A Veritable Cornucopia of Terrible Events

I recently learned of a three-book series written by Richard Telfair, published by as Fawcett Gold Medal paperbacks in the late 1950s, Featuring a character named Wyoming Jones, the reviewer mentioned that the first and third novels in the series were so-so at best, but the middle one--1958's Day of the Gun--was quite good.

Since each book in the series was a self-contained story, I decided to ignore my usual obsession with reading stuff in strict order and found a copy online. And, gee whiz, it turned out to be superb.

Though only 141 pages long, Telfair manages to fit an awful lot of story into the novel. 90% of that story takes place in a single day. It's set at the end of the Civil War, with Wyoming Jones working as a deputy in the remote Texas town of Serret. At least, he was working a deputy. He's just been fired by the mildly dishonest sheriff for doing too efficient a job. His pride hurt, he's planning on leaving town, giving up on opportunities to go partners in a local ranch and marry one of the local girls.

But plans change quickly when one terrible thing after another begins to pile up on the small town. A dozen outlaws ride in, take three women hostage, gun down the sheriff, and threaten to kill the women if the town doesn't give up all their guns. The outlaws have a larger plan. They know that a couple of dozen Confederate soldiers will be passing through town later that day. Those soldiers are escorting a wagon containing over two million dollars in gold coin.

But that's not all. The Comanche chief Sanni learns that trouble is brewing and, seeing a long-desired opportunity to burn Serret to the ground, gathers his men together to attack.

And that wagon full of gold is being followed by a super-fast gunslinger named Glade Perrin, who is looking for his own opportunity to steal the wagon.

As I said, there's an awful lot going on here. But Telfair does an excellent job in contructing the plot. The story flows along at a lightning pace, but never seems too crowded nor do we ever lose track of what's going on.

Wyoming learns that, despite his bitterness over being fired, he still thinks of Serret as his home and still cares about the people. He finds himself in charge, though both he and the townspeople have been disarmed. At first, the situation seems helpless:

One of the outlaws looked [Wyoming] up and down as if he were an animal. His right fist shot out and slammed into Wyoming's face. Wyoming went down, stunned. He knew that his nose had been broken. He lay there without moving because he knew that if he did the three women hostages would die. He tried to think of another time, another place, anything, anything from the past; anything at all but what was happening to him right now.

The situation continues to get more complicated. Glade Perrin arrives in town with word of the Comanches. Glade, though his end goal is to get the gold for himself, ends up teaming with Wyoming as they come up with a plan to whittle down the outlaws, then scalp the bodies so that it appears that Comanches were responsible (thus keeping the women from being killed in retaliation). The troopers arrive while this is going on. Plans go awry. A barrage of fire arrows begin to rain down on the town. Good guys and bad guys die as brutal action scenes unfold.

While this is going on, Wyoming and Glade find themselves becoming friends, though the two seemed destined to have to eventually fight each other.

Oh, and don't mess with Mrs. Maggie. The bitter old woman, who lost her family to Comanches years ago, is one of the hostages, but also might be the most dangerous and cool-headed person in town. Just... well, just don't mess with her. It won't end well for you.

Day of the Gun takes off like a bullet and never lets up, filling its pages with action, tragedy, strong characterizations and a satisfying conclusion. It is worthwhile tracking down a copy.

A Villainous Guest Star

I know the DC Universe has a lot of superheroes scattered about a lot of U.S. cities, but they aren't everywhere.  So when a villain decides to take a break from battling his usual arch enemy and visit another town, one wonders why he doesn't pick a spot that's not regularly patrolled by another super hero.

Well, when the Weather Wizard visits Gotham City, he actually gives a brief and not-completely unreasonable justification. At one point in the story, he mentions that the workout he's getting matching wits with Batman will sharpen him up for a future encounter with the Flash. Though he doesn't overtly say so, we can assume that he thought the non-powered Dark Knight would be easier pickings.

This occurs in Detective Comics #353 (July 1966) in a story written by Gardner Fox and drawn by Carmine Infantino. The Weather Wizard announces his arrival in Gotham by ending a four-year drought and refilling the city reservoirs, but this is simply to get everyone's attention as he announces his intention to steal the three greatest treasures in the city.

