King Kong Vs. Tarzan

The year was 1933. Filmmaker Carl Denham had captured the stupendous monster he had dubbed “King” Kong. But that was only the beginning. Denham was determined to get the dethroned ruler of Skull Mountain Island back to America, and cash in on the greatest wild animal capture in human history.

The saga of how Kong was taken in chains from his Indian Ocean kingdom to New York City has never been told. In order for the cargo freighter Wanderer to make the long transit to the Atlantic, she is forced to circumnavigate Africa––jungle home of the legendary Tarzan of the Apes!

Here is the long-anticipated clash between the Monarch of Skull Island and Lord of the Jungle.

When the largest anthropoid who ever lived encounters the savage superman raised by the great apes, will they make peace––or war?

King Kong Vs. Tarzan (Epic Adventure)

 “The Wild Adventures of King Kong”

By Will Murray

Altus Press www.altuspress.com

ISBN #978-1618272812

Price $24.95

488 Pages

Rating 5-Stars

“An Epic Adventure For Modern Times.”

We are familiar with the capture of King Kong on Skull Island, and his eventual death in New York, but in this tale, the author details Kong’s journey from Skull Island, and how he was kept sedated for much of the trip, until problems arose, and the giant monarch of Skull Island escapes onto the African continent. Traveling from Skull Island, Captain Englehorn warns Carl Denham that the passage through the Suez Canal might not be a good idea, and he turns his ship, the Wanderer towards the African coast where they hope to find more food and supplies for the voyage and avoid official scrutiny of their cargo.

They reach the African coast before the storm sinks the ship, but Kong soon awakens and breaks loose. Now he’s afoot in Tarzan’t domain, and the Jungle Lord doesn’t like the damage he is causing. It’s truly a wild adventure, as Tarzan, To-Yat’s ape tribe, and Jack Driscoll and his ships crew all chase after the mighty Kong.

The reader is in for a treat. Will Murray’s writing is smooth and fast paced, and his characters come alive. Kong is magnificent, and Tarzan is at his best in this story. Tarzan’s constant companions, little Nkima, the monkey, Jad-bal-ja, his golden lion, and Tantor the elephants are around for the action. An epic tale for the modern times, and highly recommended.

Tom Johnson

Author of JUR: A STORY OF PRE-DAWN EARTH

Tarzan: Return To Pal-ul-don

With the African continent engulfed by World War II, John Clayton, Lord Greystoke, abandons his role as Lord of the Jungle in order to combat the spreading Nazi menace.

Flying a P-40 Tomahawk warplane, Clayton is sent on his first mission: to rescue the missing British Military Intelligence officer code-named Ilex. But the daring task plunges him into his savage past after he’s forced down in a lost land that seems hauntingly familiar.

When Tarzan of the Apes returns to the prehistoric realm called Pal-ul-don, he must revert to his most savage persona, that of Tarzan-jad-guru––Tarzan the Terrible!

Tarzan: Return To Pal-ul-don (SF/Adventure)

By Will Murray

Altus Press www.altuspress.com

ISBN #978-1618272098

Price $22.46

380 Pages

Rating 5-Stars

“Back To Pal-ul-don!”

With Nazis in Africa, Tarzan joins the RAF, and as Flight Officer John Clayton, he is given an assignment to fly from England to the African continent to locate a missing British agent code-named Ilex, whose plane has crashed somewhere on the Dark Continent. Given the coordinates of the downed plane, Clayton’s P-40 Tomahawk is knocked out of the sky by a huge pteranodon when he reaches the area. On the ground he discovers an elephant he names Torn Ear, who becomes his companion is this wild valley of prehistoric creatures. Tarzan soon discovers he is in Pal-ul-don (Land of man). First coming across a tribe of turtle men, he stays with them awhile, then sets out again on his mission to find the missing secret agent, and is soon joined by Mu-bu-tan, a hairy man with tail. From this point on they are beset by a race of spider-men who carry poison darts with spider venom, and go through several captures and escapes, eventually finding Ilex also in the spider-men’s lair.  Tarzan once again becomes Tarzan the Terrible, and goes to war with the spider-men.

This was certainly an action-filled adventure, which Will Murray handles quite well. Perhaps it was about 100 pages too long, as there are a lot of repeats that weren’t needed, but the author is just satisfying the current trend for lengthy novels. I did get a kick out of Mu-bu-tan’s perfect diction, and use of words 8 and 9 letters long for a prehistoric man-thing that should have a limited vocabulary. You’d have thought he went to Harvard with Ham Brooks. There are no Nazis, which is also a shame, after all this is WWII. I thought I knew who Ilex was by page 148, but I was wrong. I will leave it at that. Whatever faults this novel may have you can contribute to it being Will Murray’s first Tarzan novel. After all, Burroughs originally put tigers in Africa. I hope the author continues writing the series. This is the first good one since Fritz Leiber’s TARZAN AND THE VALLEY OF GOLD. Highly recommended.

