Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage 40

June 1936 - The Haunted Ocean

The Haunted Ocean is another Laurence Donovan tale, this time with a lofty villian's goal: Defeating all the world's armies and using his own to enforce world peace. The US President (FDR at this time, although not named) telephones Doc and summons him to Washington, D.C. to discuss the disappearance of the peace commission.

At the meeting, the President stated, "The whole thing is fantastic, but it suggests such great possible calamity, it cannot be overlooked! We seem to be threatened by such a power as none of our government scientists and technicians have ever before seen."

Doc replied that science had advanced so rapidly that the threat could be genuine. "None can say what vast force can be discovered at any time. Unfortunately, the discoveries are not always made by those of balanced and straightforward minds."

The villain, The Man of Peace, seeks the same ends as the commission - to disarm everyone but themselves, although this is not acceptable to the great nations.

This was an odd story and in thinking about it, I find it is so strange that the writer and editor in 1936 would not find it strange or worry that the readers would not like the commission members to be Great Britain, France, the United States, Spain, Italy, and Germany! This is only 15 years after the Great War! William Harper Littlejohn (Doc's aide Johnny) was currently the US delegate and has gone missing.

There are plenty of planes and ships and submarines involved in the action, but I didn't find it all that engaging. I'll give Donovan's tale a 7 out of 10. The pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer, and the Bantam paperback cover is another great James Bama painting.

 

Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage 38

THE MEN WHO SMILED NO MORE

APRIL 1936

The Men Who Smiled No More is a very different Doc Savage tale for a number of reasons. It takes place entirely in New York state. It does not involve foreigners. And 95% of it has no super-science. Yet the plot is entirely about two completely different aspects of super-science. Writer Laurence Donovan contributed this tale.

The story begins with a humble shoe shiner. "Smiling Tony" Talliano was the first to quit laughing" is the first sentence of the story. What follows is a wild story where even Doc himself is afflicted with a strange condition where people become emotionless, flat versions of themselves. It's like they were replaced with a robot replica. The violence is also at a high level with killings perform is a callous and brutal manner. What intrigued me about this is that many people perceive Doc himself to be emotionless like this all the time anyway. That is not true. Doc has emotions, but he rarely displays them openly. Donovan also enhanced Docs' humanity to emphasize the difference when Doc is afflicted by the strange emotionlessness.

Donovan also brings the whole cast of regulars into this adventure, so we get to see Monk, Ham, Renny, Long Tom, Johnny, and Pat Savage struggle and change into lethargic shells, with no humor, or passion in their lives. Chemistry is the only one left out.

The bulk of the tale is set in the Shinnecock Hills on Long Island in New York. Monk, it turns out, has a cabin retreat in the woods and strange things are going on in a neighboring cabin. The man there has a duck pond and gets particularly furious at anyone who comes near his ducks. Then everyone starts getting the affliction. One by one the cast loses their drive, their will to live or to be active about anything. Finally, Doc himself falls under its spell.

The Men Who Smiled No More itself is told far more like a mystery story than any of the other Doc Savage tales I have read so far,and it includes Doc giving a long, detailed wrap up at the end.

I'll give The Men Who Smiled No More an 8.5 out of 10. This is a fun story with a welcome stylistic change of pace - harder, more savage.

For this review, I read my Bantam paperback dated February 1970. The Pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer and the Bantam cover is by James Bama. Interestingly, that cover seemed to have nothing to do with the story for a very long time. It is an illustration of action from the story, however. Page 124 to be precise. I'm not sure that I have ever read a story with the cover happening so close to the end. Cherie Priest's The Inexplicables is the closest in recent memory, but even that cover was not nearly as close to the end as was the one for this Doc Savage story.

Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #34

The Fantastic Island - December 1935

Written by Ryerson Johnson and Lester Dent

What do I love about the Pulps? Stories like this one…

Take an island in the Galapagos, add escaped Russian royalty, Komodo Dragons, and an active volcano… what do you get?