It's actually a clever plan, as he doesn't necessarily have an specific treasures in mind. But the worry his announcement brings actually opens up an opportunity for him to steal the valuable Golden Cup of Ur.

This is a great start to a strong story. The Wizard actually acts in a clever manner throughout the story in what becomes a battle of wits with Batman. Both characters are shown to act intelligently and use careful planning, so Batman's eventual victory is well-earned.

After Wizard's opening gambit, it's Batman's turn to be clever. As Bruce Wayne, he owns a valuable ruby. He fakes a robbery of Wayne Manor, leaving a difficult-to-follow trail away from the crime scene afterwards. Robin is ordered to sit this one out, since he's recovering from a sprained wrist.

 The police suspect the Wizard and he is indeed nearby. But this is because he sees an opportunity to rob the original thief. Using ice crystals to reveal light footprints, he follows the trail to a cave. Batman, though, expected this and is waiting to trap him. Unfortunately for the Dark Knight, he loses the fight.

The next bit is interesting, though. Weather Wizard leaves Batman in a block of ice with enough air to last the two hours it will take for the ice to melt. It's a nice touch that the Wizard isn't psycho killer and that Fox remembers that he has no grudge against Batman as he would with Flash. He now just has to steal one more treasure, so he just needs to keep Batman out of the way for a few hours.

But its never a good idea to assume that Batman can't escape from any sort of prison much quicker than you would otherwise expect. He figures out a way to melt the ice quicker.

Then comes the next round of the good guy and bad guy being alternately clever. As a back-up plan, Batman coated the ruby with an infra-red chemical to allow him to trace it. But then Wizard deduces that Batman would try something like that and transfers the chemical to a taunting note he leaves in a phone booth. But Batman had in turn deduced that the Wizard might deduce that. So he had Robin stationed near the cave (with orders to not take direct action against the Wizard because of his injury). The Boy Wonder had simply followed Wizard to the scene of his next crime. So a quick radio call lets Batman know where the bad guy is and this time the Caped Crusader wins the ensuing fight.

As I said above, I really enjoy the story construction here. The opponents are both shown to be smart. Both come up with clever plans that make perfect sense in the context of a Comic Book Universe. Batman's eventual victory is indeed well-earned, with Infantino's art adding enormously to the overall fun of the story.

Next week, Ben Grimm and Bruce Banner switch minds, which is one of the least unusual things that ever happened to either of them.

Edgar Rice Burroughs Mini-Podcast #6: Tarzan's Magic Fountain

Tim DeForest does a brief review of the 1948 film Tarzan's Magic Fountain.




The audio only version can be accessed HERE. 

Cover Cavalcade

An effective Frank Brunner cover from 1973, though I think it might have worked better without the world balloon.

Friday's Favorite OTR

The Falcon: "The Invisible Thug" 1/7/51

A guy commits a murder, then hires the Falcon to prove he's innocent.

Click HERE to listen or download.

The Importance of Being Literate: The Pusadian Tales, Part 7

Read/Watch 'em In Order #110

When I wrote about the 1974 short story "The Rug and the Bull"--the 6th of L. Sprague de Camp's 7 Pusadian short stories--I thought I was done, since the very last story had been published in the Fall 1977 issue of Weirdbook, which I was unable to find either online or at an afforable price. So I moved on to another series.

But one of the members of an excellent Facebook group about de Camp was enjoying my reviews sufficiently to send me a copy of that last story. Therefore, I'm jumping back to de Camp's Bronze Age world to cover this last story.

Though "The Stone of the of the Witch Queen" is last story featuring Gezun of Lorsk that de Camp wrote, it's not the last one chronologically. Gezun is still a young man and there's no mention of the wife and kids we met in "The Rug and the Bull." The events of "The Hungry Hercynian" are mentioned, so for those of us who enjoy figuring out fictional chronologies, we can place "Witch Queen" between that one and "Ka the Appalling."

