Limited edition... only 100 made! Another complete series collection from Altus Press, this time focusing on the classic Doc Savage clone Jim Anthony, complete and uncut from the pages of the Super-Detective pulp magazine from 1940-43. Volume 1 contains the first three adventures, collecting the Rado Ruric trilogy: "Dealer in Death," "Legion of Robots" and "Madame Murder." These also include editor notes and correspondence, and this edition contains an all-new introduction by Will Murray.
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By Michael Brown
Jan 5, 2011
For those not familiar, Jim Anthony was a sort-of Doc Savage clone published by Trojan/Culture publications, a publisher of the "spicy" pulps of sort-of soft porn. Strangely enough, it was owned by the same guy who owned DC Comics. Jim Anthony was 'half-indian, half-irish, and all American'. More emotional then Doc, he was a physical and mental marvel. He had a penthouse in the "Waldorf-Anthony" hotel he owned, had a secret mansion in the Catskills called "The Tepee", another resort in an oasis in the American Southwest called "The Pueblo". He was assisted by a small group of people include Tom Gentry, pilot and right-hand man; Mephito, his shaman grandfather; his butler, and Dolores, the daughter of a US Senator and his fiance. His stories ran about 24 stories. For the first 10 or so, he was 'super Jim Anthony', where he fought against science-ficional menaces. After that, he was sort of 'de-powered' and lost most of his aides except for Tom.... More > He was turned into more of a hard-boiled detective. He would soon be written by the authors' of Trojan's Dan Turner, Hollywood Detective. At the begining he was written by Victor Rousseau. Its known he wrote the first 3 (in this volume) and prehaps the others before the others took over. This book reprints the first 3 novels, where Jim goes up against Rado Ruric, a foreign villian. The stories are "Dealer in Death", "Legion of Robots", and "Madame Murder". In the first novel, Rado is formenting trouble for the US at the behest of a munitions owner who hopes to make billions selling munitions to the US. We learn this is actually the 2nd time Anthony goes up against him, as he had previous dealings with Rado in Tibet (this is hinted in the next two, but we don't learn more about it). In the next novel, Rado is on his own and being a threat. He has duped some Indian (from India) to help him. He creates a mechanical sea serpent, and gets a drug that turns people into 'robots', basically super strong and easily controlled zombies. He menaces The Pueblo, but is again defeated (but escapes). In the final novel, Rado is now behind a world-wide extorsion ring (kind of a let down from the previous novels in scope). Anthony figures things out and defeats Rado, who is killed in an explosion. Of the 3 I found the first 2 more interesting then the third. I look forward to seeing the next volume, as few of these stories have been reprinted before.< Less