Lost City of Uranus - the Sixth Dig Allen Space Explorer Adventure

And with this sixth book, we've reached the final Space Explorer Adventure of our hero, Dig Allen.  Six books published over the span of four years (from 1959 to 1962), this series turned out to be considerably better than I had anticipated.  Author Joseph Lawrence Greene (1914 - 1990), who was a prolific writer who also created Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, has given young readers an exciting series of adventures of what the future could have been from a mid-century viewpoint.  The period in which these books were published was right at the end of the over-the-top, campy sci-fi films of the '50s, and so it should come as no surprise that these books are filled with what we now know to be scenarios that are simply impossible to have happen.  But, back when these were written, I have no doubt that young readers fantasized about life on other planets in our solar system and what it would be like to travel the stars.  Well, Greene offered them the chance to see it with this series.   (Special thanks to my good friend, Ray Lambert, who gifted me with a copy of this final book in the series, as I was having one heck of time trying to find a copy of it!)

 

Lost City of Uranus, published in 1962, takes a different direction from the other books.  Sure, we still get a space adventure involving Dig Allen and best friends, twin brothers Jim and Ken Barry; yes, we still follow them as they set off to yet another unexplored planet in our solar system.  But with this book, Greene opens the story differently, with readers being introduced to a ship that has just dropped off the latest settlers to the new colony on Ganymede, one of Jupiter's moons that was being settled by daring spacemen and women.  When two of the crew are sent outside to inspect the rocketubes, one of them - a man by the name of Dirk Danton, happens to spot on old-fashioned bottle floating through space. He retrieves it, and inside is a handwritten letter from a pilot who disappeared, along with his ship, decades okay.  According to the letter, the pilot (Steven McKay) was the sole survivor after a meteor struck their ship, and as he was about to crash on the planet Uranus, he decided to send out this message in a bottle in the off chance someone may find it and be aware - for McKay had spotted what appeared to be a shining city on the surface of the planet, a planet always believed to be lifeless!  The crew in the present (our future?!) laugh it off, except for Danton.  Danton believes there is something to it, and thus, his greed gets our story going.

 

And thus, with a bit of a jump, Dig, Ken and Jim are readying to head to Earth for a much needed vacation, only to be given a brief mission while they are on Earth - deliver the letter from Steven McKay to his family - his now elderly wife and their son, with his wife and two children.  There does not seem to be any problem with the delivery - but they are unaware Danton has been following them, determined to get his hands on that letter so he can head to Uranus and find that city.  Through a series of unexpected circumstances, the McKay grandchildren - Jamie and Judy - are tricked by Danton into a smuggler's ship; but when left by themselves for only a moment, it is sufficient time for the children to accidentally start the ship's engines and send it flying off into space!  After they are missing for a couple of days, McKay's son comes to where Dig and his friends are vacationing and begs for their help.  And, thus, it becomes a race against time for Dig to find the children before they crash on the same planet where their grandfather is believed to have died.  Dig enlists the help of the smuggler, whose ship the children are in, and unknowingly take Dirk Danton along with them - with ultimately proves disastrous!  

 

Although the idea of there being an underwater city thriving on Uranus, Greene does actually provide a fairly good tale of morality and the cost of greed.  Dig, Jim, Ken, and the smugglers do ultimately find the city, and even though Dig claims it for the Space Explorers, placing it under their jurisdiction, the smugglers, at Dirk's insistence, decide to sneak in and steal some things from the city for their own benefit.  Those actions have some pretty major consequences, not only for Dirk and the smugglers, but for the entire city and its inhabitants!  It is tragic in a number of ways, and provides a double meaning to the title of the book; yet, at the same time, it provides for a not-so-surprising reunion and some measure of hope for what they have learned to be applied to life on Earth.  As a final story for the series, it is a unique one, and definitely one that is heavy on the heart.

 

There is not a whole lot of science within this story, but Greene does have his characters mention that Uranus "is not as dense as the Earth" and the atmosphere "is mostly methane" (p. 78).  While the first part is true, as Uranus does not have a solid surface, but is more or less an ice giant made up of various "ice" type materials, the second part about the methane is not true.  The atmosphere of Uranus is 83% hydrogen, 15% helium, and only 2.3% methane - so it is definitely not "mostly methane."  Further, the references in the book to the gravity being heavier than that of Earth are also wrong, as Uranus' gravity is about 11% weaker than the Earth's gravity.  This is due to the fact that Uranus' mass is so large and spread out over a large volume, the surface is much farther from the planet's center, and therefore the gravitational pull is weaker.  Of course, this book was written and published in the early 1960s, before much of the in-depth study of the planet discovered a lot of these facts.  Besides, these books are science fiction, and therefore, the details do not need to be factual!