We find Gezun in the city-state of Ausonia, where he's fibbed about his swordsmanship and gotten a job in the private guard of a senator. This has the added benefit of giving him access to the senator's amorous daughter. But that sort of access to the daughter will earn Gezun a rather painful death if her father learns about it. So, when he gets a chance to steal a magical amulet from the young lady and leave the city, he does so without hesitation.

That amulet gives whomever holds it power over the opposite sex. Gezun plans to sell it back to its original owner, Queen Bathyllis of Phaiaxia, for a roomful of gold.

One of the strengths of "The Stone of the Witch Queen" is that, in a way, it subverts expectations. The amulet is the driving force of the plot and a reader might expect its power to be used by Gezun or others during the story to accomplish their goals and perhaps generate some humor. But after Gezun employs it to put the senator's daughter asleep, it isn't used at all. It is simply the story's Macguffin. Other events move the story along instead. Considering how much fun "Witch Queen" turns out to be, de Camp obviously made the wise choice here.

Gezun soon meets an elderly traveling philosopher named Aristax of Pylion, who is such a fun character that it is tragic this is his only appearance. Aristax shows his intelligence by doing a Sherlock Scan on Gezun and accurately deducing a number of things about him, then soon after comes up with a clever plan to help Gezun escape from a band of angry Ausonians who are trying to recover the amulet. The two are soon partners--planning out the best way to safely collect money from Bathyllis. Aristax also points out that Gezun would have a great deal of trouble transporting a roomful of gold and convinces him to ask for a smaller (but still significant) ransom instead.

But even well-laid plans can go awry. As events play out, Gezun, Aristax and another character find themselves trapped in a house that had been used by a magically disguised Bathyllis. That pesky band of angry Ausanians is trying to break in and a drugged gorilla inside the house with them is about to wake up. It is Aristax who comes up with a quite clever stratagem that allows them to escape. Sadly, the amulet is lost in the confusion.

And then Gezun finds out that if he had been able to read a certain letter, he might have avoided all that trouble. The tale ends with him asking Aristax to help him learn to read.

It's yet another fun story--fast-paced, well-written, witty and full of characters with whom we enjoy hanging out. A number of de Camp's works have become avaiable as e-books, including the Pusadian novel The Tritonian Ring. But the Pusadian short stories have yet to be collected and released. In fact, they never have been collected in their entirety even as a traditional book. Hopefully, this will not stand and we'll someday see such a collection pop up on for sale.

Thanks to Brian Kunde for sending me a copy of "The Stone of the Witch Queen." I really do appreciate it.

Hypnotised Secret Agent

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. #6 (May 1966) has a wonderful concept for a spy story, but falls flat a little in its execution.

The script is by Dick Wood, with Mike Sekowski doing the art. This is Sekowski's second issue on the book--he'd be the regular artist for the rest of the run and would give Man from U.N.C.L.E. a fun and lively look. So the problem isn't the art, but in Wood's script, which fails to properly tie the events of the story together in a way that makes sense in context of the Man from U.N.C.L.E. universe.

As I said, the overall premise is a strong one. THRUSH, the evil organization out to achieve world domination, is employing three guys who pretend to be blind, but are actually world-class hypnotists. As part of a plot to gain control of a Central American country, they have infiltrated agents into the lower levels of the government. The "Three Blind Mice" agents are planting post-hypnotic suggestions into maids, gardners and civil servants, getting them to plant deadly booby traps that take out the upper-level government figures. The THRUSH agents would then be promoted into positions of real power.

That is indeed a great premise, as is another plot twist we'll get to in a moment. But the plot itself is, I'm afraid, a bit of a mess.

Napoleon and Illya are sent to the country without any real plan other than "Talk to the President and tell him about THRUSH" even though they don't have an appointment. To be fair, the story begins with U.N.C.L.E.'s one friend in the government being assassinated, but the mission still has a rushed and chaotic feel to it. Napoleon and Illya (and their boss Mr. Waverly) are supposed to be smart guys. A plan that starts out with "Let's parachute into the country and see what sort of random stuff happens" doesn't speak well of their intelligence.

Anyway, they get captured by rebel forces. They escape, but then get captured by government soldiers as they try to break into the presidential palace to see the president.

