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L. Ron Hubbard and his works of fiction  (page 2)

Go to “L. Ron Hubbard and his works of fiction” index



 
Back to Main Index Complete works of fiction in chronological order
The main source used for this list is ‘The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard: A comprehensive bibliography’ (1994). Published works are listed by first publication date (#1-242), followed by unpublished works (#1-98) which are listed by genre. Total listed works of fiction: 340.
There are 5 additional stories listed that were published under the pseudonym of Frederick Engelhardt, but I find no confirmation by any Church of Scientology representatives. The fiction writing communities however appear to have accepted them. (see #137, 139, 140, 150 & 160 in list)
Publication information (only first published) has been included. If published under a pseudonym this is indicated ‘(as ...)’. Further screenplays, separately published poems and nonfiction are not included here.

 
Go back Published works of fiction (1932-50)

# Cover Story title, synopsis, published (pseudonym) Genre Issued
1 Magazine cover Tah
Twelve-year-old Tah dies in battle after an all-night forced march.
(The University Hatchet Monthly Literary Review (George Washington University), Vol. 28, No. 18, Feb. 9 1932: pp. 1-4)
Adventure 1932/Feb
2 Magazine cover Grounded
With his reputation tainted by the inadvertent death of a friend in an air incident, a Royal Air Force lieutenant redeems himself at the cost of his own life. The setting is pre-World War II China.
(The University Hatchet Monthly Literary Review (George Washington University), Vol. 28, No. 25, Apr. 5 1932: pp. 1-4)
Adventure 1932/Apr
3 Magazine cover The God Smiles
The setting is the Wai Cafe in the Chinese city of Tsingtau. Dimi, a hostess, and the man she loves, Alex Konrad, resourcefully contrive to incapacitate the local warlord and escape to Manila.
(The University Hatchet Monthly Literary Review (George Washington University), Vol. 28, No. 33, May 24, 1932)
Adventure 1932/May
4 Magazine cover Submarine
On a 72-hour liberty from his submarine, a young sailor and his girlfriend experience romance, unexpected danger, and ominous separation when he is abruptly recalled to his ship.
(The University Hatchet Monthly Literary Review (George Washington University), Vol. 29, No. 7, Nov. 1, 1932)
Romance 1932/Nov
5 Magazine cover The Green God
A U.S. Navy intelligence officer endures burial alive and ingenious tortures while searching for a missing Green Idol in pre-World War II Tientsin.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 8, No. 3, Feb. 1934: pp. 56-66)
Adventure 1934/Feb
6 Magazine cover Calling Squad Cars!
A police dispatcher suspected of helping a gang of bank robbers, vindicates himself after being dismissed.
(Phantom Detective, Vol. 5, No. 2, Apr. 1934: pp. 92-102)
Mystery/
Detective
1934/Apr
7 Magazine cover Pearl Pirate
A nautical tale of deceit and treachery, set in the pre-World War II Coral Sea, leaves a schooner skipper in possession of two vessels and a box of black pearls.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 9, No. 3, May 1934: pp. 132-146)
Adventure 1934/May
8 Magazine cover Sea Fangs
Bob Sherman, stripped of his Venezuelan oil fields, twice imprisoned by pirates when he takes to the sea in an effort to regain his fields, is helped by a beautiful companion.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 26, No. 3, June 1934: pp. 129-160)
Adventure 1934/Jun
9 Magazine cover Dead Men Kill
Detective Terry Lane, on the trail of a series of murders, fights corpses that carry the scent of moist earth and undertaker perfumes.
(Thrilling Detective, Vol. 11, No. 2, July 1934: pp. 12-52)
Mystery/
Detective
1934/Jul
10 Magazine cover Twenty Fathoms Down
Recovering gold and emeralds proves almost fatally dangerous for diver Hawk Ridley as he contends with a ruthless salvage crew and a girl stowaway.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 27, No. 3, Sept. 1934: pp. 9-37)
Adventure 1934/Sept
11 Magazine cover Mouthpiece
Mat Lawrence returns from building a power dam in the desert to track down the murderer of his gangster father.
(Thrilling Detective, Vol. 12, No. 1, Sept. 1934: pp. 65-73)
Mystery/
Detective
1934/Sept
12 Magazine cover Maybe Because—!  (as Ken Martin)
Two old-time gunfighters, released from prison, steal $10,000, save a woman, and come face-to-face with the truth about themselves.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 26, No. 3, Sept. 1934: pp. 30-38)
Western 1934/Sept
13 Magazine cover Yellow Loot
A search for precious amber ends in a tumultuous race for freedom on the Great Wall of China.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 11, No. 2, Oct. 1934: pp. 137-145)
Adventure 1934/Oct
14 Magazine cover Hurtling Wings
With valuable air mail contracts at stake, a daredevil racing pilot contends with an unscrupulous competitor to win the National Air Meet.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 28, No. 2, Nov. 1934: pp. 8-40)
Adventure 1934/Nov
15 Magazine cover The Carnival of Death
A U.S. treasury agent, in the incognito of a carnival detective, solves a series of bizarre murders and exposes a drug ring.
(Popular Detective, Vol. 1, No. 1, Nov. 1934: pp. 118-144)
Mystery/
Detective
1934/Nov
16 Magazine cover “Tooby”  (as Ken Martin)
A story of competing musical bands, veined with humor, and written in the western parlance Hubbard knew from childhood. The “Tooby” is a tuba.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 26, No. 5, Nov. 1934: pp. 78-85)
Western 1934/Nov
17 Magazine cover The Phantom Patrol
In a tale that combines air and sea themes, a drug runner and murderer almost succeeds in a scheme to disgrace a Coast Guard officer.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 29, No. 1, Jan. 1935: pp. 42-73)
Adventure 1935/Jan
18 Magazine cover The Trail of the Red Diamonds  (as Lt. Jonathan Daly)
A fateful expedition into the depths of China to unearth a fabulous fortune in red diamonds involves a naval lieutenant in a dark maze of espionage, treachery and death.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 12, No. 2, Jan. 1935: pp. 74-91)
Adventure 1935/Jan
19 Magazine cover The Red Dragon
A failed scheme to kidnap “the last emperor” of China, and a set of priceless idols in a mysterious black chest, pose problems and dangers for a red-haired soldier of fortune in occupied China.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 29, No. 2, Feb. 1935: pp. 10-43)
Adventure 1935/Feb
20 Magazine cover Flame City
Fire Chief Blaze Delaney, his job in jeopardy, gets help from his son to stop an epidemic of fires and bring the arsonists to justice.
(Thrilling Detective, Vol. 13, No. 3, Feb. 1935: pp. 81-94)
Mystery/
Detective
1935/Feb
21 Magazine cover Destiny's Drum
Adventurer Phil Sheridan cleverly enlists native head-hunters to help him oust the predatory local regime.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 29, No. 3, Mar. 1935: pp. 124-160)
Adventure 1935/Mar
22 Magazine cover Brass Keys to Murder  (as Michael Keith)
A navy lieutenant, accused of murder, risks his life to find the real killer and discovers the motive: the brass keys.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 30, No. 1, Apr. 1935: pp. 98-127)
Mystery/
Detective
1935/Apr
23 Magazine cover False Cargo
An insurance company investigator combats insurance fraud, organized ship scuttlings, and the apparent death of his best friend to bring criminals to justice.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 30, No. 2, May 1935: pp. 44-71)
Adventure 1935/May
24 Magazine cover The Squad That Never Came Back  (as Legionnaire 148)
Threatened with death, a corporal leads a group of fellow legionnaires to a lost treasure in the Moroccan desert.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 13, No. 3, May 1935: pp. 70-89)
Adventure 1935/May
25 Magazine cover The Drowned City
Two divers fight off a dangerous adversary and find lost treasure in a hidden, undersea tunnel.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 96, No. 5, May 1935: pp. 98-117)
Adventure 1935/May
26 Magazine cover The Cossack
A final confrontation between Colonel Komroff and the woman he had spurned in pre-revolutionary Russia ends in death for both.
(New Mystery Adventures, Vol. 1, No. 3, May-June 1935: pp. 36-46)
Adventure 1935/May-
Jun
27 Magazine cover Man-Killers of the Air
A daredevil pilot wins an international air race, foiling a scheme to sabotage his plane.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 30, No. 3, June 1935: pp. 8-39)
Adventure 1935/Jun
28 Magazine cover Hostage to Death
The Foreign Legion exacts full pay for an officer's mistake by sending him into “Suicide Section”—the Intelligence Service. And so Bill Reilly goes into enemy country as a renegade, a derelict of the Legion.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 31, No. 1, July 1935: pp. 38-67)
Adventure 1935/Jul
29 Magazine cover Hell's Legionnaire  (as Capt. L. Ron Hubbard)
An American deserter from the French Foreign Legion, fleeing undeserved punishment, rescues a young woman from torture.