 

This book gives us the fourth artist on the series, Phil Marini. I could not find much information about Marini, other than the fact that he did a number of paperback covers for Dell and other publishers back in the 1950s.  His cover for this book is a bit off, as one cannot really tell who the older characters are supposed to be.  This scene is taken from the moment when Dig, Jim, Ken, and the smuggler captain find the two children on the surface of Uranus, and after reviving them with oxygen, they discover the city under the icy surface (p. 91).  However, none of the men have Dig's red hair, and the man kneeling down and pointing does not look anything like the captain described in the story.  His appearance does not even match Marini's drawing of him in the story (p. 85)!  And speaking of that particular drawing - for some reason, that one is the only one printed in black.  All of the other internal illustrations are printed in a light blue ink.  Not sure why they difference, but it definitely stands out from the others.

 

As I've said before, it is a shame this series ended after only six books.  The stories were actually very engaging and filled with adventure, and the main characters were very likable.  I mean, the publisher could have at least given him two more books, so he could have finished the planets in our solar system - one wonders what Dig and his friends would have found out on Neptune and Pluto!

RATING:  9 English-speaking Uranians out of 10 for giving Dig and his friends a final farewell story that sticks with you in terms of story and impact!

Robots of Saturn - the Fifth Dig Allen Space Explorer Adventure

This penultimate adventure of Dig Allen, Space Explorer brings us one step closer to the final book in the series.  We have visited Mercury, Venus, Mars, the asteroid belt, and Jupiter, and now, in this fifth book, author Joseph Greene takes us on a trip to Saturn - or, more specifically, the rings of Saturn.  Greene offers a great dedication at the beginning of the book, "To the young people whoa re reading stories of space today, and who will on the moon tomorrow."  Since this book was published in 1962, Greene and his readers were still seven years away from man actually walking on the moon; thus, his dedication was more prophetic than he likely ever knew.  Greene lived until 1990, so he was alive to see a number of trips into space and the moon, and one has to wonder if he ever looked back at his science fiction stories and realized just how far-fetched many of them were in light of what science was discovering about our solar system and the planets in it.

 

Robots of Saturn is certainly a dead-on title for this book, since the story deals with exactly that - robots being used to mine the rings of Saturn.   When Dig and his friends get a call from Dr. Barry (the twins' father) asking for their help, they head out immediately.  What they learn is that Dr. Barry is heading an expedition to the rings of Saturn, where they will mine some very rare minerals that cannot be found elsewhere - minerals that can be used to create an indestructible metal that can withstand even the heat and deadly radiation of the sun itself!  But the only way to mine the minerals is through a new technology that allows man to interface with robots - in other words, they can transfer their minds and essence into a robot that they can then "live" through to do work a normal man cannot!  Professor Norwyn is the scientist who has developed these robots, and Greg and Maxie are the two space men who have volunteered to transfer themselves into the robots to mine the rings.  Needless to say, there is trouble when robot disappears, and it seems someone is out to sabotage the entire mining operation!

 

Published in 1962, one wonders if author Joseph Greene got some of his ideas for these robots from the great sci-fi author, Isaac Asimov.  Asimov introduced what is known as the "Three Laws of Robotics" in his 1942 short story, "Runaround," which include (1) a robot may not injure a human being or allow a human being to be harmed; (2) a robot must obey human orders except where such order would conflict with the first rule; and (3) a robot must protect its own existence as long as that protection does not conflict with the first two laws.  Greene, in this story, sets up very similar rules, but expands it to five rules:  (1) a robot shall not harm a human being; (2) a robot shall not permit a human being to be harmed; (3) a robot shall not permit a human to bring harm to himself; (4) a robot must obey all orders given by a human unless it conflicts with the first three rules; and (5) a robot must protect itself, unless it conflicts with the first four rules.  As you can see, these are basically the same rules established 20 years prior to Asimov in his short story.

 

Greene does provide some scientific detail (at least, what was known at that time) regarding the various rings of Saturn.  Most of the story, however, takes place in the Central Ring and the Cassini Space-Gap that separates the outer ring from the next one heading towards the planet (p. 61).  As it turns out, these facts are accurate.  The "A" and "B" rings are the brightest, separated by the "Cassini division."  Both of these rings are made up of chunks of water ice, some only an inch in diameter, while others are larger than buildings.  Now, in the book, The Cassini gap is described as being "3,360 miles wide" (p. 61); however, in reality, scientists have determined the separation is actually more like 2,290 miles (4,700 km) wide.  That's still a large distance to cross!