Only the intervention of the president's daughter keeps them from being immediately executed. But,even with her as an ally, they can't get the stubborn president to listen to them. In the meantime--in what is the best part of the story--bizarre booby traps planted by hypnotised staff keep taking out the president's staff.

Then comes another wonderful plot twist. Illya is captured by the Three Blind Mice and hypnotized. The cool part is that Illya, because he and Napoleon had deduced the use of hypnotism, knows he's had a post-hypnotic suggestion planted in him. He just doesn't know what that suggestion is. He's now a ticking time bomb.

That's where the story drops the ball again. Despite the good guys knowing that Illya is hypnotized, he's still left alone in the president's office long enough to plant a booby trap. And this happens just a few panels after Illya, Napoleon and Mr. Waverly all agrees that he needs to be watched like a hawk. Fortunately, Illya is able to remember what he did afterwards and Napoleon  has time to save the president's life.

Soon after that, the U.N.C.L.E agents come up with a reasonably clever plan to capture the Three Blind Mice. The THRUSH plot is exposed and the government even makes peace with the rebels.

This is still a fun story to read. It's fast-pased with a number of good action scenes. The premise is indeed strong and the various booby traps left in the presidential mansion are awesomely cool. But "The Blind Mice Affair" also demonstrates that even when a story is set within an inherently goofy universe such as that of The Man from U.N.C.L.E., basic story logic still applies and the plot will suffer if that logic slips away.

That's it for today. Next week, a Flash villain visits Gotham City.

Cover Cavalcade

A fun cover from 1959. Art by Paul Murry.

Friday's Favorite OTR

Escape: "The Derelict" 4/26/53

Three men and a woman are stranded aboard a derelict ship drifting randomly across the sea. A chest full of gold keeps them company, which makes some of them think that a four-person crew is at least two too many.

Click HERE to listen or download.

The Liberal Use of Dynamite During the Chase Scene

A recent podcast found on the excellent Sixgun Justice site metioned the low budget Westerns starring John Wayne that were churned out almost non-stop during the 1930s. I've seen quite a few of them and they are inevitably entertaining, but the podcast highlighted one particular film that I hadn't seen. So, naturally, I needed to watch it as soon as possible.

In Blue Steel (1934), John Wayne plays a U.S. Marshall looking into trouble hitting a remote town. The town is essentially besieged by an organized band of outlaws who have cut off supply shipments, leaving the local ranchers low on both food and ammunition.

Wayne's character--named John Carruthers--teams up with the local sherrif, played by George Hayes before Hayes he developed his "Gabby" character and the two to look into things. He soon has reason to suspect a local businessman named Malgrove (Edward Peil) is the leader of the outlaws. Malgrove wants to force the townspeople to sell out to him cheaply because he's discovered gold in the area.

One of the victims of the outlaw gang is the father of Betty Mason (Eleanor Hunt), who was killed while trying to bring a mule train full of supplies into town. Even aside from abruptly becoming an orphan, she's soon up to her hips in trouble, including getting held prisoner by the bad guys. So its up to the Duke and his sidekick to rescue her, recover the stolen supplies and, of course, stay alive.

Blue Steel isn't perfect. It's biggest flaw is that the bad guys never really seem that impressive. In fact, Malgrove gives away his entire plot early on because he doesn't know that Betty (whom he had just invited to his ranch) is standing nearby listening. John and Betty somehow manage to fall in love despite not sharing more than a dozen lines of dialogue together throughout the movie.

But despite this, the movie is a lot of fun. The plot moves along quickly along a reasonably logical path. Typical of B-movie Westerns, the location photography is wonderful. And the action sequences are particularly good, especially the climactic chase scene. The good guys are racing to town with a wagon-full of supplies while the outlaws pursue them. A liberal use of dynamite allows them to escape and eventually wipe out the bad guys. In the meantime, famed stuntman Yakima Canutt doubles for Wayne to long enough to pull off a magnificent stunt that looks ahead to what he would accomplish on Stagecoach a few years later.  Blue Steel is 50 minutes well spent.

