John Russell Fearn

This volume collects four classic tales from the SF pulp magazines by a master of the genre! <P> THE MAN FROM HELL… <P> From top to bottom the Brant Building became insubstantial, like the illusion of a dream world. It hung transparent, incredible, for a moment with the figures of people momentarily visible through the suddenly glassified walls–then with staggering abruptness the whole 1,000-foot mass snapped into black extinction! Its very foundations changed to cavernous...

Gerald Dawson was the first to die—in an apparent road accident. But when other members of his family receive mysterious telephone calls informing them of their own imminent demise, and the predictions come true, Scotland Yard soon realizes that a serial killer is at work. Baffled, the police call in Dr. Sawley Garson, a specialist in scientific puzzles. But can even he save the few remaining Dawsons from the cunning killer—a man who appears not to exist? Another classic «impossible crime» novel...

Maria Black, Head of Roseway College for Young Ladies during World War II, and a textbook solver of crimes, finds herself faced with a problem after her own heart when the strange, haughty Frances Hasleigh, daughter of a somewhat mysterious British Major, enrolls in her school. Within a few days the girl is found hanged in a nearby wood, in circumstances that seem devoid of clues and without motive. Scotland Yard is called in to solve the horrifying crime, but Black Maria has her own unique...

Nick Hansley and his young wife and father-in-law soon find that The Cedars, the isolated country house Ena has inherited, has more than just a sinister appearance – it radiates a positively evil aura.<P> Soon after moving in, they are visited by a strange figure of a man – Dr. Lexton, their nearest neighbour, who tries to persuade them to sell the house to him. But who is Dr. Lexton, and what was the nature of the secret experiment that Ena.&apos;’s deceased uncle, entomologist Cyrus...

The Cosmic Crusaders discover a planet whose people are subject to a baleful influence from outer space that sweeps across their world once a month, affecting every man, woman, and child. It stirs the emotions of the sexes against each other: men want only to destroy women, and women men. Only those with higher types of mind can resist the mental attack–the less fortunate are left dead or maimed after the Wave has passed. But when the Crusaders identify and destroy the apparent source of the...

For an illusionist to make a woman vanish from a cage is merely a parlor trick, because the person must go somewhere; but in this instance the woman really DOES disappear, in full view of an audience, and cannot be found afterwards. This seeming impossibility is the commencement of a completely baffling puzzle, which even Scotland Yard finds hard to crack. And then the magician himself is found murdered in his flat, lending credence to the notion that the woman has also been killed. Scotland...

In Annex 10 in the Adirondack Mountains in New York, the scientists under the leadership of astronomer Dr. Gray can hardly believe the things their instruments are telling them; but, because their equipment is absolutely reliable, they HAVE to believe, and on that ill-fated June 30th, they begin to see the chaos will affect mankind. The Earth is growing steadily hotter. Temperatures rocket as the sun shines through the night and the world is plunged into endless day. Everywhere people are...

There are six people in millionaire Nick Clayton&apos;s limousine when it leaves a country home to return to London: Clayton himself; his girlfriend, Bernice; Dawlish, his driver; the unhappily married financier Harvey Brand and his wife, Lucy; and the tragic socialite, Betty. But the car never reaches its destination; instead, it drives thirty miles down a country road–and just disappears! And when the travelers suddenly find themselves in an alternate reality, one where time stands still, they...

Betty Shapley was a local beauty, for whose charms three young men fell heavily. But she never expected that her coquetry would lead to the sudden and horrifyingly brutal death of one of her admirers, the shy, inoffensive Herbert Pollitt–plus the life of a fugitive for another, Vincent Grey; as well as the role of a murder-case witness for the third, Tom Clayton. Inspector Morgan and Sergeant Claythorne of the local police investigate the death, and suspect that the now-vanished Vincent Grey,...