(New Mystery Adventures, Vol. 1, No. 4, July 1935: pp. 46-54)
Adventure 1935/Jul
30 Magazine cover Plans for the Boy  (as Ken Martin)
The son of a rancher saves his father's spread from a mesa fire set by enemies, and dramatically changes his own future.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 28, No. 1, July 1935: pp. 23-31)
Adventure 1935/Jul
31 Magazine cover The Contraband Crate
In the guise of an army pilot, a U.S. naval intelligence officer contrives to have himself seized by the Japanese, photographs a military installation, and escapes.
(Sky Birds, Vol. 19, No. 1, Aug. 1935: pp. 41-49)
Adventure 1935/Aug
32 Magazine cover Under the Black Ensign
A rousing swashbuckler romance—set in the Caribbean of the 17th century—that blends piracy, British men-of-war, a girl of aristocratic birth disguised as a boy, and an officer unjustly stripped of rank.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 31, No. 2, Aug. 1935: pp. 74-103)
Adventure 1935/Aug
33 Magazine cover Yukon Madness  (as Capt. L. Ron Hubbard)
Though wounded, Mounty Tom McKenna uses a ruse to vanquish the rampaging Itauk the Madman, and then leaves him to the wolves.
(New Mystery Adventures, Vol. 1, No. 5, Aug. 1935: pp. 46-54)
Adventure 1935/Aug
34 Magazine cover The Bad One  (as Ken Martin)
Thousands of pounds of angry bull—called “Old Renegade” with careful affection—comes to the assistance of a beleaguered ranch hand with his back to the wall.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 28, No. 3, Sept. 1935: pp. 37-45)
Western 1935/Sept
35 Magazine cover Buckley Plays a Hunch  (as Bernard Hubbel)
Jim Buckley, looking for members of a lost expedition, finds three madmen on an island in the Pacific.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 3, Sept 1935: pp. 126-138)
Adventure 1935/Sept
36 Magazine cover Medals for Mahoney  (as Ken Martin)
Mahoney and a native medicine man collaborate to thwart a murderous plot to defraud the trading company.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 3, Sept. 1935: pp. 36-45)
Adventure 1935/Sept
37 Magazine cover The Sky Devil
Exhausted, wounded and almost out of gas, an adventuring pilot lands his plane at a Sahara oasis, where he uses his cunning—and gasoline—to outwit a dangerous opponent and marry the local king's daughter.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 3, Sept. 1935: pp. 54-77)
Adventure 1935/Sept
38 Magazine cover He Walked to War
Tired of walking, E. Z. Go transfers from Marine signalman to airplane gunner, only to find himself walking, once again, through the Nicaraguan underbrush.
(Adventure, Vol. 93, No. 5, Oct. 1, 1935: pp. 105-115)
Adventure 1935/Oct
39 Magazine cover Murder Afloat
With killers and thieves free to commit murder and rapine on the S. S. Cubana, an ace government operative sets out with singlehanded boldness to end their reign of terror.
(Star Detective Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 3, Oct. 1935: pp. 42-55)
Mystery/
Detective
1935/Oct
40 Magazine cover Forbidden Gold
A dead man's hatred challenging him to accomplish the apparently impossible, an adventurer-aviator braves the perils of the Yucatan jungle to find a missing gold nugget and inherit a fortune.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 32, No. 1, Oct. 1935: pp. 94-126)
Adventure 1935/Oct
41 Magazine cover Wind-Gone-Mad
Strongly defined tale of a madman's plan to wipe out an entire province in pre-war China and how it is thwarted by the man they call “Feng-Feng”—the Chinese word for hurricane or “Wind-Gone-Mad.”
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 4, Oct. 1935: pp. 20-43)
Adventure 1935/Oct
42 Magazine cover Five Mex for a Million
An outcast in pre-war Peiping (Peking), with a price on his head for murder, Captain Royal Sterling buys a mysterious black chest whose contents surprise and dazzle him.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 5, Nov. 1935: pp. 10-33)
Adventure 1935/Nov
43 Magazine cover The Adventure of “X”  (as Ken Martin)
An ex-U.S. Army lieutenant, now a French Legionnaire, nearly succumbs to a Tuareg ruse, then leads his fellow legionnaires against them.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 97, No. 5, Nov. 1935: pp. 96-115)
Adventure 1935/Nov
44 Magazine cover The Black Sultan
American Eddie Moran saves the life of the true “Sultan of the Black City,” then helps him depose the man—the “Black Sultan”—who has usurped the throne.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 15, No. 3, Nov. 1935: pp. 12-42)
Adventure 1935/Nov
45 Magazine cover Catapult Courage  (as Ken Martin)
Despite repeated attempts to kill him, an airmail pilot flies a secret code to New York, thwarting a plot to blow up the Panama Canal.
(Bill Barnes Air Trails, Vol. 5, No. 2, Nov. 1935: pp. 24-26)
Adventure 1935/Nov
46 Magazine cover The Barbarians
Captain Jack Harvey of the Legion beheads the Berber tribal chief, avenging his comrade's equally violent death, then comes to a new, philosophically clearer view of the nature of war.
(Dime Adventure Magazine, Vol. I, No. 5, Dec. 1935: pp. 38-48)
Adventure 1935/Dec
47 Magazine cover Machine Gun 21,000
Blake loses machine gun number 21,000, then, facing court martial, finds the man who stole it and quells a mutiny.
(Dynamic Adventure, Vol. 1, No. 3, Dec. 1935: pp. 90-100)
Adventure 1935/Dec
48 Magazine cover Trick Soldier
The officer they called the “trick soldier”—long on drill and routine and short on courage—and the recruit who has physically bullied him, meet under fire 10 years later, and reverse their roles.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 98, No. 1, Jan. 1936: pp. 26-38)
Adventure 1936/Jan
49 Magazine cover The Sky-Crasher
Despite his well-earned nickname, Caution Jones finally risks the hazards of a breathtaking around-the-world flight while a rival airline desperately tries to sabotage his every move.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 33, No. 1, Jan. 1936: pp. 68-89)
Adventure 1936/Jan
50 Magazine cover Starch and Stripes
A marine captain ensnares a dangerous rebel leader, and saves his camp and his men from congressional disapproval.
(Dime Adventure Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 6, Jan. 1936: pp. 36-47)
Adventure 1936/Jan
51 Magazine cover Red Sand  (as Kurt von Rachen)
Hubbard deftly blends genres—adventure and mystery/detective—in this tale of the Foreign Legion, a desert ambush, a phantom gunner and an ex-Chicago detective who solves the mystery.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 98, No. 2, Feb. 1936: pp. 107-116)
Adventure 1936/Feb
51b Newspaper article heading Model Gentleman
When Sheila O’Mara tries to use a model gentleman of the theatre to help smooth away her boxer boyfriend's social rough-edges, she discovers to her delight that the gentleman is also a man of unexpectedly decisive action.
(The Pittsburgh Press, Feb. 17, 1936: p 32)
Note: Republished in Legacy Premiere issue, 1992. Los Angeles: Author Services, Inc.: pp. 7-8. See further notices at 237 in list.
Romance 1936/Feb
52 Magazine cover The Price of a Hat
A fur hat with a secret message stitched into its hatband costs the lives of six men in a belated effort to save the lives of Nicholas II, the last Russian Tsar, and his family.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 17, No. 1, Mar. 1936: pp. 63-69)
Adventure 1936/Mar
53 Magazine cover Raiders of the Beam  (as Ken Martin)
An attempt to hijack a commercial airliner “riding the beam” through zero visibility is resourcefully thwarted by the co-pilot.
(Bill Barnes Air Trails, Vol. 5, No. 6, Mar. 1936: pp. 22-24)
Adventure 1936/Mar
54 Magazine cover The Blow Torch Murder
A cleverly devised murder—that appears to have been committed with a blow torch—is solved by a homicide detective.
(Detective Fiction Weekly, Vol. 100, No. 5, Mar. 14, 1936: pp. 117-126)
Mystery/
Detective
1936/Mar
55 Magazine cover Hurricane
Captain Spar, determined to find the man who contrived his imprisonment on Devil's Island, escapes from the infamous penal colony, encounters a hurricane at sea and a forbidden Caribbean castle, and discovers the identity of his betrayer.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 33, No. 3, Mar. 1936: pp. 8-39)
Adventure 1936/Mar
56 Magazine cover Spy Killer
Innocent of the murder and grand larceny that he is charged with, Kurt Boyd alights in Shanghai, where he reluctantly accepts a mission from a traitorous bandit to eliminate a spy. A series of surprising identity changes are pivotal in this tale of Japanese-occupied China.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 34, No. 1, Apr. 1936: pp. 8-37)
Adventure 1936/Apr
57 Magazine cover The Death Flyer
The Death Flyer tears through the blackness, a ghost train with Jim Bellamy aboard, trying to save the life of a girl who died in its wreckage ten years before.