Cloud of Hate

cover art by Howard Chaykin

In 1973, the short-lived title Sword of Sorcery began to treat us to entertaining adaptations of Fritz Leiber's wonderful "Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser" tales, with a few completely original stories featuring the two heroes mixed in with the adaptations.

Sword of Sorcery was a DC title and I'm sure it was a response to the success of Conan the Barbarian over at Marvel. That's a good thing, though, since Fafhrd and the Mouser are also great characters. That they didn't have the commercial success as comic book characters that Conan did is a shame, but Sword of Sorcery was a valiant try.

Denny O'Neil wrote all but one of the stories in the series and Howard Chaykin was the usual artist. Today, we'll be looking the title story from the fourth issue (September-October 1973), written by O'Neil, with Chaykin splitting the pencils with Walt Simonson.

"Cloud of Hate" is one of my favorites of the prose stories and it is interesting to see the changes O'Neil made when adapting it to a comic book. In the prose version, Fafhrd and the Mouser are broke, with the Mouser bemoaning this situation and Fafhrd joyfully taking a more philosophical attitude, claiming they should enjoy life as they find it. But after an encounter with four killers controlled by a literal Cloud of Hate and then dealing with the Cloud itself (via teamwork and the Mouser's agility), Fafhrd just wants to take money looted from the bodies of their opponents and use it to fund a proper good time.

Like most of Leiber's stories from the series, "Cloud of Hate" is clever, imaginative and full of dry humor.

But is also very dialogue-heavy. This, I think, is probably the main reason O'Neil rearranged the events of the story so drastically. Comics are, after all, a primarily visual medium. A story in which the two characters debate life with most of the action coming only at the end would not work as a comic book story.

So the story begins with Fafhrd already bemoaning their poverty and they get jumped by villains who simply want to rob them. The ensuing fight takes its cue from the parallel fight in the prose version, but it serves to set up the plot rather than bring it to a finale.

Nearby cultists are summoning up the Cloud, which sends tentacles across the city of Lankhmar to snatch up weapons. Fafhrd and the Mouser follow, reasoning that the cloud might be gathering up valuables as well and they might be able to claim some riches for themselves.

As they trail the Cloud, they see it murder an innocent girl, thus giving the partners an overtly heroic motive for dealing with it above their desire for loot. This element, not present in the prose story, might have been added to satisfy the Comics Code, but it fits nicely into O'Neil's version of the tale, so there's no harm done.

They trail the Cloud to a cave full of cultists, where, much like in the original, they defeat it with a combination of teamwork and the Mouser's agility.

"Cloud of Hate" is among my favorites of Leiber's original story, so I can't help feel a little disappointed that O'Neil turned it into something with a completely different feel to it and with most of the humor absent. But, as I mentioned above, drastic changes were probably necessary to make the story work in a comic book. And the story we are given in this issue is a good one, enchanced by Chaykin's and Simonson's excellent art.

That's it for now. Next week, we'll visit again with our favorite agents from U.N.C.L.E.

Cover Cavalcade

This 1936 cover reminds us that the Foreign Legion exists primarily to make such covers look awesome. I believe they actually teach this in Foreign Legion boot camp.

Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast #11--Video Version

Also, here's the video version of the latest mini-podcast. The audio version can be found HERE.

Friday's Favorite OTR

Phillip Marlowe: "Nether Nether Land" 9/1/51

A woman claiming to be followed shows up at Marlowe's apartment in the early hours of the morning, then vanishes a few minutes later. Marlowe has few clues available with which to find her.

Click HERE to listen or download.

"... meet your fate with the dignity becoming a scientist."

cover art by Hubert Rogers

Read/Watch 'em in Order #109

Between 1940 and 1950, A.E. Van Vogt published six stories in Astounding Science Fiction featuring a scientist named Jamieson who is involved in a war against an alien race called the Rull. Mankind has spread out across the galaxy and even visits other galaxies, contacting and befriending many intelligent races. But the Rull don't make very pleasant friends.

They are man-sized centipede creatures that can't or simply refuse to communicate with any other intelligent species and--in fact--make constant war in their efforts to wipe out any species that is indeed intelligent.

