Edition · cover shown
Hachette UK
Edition details
The Destroyer#34Chained ReactionThe DestroyerBook 341978
Chained Reaction
- Writer
- Warren Murphy, Richard Sapir
A Norfolk wig-factory owner asks a retired CURE operative to help recover her brother after a clandestine military force abducts him and thirteen other men. The search leads Remo, Chiun and Ruby into a military operation linked to a prominent businessman and a public campaign about racial conflict.
Plot contains spoilersReveal the full storyHide the plot · 1 min read
After deciding to quit CURE, Remo takes a commercial job demonstrating the Vega-Choppa. Ruby Gonzalez recognizes his hands on television and asks him to recover her brother Lucius, one of fourteen young Black men abducted by Colonel Wendell Bleech’s clandestine military force. The captives are forced to work at a pointless assembly line while Baisley DePauw, a wealthy businessman and National Urban Movement chairman, plans a pro-slavery referendum disguised as a security and affirmative-action measure. Smith traces Bleech’s unit to the South Carolina piney woods and then Pennsylvania; Remo, Chiun and Ruby confront the unit at Gettysburg, where Ruby kills Bleech. They find Lucius and twelve other captives at DePauw’s West Palm Beach mansion, free them, and Remo throws DePauw overboard bound in an anchor chain.
Smith proposes killing Ruby to protect CURE, but Remo and Chiun refuse. Ruby claims a CIA disclosure contingency if she dies and bargains her way into paid CURE service. She then persuades Remo that freeing the captives served his country, and he returns to CURE.
Characters & places
SpoilersFull articles
- ChiunCharacter
- CUREOrganization
- Folcroft SanatoriumPlace
- Harold W. SmithCharacter
- House of SinanjuGroup
- Lucius Jackson GonzalezCharacter
- Miss PurvishCharacter
- Remo WilliamsCharacter
- Ruby Jackson GonzalezCharacter
- SinanjuPlace
- Sinanju (martial tradition)Lore
Characters 39
- Anderson Drake
- Baisley DePauw
- Big Jack
- Bleech’s unnamed lieutenant
- Chiun
- Harold W. Smith
- Hastings Vining
- Ibrahim Al Shabazz Malik Muhammid Bin
- James Trothman
- Joe
- Lucius Jackson Gonzalez
- Mama / Mrs. Gonzalez
- Miss Purvish
- Remo Williams
- Ruby Jackson Gonzalez
- Unnamed advertising marketing vice president
- Unnamed beheaded Norfolk captive
- Unnamed camp captain
- Unnamed chief
- Unnamed Delray marina secretary
- Unnamed Delray yacht owner
- Unnamed DePauw office secretary
- Unnamed Folcroft Hills caddy
- Unnamed former Republican presidential candidate
- Unnamed grateful enemy prince
- Unnamed Himalayan prince
- Unnamed marina commodore
- Unnamed red-haired overseer
- Unnamed red-haired sword executioner
- Unnamed talent agent
- Unnamed U.S. President
- Unnamed Vega-Choppa announcer
- Unnamed Vega-Choppa investor
- Unnamed yellow-toothed sergeant
- Unnamed22nd-floor hotel guest
- Walker Teasdale III
- Wendell Bleech
- Willie
- Willie Ganetti
Places 38
- Afro-Natural Wig Factory
- Altoona, Pennsylvania
- Baqia
- Cemetery Ridge
- Charleston, South Carolina
- Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel
- Delray
- DePauw mansion
- Exmore
- Folcroft Hills Golf Club
- Folcroft Sanatorium
- Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
- Granby Street
- Gulps Hill
- Holiday Inn
- Jefferson County
- Jefferson Street
- Jersey City
- Long Island Sound
- Miami Beach, Florida
- Nawl’s Hollow
- Norfolk, Virginia
- Ocean-bridge
- Oceana
- Pieraffle, South Carolina
- Piney woods of South Carolina
- Princess Anne County
- Queens Memorial Hospital
- Ramage, South Dakota
- Route 13
- Route 675
- Sinanju
- South Carolina
- Vining Miami Beach hotel
- Virginia Beach
- Watts City
- West Palm Beach, Florida
- Winstead Memorial Hospital
Organizations 15
Groups 9
People 1
Lore 3
Chapter summaries
Chapter 1
Walker refuses Bleech’s order to kill Drake and is himself killed by Drake.
Chapter 2
Remo obtains grain-deal intelligence, kills Vining and leaves CURE.
Chapter 3
Bleech abducts fourteen men from Norfolk; Smith detects the missing persons.
Chapter 4
Remo demonstrates the Vega-Choppa in New York; Chiun recognizes the underlying Sinanju skill.
Chapter 5
Ruby sees his hands on television and asks him to find Lucius.
Chapter 6
Lucius and twelve men work under coercion while DePauw shows executives the project.
Chapter 7
Remo agrees to find Lucius; Chiun calls the abduction a slave raid and identifies the likely camp region.
Chapter 8
Smith’s search points to the South Carolina piney woods through road and flight data.
Chapter 9
Smith meets Remo, Ruby and Chiun in Norfolk, and Remo agrees to work with him.