(Mystery Novels Magazine, Vol. 3, No. 5, Apr. 1936: pp. 115-121)
Fantasy 1936/Apr
58 Magazine cover Marriage for Spite  (as Ken Martin)
A rancher, a beautiful neighbor who wants his land, and a preacher incognito, in one of Hubbard's purely romantic stories.
(Romantic Range, Vol. 1, No. 6, Apr. 1936: pp. 107-116)
Romance (Western) 1936/Apr
59 Magazine cover Horse and Horse  (as Ken Martin)
Two cowpokes break broncs, avenge a monetary wrong, and earn the money they need to buy the ranch they want.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 29, No. 5, May 1936: pp. 30-39)
Western 1936/May
60 Magazine cover They Killed Him Dead
Notorious for his case cracker thoroughness, “Careful” Cassidy changes his tactics, arresting five men for committing the same murder before finding the real cause of death.
(Detective Fiction Weekly, Vol. 101, No. 6, May 2, 1936: pp. 116-126)
Mystery/
Detective
1936/May
61 Magazine cover Loot of the Shanung
An American reporter in China, and the heiress daughter of a missing American oil magnate, combine forces to find her father.
(Smashing Novels Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 1, May 1936: pp. 42-70)
Adventure 1936/May
62 Magazine cover Escape for Three
With Berber tribesmen on a rampaging killing spree, a hard-boiled trio of French Legionnaires raid the Berber camp and rescue a captive.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 18, No. 1, June 1936: pp. 95-99)
Adventure 1936/Jun
63 Magazine cover The Mad Dog Murder
An ingenious and cold-blooded plan turns a harmless Pekinese dog into an insidious agent of murder.
(Detective Fiction Weekly, Vol. 102, No. 5, June 6, 1936: pp. 128-137)
Mystery/
Detective
1936/Jun
64 Magazine cover The Grease Spot
The dangerously enterprising owner of a wrecking company finds himself a captive, at gunpoint, and needing help from the men in blue.
(Thrilling Detective, Vol. 19, No. 2, July 1936: pp. 67-76)
Mystery/
Detective
1936/Jul
65 Magazine cover Leaducation  (as Ken Martin)
Two feuding ranchers test their rivalry in a spelling bee and a declamation contest, then join forces against a “wild bunch” of thieves.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 30, No. 1, July 1936: pp. 100-110)
Western 1936/Jul
66 Magazine cover Sleepy McGee  -  (1st in “Hell-Job” series)
Only the laziest civil engineer in the world can build a road through ten miles of rain-soaked jungle!
(Argosy, Vol. 265, No. 5, July 11, 1936: pp. 84-95)
Adventure 1936/Jul
67 Magazine cover Don't Rush Me  -  (2nd in “Hell-Job” series)
The trench he's ordered to dig is never dug—yet Sergeant “Don't Rush Me” Marshall has to defend it from the enemy.
(Argosy, Vol. 265, No. 6, July 18, 1936: pp. 82-95)
Adventure 1936/Jul
68 Magazine cover The Neck Scarf  (as Ken Martin)
The story of a red neckerchief, its infinite utility on the range, and how a cowboy uses it to keep alkali dust out of his mouth, fight off bulls, and find his way out of a maze of thornbushes.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 30, No. 2, Aug. 1936: pp. 114-121)
Western 1936/Aug
69 Magazine cover The Headhunters
In the jungles of the Solomon Islands, an explorer-prospector, and a man who had mistakenly trusted a tough and treacherous renegade in the jungle, encounter head-hunters and the ploys of a desperate enemy.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 35, No. 2, Aug. 1936: pp. 8-37)
Adventure 1936/Aug
70 Magazine cover Sky Birds Dare!
A glider pilot, trying to demonstrate the value of gliders and gliding techniques in war, survives both a competitor's ruthless attempts to destroy him and engine failure in a powered aircraft.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 35, No. 3, Sept. 1936: pp. 44-71)
Adventure 1936/Sept
71 Magazine cover The Baron of Coyote River
A cowpuncher with a price on his head for murder joins forces with a mystery man of the range to bring rustlers to a harsh accounting.
(All Western Magazine, Vol. 18, Whole No. 53, Sept. 1936: pp. 58-79)
Western 1936/Sept
72 Magazine cover The Slickers
The sheriff of Cactus County learns a little about city slickers—and teaches the New York City Police a few elementary things about dealing summarily with criminals.
(Detective Fiction Weekly, Vol. 105, No. 1, Sept. 12, 1936: pp. 36-48)
Mystery/
Detective
1936/Sept
73 Magazine cover Mr. Tidwell, Gunner
With Nelson challenging Napoleon's fleet for dominance of the Mediterranean Sea, ex-schoolmaster Tidwell calculates a grenade's trajectory, sinks a French flagship, and meets the admiral, himself.
(Adventure, Vol. 95, No. 5, Sept. 1936: pp. 97-109)
Adventure 1936/Sept
74 Magazine cover Golden Hell  (as Captain Humbert Reynolds)
Told in the first person by the man who, tortured and shackled, is condemned to work deep within the bowels of a Mongolian mine, then leads a daring escape.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 19, No. 1, Sept. 1936: pp. 40-54)
Adventure 1936/Sept
75 Magazine cover Flaming Arrows
An accused embezzler, while trying to rescue his friend and employer, fights valiantly though he knows that escape can only mean prison.
(Mystery Adventure Magazine, Vol. 4, No. 2, Oct. 1936: pp. 108-123)
Adventure 1936/Oct
76 Magazine cover Tomb of the Ten Thousand Dead  (as Capt. Charles Gordon)
A search for the lost treasures of Baluchistan leads to an ancient tomb, murder, and the obliteration of an entire expedition. Told in the first person by the pilot of the expedition, the only man to escape alive.
(Thrilling Adventures, Vol. 19, No. 2, Oct. 1936: pp. 66-80)
Adventure 1936/Oct
77 Magazine cover Mr. Luck  -  (3rd in “Hell-Job” series)
To build a railroad in South America, “Shoot-the-Works” Kelly needs all the luck he can get. He finds it in a small boy whose singular ability to come up with money to pay the bills remains a mystery until the very end.
(Argosy, Vol. 267, No. 5, Oct. 3, 1936: pp. 58-73)
Adventure 1936/Oct
78 Magazine cover Test Pilot  -  (4th in “Hell-Job” series)
A feckless test pilot, confronted with the ultimate trial of courage, sacrifices his own life to save his younger brother.
(Argosy, Vol. 268, No. 1, Oct. 17, 1936: pp. 86-98)
Adventure 1936/Oct
79 Magazine cover Deep-Sea Diver  -  (5th in “Hell-Job” series)
An unfaithful wife, a treacherous friend and unmerited jealousy bring two salvage divers close to death beneath the sea.
(Argosy, Oct. 24, 1936: pp. 72-82)
Adventure 1936/Oct
80 Magazine cover The Big Cats  -  (6th in “Hell-Job” series)
Two wild animal trainers, vying for top billing in the circus, each comes close to death under the slashing claws of the big cats.
(Argosy, Vol. 268, No. 3, Oct. 31, 1936: pp. 33-45)
Adventure 1936/Oct
81 Magazine cover Black Towers to Danger
Drilling for oil in Venezuela, Murphy encounters murder, a vengeful woman, and the destruction of his rig before he uncovers the truth.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 36, No. 1, Oct. 1936: pp. 8-38)
Adventure 1936/Oct
82 Magazine cover The No-Gun Gunhawk
Forced to change clothes with a masked rider, the son of a dead gunslinger takes up the gun he disavowed, to expose a plot.
(Western Aces, Vol. 7, No. 1, Nov. 1936: pp. 103-127)
Western 1936/Nov
83 Magazine cover Canteens  (as Ken Martin)
A Texas Ranger trails three renegade cowhands pursuing a gold prospector and his daughter into the desert. The true protagonist, Hubbard makes clear, is the desert and water.
(Cowboy Stories, Vol. 30, No. 5, Nov. 1936: pp. 119-127)
Western 1936/Nov
84 Magazine cover River Driver  -  (7th in “Hell-Job” series)
The soft-fingered, banjo-playing son of rough and tough Christopher Plunkett gets a million dollars if he has the nerve to go into one of his father's logging camps and kill John Newcome.
(Argosy, Vol. 268, No. 4, Nov. 7, 1936: pp. 62- 73)
Adventure 1936/Nov
85 Magazine cover The Ethnologist  -  (8th in “Hell-Job” series)
Reading a musty book, or out-witching witch doctors in the midst of a fear-crazed jungle tribe is all in a day's work for a good ethnologist.
(Argosy, Vol. 269, No. 1, Nov. 28, 1936: pp. 112-122)
Adventure 1936/Nov
86 Magazine cover Fifty-Fifty O’Brien
An ex-carnival barker becomes a marine sharpshooter during a guerrilla war in Nicaragua, saves another marine's life, then has the favor returned.