The stories were eventually collected and linked together into a 1959 fix-up novel titled The War Against the Rull. I'll be reviewing each story as it first appeared in Astounding, but we'll look at them in the order they are placed in that book (which is different from the original publication order). The novel adds two short chapters of extra material to link the tales together more coherently, but I don't believe the stories themselves were re-written at all from their original pulp appearance. Please note that I'm not 100% sure of that. (EDIT: In fact, when I got around to reading the second story, I discovered I was wrong about how much re-writing was done.)

Anyway, Professor Jamieson's first appearance chronologically is from "Co-operate.. or else" (Astounding, April 1942), an intense adventure tale that throws Jamieson into trouble starting with very first sentence.

The professor was aboard a spaceship transporting a large, six-legged animal called an ezwal back to Earth. But as the story begins, Jamieson is floating down to the surface of a jungle-thick Death World, hanging from an anti-gravity raft and with the ezwal sitting on top of that raft.

art by Charles Schneeman

We soon find out that the ezwal is intelligent and communicates telepathically. They are a species that has pretty much rejected mechanics and manufacturing--they are essentially the neo-Luddites of the galaxy. But they have been happy in their low-tech lives until humans showed up and spoiled things.

Because didn't realize ezwal were intelligent and have killed and even occasionally eaten them. So the ezwal want humans off their home world and this particular ezwal wants to make sure Jamieson doesn't let anyone know that the ezwals are smart. They know that they can't stand up against a concerted human effort to destroy them and being thought of as mere animals is their best defense until they are ready to launch a counter strike. That counter strike involves cutting a deal with the Rull.

So the ezwal has killed everyone aboard the spaceship except Jamieson, who tried and didn't quite succeed in getting away from the large beast.

art by Charles Schneeman

But Jamieson knows something the ezwal doesn't. The planet they are both about to be stranded on truly is  a death world, thick with a variety of large, hungry animals and a species of intelligent and carnivirous plants. To survive, the human and the ezwal have to work together. On another level, Jamieson has to convince the ezwal that an alliance with the Rull won't work. The Rull would simply kill and eat all the ezwals. It's what they do.

art by Charles Schneeman

Van Vogt describes the action vividly and generates a strong sense of danger. He also creates a pretty awesome alien species in the ezwal and the dialogue between it and Jamieson is a highlight of the story. The ezwal might look like an elephant-sized killing machine, but it is very erudite. Here's an example:

"Man and his thoughts constitute a disease. As proof, during the past few minutes, you have been offering specious arguments, apparently unbiased, actually designed to lead once more to an appeal for my assistance, an intolerable form of dishonesty."

Jamieson and the ezwal debate the issue of co-operation, eventually realize they must co-operate, begin to fight their way through the jungle, and then find their situation takes a turn for the worse when the Rull show up looking for them.

"Co-operate... or else" is a great start to the Rull story, generating conflict on several levels and eventually resolving those conflicts satisfactorily.

You download this issue of Astounding HERE. Remember its the April 1942 issue.

Ghost Ship

cover art by Neal Adams

An anthology book--especially a horror-themed book that obligates the writer to come up with a twist or shock ending every darn time--can be a mixed bag. But when the creators of a particular story hit their mark, the end result is can be an atmospheric tale and a visual treasure.

Writer Jack Oleck and artist Jack Sparling came up with "Ghost Ship," the lead story for House of Mystery #197 (December 1971) and I think the two Jacks definitely hit their mark here. It's set in 1858, aboard a sailing ship with a brutal and tyranical captain named Jonah Frame. He is cruel, uncaring of the lives of his men and apt to punish them harshly for the slightest infractions. After several deaths, the crew begin to grow mutinous. 

It is when a young cabin boy named Jamie spills coffee on Captain Frame that matters are brought to a head. The crew won't stand for a boy being flogged and soon a deadly brawl breaks out between the crew and the officers.

A fire breaks out during the fight, detonating the gunpowder the ship is carrying. The only survivors are Captain Frame, the story narrator (John Dodson) and young Jamie, adrift together while clutching to a broken spar.