Pure Pulp Goodness - that's what Johnson and Dent gave us in The Fantastic Island. The story begins with an expedition led by Johnny disappearing in the vicinity of the Galapagos Islands. Something happens to him and the Pat Savage, Monk, and Ham just happen to be on a yacht on vacation in Panama, so they head off to find Johnny…

There is an attempt to make a big deal out of a mysterious hole that appears periodically punching through people's skulls… This reveal was particularly uninspired. The best parts were The set up and the locale was quite evocative. There were good character bits when Johnny, Monk, and Ham were thrown into pits and forced to dig. Pat was taken to a castle on the mountainside where a Russian expat attempted to woo her. An ever-present active volcano added a nice ticking clock - I'll have to remember that one - and Pat Savage is always welcome.

Once again, Bantam's release order baffles me. The end of Fantastic Island (Bantam paperback #15) leads directly into the beginning of Murder Melody (Bantam #14.) All the Doc stories have a paragraph at the end and usually they were cut by Bantam. But not this one, so why not just publish them in the same order as originally published? If you read the Bantams in order, you couldn't help but notice.

Other things of note - Doc has a mechanical doppelganger  called "Robbie the Robot!" This is the first known instance of the name. There are some scenes in this one where Doc gets Savage like he did in the early days. There is a cool crab swarm attack. I loved this phrase as a huge candelabra is knocked around - "Candles showered down, their flames whipping like tiny comets."  There was a well written end of the 2nd act summary that launched us right into the third act.

On the whole this was a good, but not great story. I'll give it a 7 out of 10. The Bantam cover is by James Bama and the Pulp Cover is by Walter Baumhofer. The interior illustrations from the pulp are by Paul Orban. I have linked this art from Chris Kalb's site.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

Given all the crazy set up, I was disappointed that the horrible monsters ended up being 'merely' extra large iguanas. In the story (as in life), these beasts can be 10 feet long and weigh 150 pounds which is double the normal size. That's kimodo dragon size. I was hoping for triple size, massive, lost dinosaur stuff, but they went with a realistic choice - especially after the utterly fantastic elements in Murder Melody. I guess I'll see if this becomes a trend. This story was only missing Renny and Chemistry has yet to show up again. Phew.

Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #33

Warning - unlike my usual reviews, this one is spoilerific!

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MURDER MELODY - NOVEMBER 1935

Murder Melody is another great science-fiction Doc Savage super-saga, and another hidden civilization story. We first find Doc and his men confounded by earthquakes where there shouldn't be any, and then by men with technology that doesn't yet exist. This is my kind of stuff. This novel is the first in the series to be written by Lawrence Donovan, Donovan also penned stories about the Skipper and the Whisperer.

The tale opens with a series of strange earthquakes. One in Provincetown, Massachusetts and one in Vancouver, British Columbia. Strange men with flying tube-like ships that float in the air seem to be behind them. These men have a kind of power over gravity.

Doc gets involved and the fabulous five are along for the tale; no pets, hazah. During a fight, Monk exhibits a rare bit of racism from our heroes. It is explained that the labor force in Vancouver (still a part of the British Empire) is formed of many people from India. Monk calls one a "greasy Indian." The bulk of the text calls them Indian or Hindu.

This tale, from 1935, is also the oldest story that I have read that uses the term, "smog," for that lovely combination of smoke and fog popularized by the air of many cities in the 1970s. There is a whale rendering plant in Gray's Harbor, Washington as well. That is certainly not there any longer. We also get the first (I think) use of "Mercy Pistol" for Doc's super-firer pistols loaded with anesthetic rounds. This is a far cry from the savage Doc of The Man of Bronze.

Also of note are Monk's ear that we are reminded (several times) has a finger sized bullet hole through the lobe and Ham has a signet ring with a hidden blade in it. 

