The Set-Up: By the time this fifth book in the series came along Get Smart was already at least into its second season on TV and I’ll assume that the author William Johnston had developed a familiarity with the material based upon the show. A few of the old standbys are here: The book begins with the arrival at Control Headquarters and Max Smart receiving his mission from the Chief.  As always, there is the running shoe phone gag; with the interrupting operator.  This time around the operator is given a more sustained thread: She is trying to get her nephew Arnold a job as a secret agent, and interrupts the calls to convince the Chief that Arnold could do it better.  Arnold also crosses Max and 99’s path as they are leaving HW and he’s arriving for an interview; an interview that never occurs because he gets his finger stuck in the pay phone and is left dangling when the floor drops.  This same thing occurred to Max as well in the beginning of the book.  The other is the Research and Development Department, led by Dr. Hyde, providing Max with a handful of capsules to test out on the mission.  This allows for clever interpretations by Max to get himself out of some sticky situations.

The mission is established: Once again it is to go after a not so evil scientist who is suspected as having developed a poisonous gas that could spell ruin for the world if it falls into the wrong hands.  So, the plot is again, a race against the KAOS agent to get the formula first, and keep it from falling into evil’s hands!  In this case the absentminded scientist is Dr. Livingstrom, a gentleman with a fetish for exotic foods, and was last seen heading off to Africa.  The KAOS agent is Whitestone, a former vaudevillian and magician who uses his power of illusion to make people see things.  He also is tall, white-haired and very distinguished looking.  I know that because it is mentioned over and over in the book.So with that, Max and 99 - now established as a team in no small part as a nod to the TV show - head off to Africa.

The correlation to the TV show does show up as this is the first book whose cover also features Agent 99. The back and forth between Max and 99 is also reflective of the show.  99 catches on before Max, and sometimes tells him, to where he reprimands 99, only to suggest the same thing to her.  She is supportive, and helpful, and a voice of reason along the way.  Max is not as dumb as he is in the earlier books, but is still clueless, still too reliant on doing things by the book.  The one over-the-top recurring theme Johnston employs in this story is never ending puns.  They are following Dr. Livingstrom (whom when they find there is a Dr. Livingstrom, I presume?) to the African capital city of Pahzayk.  Which was in the country of Ghirzy, which recently had a revolution, so has been renamed New Ghirzy.  So, yes, they are headed to Pahzayk, New Ghirzy.  Dr. Livingstrom is going there to sample the rare African plant, the Dog Rose.  He explains it’s a plant that is related to the American plant; the Collie Flower.  Whitestone makes his presence felt through illusions like an American Diner that Max expects to get a Peanut Butter Burger at a dockside restaurant, but it was an illusion and they splash into the water.  Soon they team up with a guide, Hassan Pfeiffer, to take them into the jungle that Dr. Livingstrom was last seen.

From there the story is a jaunt through the jungle, and Johnston breaks up the action into three distinct encounters, one with a cannibal village, one with a strange cult in a walled in Paradise, and the other is with well meaning Peace Corp volunteers trying to build a bridge over the river.  The cult is strangest, and almost exists wholly on its own to give the impression it was added to hit the 150 pages.  It is the spot where Max uses karate the most, chopping tall, distinguished looking, white-haired members thinking they are Whitestone.  The Peace Corpsmen are led by a Dental student who’s schooling is the only thing that gives him any bridge experience, and why build a bridge over a 13 inch waterfall anyway.  Oh, and if you try to ride a hippo across the river to avoid crocodiles then make sure the hippo does not try to submerge.  Whitestone works his illusions with armies of ants, stampedes, and other near-misses that Agent 99 is there to help counter-ballast Max’ worst instincts. R&D helps with a couple of the capsules, how they got NYC into a capsule is no bigger wonder than why no one noticed it was gone (it is winter, everyone in NYC is in Florida..) but the best R&D capsule was the timely “One Shovel and One Spotlight for Trapping Ex-Vaudevillians in the Jungle.”  they do think of everything, and though Max and 99 are trapped repeatedly, eventually the trap works on Whitestone too. Max outsmarts the Generalissimo of revolutionary rebels with the old bomb is the apple not the banana trick.  Max causes trouble in paradise through introducing the concept of work and brain surgery to offset their singing and dancing and dancing and singing.  And the Peace Corpsmen give up after a couple of tries with bridge building, disgusted and disillusioned, and Max reasons with Agent 99 that the bridge was useless anyway, so failing at a useless mission is not really failing, after all.

All this couples with finding Dr. Livingstrom, which is done through the sense of smell.  You see the gas he has is very smelly, it clears people out of wherever it occurs, which is its only known strength, so occasionally the odor wafts through the jungle, and leads Max, 99, and Hassan towards Livingstrom’s hut.  The only hint they had was the name Livingstrom left in his lab, Brassica Oleracia 212°.  And like a true professional Johnston saves the final 10 percent of the book to wrap everything up.  On a dime the pursuit stops, and in quick succession we find out Hassan is Whitestone, he holds 99 and Max at gunpoint, and demands the formula from Livingstrom. I will leave the Google search to the reader but Livingstrom soon points out that Brassica Oleracia 212° is a certain food, boiled.  That was the smell and while effective, Whitestone does not want to bring that formula back to the States, and passes it to Max.  Max declines too, Whitestone gives him the gun and thanks to 99 doesn’t give it back, and then gives the formula back to Livingstrom.  Chief is called, Arnold has been thwarted in his attempts to become a secret agent, and the consolation prize is bringing Whitestone back to the US as a prisoner.  But sure as you can say illusionary airplane, he slips past them, well mostly Max, 99 identified the oddity of the white haired, tall, distinguished looking ticket agent and stewardess.  That gives Max one more ‘as we say in our country’ sayings, another recurring gag in the book, and they head back home.

Overall: Formulaic by this point, Johnston is once again creative with the assignment.  Gags are regularly presented, there is an established plot and it moves along in 150 pages and remains true to the characters.  Not the best because it has a little repetitiveness throughout but works and also does a good job with 99 and the KAOS agent.  The operator gag here is as useful as in any of them, with the operator offering up negative commentary on each call while building up her own nephew.  Not a top effort but in the top half.  It does offer a premonition towards the surreal creativity which would be in full effect in the next novel, And Loving It!.

  By the Numbers:

Pages: 9-151

Chapters: 11

Control Agents: Agent 99

Non-Control Absent-minded Scientist: Dr. Livingstrom

Baddies: KAOS Agent Whitestone; former vaudevillian illusionist turned spy.  Aka Hassan Pfeiffer

R&D Gadgets: One Shovel and One Spotlight for Trapping Ex-Vaudevillians in the Jungle,

Operator Gag: Getting a job for her nephew

Review by Brian DiMarco

© 2020 Brian DiMarco