(Top-Notch, Vol. 99, No. 6, Dec. 1936: pp. 42-54)
Adventure 1936/Dec
87 Magazine cover Mine Inspector  -  (9th in “Hell-Job” series)
Delaney is only a “blueprint” miner, who stays above ground, hated for his good clothes, his office, and his education. When he goes into the mine and finds dangerous gas, an encounter with his physically intimidating nemesis ends in a dramatic reversal of roles.
(Argosy, Vol. 269, No. 2, Dec. 5, 1936: pp. 52-63)
Adventure 1936/Dec
88 Magazine cover The Shooter  -  (10th in “Hell-Job” series)
Mike McGraw uses unconventional methods—“drilling” an oil well with high explosives and the unexpected help of his dog, George, to bring in a gusher.
(Argosy, Vol. 269, No. 3, Dec. 12, 1936: pp. 92-104)
Adventure 1936/Dec
89 Magazine cover While Bugles Blow!
Against a horde of fierce men of the desert, and cut off from all help, an American commandant and sixty loyal Legionnaires put up a valiant defense of their post.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 36, No. 3, Dec. 1936: pp. 116-160)
Adventure 1936/Dec
90 Magazine cover Steeplejack  -  (11th in “Hell-Job” series)
The Lanning line of nerveless steeplejacks appears to have ended with young Terry, but the physically unprepossessing youngster proves worthy of his lineage when he tackles a church steeple in a raging storm.
(Argosy, Vol. 270, No. 1, Jan. 9, 1937: pp. 75-87)
Adventure 1937/Jan
91 Magazine cover Flying Trapeze  -  (12th in “Hell-Job” series)
A master of the trapeze, forced to masquerade as a prince, gives the performance of his life and quiets his critics.
(Argosy, Vol. 270, No. 3, Jan. 23, 1937: pp. 104-115)
Adventure 1937/Jan
92 Magazine cover Mountaineer  -  (13th in “Hell-Job” series)
Three mountain climbers assail the highest unscaled peak in the world, but only one achieves the goal; and he makes it to the top only with the help of the others, though it means his own death.
(Argosy, Vol. 270, No. 5, Feb. 6, 1937: pp. 56- 66)
Adventure 1937/Feb
93 Magazine cover The Bold Dare All
A sadistic taskmaster is subdued by an incognito U.S. Army lieutenant who then seeks—and finds—his father's killer.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 37, No. 2, Feb. 1937: pp. 34-61)
Adventure 1937/Feb
94 Magazine cover The Battling Pilot
An airline pilot finds his flight routine disrupted by a princess with a cause when she takes to the air with him. An aerial dog fight with a desperate antagonist, and the discovery that the “princess” is not who she pretends to be, climax the story.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 37, No. 3, Mar. 1937: pp. 90-117)
Adventure 1937/Mar
95 Magazine cover Cattle King for a Day
The real identity of the man who arranged to kill Chinook Shannon's grandfather and is trying to steal his ranch provides an ending with a jolting twist.
(All Western Magazine, Vol. 20, No. 59, Mar. 1937: pp. 8-31)
Western 1937/Mar
96 Magazine cover A Lesson in Lightning  -  (14th in “Hell-Job” series)
Blustering, brave George Potts always wanted a rugged son—but got small, pale, half-blind, stoop-shouldered physicist Horace Purdy Potts instead. Horace proves he is his father's son in the flaming hold of a Caribbean tramp steamer.
(Argosy, Vol. 271, No. 5, Mar. 20, 1937: pp. 30-49)
Adventure 1937/Mar
97 Magazine cover The Crate Killer
After parachuting nine times from airplanes coming apart around him, “Jumper” Bailey faces his tenth—and most challenging—test flight.
(War Birds, Vol. 33, No. 2, June 1937: pp. 48-55)
Adventure 1937/Jun
98 Magazine cover All Frontiers Are Jealous
An American engineer surveying the route of a railway in Africa, saves a girl from the fierce Dinkas, then takes on the tribal chief in a face-to-face encounter.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 38, No. 3, June 1937: pp. 122-160)
Adventure 1937/Jun
99 Magazine cover The Dive Bomber
A famous test pilot clashes with the man who wants to sell planes to a foreign government and will stop at nothing, from sabotage to savage attacks in the air, to destroy his competitor.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 39, No. 1, July 1937: pp. 8-38)
Adventure 1937/Jul
100 Book dustcover Buckskin Brigades
On May 14, 1804, the Corps of Discovery—more familiarly known as the Lewis and Clark Expedition—left St. Louis, Missouri, to explore the newly acquired Louisiana territory: 900,000 square miles of the North American continent purchased by the Jefferson administration from France for 15 million dollars. The famous journal of that expedition records that just after the expedition split briefly into two parts, Lewis first encountered the Blackfeet Indians. Hubbard writes in the Foreword that in a briefly violent encounter on the banks of the Marias River a chief of the Blackfeet is killed. In the same journal, just a few pages earlier, is a reference to an unnamed white man who has been raised by, or is living with, the Blackfeet.
With this historical background as an introduction, Hubbard begins Buckskin Brigades with the death of the chief, and chronicles the daring journey of the blonde white man the Blackfeet call “Yellow Hair”—identified by Hubbard as scout and warrior Michael Kirk—through the rugged, unmapped country that is now Montana, across the Canadian wilderness to the shore of the great Hudson Bay, and back.
The central elements of the plot and conflict include: the Nor’Westers—avaricious fur traders who build their own fortified trading posts and trap indiscriminately and ruthlessly on Indian land; the Hudson's Bay Company, whose territorial dominion is menaced by the traders and whose “brigades” (of the title) build forts to fend off intruders; and the Blackfeet, whose very survival depends—in the face of foreign encroachment, predatory traders, and their own tribal enmities—on the success of Yellow Hair's perilous journey. Told, uniquely, from the Indian point of view, the story is a significant departure from the “another redskin bit the dust” stereotypes of traditional western fiction.
(New York: Macaulay, 1937, cloth, 316p.)
Western 1937/Aug
101 Magazine cover Nine Lives  -  (15th in “Hell-Job” series)
It's a well known fact that a cat in the cockpit is worse than a bee in your britches. So what do you do if your sweetheart gives you a black cat as a mascot?
(Argosy, Vol. 275, No. 3, Aug. 21, 1937: pp. 50-68)
Adventure 1937/Aug
102 Magazine cover Reign of the Gila Monster
When Howdy Johnson relieves the town of its murderous sheriff—called “Gila Monster” because of his formidable size—he loses his life in the exchange of gunfire. Or does he?
(Western Aces, Vol. 9, No. 3, Sept. 1937: pp. 103-126)
Western 1937/Sept
103 Magazine cover Red Death over China
A fighter pilot who espouses no cause worth dying for finds one over war-torn China.
(War Birds, Vol. 34, No. 1, Oct. 1937: pp. 75-81)
Adventure 1937/Oct
104 Magazine cover The Devil—with Wings
A British pilot in black garb and flying an ominous black plane challenges the Japanese in their attempted conquest of China.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 40, No. 2, Nov. 1937: pp. 10-41)
Adventure 1937/Nov
105 Magazine cover Gunman's Tally
Easy Bill and his undeserved reputation as a gunman survive a scheme to kill him and seize his ranch.
(All Western Magazine, Vol. 23, No. 67, Nov. 1937: pp. 10-32)
Western 1937/Nov
106 Magazine cover Cargo of Coffins  -  (16th in “Hell-Jobs” series)
The man who considers murder a pastime—Paco Covino, now a chief steward—and the man he doomed to a penal colony—Lars Martin, now captain of an oceangoing yacht—confront each other at sea.
(Argosy, Vol. 277, No. 3, Nov. 13, 1937: pp. 32-66)
Adventure 1937/Nov
107 Magazine cover Tinhorn's Daughter
A western romance about a girl from the east and her outlawed sweetheart—gallant, red-haired Sunset Maloney—who has sworn to shoot it out with her tinhorn fraud of a father.
(Western Romances, Vol. 27, No. 79, Dec. 1937: pp. 10-30)
Western 1937/Dec
108 Magazine cover Orders Is Orders  -  (17th and last in “Hell-Job” series)
Two marines and a girl dodge bullets on a 200-mile trek through embattled China to bring serum and food to the American consulate, an isolated island of safety in a sea of dead and dying.
(Argosy, Vol. 278, No. 2, Dec. 18, 1937: pp. 48-85)
Adventure 1937/Dec
109 Magazine cover Six-Gun Caballero
Michael Patrick Obañon, who may have an Irish name, but has the soul of a Spanish gentleman, loses his hundred-thousand-acre spread and has to fight his renegade foes with cunning and firepower.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 163, No. 4, Mar. 12, 1938: pp. 6-40)
Western 1938/Mar
110 Magazine cover Under the Die-Hard Brand
The son of the sheriff, disguised in his father's clothes, eliminates the town menace in a gunfight and restores the old sheriffs reputation.