Doc is a bit more more super in this story.  Twice he climbs with virtually no hand holds. First, he climbs up the inside of a ship using only the steel rivets holding it together, and later he climbs a tower in the underworld. As the book said, "The human eye showed the tower of gold and mica to be as evenly surfaced as tranquil water. Vision indicated no hold whatever. But the cabled wrists of the bronze man made steel-like claws of his fingers. The gold and mica sank under their pressure." Now that is strong.

Other items of techological wonders include powering ocean going ships to travel at thousands of miles an hour and devices with a "gravity button" that allows men and machines to float weightlessly. There are also ships that travel though the strata of the earth. This trip sends Johnny into heaven as the ship travels through the geological eras and then deep down through the earth to the hollow core where a great civilization, the Kingdom of Subterranae, flourishes. The Earth is not as Johnny has known it with a molten core. The Earth's crust is only 200 miles thick and is hollow (shades of Burroughs). The residents of the inner world have lived in harmony for eons - until now. One of their own, Zoro, has gone rogue and escaped banishment to the Land of Beyond. He stole some of Subterranae's ships and has come to the surface to get what he needs to destroy his enemies. Doc isn't going to let that happen.

Then there is Princess Lanta, who has taken a shine to Monk which of course makes Ham crazy. In the end, the hidden civilization remains just that, and so it stays unti this day.

The pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer and the Bantam paperback is by James Bama. I read my bantam paperback for this review and I'll give Murder Melody an 8.5 out of 10. The middle is a bit slow, but once we get headed to the inner world the story freight trains along.

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Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage 29

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July, 1935 - Quest of Qui

The opening of Quest of Qui is a classic.  A Viking Longship drifts lifelessly alongside an eighty-foot yacht. The passengers and crew of the wealthy ship come out to have a look. Then, startlingly, Vikings pour out of the Longship's hold and swarm the yacht, forcing everyone aboard to trade ships. The yacht cruised to parts unknown and the Longship, after much struggle, arrives at a harbor on the tip of Long Island.

That same night, William Harper Littlejohn was at the movies and saw footage of the ship in a newsreel. His expert eye gave him little doubt that the ship was authentic. He left a message on Doc Savage's answering machine and headed to Long Island in the morning.

Thus begins the 28th supersaga, a story of ice, snow, near freezing and falling in ice crevasses. Oh, and lost civilizations, but you probably already figured that out.

Quest of Qui is more prime goodness from Street and Smith. It was great to see Johnny get the opening scene, using all his archaeological knowledge and to be recognized while he is examining the Longship.

From the scene where Johnny is at the movies - "William Harper Littlejohn was a very erudite gentleman, but he occasionally attended the cinema for relaxation." - we can see that movies then were kind of like television is now. It has the perception of being for the masses, whereas in fact, almost everyone watches TV.

The Hidalgo Trading Company is firebombed, destroying all of Doc's planes.

There is also a rare scene where there is a bit of racism sneaking into the text. Doc asks Ham if he has cold weather clothes. "Brand new," Ham admitted. "Made by the best fur house in the city. No crude Eskimo work on them."

The story also mentions a passenger "Tri-motor biplane." I hadn't heard of such things, but here you go… Well a model of one anyway...

Quest of Qui also features the expression, "Nerts to you!" meaning "you get nothing," or "up yours."

Doc also does one of the most amazing things he has ever done in one of these stories. He shoots the wiring off a plane engine that is circling high overhead. He wanted to bring it down, but at the same time be able to fix the motor and use the plane. That is good shooting!

I'll give Quest of Qui an 8 out of 10. It has some great stuff, but there is way too much floundering in arctic snow. It gets repetitive. And Johnny is wearing just a jacket with blankets wrapped around his feet. While people get cold, there are no repercussions for not being well enough equipped. 

The pulp cover by Walter Baumhofer is a head shot of Doc, which may have been created for other purposes and reused here. The pulp interior illustrations are by Paul Orban. 

 

The Bantam paperback cover is by James Bama and is one of the great Doc covers. There was also a Golden Press edition, which has a beautifully composed cover by Ben Otero.