 

The story is adventure from the first chapter to the last, as Dig and Ken have their turn in the robots, only to learn that the saboteur has no problem with trapping them with the ice of the inner ring, or even worse - electrifying the robots to destroy their brains, and thus killing the two boys!  The discovery of more robots (even after the Professor indicated that there were no more built yet) only makes the situation worse, as Dr. Barry and the boys are left to wonder - is someone controlling the robots, or have they gone rogue and are following their own directive?

 

This book sees the return of Myron Strauss as the illustrator (he provided the illustrations in the first book).  Strauss's art is just as good as it was for the first book; however, there are much fewer illustrations, and most of the ones in this book are of the robots - we get very few illustrations that show human characters.  There is no indication who provided the cover art, but since there is no other reference, we can assume that Strauss provided the cover art (since the last book specifically indicated there was a different cover artist than the interior artist).  The only thing I find odd about the cover is Saturn with its rings are shown in the background, but the boys with the two robots are some distance away in the foreground.  No scene like this appears anywhere in the book.  I assume it was simply an artistic way to show the entirety of Saturn, while also showing the main characters and the robots.

 

Everyone that has praised this series definitely has had reason to do so.  I believe the stories have gotten better and stronger as they series progresses (even if some of the sci-fi aspects are way beyond believable at times - but, hey, written back in the early '60s, after coming through a decade of sci-fi schlock at the theaters, what can we expect?).  It's rather sad that the next book is also the last.  One must wonder, if the series continued, would we have seen trips to Neptune and Pluto, and maybe even beyond?

 

RATING:  9 deadly bolt bombs out of 10 for a crazy-fun robot adventure filled with space-faring feats of bravery and quick-thinking, with just a smidge of mystery to boot! 

 

Trappers of Venus - the Fourth Dig Allen Space Explorer Adventure

Four books in, and this one, by far, is the best one yet!  I was actually caught by surprise as to how much I really enjoyed this story.  The author, Joseph Greene, has definitely got a much stronger feel for his main characters in this book, and he focuses less on back story and more on the actual adventure, which starts right on page one.  This is the second of Greene's planet-hopping books, with the previous one taking Dig and his friends to Jupiter - now they head to Venus, before journeying to Saturn in the fifth book and Uranus in the sixth, and final, book in the series.  With each book better than the last, I can only imagine just how good the stories will be in the last two entries.

 

Trappers of Venus begins with Dig sneaking out for a clandestine meeting with an unknown person (well, unknown to the reader, anyway). Once meeting his contact, Chips, Dig learns he has been asked by an old space pirate friend of his to assist a trapper from Venus named Tim Buckle.  Dig saves Tim's life, after they find him attacked by some hunters, but Tim turns out to be far from grateful.  As Dig is getting ready to blast off, taking Tim back to Venus, Tim wakes up and takes over the ship, blasting off with too much speed and force, sending them way off course!   Dig manages to gain Tim's trust and gets the ship back on track, learning that he, as a Space Explorer, needs to help Tim and his friends on Venus protect the lives of an indigenous species known as the Kohoolies.

 

Meanwhile, twin brothers Ken and Jim Barry are visiting their father on the asteroid science center, where they meet the business man, Linton Wells, and his prideful, egotistical son, Chuck.  It seems Wells needs some Space Explorers to come to Venus with him to determine that an indigenous species there is nothing more than another animal species, not as intelligent as man, and therefore open for hunting.  The brothers, while not particularly liking Wells and his son, see no issue with going to Venus to make a determination of the alien species' level of intelligence and humanity, so that a report can be made to the scientists who will give authorization for hunting or protection of the animals.

 

Can you see where this is headed?

 

Greene goes beyond just your typical adventure story with good guys vs. bad guys.  In addition to that, we get the misunderstandings that cause a rift between Did and the Barry brothers; we get the mystery surrounding the Kohoolies and whether they are intelligent life forms; we get the question of who are the real good guys and who are the real bad guys; we get some very intense life-and-death scenarios; and we get a story of real redemption for one, if not two, of the characters in the tale.  There is a strong human nature element to the story that causes you to suspend your disbelief over the idea that Venus no only has a breathable atmosphere for humans, but also has a thriving planet of fauna and life forms.  In reality, we know its closeness to the sun would prohibit life as we know it; but hey, this book was published back in 1961, back before man ever actually reached the moon and not long after all of those wacky space films from the '50s. 