Tom Johnson

ECHOES MAGZINE

Edgar Rice Burroughs Hardbacks

Edgar Rice Burroughs hardbacks for Trades & Wants. Now that I’ve started reading Will Murray’s new TARZAN novel, it reminded me that I have some duplicate hardbacks for trade, and I still need quite a few hardbacks in my collection. I need the following Tarzan hardbacks: AT THE EART’S CORE, THE INVINCIBLE, TRIUMPH, AND THE CITY OF GOLD, AND THE LION MAN, AND THE FORBIDDEN CITY, QUEST, THE MAGNIFICENT, AND THE MADMAN. Here are two G&D editions for trade: PELLUCIDAR (1923), THE MAD KIND (1926). Two later G&D hardbacks of Tarzan: TARZAN THE UNTAMED and TARZAN AND THE GOLDEN LION. I need other Burroughs hardbacks, but I would really like to complete my Tarzan hardbacks first.

Double Trouble

Double Trouble (Action/Adventure)

By Jerry Gill

Ann Darrow Publishing

ISBN #978-150258829

Price $12.54

416 Pages

Rating 4-Stars

“Old Style Fun & Adventure.”

This actually contains the first two novels in the Vic Challenger series, “Time Doesn’t Matter” and “Mongol”. The first story has Victoria Custer and her brother, Barney visiting Lord & Lady Greystoke’s ranch in Africa, where Tarzan allows Vic to hunt water buffalo and other game. The natives and white men are all in awe of Vic, and Tarzan tells them that the girl is a capable hunter. One day when Vic is out hunting, slavers capture her. Barney, Tarzan and his Waziri take the trail to rescue her and kill the Arab slavers. Amidst this early tale, Vic dreams about Nu and Nat-ul, a couple in love 100,000 years ago during the Stone Age. We learn their story, and how they influence Victoria Custer in 1919. In truth, Vic and Nat-ul seem to be attached, and Vic may be Nat-ul reincarnated. With this knowledge Vic feels she must find her lost lover, Nu, son of Nu, chief of the Nu people, dwellers in caves.

The story is episodic, with Vic falling into traps, escaping, fighting against great odds, and always showing the strength and fearlessness of the stone-age tribe of Nu. The author’s writing style captures that of Edgar Rice Burroughs. And, indeed, we have the cameo of Tarzan at his African ranch, and chapter titles like “Back To The Stone Age”, etc. In this story, Vic meets Ann Darrow who tells her about her adventure on Skull Island.  She also meets an “Indiana” Jones. Victoria obtains a job with a big newspaper to supply stories and photographs of her adventures, using the byline of Vic Challenger, her homage to Professor Challenger from The Lost World.

In “Mongol”, the second, and weakest, novel in the book, it reads a bit like a travelogue, with some episodic adventures. Lin Li, her pharmacist friend, joins Vic and they meet Evelyn Chan, the niece of Charlie Chan in San Francisco. She is a private detective involved in a murder mystery. The mystery follows them on board The Red Dragon, a ship heading for Hawaii before the mystery is solved. As they enter China, heading for Mongolia, they pick up a guide and learn about food and travel through the desert. They run across a band of Red Beards and have a shoot out, then giant worms come out of the ground and attacks everyone. Then they discover an underground city with space aliens, and rooms filled with gold, jewels, and silver. Escaping seconds before being killed, they return to their guide’s home to find Mongol warriors killing all the people. Alone, Vic, Lin, and their guide take on the Mongol horde in a fierce fight defeating them just as the Cavalry shows up.

Overall, this is a fun series so far, but the author needs to have better structure to the novel, instead of short episodic adventures, it needed a real plot the reader could follow. And with the travelogue in the second novel, the action slowed down a bit too much. For me, the story of Nu and Nat-ul, which took up a good portion of the first novel, was the best portion of the two books. The writing definitely captured Edgar Rice Burroughs in that segment. I like the character of Victoria Custer and Lin Li, although a lot of the dialogue was wooden in the second book. However, it is written in the old pulp style, and I think readers of adventure heroes like Doc Savage and Indiana Jones will enjoy it. Highly recommended.

Tom Johnson

ECHOES Magazine