I'm not a Doc Savage fan, but I like The Shadow, so I bought Will Murray's two crossover novels (haven't read them yet) and only noticed the other day that they were credited to Robeson. It's a shame Murray died recently.
I'm not a Doc Savage fan, but I like The Shadow, so I bought Will Murray's two crossover novels (haven't read them yet) and only noticed the other day that they were credited to Robeson. It's a shame Murray died recently.
I am sorry to hear that Will Murray has died. I missed the news, and I appreciate you mentioning it. I enjoyed his Doc Savage/Shadow crossover The Sinister Shadow. I have yet to buy/read Empire of Doom. I regret that I never met him or heard him speak at a convention. It seems that the last generation that was significantly influenced by the original Doc Savage tales has all but left us. If I remember correctly, Peter David was also a fan.
Personally, I like the concept of Doc Savage, but of what I have read, I find Lester Dent's prose wildly uneven. In some stories it's solid, while in others it's so stunted that it put me in to "editor" mode, and I wasn't able to finish reading it.
It’s been a rough time for pulp fans. Steve Donoso, publisher of The Shadowed Circle, a Shadow fanzine that published some of Murray’s articles, also died recently.
That Appleton is a healthy guy, still cranking out the stories 100 years on.I've seen the guys that did post-Lester Dent Doc Savage stories continued to use the Kenneth Robeson name, but I think that was more out of a sense of fun.
To be fair, the books are aimed at kids, who might not have the historical perspective to realize just how old "Appleton" would be.
At Tor, where we had a whole line of public-domain classics marketed toward kids, we got enough fan letters directed to Mary Shelley, H. G. Wells, Jane Austen, Washington Irving, et cetera, that our Classics editor actually composed a form letter directing such correspondents to check out the author bio in the back of the book.
And this wasn't just kids, btw. I still recall the time I got a phone call from the Accounting Department wanting a current address for James Fenimore Cooper, so they could send him his royalties for The Last of the Mohicans . . . .
I know that in my childhood, I was under the impression that "Laura Lee Hope" was a real person. I even fancied that she was in some way related to Bob Hope.
I will note that the milieu of my novel, my "Organ Princess" short stories, and my current planned model railroad layout, is fairly littered with subtle nods to Stratemeyer. Some of which don't just break the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh walls, but demolish them as thoroughly as the ending of Blazing Saddles.
I will note that the milieu of my novel, my "Organ Princess" short stories, and my current planned model railroad layout, is fairly littered with subtle nods to Stratemeyer. Some of which don't just break the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh walls, but demolish them as thoroughly as the ending of Blazing Saddles.
As a kid, I thought that "Kenneth Robeson" was real person, who authored both the Doc Savage and The Avenger novels.
When I got to contribute to an Avenger anthology some years ago, we were not required to pose as Robeson. I guess it would have been silly to feature a Table of Contents in which all of the stories were attributed to an imaginary author!
I they could have just presented the book as a collection of stories by Robeson, but, unlke Nancy Drew or whatever, that book was not marketed to kids but to nostalgic pulp fans, who were presumably well-acquainted with the fact that "Kenneth Robeson" was just a house name.
When I got to contribute to an Avenger anthology some years ago, we were not required to pose as Robeson. I guess it would have been silly to feature a Table of Contents in which all of the stories were attributed to an imaginary author!
I they could have just presented the book as a collection of stories by Robeson, but, unlke Nancy Drew or whatever, that book was not marketed to kids but to nostalgic pulp fans, who were presumably well-acquainted with the fact that "Kenneth Robeson" was just a house name.
Did you fancy that he was in some way related to the African-American bass-baritone, Paul Robeson?
Can't say that ever crossed my mind, to be honest.
As with assuming "Laura Lee Hope" had a connection with Bob Hope, I can't imagine seeing the name "Robeson" and not immediately thinking of Paul. After all, "Robeson" is not exactly a common name.
I watched that when it originally aired, and I liked it. I don't really know enough about the two title characters to judge how accurately they were written, but approaching as just a period mystery series I thought it was good.
Since my last post I finished up the Star Trek: Library Edition, and then Star Trek: Red Shirts: Ghosts of the 21st Century #2, and then the IDW's 60th Anniversary Special.
The last issue for the Library Edition was the Gorn Alien Spotlight, which was fantastic. It was cool to get a Reliant era Terrel and Checkov story, which is something I don't think we've gotten much of, and the story with the Gorn felt like a nice sequel to Arena.
The second issue of Ghosts of the 21st Century was good, I'm liking Deubert and Lena as our heroes and Miller is a great villain. I still find it a little funny that our hero from the first Red Shirts is now the big bad for this one.
The 60th Anniversary Special was a ton of fun, there really wasn't a bad story in the lot. It was fun getting a post-New Next Generation Lower Decks story, although it was a little weird seeing a Lower Decks story done in the Alreds artstyle rather than the show's usual style.