Once again, a big thanks to Chris Kalb's 86th Floor website for the interior illos...

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Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #27

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May, 1935 - The Secret in the Sky

This is good quality Doc Savage adventure from the mid 1930s where Doc and crew encounter another scientific marvel that has been co-opted for nefarious purposes. For some reason, using superscience in the pursuit of criminal thievery is what is on the mind of every criminal mastermind in the 1930s.

In this supersaga, the invention is a spherical flying craft that can hover, take off vertically, and whiz across the country in around 2 hours.

It is that last aspect that gets Doc's attention at the start of the book. An acquaintance of Docs' is publicly killed in San Francisco and two hours later his body is found in New York.

Doc, Monk, Habius, and Ham again share the bulk of the action, but at least this time Renny, Long Tom, and Johnny are present. The capable woman is present again in the form of Lanca Jaxon, although she is a reduced presence from the usual.

The flying spheres are quite mysterious and Doc never does get a good look at the innards of them before they are destroyed.

For this review, I read my quite battered Bantam paperback - Nov 1967 - 3rd printing. I'll give The Secret in the Sky a 7.5 out of 10. My main criticism of these stories is that the set-ups are great, but the resolutions are rushed. The Paul Orban interior art presented is from Chris Kalb's Doc Savage fan site, The 86th Floor. The pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer and the Bantam paperback cover is by James Bama.

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Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #26

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APRIL 1935 - THE SPOOK LEGION

Here is another science fiction Doc Savage novel, this one written by Lester Dent. In The Spook Legion, a criminal genius has perfected a technique for rendering people invisible and is using it to unleash a crime wave upon Manhattan.

Doc and Monk get in on the fun and are made invisible very early in the novel. The Spook Legion cleverly gets Doc pegged as the mastermind early on and it causes Doc, Monk, and Ham no end of trouble.

Dent has a bit of fun as Doc and Monk are cavorting about New York completely naked for much of the book. It leads to a few awkward moments.

Monk utters the title of the novel in a bit of dialog, which was nice and this story also reveals a secret entrance to Doc's 86th floor headquarters via a secret ladder on the 85th floor.

The gang successfully pulls off the crime wave and all New York is on the lookout for the invisible gang. They are going to pull up stakes and head to Chicago next, if Doc can't stop them.

Well, what do you think happened?

For this review I read my quite beat up Bantam paperback #16, published March, 1967. I guess I bought it used as Carey Champoux wrote his name on the inside of both the front and back covers.

I give The Spook Legion an 9 out of 10. This is one of "the good ones." Having the rest of the Fab Five absent allows Dent to give full support time to Monk and Ham. Even Habias (Monk's pig) has a good role in this one. The pulp cover by Walter Baumhofer is quite famous as it was used for the cover of Philip Jose Farmer's biography, "Doc Savage: His Apocalyptic Life." The Bantam cover is by James Bama. 

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Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #25

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 March 1935 - Land of Always-Night

Written by Ryerson Johnson and Lester Dent
Illustrated by Paul Orban

The Land of Always Night is another terrific read and this time out, it is not  a (primarily) Lester Dent tale. This story was written by Ryerson Johnson stepping in as Kenneth Robeson with Dent editing and providing about a third of the book according to Bobb Cotter's A History of the Doc Savage Adventures. In this story a mysterious pair of goggles draws a lot of attention after a hood is ruthlessly killed. The goggles have thick lenses "the size of a small can of condensed milk" that are black as pitch.

These goggles, and the strange white skinned Ool that desperately wants them back, lead to a bizarre civilization hidden under the arctic ice. 

This is truly a lost world novel as the underground dwellers have evolved radically differently than we have. They have an entire technologically superior, yet socially stunted, civilization based underground, away from the frigid arctic temperatures. Much of their structures and items are made from a plastic generated from processed fungus.

The story features the full cast and a native beauty named Sona as well. It is explained that Long Tom got his nickname "after a disastrous experience in trying to make use of a rusted 'long tom' cannon of buccaneer vintage."