So far, the story is a pretty good one, elevated by Sparling's art. I especially like his panel design in the one of the pages above, using slanted, vertical panels to highlight the the danger of working atop the mast during a storm.

Well, this is a House of Mystery tale, so its not surprising when something supernatural happens. They soon find themselves aboard a literal ghost ship, crewed by the spirits of sailors who can't seem to see or hear them. Frame refuses to acknowledge that this ship is indeed the Flying Dutchman or that there is anything supernatural going on. Dodson and Jamie believe what they see, though, and jump off the ship before it vanishes. Frame is trapped aboard the ship for all eternity.

The twist comes in the final panel. When Dodson and Jamie are picked up by a non-ghost ship, we don't see them directly as they tell their story and are dismissed as having gone mad while drifting on the sea. But are they mad? Was it all an hallucination? If so, why--as we finally see in that last panel--have forty years passed and why are Dodson and Jamie both four decades older?

It's not the world's greatest twist and might have been made stronger by a little foreshadowing about the passage of time while on the Flying Dutchman. But it's a pretty good twist and it is strong enough to sell the story. And Starling's art remains strong throughout. "Ghost Ship" is well-worth reading.

Next week, a look at the comic book adaptation of one of my favorite Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories.

Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast: Episode #11

Tim, Jess and Scott listen to an episode of the 1950-51 Tarzan radio series and comment on it. This episode--"Tarzan and the Arena of Death"--borrows elements from ERB's 1932 novel Tarzan and the City of Gold, incorporating those elements into a self-contained story.

You can listen or download the episode HERE.

Cover Cavalcade

A superb Robert McGinnis cover from 1965.

Edgar Rice Burroughs Mini-Podcast #4: Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar.

I geek out over ERB's 1916 novel Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar.

Click HERE to listen or download the audio version. Or watch the video version:

Friday's Favorite OTR

Philo Vance: The Identical Murder Case 12/27/49

A man is mistaken for Philo Vance and murdered because of this. To catch the murderer, Philo will have to deliberately walk into a trap.

Click HERE to listen or download.

IT'S NOT MY FAULT! MY WIFE MADE ME READ THEM!

Even before we started dating, Angela and I were trading book recommendations, mostly history books, mysteries and fantasy. But after she snared me and had me in a position where I dare not refuse her anything, she told me I should read Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books, which were a favorite of hers when she was growing up.

And, as much as I would delight in pretending to grumble and complain about this, I enjoyed the series enormously. They are at least slightly fictionalized accounts of Laura's childhood growing up on the frontier, but still filled with historical accuracy and characters you come to care for a great deal. Laura's prose is clear, straightfoward and able to generate honest emotion. Seeing events unfold through Laura's eyes as she grows up over the course of the books is often fascinationg.

For me, there is one book in the series that really stands out--The Long Winter (1940), which recounts the winter of 1880-81 in the Dakota territory, in which a series of blizzards struck the Ingalls homestead in a seemingly unending volley and kept them housebound, with dwindling supplies, for months. Outside the house, the railroad has stopped running and the cattle suffer and often die.

I think Laura's prose here is her best--giving a vivid and downright terrifying word picture of the ensuing hardships:

That blizzard seemed never to end. It paused sometimes, only to roar again quickly and more furiously out of the northwest. Three days and nights of yelling shrill winds and roaring fury beat at the dark, cold house and ceaselessly scoured it with ice-sand. Then the sun shone out, from morning to noon perhaps, and the dark anger of winds and icy snow came again.

The Ingalls run out of fuel for their fire, so begin twisting sticks of hay together to make fuel while they use a coffee grinder to grind wheat and make a little bread each day. But the storm continues.

The constant beating of the winds against the house, the roaring, shrieking, howling of the storm, made it hard to think. It was possible only to wait for the storm to stop. All the time, while they ground wheat, twisted hay, kept the fire burning in the stove, and huddled over it to thaw their chapped, numb hands and their itching, burning, chillblained feet, and while they chewed and swallowed the coarse bread, they were all waiting for the storm to stop. 

