The Phantom Patrol

Written by L. Ron Hubbard

Narrated by R.F. Daley and Shane Johnson

Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Johnny Trescott is as tough as they come. But he's about to lose everything — his boat, his freedom, and his identity. His mission is to track down drug runners, but a rescue mission leads straight to disaster. Stranded on an island by a smuggler, Johnny's got nothing left to lose... and there's nothing he won't do to reclaim his name and his boat. Rev up your engines and get ready to ride a wave of action and intrigue as the audio version of The Phantom Patrol delivers an unsinkable adventure.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Galaxy Audio
• Release date: Apr 29, 2024
• ISBN: 9781592125098

L. Ron Hubbard

With 19 New York Times bestsellers and more than 350 million copies of his works in circulation, L. Ron Hubbard is among the most acclaimed and widely read authors of our time. As a leading light of American Pulp Fiction through the 1930s and '40s, he is further among the most influential authors of the modern age. Indeed, from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King, there is scarcely a master of imaginative tales who has not paid tribute to L. Ron Hubbard.

Reviews for The Phantom Patrol

[sheila1957 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Joe is a member of the Coast Guard, leading a boat that is after a dope-smuggling pirate. Receiving a distress call from a downed plane, they go to save the plane's passengers but find the pirates have the same idea. A fire fight ensues, leading all to be kidnapped and kept on the pirates' island. Will they be able to escape? Will anyone believe their story?I liked this audio CD. It was fun. The readers were great! I liked Joe and his crew. I also liked the hostess on the plane. I think her name was Eleanor. She was strong and smart. Joe tried to protect her, but she was able to do that herself as well as make plans to save them also. Joe looked for ways for them to escape. He was in trouble with the Coast Guard, but he knew what he had to do to prove he was loyal. I liked how it all worked out. I look forward to listening to more in the Stories of the Golden Age series.

[prettytarantula · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was an exciting short book or novella. It was a good story but not much depth to it because of its length. I like how this book includes a biography of L. Ron Hubbard at the end along with a glossary and a list of his novels. He is a prolific writer and an interesting person. Thanks to LibraryThing for this free book through their Member's Giveaway.

[rtp3_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

It is a reprint of a pulp fiction novel, what more can you ask for? Average plot. Average characters. Average writing. Pulp fiction is meant to be read quickly, easily, and to entertain. On those points, this book delivers. On that basis, it would normally be around three stars ...But, this reprint costs $9.95 and contains a bunch of useless filler material (really, a glossary!) and a horrible essay about how great L. Ron Hubbard was and how important his writing. For charging that much and padding the 94 page story with another 30+ pages of material, I have to knock off at least one star.

[tpmcnulty · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Phantom Patrol has become one of my favorites in the ongoing reprints from Galaxy Press. The action is endless which is what I've come to expect from an L. Ron Hubbard story, the characters are believable and the plots are breathless. What more do you want from classic American pulp fiction? This is great stuff. This time around Hubbard offers up a Coast Guard tale and once you begin reading it I guarantee you won't be able to put it down!

[pixiedark · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I received this audio book through Library Thing Early Reviewers. "The Phantom Patrol" by L. Ron Hubbard is about Johnny Trescott a Coast Guard CPO. Johnny receives an SOS from a transport plane that's crashed and is sinking. Johnny has to cut off his pursuit of the dope smuggling pirate and rescue the plane. Unfortunately, the pirate hears the same alarm and greets Johnny and his crew at the crash site. Johnny's life is forever changed and his reputation gets ruined after the incident.I thought that "The Phantom Patrol" was full of adventure and suspense. I enjoy the listening to the audio books from Galaxy Press and I love the old pulp stories from the 1930's and 1940's.

[rayneofdarkness · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I love how these books are presented with the different voice actors and sound effects to really make you use your imagination to visualize everything. I liked this story better - probably due to the pirates and rum in the story but it was a little more action packed and kept me not wanting to stop the car to go to work to continue to hear the story.

[turtle1965-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I won a free copy of The Phantom Patrol from the Early Reviewers program from LibraryThing. It was a short interesting story. Thank you.

[mrdoan72 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I would have to say. I really like L Ron Hubbard. And this cd does not disappointI highly reccomend this book. And any other books by this auther.

