Review of The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

Edgar Rice Burroughs genre milestone A Princess of Mars ended with the hero appropriately back on Earth where he’d begun his tale.  One plot line was left unresolved, but had the book not sold as well as it did, the reader could have walked away satisfied the circle was completed.  But with Dejah Thoris trapped in the First Born’s Temple of the Sun, a Martian year to go before she is to see the light of day again, the ending of The Gods of Mars is anything but complete.  With the red carpet laid out for a third installment, The Warlord of Mars follows upon The Gods of Mars, but, brings the tale of John Carter to a close, no loose ends.

And indeed, with Dejah Thoris trapped, it is up to her beloved John Carter to rescue her (for the millionth time) from the jaws of death.  Trailing a Thern and First Born into an underground cavern in the opening chapter, he learns of a secret entrance into the Temple of the Sun.  But worse yet, he learns the pair plot to kill Dejah Thoris before her allotted year is up.  Spurned to action with the ever-faithful Woola at his side, John Carter embarks on yet another rescue attempt (rolls eyes).  An extended chase that takes Carter to the North Pole, every color of man on Barsoom—red, black, white, yellow, and green—is eventually drawn into the plight.  Battles on ice, secret entrances, double-bluffs, new alliances, enemies turned friends—all of Barsoom intersects for the massive conclusion of the John Carter epic.

Review of The Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

A Princess of Mars (1912) by Edgar Rice Burroughs is one of the most over-the-top novels ever written.  Inspired by pulp and in turn inspiring pulp to this day, its heroic absurdity—ahem, sentimentality possesses a verve for storytelling that plumbs the depths of exaggerated and imaginative fiction like few other period works of such length. And once the train starts rolling, it’s tough to stop it.  The Gods of Mars (1914), sequel to A Princess of Mars, sets the dial to twelve for John Carter’s wild return to Barsoom.

Transported back to Earth amidst an oxygen crisis at the end of A Princess of Mars, John Carter never learned whether the woman he loved, Dejah Thoris, or the son they were waiting to hatch (hatch!!!) suffocated or not.  Praying to the sky above his New York home one night that he might return to know their fate, at the outset of The Gods of Mars John Carter once again finds his corporeal-self transported away from Earth.  Arriving in an unfamiliar land, he’s unsure whether he’s on Barsoom or not. Strange plant men assaulting him in an exotic landscape that is nothing like his memories of the red planet, it isn’t until he meets up with his old friend Tars Tarkas that the truth slowly unfolds: he has arrived in Dor, the land of the dead.  All manner of exotic adventure unraveling, Carter must fight through peril and danger to escape a land no Barsoomiam has ever escaped from to learn what has befallen his beloved Dejah Thoris and son in the ten years since he last set foot on Mars.

Review of Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne

Jules Verne is perhaps the single most important persona in the evolution of science fiction as a genre.  Seminally seminal to say the least, his books utilized and pushed beyond the limits of discovered reality to incorporate elements of the yet undiscovered in adventurous tales.  Appearing a century prior to the likes of Asimov, Bester, and Clarke, his novels of Earth’s exploration, though certainly dated by today’s standards, set a high bar for imagination, science, and entertainment rolled into one.

Journey to the Center of the Earth is Verne’s fifth major published work and sees the author finding form writing stories of exotic expeditions.  After cracking a secret message hidden within the saga Heimskringla, Professor Lidenbrock and his nephew Axel head to Iceland.  Hiring the services of the guide Hans Bjelke upon their arrival, they following the instructions of the encrypted message to a local volcano and enter the caldera.  The trio’s journey from there only becomes more adventurous by the page: what exists at Verne’s center of the Earth is anything but predictable.

Review of The Demon Princes by Jack Vance

For those familiar with the works of Jack Vance, the five short novels which comprise The Demon Princes series are a notable deviation in style.  Embedded within the trademark storytelling, imagination, and comically over-formal dialogue is a noticeable attempt to produce a work more serious in subject.  The result, while perhaps not a Nobel-worthy masterpiece, remains a multi-layered if not entertaining story having a continuous theme threading the five novels which comprise the series: The Star Prince, The Killing Machine, and The Palace of Love in Vol. 1 and The Face and The Book of Dreams in Vol. 2.  

