John Russell Fearn’s SF, including Golden Amazon stories, back in print

Golden Amazon by John Russell Fearn

If you’ve been enjoying the adventures of the Golden Amazon, drawn by Ron Turner, in Spaceship Away, then you may be interested to know that a number of novels starring the warrior space heroine written by John Russell Fearn are back in print by Endeavour Media through its Venture Press imprint – along with other works by the prolific and popular British writer.

Available in print and for Kindle, the Golden Amazon series launched in 2016 and six books are now available, with Twin of the Amazon, released last October.

One of the most influential stars of science fiction, John Russell Fearn’s career as an SF writer launched in 1944 with The Golden Amazon, published by World’s Work, and the character would feature in numerous British and Canadian pulp magazines as well as her own series of over twenty novels.

Born from the chaos of World War Two, created as the first genuine superhuman, Violet Ray raised herself using her superior strength and intelligence to conquer the world, but eventually became mankind’s interstellar saviour as the “Golden Amazon”.

Spaceship Away Issue 42 - John Russell Fearn's The Golden Amazon

The Golden Amazon also appeared in a number of comic strips, some re-published recently in the SF anthology comic Spaceship Away, coloured by Martin Baines, and some strips also reprinted in the 1990s by Harrier Comics.

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 Two 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 Statten’s Science Fiction Magazine in the 1950s. His work is noted for its vigour and wild imagination and he has always had a substantial cult following, and has been popular in translation around the world.

Venture Press, working with editor Philip Harbottle, have now re-published a number of his novels and stories, including his detective thriller Liquid Death, released just last week, in which a  gang of criminals has established a far reaching racket in counterfeit coins, making English gold sovereigns to order. The CID is on the case, but a mysterious epidemic of deaths from snakebites soon diverts their attention.

Slaves of Ijax by John Russell Fearn, cover by Ron Turner

Slaves of Ijax by John Russell Fearn, cover by Ron Turner

Also recently released is the SF adventure Slaves of Ijax, the paperback edition offering a cover by Ron Turner, in which a scientist’s vengeance propels Peter Curzon seven hundred years into the future, where he finds himself in a very mysterious world. Science has banished the need to work in order to earn money, and people only pursue activities as a vocation and by choice.

But everyone is also engaged on a Great Task – constructing gigantic towers, with no discernible purpose, following out the orders given to them in the temples of Ijax, a mysterious Buddha-like entity worshiped as a god. Peter alone seems immune to the influence of Ijax, and unless he can penetrate to the root of the mystery, the future of mankind is imperilled…

The Best of John Russell Fearn – Volume OneThe Best of John Russell Fearn – Volume One is a gripping collection of science fiction mysteries where adventure, super powers, dream invasion and calamity unravel in the midst of experimental pursuit.

Offering seven classic stories from science fiction’s golden age, selected from Amazing Stories, Astounding Stories, Science Fiction, Thrilling Wonder Stories and Weird Tales, this book will transport you from the beginning of creation to the end of the universe.

Ranging from universe-busting “thought variants” to very human stories, they will surprise and delight all science fiction connoisseurs, from the benevolent ambitions of Professor Renhard and a machine that stops dust, to an accident at the hands of Dr. Anderson, for which there are ruinous consequences.

The Best of John Russell Fearn Volume Two: Outcasts of Eternity and Other Stories offers nine more classic stories, selected from Fantastic Adventures, Science Fantasy, Startling Stories and more. Collected here, Fearn explores worlds of different possibilities – bright and hopeful, dark and doomed, including a tale of the first explorers of Mars who return to Earth, a story of when the universe comes to an end and another centring on one man tries to cheat death and destiny; when alien invaders encounter the totally unexpected; and when a man of the future reaches back into the past…

Also released now are Waters of Eternity, in which life on Mars takes a terrifying turn as Rad and his partner Invia realise that the resources of the planet have grown scarce. Forced into action, they turn to the only option they have left – a complex water compound of immense power and great danger…

In War of the Scientists, when a newly-colonised Mars decides to rise up against its Earth-based predecessors, all hell breaks loose. And things go from bad to worse when they launch an atmosphere-compromising particle beam that could lead to a galactic war…

Secret of the Buried City by John Russell FearnWhen Rodney Marlow purchases a new plot of land, he thinks he has struck gold in Secret of the Buried City. A perfect idyll, out in the countryside. But all that is about to change… As he ventures further into the cavern, Rodney uncovers something that he would never have expected: a secret city under the Earth…

When a freak accident during an experiment causes a mysterious girl to appear in The Multillionth Chance, scientists are left wondering where she came from and why they cannot understand her. She turns out to be from an ancient, astral civilisation and her materialisation is down to the magic of entropy – the multillionth chance.

If pulp SF and thrillers are on your radar, then you may well want to check these out, other SF from Venture Press which includes new editions of SF by EC Tubb, who will be known to some downthetubes readers fro his Space: 1999 novels, a list that includes Child of Space and Destroyer of Worlds.

Venture Press is a science fiction and fantasy imprint of Endeavour, the UK’s leading independent digital publisher. The team are committed to the discovery and rediscovery of immensely talented authors in the SFF genre, and continue to push boundaries in search of great literature.

Check out the work of John Russell Fearn published by Venture Press here on AmazonUK (Affiliate Link)

Check out the work of EC Tubb published by Venture Press here on AmazonUK (Affiliate Link)

• Endeavour Media is online at www.endeavourmedia.co.uk

With thank to Philip Harbottle



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