[regularguy5mb · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was the first piece of L. Ron Hubbard's fiction I have been exposed to, and while I have plenty to say about his nutty religious and psychological creations, I must say that as a pulp writer he's not bad.Like most pulp, the characters are very black and white and the dialogue is a bit cheesy, but that's part of the charm behind the best pulp fiction, especially in what Galaxy Press calls the "Golden Age."The story is interesting. Not many writers go the Coast Guard route, so it was interesting to see one small crew square off with this over-the-top pulp villain leading a piracy and drug running business.This is an audiobook, which I've never really been a big fan of, but this one was put together with a full cast, music, and sound effects along with the standard narration. It played much more like a radio play, which I do enjoy.Got this as a Goodreads First Reads giveaway.

[summers1630 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

*I won a free copy of The Phantom Patrol from the Early Reviewers program.The narration of this audiobook was wonderful. I felt like I was really in the action. I enjoyed listening to this wonderful novel.

[lawonder10 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This audio book was quite ell done. The book was written well.For those who wish to reflect back to "the goo dole' days", itis a delightful story of ships, Coast Guard, Gangsters, and some slight romance. The setting is during early part of the 20th century It reminds one of the nostalgia of radio broadcastsjust before TV infiltrated most homes. A time when the excitement of narration and sound effects over the radio penetrated each homeduring an evening of relaxation. This is a novella about some men of the Coast Guard answering a distress call of another ship during a storm. The story goes from there to piracy, abduction, framing of victims, violence, romance,and suspense. It would be enjoyable to those who can relate. I am not certain a younger audience would appreciate the book but perhaps the audio book.I won this audio/book in a the Library Thing giveaway donated by the author in exchange for an honest review of which II have given.Thanks to you Ron and to the Library Thing to for receiving this opportunity.

[jsgustafson · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I'm not too sure how well I liked this book. It is extremely hard to rate.... As a pulp fiction period piece, it is a good book. The main character "johnny" is a little paper thin. He was never fully developed. Overall, it is a good book, if you can get past the dated nature of the text.

[kiparsky-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I've always been a fan of pulp fiction, and not in any ironic or guilty way. I really like the stuff. The frenetic pacing (a product, no doubt, of the frenetic bouts of writing that produced it), the line-drawing characters, the chaste lust barely kept under wraps by the square-jawed hero and the darling heroine - all of the the tropes we mock so freely ultimately amount to an author stripping away a story to its essentials, and then covering that skeleton with the barest possible scrim. Done right, the stories move along at a pace not possible in more polished fiction, and provide a jolt of energy that constant readers of mundane fiction do not seem to realize they're missing. The Phantom Patrol is not a great book, but it's a great example of the genre. The plot is not worth summarizing - it was probably developed at the typewriter in one pass - and the language is stilted and improbable, but Hubbard doesn't give you a lot of time to worry about that. Done right, you're finished with the book before you have a chance to think about it - and you've spent a pleasant afternoon in a fantasy world of coast-guard Galahads fighting grim pirates and the equally corrupt System, to win out in the end, knighted and wed.

[punchout_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Thanks to the publishers for providing this book to me free to read! Once again, as most all of these "Stories From the Golden Age", the artwork and packaging are wonderful. Add in the fact that the narration is exciting and makes one feel as they were listening to a radio show rather than an audio book. Well done! However, the story isn't quit as remarkable. It's ok, a short listen that is wonderful for a short trip and is family friendly as well. If you are in need of such an audio book pick this one up.

[mrsbaty · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I find this a little hard to rate because it is of it's time and that time isn't now. This is definitely pulp fiction from the 20's. The tale is predictable but that doesn't make it unpleasant. It reminds me a lot of the old time radio shows I enjoy listening to. The downside of this compared to OTR is that the language is not as clean in this story. The voice actors do a good job. All in all, if you like pulp, it's for you. If you don't, you won't like this one.

[mnorris3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I received this as part of the LibraryThing Early Reviewer program.Despite my misgivings about L.Ron Hubbard and Scientology, I love his pulp fiction.This story is fast paced and intriguing. Some of the Stories from the Golden Age are a bit slow, but not this one... It has it all, gun fights, airplane crashes, love and jail breaks.One of the better ones, recommended.