JOHN RUSSELL FEARN (1908-1960) sold his first novel to the pulp magazine Amazing Stories , and quickly became a prolific and popular contributor to all of the American science fiction magazines of the day. Later he switched to the U.K. market, writing scores of SF, detective, and western novels. He is best remembered for his famous superwoman &apos;Golden Amazon&apos; series, currently available from Wildside Press.

To the peoples of Earth, it had seemed the perfect marriage when Violet Ray Brant–better known as The Golden Amazon–and Abna of Atlantis were wed in Westminster Abbey. But it was nothing of the kind, and before long Abna found himself betrayed and marooned on a satellite of Jupiter, while the Amazon&apos;s spaceship had been sent hurtling far beyond the solar system in reprisal. Taking advantage of the absence of Earth&apos;s greatest protectors, master scientist Sefner Quorne, another survivor...

Science fiction author Stanley G. Weinbaum died from cancer at 33 in December 1935. Short though his career was, his scientific imagination, smooth characterizations, and pervasive humor completely revolutionized the field, and profoundly influenced his contemporaries. Among his many imitators was English writer John Russell Fearn. Although his own distinctive work was very popular in the SF magazines of the time, the ambitious Fearn wanted to increase his number of acceptances by writing under...

Albert Simpkins, a mild-mannered theater projectionist, dreams of the inventions that that he can create–and when he finally has an opportunity to realize his vision, he sets himself up as the «Voice of the Conqueror,» a supposed alien lifeform in orbit around the Earth, whose sole intent is to rid the world of weapons of mass destruction. But even the best-imagined notions sometimes go awry, and when several individuals–including one of Albert&apos;s daughters–are killed under mysterious...

Dick opened the door again swiftly, Vera clinging to him–and they were so astounded at what they saw that he forgot for the moment to slam the door shut again. For the phantom was there–clearly visible in the sunlight, which now blazed across the upper half of the great window. A strange, incredible caricature of a being hung in the dusty air, a haze of blurry light surrounding it from the back. There was the pointed tail, the simian ears, the long needle-chinned face, bent arms flexed as though...

The sun is dying. Astronomers can see that the Earth will soon become a frozen planet. All life will vanish from the surface, and the sea and air will freeze, as the light of the sun dwindles to that of a full moon. Mankind is forced to retreat underground, there to try surviving in vast underground habitats–trapped in a World Beneath Ice. Only one person on Earth has the scientific knowledge to rekindle the sun–the incredible Golden Amazon, a woman changed by surgery and genetic engineering...

Continuing their cosmic crusade among the stars, the Golden Amazon and her three companions discover a planet in another space where intelligent beings are being created, not through normal biological processes, but spontaneously, fully-grown, fashioned from the very chemicals of another planet. The mystery deepens when they discover that the synthetic race (and the planet it inhabits) is evolving backwards! Determined to solve these mysteries, the Crusaders find themselves up against the...

The Cosmic Crusaders find themselves on a truly strange world–a misfit planet that seems mysteriously cursed. Instead of evolving naturally from birth to death, it&apos;s a world out of step with the universe, leaping ahead into the future at unexpected moments. With each 50-year «step,» much of the population dies, and the young replace them as middle-aged individuals. The Crusaders are suspicious that the adviser to the planet ruler is actually an alien from another world, and is causing the...

SF Author Stanley G. Weinbaum died from cancer at 33, in December 1935. Short though his career was, his scientific imagination, smooth characterization, and humor completely revolutionized the field, and profoundly influenced his contemporaries. Among his many imitators was English writer John Russell Fearn. Although Fearn&apos;s own distinctive work was very popular, he wanted to increase his number of acceptances by writing under pseudonyms–Thornton Ayre and Polton Cross–with a change of...

In this sequel to John Russell Fearn’s classic Liners of Time, Time Liner Pilot Sandford Lee continues his battle against Elnek Jelfel, the Jovian wizard of science intent on galactic domination. Zagribud carries out their contests against an interstellar canvas, with Jelfel using his scientific powers to ultimately take possession of the Earth and carry out mass vivisection on humanity.<P> This is the first unabridged book edition of a classic pre-war serial from the pages of Amazing...