in that actual adventure. Also, the differentiation of International and Metropolitan is the name is decidedly odd. Also odd is the actual origin and raison d'etre of the organization.

At the 43rd  annual meeting of the World Organization of Airlines (WOAL), held in the first year or two of the 1960s, there had been a unanimous agreement to create its own security force. The WOAL was said to be comprised of representatives from 83 different countries and 114 different airlines; only Russia has chosen to stay out. Each of these countries concurred that IMPACT would have "full authority to exercise their powers in anything appertaining to, connected with, or coming under the jurisdiction of the aforesaid airlines, whether on airports, property owned by the airlines, or in the air". It was firmly stated that IMPACT operatives "were not policemen in the full sense of the word. They had no more powers of arrest than ordinary citizens [but] their duties were to present enough evidence to the authorities so that they could make the arrests". 

Named in this new investigative bureau as its chief operative, Elliot Carr is said to have "carte blanche, crash-dive authority over aircrews, ground staff and all personnel. As well as that, the police of every country must know who [he was] and what authority [he had]".

From the blurb for both of the recorded adventures, we learn that Carr is a "world trouble shooter" which definitely fits the International aspect of his employer's name. Likely based out of New York (but then again, possibly Sydney) he is able to fly, courtesy of any airline, to wherever there are problems of a criminal nature affecting the skyways.

His pictures show him to be likely in his middle 30s with shortish brown hair and an athletic build. He is shown in both cases to be dressed in a suit, fairly common for that days, with a pistol in his right hand ready for instant use. Description-wise, he is said only to have "the surety of a man of affairs, the sensitive mouth of an artist, and the powerful, clean-cut build of a jet".

Not meaning to nitpick on these adventures but ... in the second one, the cover clearly talks about Carr being involved with "espionage  - and a wanton woman". My dictionary defines wanton as "sexually unrestrained" but the picture shown clearly has the woman gagged with her hand tied behind her back - that seems restrained to me!

Note: for more information on this series (and a second opinion), head to the terrific website Permission To Kill.

For the longest time since I learned about this series, I was unable to the quality or the enjoyability of this two-book series because I was not able to read it because the two books were very pricey. Eventually, checking every few months, I found copies I could afford.

These books were released by Horwitz, an Australian publisher. I believe Horwitz had an idea for a marketing scheme which would make create a best-selling author of exciting thrillers so it came up with a house-name of James Dark. The primary use of this pseudonym was for the very enjoyable Mark Hood series of spy adventures by the talented J.E. Macdonell. Obviously looking at these two Elliot Carr tales, 'James Dark' was doing other writing as well.