The theme is vengeance.  When just a child, Kirth Gersen watched his family and city destroyed by an alliance of the five evil men later called the “demon princes”.  His grandfather, the only other survivor, trained Kirth to be an assassin, and before dying, instructed his grandson to get revenge.  One by one, crossing names off the list he carries in his pocket, Kirth now makes his way through the galaxy, hunting the princes, luring them into the open, and killing when the opportunity arises.  His five targets in hiding, Kirth uses not only his physical skills, but his wits to see through the social camouflage they’ve spread over their lives since their terrible deed.  The most evil of men often lurking in the most open of places, things are not always what the seem, and trust is rarely an option.  Part detective noir and part spy thriller, Kirth exercises all of his abilities in tracking down the five.  But, after traversing the width and breadth of the universe, what he finds in the end is not what he expected.

While Cugel is Cugel in Tales of the Dying Earth and Reith remains Reith throughout Planet of Adventure, Gersen’s character subtlety changes through The Demon Prince series. The drastic steps Gersen is willing to take and the sacrifices he makes toward achieving his goal have him paralleling, in a most interesting of fashions, the last prince standing.  It is this development of character which sets the series apart from Vance’s other work and moves it toward the more serious end of his oeuvre.  Recommended for anyone who enjoys adventure, mystery, far-fetched but interesting views on culture, brilliant wordplay, and above all a healthy examination of the idea of revenge.  Space opera just doesn’t get any more colorful and fun. 

Review of "Planet of Adventure" by Jack Vance

Of the people who pick up a book by Jack Vance, there are only two possible outcomes: those who melt over every word he writes with twinkles in their eyes, and those who bear furled brows for a time before giving up.  I don’t know what to say about the latter – different strokes for different folks – but for me, Vance is sci-fi sundae with chocolate swirls.  Pure genius.  The number of layers his stories operate on, from humor to social commentary, pure imagination to pure adventure, are enough to keep me coming back for more and more.  Planet of Adventure, or as Vance preferred the series be called The Tchai, is no exception.

The book, which is actually a compendium of four short novels, City of the Chasch, Servants of the Wankh, The Dirdir, and The Pnume, has everything that makes a story Vancean, Vancean.   Where each novel ends makes no real difference as the overall story of the marooned spaceman Adam Reith and his plight to find transportation back to Earth reads smoothly from cover to cover.  (In other words, none of the four books stand alone.)  As the title indicates, the adventures Reaith has and colorful situations he finds himself in along the way are numerous.  Told as only Vance can, surprises lurk around every corner of the plot, colorful descriptions light up the settings, witty dialogue follows with the introduction of every new character, and always there is that archaic/satirical/erudite/how-else-do-you-want-to-call-it/wild and crazy sense of humor that can only be Jack Vance.  Not Shakespearean, he is nonetheless a master of the English language, and Planet of Adventure finds him in peak form.  Certainly some will disagree, but for me, this book is second only to the Tales of the Dying Earth compendium.    But when you’re comparing Bavarian Black Forest cake and apple pie with ice cream, everyone is a winner.

That being said, I know Vance does not write perfect literature.  But honestly, I have nothing negative to say about the book.  It is space adventure as it should be written, so know what you’re getting into.  If you’re a Vance fan but have not read this, what are you waiting for?!?!  If you’ve heard good things about Vance and you want to give him a try, there is no better place to start than this, though the Cadwal Chronicles, The Demon Princes, Alastor, Lyonesse trilogy, Tales of the Dying Earth, Big Planet, Emphyrio, so on and so on, are also good places.  If you tried to read Vance, but just didn’t get it, then you should probably give up on this before you even start because nothing could be more vintage Vance than Planet of Adventure.