Flearun

This book is another good example of how Doc Savage transports readers to distant lands in an adventurous, yet educational way. He has an open-eyed view of the world that reveals detailed landscapes and cultures wherever he goes. This book was one of my early favorites, because that dense, unexplored "green hell" scared me to death and started a lifelong fascination with the Amazon region. Whether Doc was cutting his way through a jungle, high flying, lost in the middle of a great desert, sailing a vast ocean, or surviving the arctic, it was rivetting and intelligent explorations. You really felt like you were on location and that Doc was indeed a scientist observing and utilizing his surroundings, not just moving blindly through them.

A superior Doc all around! Great fun! The Green Death coming from a simple form of grass shows how in the Doc universe, adventures can come from anywhere. There's a bit of hedging at the end as to the effects of the Green Death but Doc's use of science to penetrate the mystery as well as brawn are what the series is all about. Two thumbs up for this one!

I think Lester Dent was on a roll when he wrote Fortress of Solitude, The Green Death, and The Devil Genghis. These are three very good adventure novels that still retain some of the aura of the grand adventures of the first two years of the Doc run. I read The Green Death about 30 years ago and all I remember about it (besides liking it) was that Monk's pig comports himself rather well in this adventure.

I never EVER thought I'd put a ghostwritten Doc novel in my personal top ten, but "The Green Death" is that good. Davis hits it out of the park here, with a brisk, engrossing story, and a heart-stopping climax on the railing of a dirigible floating 5,000 feet above the Amazon. As fun today as it was when I first read it in 1974.