 

The rotation of artists for this series continues with this book.  Walter Dey, who provided both the cover and interior art for the third book returns to provide the cover art for this book.  Honestly, the art is not quite as crisp and defined as his cover for Journey to Jupiter was, but it is definitely superior to that of the second book.  The interior illustrations, however, are provided by Charles Beck - who, as it turns out, was an artist for Fawcett Comics, illustrating the first Captain Marvel (a/k/a Shazam!) stories!  When he severed his ties with Fawcett, Beck moved for Florida, where he became a freelance illustrator.  This was the only book in the series that Beck illustrated.  (One disappointing thing I have noticed about this series is that the further it goes, the less interior illustrations each book seems to have!)

 

The back cover for this book (my copy, at least) features the same design as that on my copy of the first book; however, my copy of Venus is obviously an earlier printing that my copy of Forgotten Star, as the series all list fewer books than the earlier novel - and Vicky Loring is listed as "Coming Soon" rather than the three titles shown on the first book.  

 

This book definitely cemented my enjoyment of this series, and I'm now really looking forward to the last two books.

 

RATING:  9 deadly scorpion lizards out of 10 for science fiction, space adventure with a strong dose of human drama and good vs. evil! 

Fashion in Action - the Collected Edition

Back in the 1980s, a number of independent comic book companies hit the market, flooding the direct market with hundreds of titles. Going to The Great Escape in Louisville, I found myself enamored by a number of indy titles: Ms. Tree, DNAgents, Evangeline, Grim Jack, Whisper, and quite a few others. One title I can remember seeing on the shelf, but not picking up, was the Fashion in Action Summer Special. The art looked kind of cool, and I have always been a fan of female-led titles. But, at the time, I was more focused on on-going series, so a one-issue special just wasn’t on my radar, and I passed it up.

Now, here it is, some thirty-plus years later, and I come across the collected Fashion in Action, featuring all of the back-up stories along with the two specials in one trade paperback. Nostalgia instantly set in, so I ordered it. This was a title I never read back in the day, and to be honest, I wasn’t really sure what to expect. But as the introduction by John Ostrander states, this book was unlike any other of its time, and even today, it stands out as not only unique, but well-written, beautifully drawn, and just plain good to read!

The comic tells the story of Frances Knight, a patch-wearing woman who specializes, along with her all-female team, in providing bodyguard services for celebrities of all kind in the not-so-distant future. The first issue opens with the New Year’s celebration of 2087, and the FIA team is on the job when a pulp character suddenly comes to live as Dr. Cruel kidnaps the man they are supposed to be protecting from right under their noses! The case becomes personal when Frances learns that Dr. Cruel’s cohort, known only as Roxanne, has a personal score to settle with her.  Plenty of action, plenty of fashion, and plenty of twists abound in the first seven-part story that was originally published as a back-up in Eclipse Comics’ Scout title.

Snyder followed-up his initial back-up run with two one-shot specials – the Fashion in Action Summer Special and the Fashion in Action Winter Special. Each special was a done-in-one story, the first focused on the girls’ hunt for a designer who has been stealing and profiting from other designers’ creations, while the second provided a flashback story that gave readers some insight into Frances Knight and why she is who she is (side-by-side with a present day story involving Dr. Cruel and Roxanne once again).

The series clearly focused on its main protagonist, but readers did get a glimpse into the other women who made up FIA. They were varied in size, color, and nationality, as well as skills – ranging from psychics to demolition experts.  Plus, Snyder gives them a base of operations in the Statue of Liberty!  How cool is that?!?!

It is interesting that back in the mid-to-late ‘80s that a male creator wrote and drew a comic dedicated to an all-female team that showcased strong, independent women in stories that would normally be written for male heroes. Perhaps the female readership just wasn’t large enough back then, or perhaps the male readers simply didn’t appreciate the appeal of this female team, but after the Winter Special, the FIA team disappeared from the comic scene.  Reading these stories now, I can see a bit a similarity between FIA and Dakota North, a fashion-centered character who held her own five-issue series at Marvel around the same time.  (Coincidentally, Martha Thomases, who created and wrote the Dakota North Investigations series, also writes an Afterward in the FIA trade paperback!)

Another interesting tidbit of which I was unaware was that Snyder created paper dolls of the characters, with fashions and a bit of character info that was placed on the back of each issue of Scout, as well as the two Specials. The paper doll pages are also reprinted in this collected edition, along with in-house ads from Eclipse Comics, original concept sketches for the characters, and even a "runway gallery," featuring various artists' interpretations of the characters from the series.

I wish Snyder was in a position to revive the series and give fans a continuation of Frances Knight’s saga.  I have a feeling he had plenty more stories waiting to be told, and in today’s independent market, a series of Fashion in Action mini-series would certainly be a hit!

RATING:  9 mystical life-giving gasses out of 10 for giving the comic world an all-female team of fashion-conscious bodyguards that are well worth the read!