(Western Aces, Vol. 11, No. 1, Mar. 1938: pp. 10-27)
Western 1938/Mar
111 Magazine cover The Toughest Ranger
Scared, exhausted, half-starved young Petey McGuire, a saddle tramp on the run from one beating to another, crying sensitively when a lame horse has to be shot, finally gets angry and becomes the toughest Ranger.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 165, No. 5, June 11, 1938: pp. 40-61)
Western 1938/Jun
112 Magazine cover Arctic Wings
Without compassion, convinced that all suspects are evil, a Canadian Mounty brings harsh justice to the Arctic until he is framed by a false witness, and must clear his name.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 42, No. 3, June 1938: pp. 68-96)
Adventure 1938/Jun
113 Magazine cover Killer Ape
When Joe the orangutan escapes from his owner and is accused of killing a man, Bill flees in terror through the forest, pursued by his erstwhile animal friend. But, friendship triumphs and Bill proves Joe's innocence and his owner's complicity.
(Detective Yarns, Vol. 1, No. 1, June 1938: pp. 35- 44)
Mystery/
Detective
1938/Jun
114 Magazine cover
Magazine cover Magazine cover Magazine cover
Hot Lead Payoff
Tom Noland risks everything he's got—including his neck—to save Rio Camarca from the harsh domination of one man.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine,
Part 1, Vol. 166, No. 1, June 25, 1938: pp. 6-26;
Part 2, Vol. 166, No. 2, July 2, 1938: pp. 40-57;
Part 3, Vol. 166, No. 3, July 9, 1938: pp. 82-100;
Part 4, Vol. 166, No. 4, July 16, 1938: pp. 94-107)
Western 1938/Jun-
Jul
115 Magazine cover King of the Gunmen
Kit Gordon escapes into the desert, only to become embroiled in the conflict between the cattlemen and the sheepherders.
(Western Yarns, Vol. 1, No. 3, July 1938: pp. 6-29)
Western 1938/Jul
116 Magazine cover The Dangerous Dimension
Meek, diffident Dr. Henry Mudge undergoes a striking personality change when he discovers a mathematical equation that defines a negative dimension, enabling him to go anywhere he thinks of—even when he doesn't want to.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 21, No. 5, July 1938: pp. 100-112)
Science Fiction 1938/Jul
117 Magazine cover Ride ’Em, Cowboy!
When a champion bronco-buster and the girl he wants to marry—but constantly quarrels with—compete for the same prize at a rodeo, the results are unexpectedly romantic.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 166, No. 6, July 30, 1938: pp. 114-128)
Romance 1938/Jul
118 Magazine cover The Ghost Town Gun-Ghost
An old cowpoke and a young one—a step ahead of his pursuer—confront outlaws looking for money in a ghost town.
(Western Action, Vol. 4, No. 5, Aug. 1938: pp. 100-114)
Western 1938/Aug
119 Magazine cover When Gilhooly Was in Flower  (as Barry Randolph)
The trouble with Jigsaw, according to Mary Ann, is there is no romance in his soul. But a reading of Ivanhoe, a knightly joust with a bull, and conquest of two local desperadoes prove her wrong.
(Romantic Range, Vol. 6, No. 4, Aug. 1938: pp. 116+)
Romance 1938/Aug
120 Magazine cover Boss of the Lazy B
There's only one kind of justice for a kidnapper and a thief—and the taciturn boss of the Lazy B dispenses it with authority.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 167, No. 6, Sept. 10, 1938: pp. 66-84)
Western 1938/Sept
121 Magazine cover
Magazine cover Magazine cover
The Tramp
A hobo, endowed with phenomenal mental powers after a brain operation to save his life, attempts to seize control of the government of the United States.
(Astounding Science-Fiction,
Part 1, Vol. 22, No. 1, Sept. 1938: pp. 70-86;
Part 2, Vol. 22, No. 2, Oct. 1938: pp. 90-105;
Part 3, Vol. 22, No. 3, Nov. 1938: pp. 46-65)
Science Fiction 1938/Sept-
Nov
122 Magazine cover Come and Get It
An Eastern tenderfoot inherits a huge Wyoming ranch and the mystery of his father's death. He becomes a cook, learns to shoot, and uncovers the real culprit and his own identity.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 168, No. 5, Oct. 15, 1938: pp. 31-43)
Western 1938/Oct
123 Magazine cover Branded Outlaw!  (as Barry Randolph)
Blamed for the rustling of 2,000 head of cattle, almost lynched, and with every man's hand against him, Lee Weston relentlessly searches for his father's killer.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 44, No. 1, Oct. 1938: pp. 127-162)
Western 1938/Oct
124 Magazine cover The Lieutenant Takes the Sky  (aka The Lieutenant Takes the Air)
Sentenced unjustly to five years in a penal colony, Malloy disrupts a planned revolt.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 44, No. 1, Oct. 1938: pp. 8-35)
Adventure 1938/Oct
125 Magazine cover Death Waits at Sundown
A hard-riding, two-fisted Texan isn't depriving the town of Pioneer of its necktie party—he just wants to substitute another victim.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 169, No. 1, Oct. 29, 1938: pp. 46-56)
Western 1938/Oct
126 Magazine cover Silent Pards
A couple of human rattlesnakes have Old Cherokee marked for their hungry fangs, but they overlook his two silent partners—his dog, Hardtack, and Joe the mule.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 169, No. 4, Nov. 19, 1938: pp. 54-61)
Western 1938/Nov
127 Magazine cover Ruin at Rio Piedras
Exile at Rio Piedras portends the worst for Tumbleweed Lowrie—but he captures the rustlers and saves the cattle and the ranch.
(Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine, Vol. 170, No. 3, Dec. 24, 1938: pp. 83-94)
Western 1938/Dec
128 Magazine cover Empty Saddles
Having failed his command, and while awaiting court martial, U.S. cavalry major Lee Stuart deserts, pretends to join the band of outlaws who ambushed his men, helps to foil their attack on the fort, vanquishes their renegade leader and reclaims his reputation.
(Adventure Yarns, Vol. 1, No. 2, Dec. 1938: pp. 26-58)
Western 1938/Dec
129 Magazine cover Trouble on His Wings
Covering a rampaging forest fire, a burning ship, or war in China, it's all in a perilous day's work for ace photographer Johnny Brice—despite the boss's guileful daughter.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 45, No. 1, Jan. 1939: pp. 8-41)
Adventure 1939/Jan
130 Magazine cover Wings over Ethiopia
The only weapon with which Larry Colter can elude pursuit planes and sharpshooters is a movie camera.
(Air Action, Vol. 1, No. 2, Feb. 1939: pp. 77-87)
Adventure 1939/Feb
131 Magazine cover The Ultimate Adventure
A penniless young man, Stevie Jepson, undergoes an experiment by a malign scientist and journeys into a fantastic Arabian Nights land where a beautiful queen and her subjects are asleep, and an evil jinn nearly kills Jepson before he returns to the real world. Sent back by the scientist for jewels, Jepson rescues the queen from a usurper, shares her throne and then deals peremptorily with the scientist when he himself comes searching for the jewels.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 1, No. 2, Apr. 1939: pp. 9-62)
Fantasy 1939/Apr
132 Magazine cover The Falcon Killer
War-torn China is again the setting for this swiftly-paced story of an ace free-lance fighter pilot, the spy he finally eliminates, and the meaning of the mark of a half dragon he bears on his shoulder.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 46, No. 1, Apr. 1939: pp. 6-37)
Adventure 1939/Apr
133 Magazine cover The Hurricane's Roar
Hubbard's second story about the man the Chinese call “Feng-Feng” or “Wind-Gone-Mad”—actually pilot-adventurer Jim Dahlgren—and a conspiracy to incite a provincial war. (See “Wind-Gone-Mad” #41)
(Adventure Novels and Short Stories, Vol. 1, No. 3, Apr. 1939: pp. 10-27)
Adventure 1939/Apr
134 Magazine cover Danger in the Dark
Billy Newman purchases a South Sea island, encounters its terrifying shark-god, Tadamona, and destroys the powerful spirit with brilliant flares of light.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 1, No. 3, May 1939: pp. 59-74)
Fantasy 1939/May
135 Magazine cover Slaves of Sleep
When larcenous Professor Frobish opens businessman Jan Palmer's ancient copper jar, he releases Zongri, an enormous, angrily vengeful jinn who slices the professor in half, and condemns Palmer to eternal wakefulness. Arrested for murder and asleep in his cell, Palmer finds himself suddenly in a nightmare world ruled by the jinn, where he has taken on the identity of Tiger, a buccaneer and rogue. Transported magically between parallel worlds by the ring and seal of Sulayman, Palmer/Tiger vanquishes the jinn in the fantasy world, defeats his corporate enemies in the real world, and, exonerated, marries the girl of his dreams, Alice/Wanna. (Sequel was “Masters of Sleep” #221)
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 1, No. 5, July 1939: pp. 9-78)
Fantasy 1939/Jul
136 Magazine cover The Ghoul
A maladroit bellhop opens a trunk left by a mysterious turbaned guest, but finds it empty. And then the voices begin. . .