The Land of Always Night is full of big SF ideas, from Doc's streamlined dirigible that uses a non-flammable gas with greater lifting power than hydrogen, to the lost society with towering geometric structures hidden in the caverns. There is "cold light" technology and the society of workers and elites reminded me of the classic SF films "Metropolis" and "Things to Come."

Even before looking I could tell that Dent was not the author of this one. Not that it was better or worse, it was just different. Kind of refreshing, and interesting that this lost advanced civilization novel came from Ryerson Johnson, a man most associated with westerns.

In an interview Johnson  said, "I never could spell good. I had sold maybe a dozen stories to Western Stories and I wandered in to talk to the editor. And the publisher comes in and I'm introduced and he says."Oh, yeah boy you write a good story but your spelling is terrible." I must have looked downhearted at that, because he says, "Oh, don't worry, don't worry, we can get Welsley girls and Harvard boys to fix the spelling. Just keep sending us those good stories."

Well, this is one of those good stories. I give Land of Always-Night an 9 out of 10. The pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer and the Bantam paperback is by James Bama, goggles, mushrooms, creepy underground dwellers, and all.

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Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #24

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February 1935 - Red Snow

The story starts in the Florida Everglades and it doesn't take long to for Doc and his men to get there. In this adventure we have Doc, Monk, and Ham. Doc is looking into mosquito eradication techniques, but is attacked the minute that his baggage arrives at the Miami hotel.

The attackers are wearing blackface, but it is obvious they are Caucasians in disguise when the greasepaint rubs off.

After the attackers are driven off, Doc's trunks and luggage are collected, but blood drips from a bullet hole in one of the trunks. The trunk is opened and there is a dead man inside. This revelation leads to a series of events that are punctuated by a terrifying Red Snow. Yes, the Red Snow is capitalized throughout the book.

The snow falls to the ground and turns everything in its path to dust. People are turned into statues, but if they are later touched, they crumble to a fine powder. Trees and cars are disintegrated and left to blow away in the gulf breeze.

The 'girl' in this book is Nona Space. It is her actions that cause Doc to admit that he can't read women very well. He has spend very little of his life with females and they remain a mystery to him.

At one point, Doc uses the nickname Andy Blodge for Monk. That was new to me. When clews (that's the spelling in these stories), lead Doc and his crew along the beach to an abandoned development on the outskirts of Miami, there are several references to the Great Hurricane. These refer to the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane that killed 2500 people in Florida and over 4000 total as it devastated Puerto Rico and other islands before hammering the state.

The chase to stop the Red Snow weapon leads across the Florida peninsula to the Everglades and finally, to another victory of the Man of Bronze over the forces of darkness and anarchy.

Chris Kalb's site again provided the interior art and these wonderful letters to the editor from the February, 1935 issue:

"MARY KAYE, Canada.
      Allow me to congratulate you on your success at publishing so very fine a magazine as the Doc Savage. The October issue was the first I had read, but, not like so many other magazines I had tried, my last. The stories are all that can be called for in stories, and my only regret is that it is issued but once a month.
      Kindly enroll me as a member of your club.
      Wishing the magazine, the club, and you, the publishers of the magazine, the best of luck."

"BYARD SOOY, JR., New Jersey.
      I am fourteen years old and a sophomore in high school, and have been reading Doc Savage for nearly a year. When we have to hand in book reports, I always report on the current issue of Doc Savage and the teacher herself got interested in the magazine because the report I gave was so interesting, now every month she gets the Doc Savage Magazine. The story that I liked the most was the "Sea Magician."

" FRANK COPELAND, Kentucky.
      I think the Code is great. It can't be beat. As I intend to teach physical culture and muscle building in a very short while, I intend to impress the Code upon all my pupils. My, what a world this would be if every one would comply strictly with this Code."

