A ‘dangerous’ new book

Is it just my imagination or was there an entry for "Battle Ax" in the "Essential Gear" section of "The Dangerous Book for Boys"? I seem to also remember an entry titled "How to Lay Siege to a City" between "Latin Phrases Every Boy Should Know" and "How to Play Poker," isn’t that right?

No, wrong on both counts. But you may understand my confusion when you hear that Conn Iggulden, co-author (with his brother Hal) of that surprise how-to bestseller for boys has also written a novel forthcoming in March, "Genghis: Lords of the Bow" (Delacorte: 388 pp., $25). I applaud him (this is his second novel in a series about everyone’s favorite Mongolian warlord), but it’s hard to resist seeing humor in the fact that he’s turned from old-fashioned activities for bored boys to Genghis Khan’s attack on the Chin dynasty.

"Genghis frowned as [a group of defenders] succeeded in drenching a dozen pikemen in black liquid," Iggulden writes. "The warriors ducked down behind their wooden shield, but only moments later, torches were thrown onto the oil and flames exploded, louder than the choking screams as their lungs charred." This from a guy who wrote about building the perfect treehouse and making "the Greatest Paper Airplane in the World"!

Then again, "Dangerous" and "Genghis" don’t seem all that unrelated. The cartoon violence of this novel seems the sort of stuff any adolescent boy would deem cool. And "Genghis" seems inspired by that master of boys’ adventure, Fritz Leiber, especially in its purple eloquence (funeral pyres collapse "with a cough of flame") and the berserker energy of the battle scenes ("piece by piece, the walls were hammered down, the catapult stones lofted into the air by sweating teams of men"). Leiber & Co. fed my generation and others with savage tales of adventure. Even Michael Chabon, at a higher frequency, has praised that genre by paying homage to it in a recent novel, "Gentlemen of the Road." Such books taught us not to rely on TV to feed our imaginations.

Come holiday time, I can almost see Iggulden’s "Genghis" and "The Dangerous Book for Boys" as a boxed set, emblazoned with the slogan: Long live boys’ adventure!

Nick Owchar