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 1, No. 6, Aug. 1939: pp. 9-74)
Fantasy 1939/Aug
137
Magazine cover
General Swamp, C.I.C.  (as Frederick Engelhardt)
-
(Astounding Science-Fiction,
Part 1, Vol. 23, No. 6, Aug. 1939: pp. 41-69;
Part 2, Vol. 24, No. 1, Sept. 1939: pp. 129-164)
—Note: not listed in William J. Widder's “The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard”—
Science Fiction 1939/Aug-
Sept
138 Magazine cover The Ranch That No One Would Buy
When a fearful young man comes to town, and is challenged to a gun fight for cheating by the local bully, the outcome of the six-gun showdown seems sadly predictable. Until the young man's true identity is revealed.
(Western Yarns, Vol. 2, No. 3, Oct. 1939: pp. 37-48)
Western 1939/Oct
139 This Ship Kills!  (as Frederick Engelhardt)
-
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 24, No. 3, Nov. 1939: pp. 107-118)
—Note: not listed in William J. Widder's “The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard”—
Science Fiction 1939/Nov
140   Vanderdecken  (as Frederick Engelhardt)
-
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 2, No. 4, Dec. 1939: pp. 96-111)
—Note: not listed in William J. Widder's “The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard”—
Fantasy 1939/Dec
141 Magazine cover The Professor Was a Thief
After the Empire State Building, Grant's Tomb, a taxi and an apartment building disappear, an elderly newspaper reporter discovers that they are actually being miniaturized by an ordinary cigarette lighter that has been transformed into an atomic accelerator.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 24, No. 6, Feb. 1940: pp. 130-156)
Science Fiction 1940/Feb
142 Magazine cover The Small Boss of Nunaloha
A man short in stature but large in courage, beaten by a brutal South Seas pirate, finally defies and vanquishes him.
(South Sea Stories, Vol. 1, No. 2, Feb. 1940: pp. 98+)
Adventure 1940/Feb
143 Magazine cover If I Were You
A circus midget named Little Tom Little learns from a set of ancient books on black magic how to switch bodies. But when he exchanges bodies with the lion tamer and finds himself suddenly face to face with the big cats, he discovers—almost too late—that having someone else's body and clothes is not the same as having their attributes of courage or ability.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 50, No. 2, Feb. 1940: pp. 34-59)
Adventure 1940/Feb
144 Magazine cover Death's Deputy
When people mysteriously begin to die around Clayton McLean, he knows that their deaths are inexplicably linked to him.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 2, No. 6, Feb. 1940: pp. 9-162)
Fantasy 1940/Feb
145 Magazine cover The Indigestible Triton  (as René Lafayette)
Bill Grayson, on a brief fishing trip, hooks a formidable fish that turns out to be Trigon, the Triton, great-grandson to Neptune, ruler of the sea. Triton enters Bill's body, shares a sanitarium cell with him and escapes into the sea with Bill who is now able to breathe under water and communicate with the fish. At Neptune's palace, Bill threatens to use his hypnotic powers, and is permitted to go ashore with a wealth of treasure.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 3, No. 2, Apr. 1940: pp. 9-80)
Fantasy 1940/Apr
146 Magazine cover
Magazine cover
Magazine cover
Final Blackout
In a Europe ravaged by 30 years of incessant war, devastating plague, and a blight of crop-devouring insects, small bands of soldiers are left to wander over the desolate face of the Continent. One such group of survivors is led by a man of extraordinary courage, resourcefulness, and personal magnetism—identified in the novel only as the Lieutenant. Ordered to surrender his command, he subdues his headquarters garrison, then augments his troop and heads for England. There, he attacks the Tower of London and seizes the shattered remnants of government in a chaotic country. Two years later, with England's productivity and internal unity restored, he defies the interference of a decadent but powerful United States by killing the men appointed to replace him—at the sacrifice of his own life. His act of ultimate valor preserves the essential integrity of both command and government—and the symbol of these verities, the Lieutenant's Flag of Command, continues to fly above the Byward Gate on Tower Hill. In the elegiac final words of the novel:
“That flag still flies, and on the plaque below are graven the words: ‘When that command remains, no matter what happens to its officer, he has not failed.’”
(Astounding Science-Fiction,
Part 1, Vol. 25, No. 2, Apr. 1940: pp. 9-37;
Part 2, Vol. 25, No. 3, May 1940: pp. 121-147;
Part 3, Vol. 25, No. 4, June 1940: pp. 113-151)
Science Fiction 1940/Apr-
Jun
147 Magazine cover On Blazing Wings
David Duane, artist, adventurer and air ace learns his destiny in a mystery-shrouded city of golden minarets. Then, during an aerial dogfight, he decisively—and heroically—changes that destiny by flying headlong into a bomb-filled enemy aircraft.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 51, No. 2, May 1940: pp. 60-91)
Adventure 1940/May
148 Magazine cover Shadows from Boothill
A hired gunman acquires two sinister shadows, then loses them—and his own—in a final gunfight.
(Wild West Weekly, Vol. 137, No. 3, June 1, 1940: pp. 55-72)
Western 1940/Jun
149 Magazine cover Inky Odds
The best newspaper correspondent in China and an ambitious new correspondent, who beats him to the “scoop,” cross paths in the war-ravaged country.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 51, No. 3, June 1940: pp. 126-159)
Adventure 1940/Jun
150 The Kraken  (as Frederick Engelhardt)
-
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 3, No. 4, June 1940: pp. 82-96)
—Note: not listed in William J. Widder's “The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard”—
Fantasy 1940/Jun
151 Magazine cover The Iron Duke
Blackie Lee's outrageous impersonation of the drunken Archduke of Aldoria—with the secret collaboration of the prime minister—leads to unexpected political and personal consequences.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol.52, No. l, July 1940: pp. 116-145)
Adventure 1940/Jul
152 Magazine cover Fear
James Lowry, professor of ethnology at Atwater College, having publicly denied the existence of demons and devils, unexpectedly finds himself outside the house of an academic colleague. It is a quarter of three in the afternoon of a bright spring day, brushed with ominous gusts of a cold, dark wind. Then, suddenly it is a quarter of seven in the evening. Professor Lowry has lost four hours of his life, and his hat, and has begun a descent into a macabre world of night without day; of strange figures out of time; of “hats and bats and cats,” of graves and murder in cold blood.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 3, No. 5, July 1940: pp. 9-84)
Fantasy 1940/Jul
153 Magazine cover The Idealist  (as Kurt von Rachen) (1st in “ Kilkenny Cats” series)
The year is 2893, and the world is ruled by the despot Fagar the Deliverer, who is determined to obliterate his opposition. But the captive legal system decides, virtually as a joke, to send the two principal dissident groups—the scientists and the longshoremen—to colonize the planet Sereon, confident the rival groups will destroy each other. Along with them go the dissident “Idealist” Colonel Stephen Galbraith and the rebellious Vicky Stalton. Galbraith determines during the trip to Sereon to overthrow Fagar.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 25, No. 5, July 1940: pp. 94-107)
Science Fiction 1940/Jul
154 Magazine cover Sabotage in the Sky
None of the fighter planes test pilot Bill Trevillian flies are hotter than the BCA 41 pursuit ship, so he takes it up. But someone has deliberately rigged it for failure and destruction—and for Trevillian's death.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 52, No. 2, Aug. 1940: pp. 6-34)
Adventure 1940/Aug
155 Magazine cover The Kilkenny Cats  (as Kurt von Rachen) (2nd in “Kilkenny Cats” series)
A sequel to “The Idealist” (#149): two rival groups—scientists and longshoremen—that have been exiled together on the planet Sereon discover that Fagar's plan to help them to destroy each other includes an unequal distribution of supplies. One has food, the other, water and weapons. But “Idealist” Steve Gailbraith and his rebel companion, Vicki, unite the warring groups to face a common enemy: ravenous wolves.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 26, No. 1, Sept. 1940: pp. 98-116)
Science Fiction 1940/Sept
156 Magazine cover The Devil's Rescue
When the crew of a spectral old clipper ship rescues Lanson from his drifting lifeboat, he discovers that they are faceless—except for the captain. When a special guest, the Dark One, appears, as he does every seven years, the captain—seeking release from endless wandering—plays a game of dice with the visitor and loses, once again. Lanson then plays and wins and is instantly plunged back into the sea—but finds his lifeboat.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 4, No. 2, Oct. 1940: pp. 99-113)
Fantasy 1940/Oct
157 Magazine cover One Was Stubborn  (as René Lafayette)
When an old man discovers that the world keeps disappearing around him, he checks first with his eye doctor, then with an enigmatic man named George Smiley. Finally, he realizes that things vanish as soon as he stops thinking about them. When he finds someone else with the same ability, they collaboratively begin to reassemble the world as we know it.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 26, No. 3, Nov. 1940: pp. 82-95)
Fantasy 1940/Nov
158 Magazine cover
Magazine cover
Typewriter in the Sky
A piano player suddenly finds himself part of an adventure novel being written by his friend Horace Hackett. Not only is he in the novel, but he is the villain and destined to die. Frustrated by his boredom when Horace ignores him to concentrate on other characters in the novel, and trapped by Horace's poorly researched plot and characterization, the piano player alternates between enjoying the drama and wanting to murder Horace. As the story proceeds he becomes more and more concerned about his imminent death.