[whitmelb · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Phantom PatrolTo pirate part of a quote “let’s return to the thrilling days of yesteryear...”. And the series of books that bring L. Ron Hubbard back from the golden age of pulp fiction certainly do that. Pulp fiction in the days when I was growing up was our escape from the humdrum, provided us with heroes who were both dashing and moral, and best of all, the books were cheap. But the writing was not. And L. Ron Hubbard was one of the best. He wrote in almost every genre of adventure there was, from westerns to mysteries to scifi & fantasy and military. Threw in the occasional novel as well. Because his tastes were very eclectic combined with an inquiring mind, he roamed the world seeking and finding characters and situations he wove into these thrilling tales.The Phantom Patrol is an excellent example of the pulp genre and his researches, in this case centered around the US Coast Guard. A Cutter commanded by CPO Jimmy Trescott is tracking an infamous drug runner named Georges Coquelin (interesting to note that drug runners were as prevalent then as now, and with the removal of Prohibition, were of a major concern to the Coast Guard) only to receive an SOS from an aircraft that had crashed but was still afloat. Giving up on the drug runner’s trail, Jimmy rushes to the rescue only to have Coquelin arrive at the same time. Results include a damsel in distress, a wealthy man in need, armed combat and eventually a bad case of mistaken identity. Join me in enjoying this thriller from yesteryear as L. Ron Hubbard builds the tension to an exciting climax. Remember what it was like to curl up with a rousing good tale.

[magicians_nephew · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, when men were men and the women were women and editors wanted copy . . . yesterday.L. Ron Hubbard is so closely tied in everyone's mind to Scientology and "Dianatics" that it's easy to forget that back in the day he was just another penny-a-word writer in the golden days of the pulps. This one is about a crew of a Coast Guard cutter between the wars, fighting drug smugglers and bizarre plot twists and charging through the spray to the rescue. Each chapter ends on a cliffhanger, or tries to; each sentence ends in an exclamation point, and if you don't think about the plot that will be just as well. As the forward to this little volume reminds us, in order to make a living in those days you had to crank out product and a lot of it. Editing? Wazzat? Some of these books were literally first drafts ripped from the typewriter (Daddy? Whats a typewriter?) and printed and shipped out to the backs of candy stores to be snatched up by grimy hands at a dime a copy. . So to review one of these - it is to laugh. The men are all rough hewn two fisted combat happy Joes, (but honest! and American!) the women are all fair haired and clean limbed and loving and giving too, when the plot called for it. It does the job of entertaining you for the half hour it takes to read it, and then like a piece of literary chewing gum, it vanishes.(" All at once and nothing first / just like a bubble does when it burst") This one is no worse and no better than half a hundred others - but if it didn't have el-Ron's name on the cover we wouldn't be having this conversation. Giggling to think of all the devotees of Scientology who probably buy these and read them earnestly, hoping for insight into their great prophet.

[eheinlen_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I received a set of L. Ron Hubbard audiobooks to review. This was one of them. The audiobook portion was very well-done and was more like a radio drama of old and less like a traditional audiobook. I did not care for the actual book though.

[wherewildthingreads · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I won this in a library thing give-away. This is the 3rd audio recording, I have reviewed by L. Ron Hubbard. About 2 hours long, these re-published pulp novels are a fun fast read/listen. From the hay day of pulp fiction. The multi-cast recording makes the action really pop. I really enjoy listening to the series. Great for a short car trip or while working out in the yard.

[bakersfieldbarbara · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The only thing I knew about the author L.Ron Hubbard was his connection with Scientology. Learning more about him, I found that he was a world adventurer and used real historical settings to write. He obviously lived these adventures and shares them with us through audio books and novels.Highjacking Johnny Trescott's Coast Guard ship to use for high seas piracy acts is just the beginning of a fast paced story. The descriptive words, such as the sound of pouring rain, waves crashing during a storm was the 'icing on the cake." Escaping from jail and bringing the pirate to justice on his own keeps the pace going from this premier pulp writer.Published In 1935, and republished as part of the Golden Age Stories series, these action stories translate very well into an audio book format. Each character left me panicking as I listened to the audio version and liked this version as well as the paperback.Like pulp fiction? Then you will like this republished edition. It isn't my genre but I was able to enjoy it, as a classic written in the 30s.