There was nothing but cold and dark and work and coarse brown bread and wind blowing. The storm was always there, outside the walls, waiting sometimes, then pouncing, shaking the house, roaring, snarling, and screaming in rage.

Gee whiz, The Last Winter at times nearly becomes a horror story and it is a completely engrossing, riviting tale. It is, by far, my favorite of the series.

So there you have it. My wife made me read the Little House books and I actually enjoyed them.

Um, don't tell anybody. Okay?

Don't Lie to White Eagle

Cover Artist Unknown

If I had to pick a Best Comic Book Ever, I'd give Dell's Indian Chief careful consideration for that title. Part of the reason is that the settings for the stories appeal to me--tales of American Indians before the influx of European settlers (though the presense of horses in some stories indicate a post-Columbian time frame for at least some of the stories). Part of the reason is that they appear to be very well-researched--though I'm not anywhere near an expert and could be getting fooled in this.

Mostly, though, it's just that the stories were always well-written adventure tales that were enormous fun to read. Dell Comics in the 1950s had some of the best writers in the business churning out countless strong scripts. Indian Chief was a beneficiary of this.

The book was an anthology, but for part of its run did feature a continuing character. White Eagle was a chief of the Sioux--a man who wanted peace but was more than willing to fight when he had to to defend his people. I've reviewed one of his adventures a few years ago and, by golly, it's time to pay him yet another visit.

Indian Chief #16 (September-November 1954) includes "White Eagle and the Treacherous Mission," which starts out with a bang when braves from the Winnebago tribe launch several attacks on the Sioux.

There is supposed to be a peace treaty with the Winnebagoes and White Eagle is reluctant to go to war becauseo of the actions of a few hotheads. So when Gray Wolf, the chief of the Winnebagoes, visits the Sioux village looking to reaffirm their peace treaty, White Eagle readily agrees to make a return visit along with four of his minor chiefs.

I like the way the unidentified writer handles this situation.  White Eagle wants to avoid a war, so he gladly consents to the peace conference. But that request to bring all his minor chiefs apparently sets off an alarm in his head. He brings along an armed escort when he travels to the Winnebago village.

Grey Wolf  won't stand for the presence of the armed Sioux braves, though. White Eagle isn't able to "trust and verify" to the degree he'd like, so in his desire for peace, he takes a chance. When Grey Wolf gives his word that there is no danger, White Eagle agrees to have his escort return home.

He knows he's taking a chance here, so he remains observant and plays Sherlock Holmes as he observes several clues that warn him Grey Wolf is planning treachery. But by then, it's too late. Though White Eagle makes a good fight of it when the Winnebagoes jump him and his chiefs, they are all captured. The Winnebagoes then plan to launch a surprise attack on the leaderless Sioux.

As I said, I really like the way the story handles all this. White Eagle in no ways seems stupid or naive when he walks into Grey Wolf's trap. He knows he might be betrayed, but chooses to take a risk in order to save the lives that would be lost in a war. In this case, he made the wrong choice, but it was a chance worth taking.

But it isn't easy to keep a Sioux warrior captive and Grey Wolf commits the Classic Villain Mistake of allowing his captives to live so he can gloat. Left tied up in a teepee, White Eagle manages to cut the ropes with a piece of broken pottery. He then knocks out an enemy warrior and takes his war mask, which allows him to mingle with the other Winnebagoes and learn their plans. Grey Wolf is planning on launching a two-pronged attack on the Sioux village after approaching it via canoe.

White Eagle frees the other Sioux captives and they swipe a canoe, taking a short-cut through some dangerous rapids to get home before the Winnebagoes can arrive.

Artist John Daly has been doing a fine job of illustrating this tale, but I think his skill as a visual storyteller really stands out during the final battle between the Sioux and the Winnebagoes. Each panel is exciting and progresses the battle in a logical fashion as the Sioux defeat their enemies and Grey Wolf gets killed.

This, like nearly every story in Indian Chief, is an example of solid, entertaining graphic storytelling with an engaging protagonist. This consistency in quality was typical of its entire run. You really can make a case that Indian Chief is the Best Comic Book ever.

You can read this story online HERE.

Next week, we'll take a ride on a ghost ship.