(Street & Smith's Unknown,
Part 1, Vol. 4, No. 3, Nov. 1940: pp. 9-67;
Part 2, Vol. 4, No. 4, Dec. 1940: pp. 127-162)
Fantasy 1940/Nov-
Dec
159 Magazine cover The Traitor  (as Kurt von Rachen) (3rd in “Kilkenny Cats” series)
The feuding exiles on Sereon, scientists and longshoremen, are beset by a green plague. A spacecraft, the Fury, is readied for an escape from the inhospitable planet. And once more, “Idealist” Steve Gailbraith, still intent on toppling Fagar the Deliverer, placates the rival factions.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 26, No. 5, Jan. 1941: pp. 74-89)
Science Fiction 1941/Jan
160 History Class, 2133 A.D.  (as Frederick Engelhardt)
-
(Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 19, No. 1, Jan. 1941: pp. 111-115)
—Note: not listed in William J. Widder's “The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard”—
Science Fiction 1941/Jan
161 Magazine cover The Crossroads
Farmer Eben Morse sets out to sell his crops in the big city, but encounters a strange crossroads in time. He follows each of the roads to its destination—each a different culture—and having scattered havoc in all of them, wearily sets off for home.
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 4, No.5, Feb. 1941: pp. 71-86)
Fantasy 1941/Feb
162 Magazine cover The Mutineers  (as Kurt von Rachen) (4th in “Kilkenny Cats” series)
The chief scientist seizes the Fury and heads for the planet New Terre. The “Idealist” Steve Gailbraith wrests control from him, lands and is confronted by a race of giants. They submit when Gailbraith intimidates them with the illusion of a massive armed force in space.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 27, No. 2, Apr. 1941: pp. 127-154)
Science Fiction 1941/Apr
163 Magazine cover The Case of the Friendly Corpse
A young college student who switches places with a mighty wizard, is inducted into the Order of Necromancers. When he dispenses to a dead sultan a “revivification potion” that has been accidentally mixed with the potion for making friends, he has on his hands a “friendly corpse.”
(Street & Smith's Unknown, Vol. 5, No. 2, Aug. 1941: pp. 9-80)
Fantasy 1941/Aug
164 Magazine cover Borrowed Glory
For a single glimmering day of youth and infinite promise, and the settlement of a small dispute about truth among the immortals, a life—or two—may be a satisfactory price to pay.
(Street & Smith's Unknown Worlds, Vol. 5, No. 3, Oct. 1941: pp. 85-91)
Fantasy 1941/Oct
165 Magazine cover The Last Drop  (with L. Sprague de Camp)
A special elixir from Borneo that grows or shrinks you reduces a bartender and a mobster to combat in miniature.
(Astonishing Stories, Vol. 3, No. 2, Nov., 1941: pp. 87-95)
Science Fiction 1941/Nov
166 Magazine cover The Invaders  (aka Behind the Black Nebula)
Far in the future, criminals are condemned to the Crystal Mines of the Black Nebula. When the mines are assaulted by a legion of monstrous forms, a science corps technician makes a monumental discovery: the nebula is a warp in space, and the mines are inside the macrocosmic viscera of a worm.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 28, No. 5, Jan. 1942: pp. 62-75)
Science Fiction 1942/Jan
167 Magazine cover He Didn't Like Cats
The small man has one large aversion—cats. A mousy little fellow ordinarily, he insensitively sends one large and ownerless alley cat to its fate under the wheels of a passing car. The cat, however, comes back in the form of an endlessly recurring nightmare.
(Street & Smith's Unknown Worlds, Vol. 5, No. 5, Feb. 1942: pp. 83-90)
Fantasy 1942/Feb
168 Magazine cover The Rebels  (as Kurt von Rachen) (5th and last in “Kilkenny Cats” series)
When Steve Gailbraith begins faltering in his resolve to overthrow Fagar the Deliverer, the head of the longshoremen's faction conspires with the dictator to send a fleet to conquer New Terre and dispose of the “Idealist.” Gailbraith substitutes a potent intoxicant for the flagship's water supply, seizes the spacecraft, disables the rest of the Earth's ships, then takes off with his crew to deal finally with Fagar.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 28, No. 6, Feb. 1942: pp. 49-61)
Science Fiction 1942/Mar
169 Magazine cover Strain
Two Earth intelligence officers, shot down by Saturnians, are subjected unsuccessfully to brutal interrogation.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 29, No. 2, Apr. 1942: pp. 72-77)
Science Fiction 1942/Apr
170 Magazine cover The Room
The country doctor's room is his private den—a den filled with strange souvenirs with even stranger properties. The bottle of excellent liquor, for instance. It pours but it never empties. And one day the doctor's son opens the door to find a land with camels and a green sea.
(Street & Smith's Unknown Worlds, Vol. 5, No. 6, Apr. 1942: pp. 93-99)
Fantasy 1942/Apr
171 Magazine cover The Slaver
Captured by space slave traders, befriended by a slave girl, Kree Lorin outwits his captors, frees the girl, and regains his spaceship.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 29, No. 4, June 1942: pp. 31-38)
Science Fiction 1942/Jun
172 Magazine cover Space Can
If your ship is riddled with holes, on fire, unable to maneuver, and is an obvious hopeless wreck in the midst of a space battle, there's only one way out: take over the heavier enemy ship.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 29, No. 5, July 1942: pp. 71-77)
Science Fiction 1942/Jul
173 Magazine cover The Beast
In the jungles of Venus, the mysterious Beast has to be killed—not only because it has murdered, but because it has stolen something Ginger Cranston can't live without—an intangible, absolutely necessary thing: Cranston's courage.
(Astounding Science-Fiction, Vol. 30, No. 2, Oct. 1942: pp. 100-107)
Science Fiction 1942/Oct
174 Magazine cover The Great Secret
Under the searing rays of the world's double sun, Fanner Marston, wracked with thirst and exhaustion, pushes on toward his goal. Parva, city of the erstwhile master race of the universe, is here; and here Marston will find the secret which can make him lord of creation, ruler of the very stars.
(Science Fiction Stories, Vol. 3, No. 4, Apr. 1943: pp. 81-85)
Science Fiction 1943/Apr
175 Magazine cover The Chee-Chalker
The heiress to a bankrupt halibut fishing fleet, a missing government man, an FBI agent and a string of corpses which are dismissed as “accidental drownings,” lead to a murderous heroin smuggling ring.
(Five Novels Monthly, Vol. 65, No. 15, July-Aug. 1947: pp. 84-113)
Mystery/
Detective
1947/Jul-
Aug
176 Magazine cover
Magazine cover M agazine cover
The End Is Not Yet
In a dangerous post-atomic world, a conspiracy to provoke a nuclear war between the superpowers is opposed, and ultimately defeated, by a coalition of nuclear scientists led by Charles Martel and his closest allies, his own son, and Le Chat a Faim (The Cat Is Hungry), the writer and adventurer who tells the story.
(Astounding Science Fiction,
Part 1, Vol. 39, No. 6, Aug. 1947: pp. 6-55;
Part 2, Vol. 40, No. 1, Sept. 1947: pp. 110-162;
Part 3, Vol. 40, No. 2, Oct. 1947: pp. 107-162)
Science Fiction 1947/Aug-
Oct
177 Magazine cover Killer's Law
A straight-shooting Nevada sheriff mysteriously finds badlands in the middle of Washington, D.C.—when a senator is killed and the sheriff is accused of his murder.