Chapter 10
Chiun steers around mortar fire. Ruby and Smith are captured after turning back; Smith punches Bleech after Ruby is struck. Remo disarms and interrogates Bleech while Chiun kills two firing soldiers and injures the sergeant. Ruby shoots Bleech after he retrieves his gun; Remo dismisses the troops.
Chapter 11
The group identifies the pro-slavery referendum and connects the campaign to DePauw.
Chapter 12
The group finds 13 captive workers at DePauw’s mansion. Chiun condemns slavery and kills their armed overseer. Remo and Chiun capture DePauw on his boat; Remo drowns him in anchor chain. Ruby and Chiun free 13 workers while Remo confines six visiting businessmen to the work line. Freed men take Rolls-Royces toward Norfolk.
Chapter 13
Smith proposes killing Ruby to protect CURE; both operatives refuse. Ruby claims CIA disclosure precautions if she dies and bargains for a $26,500 salary. Lawsuits undermine Remo’s advertising hopes; Ruby persuades him the rescue served his country, and he returns to Smith’s service. No romance, marriage or child is completed.
Other mentions
- “Disco Lady”
- Alfa Romeo
- All God’s Chilluns Got Shoes
- Allenby School
- Bartlett University
- Better Homes and Gardens
- Bic Banana pen
- CB radio
- Cinzano
- Civil War
- Custer
- DePauw forced-labor plan
- Dixie
- Field mortars
- Gene Autry
- Genghis Khan
- Geritol
- Gettysburg camp confrontation
- Good Honkey, Dead Honkey
- Jackie Robinson
- Jesus bracelets
- John F. Kennedy
- Kill the Honkey
- Lincoln Continental
- M-16
- Malcolm X
- Marywether College
- Miracle carrot peeler
- Norfolk abduction operation
- Northern School of the Atlantic
- Patton
- Pershing
- Proposed slavery referendum
- Ring Magazine
- Rolls-Royce
- S-L-A-V-E campaign slogan
- Saint Olaf’s
- Security for Blacks, Safety for Whites
- Shirley Temple
- Southern Jersey State
- Southern Pennsylvania Dispatch
- Swarthmore State College
- Titleist
- Up Against the Wall, Mother
- Vega-Choppa
- Vega-Choppa commercial
- Village Voice
Editions & covers
Explore cover historyReferences & notes
Sources 23 references
- stopyourekillingme.com/D_Authors/Destroyer.html
- www.fantasticfiction.com/series/destroyer
- www.warrenmurphy.com/index.php?page=books
- sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/murphy_warren
- www.45cat.com/book/title/created-the-destroyer
- api.publicrecords.copyright.gov/search_service_external/simple_search_dsl?query=TX0000113889
- www.hachette.co.uk/titles/warren-murphy-5/chained-reaction/9780751558302
- spyguysandgals.com/sgShowChar.aspx?id=472
witness:00000099:ch05:p0005witness:00000099:ch03:p0062witness:00000099:ch07:p0005witness:00000099:ch06:p0032witness:00000099:ch10:p0072witness:00000099:ch02:p0152witness:00000099:ch04:p0142witness:00000099:ch05:p0008witness:00000099:ch12:p0216witness:00000099:ch13:p0160witness:00000099:ch10:p0218witness:00000099:ch12:p0241witness:00000099:ch13:p0097witness:00000099:ch13:p0129witness:00000099:ch13:p0185
Edition and source notes
Names are the bibliography’s title-level “written by” attribution key, not a verified edition byline. credited_authors is null because no first-edition cover/title page was checked. A creator name in the general franchise metadata must not be treated as proof of sole drafting.
registration-declared first publication: 1978-09-15. CPRS record field is the registrant/depositor-reported first-publication date, not independent retail/on-sale verification; no print copy inspected. Source
Chained Reaction:
Publisher's description: A coordinated attack abducts young Black men in Norfolk, while CURE’s two field agents disappear during the investigation.
Story timeframe
Coarse estimate from the assumed incumbent’s historical presidency. The term range is context, not a claim that the plot spans the term or that a particular event occurs at either endpoint.
Historical term dates: Source 1
Presidential clues
Current U.S. President: Jimmy Carter* (inferred from surrounding books; historical identity unconfirmed).
Jimmy Carter*
conditional editorial continuity inference; historical identity unconfirmed
* Inferred from surrounding books; it does not create a local presidential appearance.
Assumes the main narratives within this bracketing series interval follow chronological presidential continuity; the selected sources do not establish that assumption.
Inferred from the matching incumbent hypotheses in surrounding retained books; this book does not identify the historical President.
* Inferred from the surrounding books.
The unnamed CURE-aware President
the President / President of the United States
- CURE is said to be known only to the President, Smith and Remo.
- A corporate executive says he has a personal meeting with the President of the United States, without further context.
- Ruby mentions a phone the President uses to call Smith.
- No White House or Oval Office setting is named.
none for a specific real-world identity
No name, year, party, term, election, or specific identity clue appears. Historical allusions do not identify the incumbent.
John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy, explicitly named in source
- The same passage also mentions Jackie Robinson and Israel’s victory.
- The reference supplies no story-date or incumbent clue.
source names him
This is a historical reference, not the current officeholder.
All 155 books in The Destroyer
Phrases & sayings in this book
Spot a mistake, or know something this page doesn’t?Suggest a correction