Red Snow is part of the early Doc Savage adventures and Lester Dent was on a roll, cranking out one good yarn after another. I'll give it an 8 out of 10.

 For this review I read my beat up Bantam paperback #38, purchased 35 years ago used for 45¢. The original pulp cover was painted by Walter Baumhofer and the haunting and beautiful paperback cover is by James Bama. The interior illustrations are by Paul Orban. This is one of the rare cases where the painting of the Baumhofer cover is available and it is beautiful.

Next Pulp... The Wave

Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #23

January 1935 - The Mystic Mullah

After reading The Mystic Mullah, I know where they got the best thing in the otherwise inept Doc Savage movie - the vaporous, floating green snakes. They appear often in the 23rd Doc Savage tale and are the weapon of choice for the mysterious Mystic Mullah.

The Mullah has been terrorizing the small asian nation of Tanan. The leader of that small, yet still mostly uncivilized nation, the Khan Nadir Shar, Son of Divinity, Destined Master of Ten Thousand Lances, Khan of Tanan, Ruler of Outer Mongolia has travelled to New York to seek Doc Savage's help. The Khan is a fierce warrior, but was educated in England and speaks "too perfect" English.

Accompanying him is 'the girl'. Every Doc adventure seems to have one. This time it's Joan Lyndell. Dent writes, "She was tall, with dark hair and lashes that were altogether delectable. But there was something else about her. She was businesslike, capable. Her person radiated efficiency.

"Her clothing was thoroughly modern, and so was the blue automatic which she held in her hand as the door opened."

An army of Tananese thugs has followed them to New York and there are a number of memorable battles. One takes place in an abandoned amusement park in New Jersey, with Renny and Johnny shooting it out among faux prehistoric terrors, and another in which Doc releases a gas bomb that bleaches the skin of everyone white. Doc "looked more aluminum than bronze."

The action soon takes everyone to Tanan and the populace, terrorized by the Mullah, has turned against the Khan. Here we learn that both Monk and Ham speak Tibetan. We also learn about the macabre human spider, a dancing girl turned trained assassin, with long sharpened fingernails coated in poison. One scratch means certain death.

Of course Doc gets to the bottom of the vaporous serpents and the mysterious Mullah, but the trip was fantastic, and exciting. This is a cracking good pulp story.

I found this to be everything I want in a Doc Savage adventure - globe trotting action, exotic locations, bizarre villians, and memorable characters. I really enjoyed this adventure. Walter Baumhofer painted the original pulp cover, Paul Orban illustrated the pulp, and James Bama's painting graces the Bantam paperback #9.

Once again, the great original art scan came from Chris Kalb's Doc Savage site. I give The Mystic Mullah a 9 out of 10.

Pulp of the Week - Doc Savage #22

 

DECEMBER 1934 - THE ANNIHILIST

I have been making an effort to keep these Doc Savage reviews mostly spoiler free, however, this particular story demands to have the details discussed, so if you have not read "The Annihilist" and are planning to ever do so - DON'T READ the part of this article AFTER THE JUMP -  go read this supersaga because it deals directly with issues at the core of Doc Savage, those of the mysterious place in upstate New York, Doc's 'college.'

This adventure has Doc, his cousin Pat, Monk, Ham and Renny appearing. Long Tom is in Chicago and Johnny is filling in for the Natural Science chair at a famous university - one that is unnamed.

One of the issues discussed is that it would be very bad for Doc to have the existence of the college revealed. What he is doing is illegal and possibly immoral, but Doc feels that it is worth it to put men back on the street, not cost the state money, their past beyond their memory, and with skills to make an honest living.

I don't think I read this book back in the day, but I purchased the Bantam #31, December 1968 first edition (cover price .50) for $2.50 at some point in my youth. The pulp cover is by Walter Baumhofer and the paperback is a brilliant piece by James Bama. I give "The Annihilist" a 9 out of 10 - mainly for the insight into Doc's college, but also for some great action sequences and story points.

Read Spoilers and more after the jump.