[dsoj84 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I have to say that this was a horrible book to read. It is very dated and seems like a book that has passed its time and can not find a foothold with a new generation. I have enjoyed many older books that seem to bring the reader back to that time so that he or she can still enjoy the book, this was not one of those books. I would not recommend anyone reading this book.

[belgrade18 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Barely more than a short story, it is categorized as a "sea adventure" in the pulp fiction genre. Fast paced with lots of action, but little more- the characters are two dimensional and stereotypical, the plot predictable, with prose that is usually straightforward but often a little confusing during the action scenes, and completely forgettable.

[lannyh_3 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

WOW! What a really, really bad book.L. Ron Hubbard's The Phantom Patrol lacks all of the ingredients necessary for digestible prose. It would be an overstatement to call the characters one dimensional - fractions are needed for accuracy. Plot development is put to shame by the narrative contained on your average Cheerios box. Evocative descriptions of time and place were much better done in the Dick and Jane books of the same era. In short, if this were a movie, the producer, director, script writer and everyone down to the key grip would never work in the industry again. Special scorn would be heaped upon the person responsible for continuity. Overall, this work brings to mind the man who sees an abstract painting, and says, “My eight year old could paint better than that!” If Jackson Pollack were to read this book, he would say, “My eight year old could write better than that!”What this book does have in common with great literature is that it raises more questions than it does provide answers. Namely:1) Was all pulp fiction of this generation so bad? In the extensive hagiographies both preceding and following the text, L. Ron is placed firmly in the firmament of pulp writers of that time. These authors include such individuals as Heinlein, Asimov, Leonard, and Chandler who were to write good-to-excellent literature in the years to come. Was their work also this bad in those days? {Regarding those pages of panegyric prose and supernumerary supplements to the book's text, there are 41 of them. This for a story that tops out at 96 pages [at 293.6 words/page]. Let's hope to goodness that there is never a similar reprint of Battlefield Earth produced by this group (my Bridge Publ. copy of B.E. is 1066 pages [484.4 words/page]). The changes in font combined with a proportionate forward and afterword would result in a B.E. paperback of 2509 pages; a little over 9.2” thick, thicker than it is tall, and needing the pulp of an entire tree to print.} 2) What or who is the money behind The Galaxy Press (whose sole product is L. Ron fiction)? There is major money here. One hundred-plus publications from L. Ron's glory days are being offered with full color (though some quite ugly) glossy covers, the books in first rate binding with thick, rich paper. Included with my LibraryThing Early Reviewers copy, was a very high class 30 page pamphlet – again glossy, colorful, and very nice. Big bucks.3) If someone were to make the totally unjustified assumption that the Church of Scientology, which L. Ron founded, is the money behind these books, the overarching question would have to be “Why?” Would the Catholic Church publish the works of Saul of Tarsus written before he fell on his head and started Christianity? Would the Church of the Latter Day Saints publish the message contained on the scratched roofing tin which Joseph Smith first brought in from the fields before going back for the golden plates? So it can't be the Church of Scientology providing the funds. More likely it is Scientology's worst enemies who are trying to make the point that the author of Dianetics wrote so badly in those early days that even Cruise and Travolta could recognize it as dreck.The take home message concerning L. Ron's early books is - if you see one, don't take it home.

[aethercowboy · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The Phantom Patrol is one of those pulp fiction books you may have read when you were a kid, provided you were a kid in pre-WWII America, and then promptly forgot about when the next issue of Five Novels came out. While it was written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, who apparently is a grand master in writing for some sense of the words grand, master, and writing, it reads just like any other pulp fiction book of its era, providing no distinguishing characteristics to set it off from the slew of contemporary writing.This particular tale is a nautical adventure, where a Coast Guard hero, Johnny has his ship hijacked by a villainous Georges, who just so happens to resemble our hero. In this pretense, Georges takes his stolen boat and does a whole mess of trouble, while poor Johnny takes the blame. Johnny, meanwhile is pitted against Georges as well as the other CGs who think that it is he who has been doing all that piracy. He must defeat evil and triumph over false accusations and a broken legal system, and hopefully in under a hundred pages.Sure, it might be worth reading if you're a huge fan of Hubbard or pulp, or maybe even nautical adventures (though, I feel that Jack London's nautical adventures are infinitely superior..), you may enjoy this book, but for everybody else, it's quite forgettable.