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Golden Amazon #4
The Amazon's Diamond Quest
Classic sci fi pulp adventure of an Amazon heroine.
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1947
4 people want to read
About the author
John Russell Fearn
374 books8 followersA prolific author in various genres under his own name, John Francis Russell Fearn also used these pseudonyms: Astron del Martia, Brian Shaw, Conrad G. Holt, Dennis Clive, Frank Jones, Geoffrey Armstrong, Griff, Hugo Blayn, John Russell, K. Thomas Mark Denholm, Paul Lorraine, Polton Cross, Spike Gordon, Thornton Ayre, Vargo Statten, Volsted Gridban, Dom Passante, John Cotton, Ephriam Winiki, Lawrence F. Rose, Earl Titan, Ephraim Winiki.
John Russell Fearn was an extremely prolific and popular British writer, who began in the American pulps, then almost single-handedly drove the post-World War II boom in British publishing with a flood of science fiction, detective stories, westerns, and adventure fiction. He was so popular that one of his pseudonyms became the editor of Vargo Staten’s Science Fiction Magazine in the 1950’s! His work is noted for its vigor and wild imagination. He has always had a substantial cult following and has been popular in translation around the world.
John Russell Fearn was an extremely prolific and popular British writer, who began in the American pulps, then almost single-handedly drove the post-World War II boom in British publishing with a flood of science fiction, detective stories, westerns, and adventure fiction. He was so popular that one of his pseudonyms became the editor of Vargo Staten’s Science Fiction Magazine in the 1950’s! His work is noted for its vigor and wild imagination. He has always had a substantial cult following and has been popular in translation around the world.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
May 16, 2019
So after describing a pulpish jungle Venus where Earthlings are gaining a colonial foothold among horrifyingly dangerous creatures and a mysterious unexplored hemisphere containing 'high' Venusians, this story eventually turns into a plot to disrupt Earth's world economy by the oversupply of 'contraband' diamonds, which is now the basis of world currency.
This, the way that women are portrayed (particularly Ethel), the colonization of Venus (never quite called that), and the status and goals of the Venusians are all quite interesting, but not in the ways that Fearn intended. You never forget that the author is a white English man in the first half of the twentieth century, and he never extends himself beyond the attitudes of his era. Belittling things are said to women, the protagonists invoke the Dreaded Other against the Venusians and even to less-enlightened Earthlings who cannot be trusted with enormous piles of diamonds ("we can handle it, they cannot!"), and Venusians can't have a simple "get off my planet, colonizer" plan but must eventually be saddled with a super-villain plot to disrupt Earth economy.
On top of this, the weird superscience isn't especially weird or superscience-y, and the once magnificent Violet Ray is now a colorless if intense person and extremely fallible when the plot requires it.
This, the way that women are portrayed (particularly Ethel), the colonization of Venus (never quite called that), and the status and goals of the Venusians are all quite interesting, but not in the ways that Fearn intended. You never forget that the author is a white English man in the first half of the twentieth century, and he never extends himself beyond the attitudes of his era. Belittling things are said to women, the protagonists invoke the Dreaded Other against the Venusians and even to less-enlightened Earthlings who cannot be trusted with enormous piles of diamonds ("we can handle it, they cannot!"), and Venusians can't have a simple "get off my planet, colonizer" plan but must eventually be saddled with a super-villain plot to disrupt Earth economy.
On top of this, the weird superscience isn't especially weird or superscience-y, and the once magnificent Violet Ray is now a colorless if intense person and extremely fallible when the plot requires it.
Displaying 1 of 1 review