I love how they got around showing Archer's face in the one page Enterprise story.
Getting a Mudd who looks like Rain Wilson in story that follows up on I, Mudd was a little weird.
I really liked the prequel and preview for #1 of the new ongoing no subtitle Star Trek series, so I'm now I'm really looking forward to reading who thing.
Now I'm working my way through the collection of the Voyager: Homecoming comic miniseries. I finished the first issue earlier this afternoon and it's off to a really good start so far.
I've also read a few more chapters of Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrell between the comics.
Finished East of Eden at lunch today.
The book whacks you over the head with its concepts, but it was enjoyable enough that I'll watch the series next month.
Going to start Carrie tonight.
I also stumbled upon W.W. Jacobs via the Librarians, so I'll be reading his short story collection The Lady of the Barge and Others over the next week or so at lunch.
And I'm half way through Atmosphere, which has basically becomes lesbians in space. It's execution isn't all that good, and the story that is supposed to be pull me through the book is pretty predictable. And of course, this all happens before the Challenger blows up, which stretches the suspension of disbelief a bit. I don't recommend, but I'll finish it for book club. It's not terrible enough to DNF, but it's not good enough to recommend.
The book whacks you over the head with its concepts, but it was enjoyable enough that I'll watch the series next month.
Going to start Carrie tonight.
I also stumbled upon W.W. Jacobs via the Librarians, so I'll be reading his short story collection The Lady of the Barge and Others over the next week or so at lunch.
And I'm half way through Atmosphere, which has basically becomes lesbians in space. It's execution isn't all that good, and the story that is supposed to be pull me through the book is pretty predictable. And of course, this all happens before the Challenger blows up, which stretches the suspension of disbelief a bit. I don't recommend, but I'll finish it for book club. It's not terrible enough to DNF, but it's not good enough to recommend.
This reminds me of Maggie Smith on the Graham Norton show, where she comments that her character in Downton Abbey would well over a hundred years, and it was time to call it quits.
Of course, it would be funny if these fictional authors were immortals. I can imagine them in Highlander fanfic.
I started Strange Novel Worlds yesterday. David Mack's essay about what canon is and isn't is a great overview of the topic. Most of the stuff I have heard from this forum over time, but it's nice to have in one place and laid out in an organized way.
Also started:
Ringworld (Niven)
They Do It With Mirrors (Christie)
Godzilla: The Official Guide to the King of the Monsters (notable for its text descriptions of every photo, quite accessible in ebook form)
Also started:
Ringworld (Niven)
They Do It With Mirrors (Christie)
Godzilla: The Official Guide to the King of the Monsters (notable for its text descriptions of every photo, quite accessible in ebook form)
Yeef! Prices are all over the place, B&N doesn't even acknowledge its existence, and Alibris doesn't have it for less than half-again what Amazon wants. (I try to avoid buying books from Amazon, or buying anything else unless they're simply providing storefront-and-delivery.)
How did I not know about this?
It's also presumably the reason that the Batman '66/Green Hornet crossover comic featuring Carmel's character Colonel Gumm has his face covered due to a permanent glue accident. Although that's odd, given that DC's Trek comics managed to portray Harry Mudd twice just by redesigning his features to look similar to Carmel but not identical, and the Batman '66 comic redesigned many of its characters, notably Commissioner Gordon. So it would've been easy enough to do the same for Gumm.
In 1930s America, I can't help but think that someone swiping a pen name from a prominent musician might be more likely to be inspired by Paul Whiteman rather than Paul Robeson. Whiteman was the acceptable face of jazz at the time, being a white man playing swing dance music that some modern jazz writers find rather bland -- though he reportedly wasn't a racist and people like Duke Ellington said good things about him. The symbolic value of his name may have appealed to some as a pseudonym more than the name of a black musician who was politically active, though when Doc Savage started in 1933 Robeson might not have been known for his politics yet.
How are you liking the book? I enjoyed the TV version, but these days, if I started reading all the books that inspired all these Brit and Scandi noir TV series I'd need to be retired. And that's still six and a half months away.
Latest read: Donald E. Westlake's satirical mystery novel Baby, Would I Lie? It's set in the country music scene in 1990s Branson, MO, but it's not Branson or country that's the target of the satire (much), it's supermarket tabloids. The main character used to work for one but managed to get a much more respectable job at a New York weekly magazine. She's sent to Branson to cover a country star's murder trial but her employer's real goal is to nail the tabloid the protagonist used to work for. The mystery isn't whether the accused country star is guilty; it's what kind of scheme he's running as he seems to be shooting his own defence in the foot. Not that things always go the way anyone initially expects. Fun.
Next up: no idea just yet. I'll be watching an episode of Slow Horses then listening to a Big Finish Doctor Who audio and then I'll pick something. Between unread ebooks and unread print books there's more than a thousand options around here. I don't have a Mount TBR, I have a whole range.
My wife likes these novels.
There are also other adaptations of them that you can watch.
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