(New Detective Magazine, Vol. 10, No. 3, Sept. 1947: pp. 96+)
Mystery/
Detective
1947/Sept
178 Magazine cover Ole Doc Methuselah  (as René Lafayette) (1st in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
Ole Doc Methuselah is one of 600 elite, Soldier of Light Immortals, who have dedicated themselves to the preservation of mankind, combatting disease, corruption, and desperate perversities of human behavior along the inter-galactic spaceways. With his devoted companion, the four-armed, one-meter-high, gypsum-eating, book-reading Hippocrates, Doc lands on the planet Spico, initially to do some fishing. But instead—ignoring the codes of authority under which he operates—Doc finds himself administering summary justice to a man who has heartlessly swindled the inhabitants of the city. When a girl discovers that Ole Doc is 700 years old, her infatuation with him ends abruptly, and Doc and Hippocrates decamp for a new destination.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 40, No. 2, Oct. 1947: pp. 6-38)
Science Fiction 1947/Oct
179 Magazine cover The Expensive Slaves  (as René Lafayette) (2nd in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
When Ole Doc Methuselah and his assistant, Hippocrates, receive a message that the population of Dorab is being destroyed by a mysterious disease, they land on the planet. Doc discovers that George Arlington, an empire builder, has brought 900 workers from the planet Sirius 68, and their arrival heralded the onset of the fatal disease. He discovers that at their biannual festivals, the Sirians feast on a substance called Kufra, and sickness is unknown among them. Doc examines the tissues of the Dorab dead, then tells the empire builder they must send the Kufra eaters back to their home planet. Arlington at first resists—but faced with planetary quarantine, he relents. The inhabitants of Dorab are dying of cancer, induced by radiation from the Kufra eaters. Kufra, Doc reveals, is plutonium.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 40, No. 3, Nov. 1947: pp. 63-75)
Science Fiction 1947/Nov
180 Magazine cover Her Majesty's Aberration  (as René Lafayette) (3rd in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
When Ole Doc Methuselah lands on the planet Dorcon, he finds murderously hostile inhabitants, a mad queen with a face disfigured by an assassin's bomb, and her deposed tubercular son—the true king—and his wife and child imprisoned in the palace dungeon. Ole Doc restores the old queen's beauty and sanity, and puts the son back on his rightful throne.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 50, No. 1, Mar. 1948: pp. 126-140)
Science Fiction 1948/Mar
181 Magazine cover The Obsolete Weapon
An American soldier in modern Rome finds himself jailed for desertion after an “obsolete” fountain pen-like device that alters time transports him back to the Rome of Nero as a gladiator in the Colosseum.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 41, No. 3, May 1948, pp. 48-63)
Science Fiction 1948/May
182 Magazine cover The Magic Quirt
When a ranch cook saves an Aztec family from bandits, they give him a silver quirt with magical properties that enable him to perform extraordinary deeds of courage. It's only later—after his heroics—that he discovers the quirt is just a souvenir, worth $2.50.
(The Rio Kid Western, Vol. 16, No. 3, June 1948: pp. 68-78. Canada)
Western 1948/Jun
183 Magazine cover When Shadows Fall  -  (1st in “Conquest of Space” series)
Far in the future, the earth faces the prospects of slow environmental death, or more immediate destruction from the fleets of the myriad colonial civilizations spawned by Earth among the galaxies. Three missions are dispatched to solicit help for the home planet from these new worlds; two out of the three missions return with grimly pessimistic reports. But when the colonial fleets do land, they come with a braver purpose:
“So we have come here, these combined forces, to make the land green again, to replace the oceans, to rebuild the atmosphere, to make the rivers run, to put fish in the streams, and game in the hills.”
(Startling Stories, Vol. 17, No. 3, July 1948: pp. 83-92)
Science Fiction 1948/Jul
184 Magazine cover The Great Air Monopoly  (as René Lafayette) (4th in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
Ole Doc Methuselah and his companion, Hippocrates, discover that a man named Tolliver has monopolized the air on the planet Arphon, taxing the inhabitants tyrannically for making the air breathable. The Soldier of Light uncovers the truth—an atmosphere contaminated with ragweed—and exposes Tolliver's scheme to control the planet.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 42, No. 1, Sept. 1948: pp. 71-99)
Science Fiction 1948/Sept
185 Magazine cover 240,000 Miles Straight Up
A renegade Russian general seizes the moon—“240,000 miles straight up”—for a potential military base, menacing the United States. First Lieutenant Cannon Gray, in defiance of presidential directives, successfully thwarts the general's plot and defeats him in a final battle.
(Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 33, No. 2, Dec. 1948: pp. 42-57)
Science Fiction 1948/Dec
186 Magazine cover Stacked Bullets
Charley Montgomery has the only land around with water on it. When he sells it for needed cash only to lose the money in a fixed poker game and the new owners start charging the other ranchers for water, Charley takes appropriate steps to rectify the situation in a shootout, and to recover his lost poke.
(Famous Western, Vol.9, No. 6, Dec. 1948: pp. 30-39)
Western 1948/Dec
187 Magazine cover Forbidden Voyage  (as René Lafayette) (2nd in “Conquest of Space” series)
George Carlyle knows how to get to the moon—but conscientious folk in authority do their best to prevent him. When he does make it there and back, his feat goes unheralded.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 18, No. 3, Jan. 1949: pp. 142-150)
Science Fiction 1949/Jan
188 Magazine cover Gunman!
With three days left to save his badge, the marshal of Deadlight cleverly prevents the bank from being robbed.
(Famous Western, Vol. 10, No. 1, Feb. 1949: pp. 8-28)
Western 1949/Feb
189 Magazine cover The Magnificent Failure  (as René Lafayette) (3rd in “Conquest of Space” series)
Jonathan Bates, the legendary “Father of Exploration,” reaches the moon, discovers George Carlyle has preceded him, then takes off for Mars and Venus and successfully returns. When subsequent spaceflights end disastrously, Bates builds a bigger ship, takes on a little boy and his dog as companion voyagers, and leaves Earth, never to return.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 19, No. 1, Mar. 1949: pp. 104-114)
Science Fiction 1949/Mar
190 Magazine cover The Gunner from Gehenna
The renegade “Gunner” returns, steals the miners’ gold and vanishes into the desert with the deputy sheriff in angry pursuit.
(Giant Western, Vol. 3, No. 2, Apr. 1949: pp. 149-159)
Western 1949/Apr
191 Magazine cover Plague!  (as René Lafayette) (5th in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
A spaceship, with an epidemic aboard, is ordered back into space, and ultimately lands on the third habitable planet of Sirius, communicating the “plague” to the local inhabitants. Ole Doc Methuselah saves the ship and its environs from being destroyed, and identifies the “plague” as an ancient—but totally unfamiliar—disease: measles.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 43, No. 2, Apr. 1949: pp. 6-33)
Science Fiction 1949/Apr
192 Magazine cover Gun Boss of Tumbleweed
Forced to act as a gunhawk for the man he hates bitterly, Mart Kincaid brings matters to a fiery Colt showdown.
(Thrilling Western, Vol. 59, No. 1, Apr. 1949: pp. 13-34)
Western 1949/Apr
193 Magazine cover The Conroy Diary  (as René Lafayette)
Mallory Fitz explores new worlds to open up the universe for mankind. When he writes a book about his travels, which becomes an instant bestseller, he's hit with a fraud case—and a gigantic tax bill!
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 43, No. 3, May 1949: pp. 134-143)
Science Fiction 1949/May
194 Magazine cover The Incredible Destination  (as René Lafayette) (4th in “Conquest of Space” series)
James Dolan, using a magnetic space drive, reaches a distant solar system, returns to Earth with proof in the form of photos—unfortunately damaged—and mineral samples that are dismissed as laughable. Though his claims are discredited, Dolan in fact finds a way to the distant stars long before mankind begins to make the same journey.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 19, No. 2, May 1949: pp. 96-115)
Science Fiction 1949/May
195 Magazine cover Battle of Wizards
The Mineralogy Service wants to mine the fuel catalyst crystals on Deltoid, but the primitive natives object. With the issue to be resolved in a battle of magic between resourceful civil officer Angus McBane and the natives’ great wizard, McBane resorts—with mystifying success—to a ruse of robotry.
(Fantasy Book, Vol. 1, No. 5, 1949: pp. 4-13)
Fantasy 1949/May
196 Magazine cover A Sound Investment  (as René Lafayette) (6th in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
The Soldier of Light summarily fires Hippocrates for carelessness, discovers a plot to destroy all life in the Fomalton planetary system, the man behind the plot, and a subsonic weapon that kills by inducing lethally paralyzing fear. Ole Doc Methuselah reduces the plotter to pulpy helplessness in a fistfight, and takes Hippocrates back.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 43, No. 4, June 1949: pp. 36-57)
Science Fiction 1949/Jun
197 Magazine cover The Unwilling Hero  (as René Lafayette) (5th in “Conquest of Space” series)
It's not hunger for personal glory or adventure that propels Vic Hardin into the far reaches of outer space on a daring rescue mission: he's been ordered out there by his editor.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 19, No. 3, July 1949: pp. 98-124)
Science Fiction 1949/Jul
198 Magazine cover Johnny, the Town Tamer
Texas Johnny frustrates an attempt to kill him, and runs off the man who tried to do it.
(Famous Western, Vol. 10, No. 4, Aug. 1949: pp. 39+)
Western 1949/Aug
199 Magazine cover A Matter of Matter
There have been small-time real estate swindlers, but in a galactic economy, the man who sells planets does it on a stupendous scale: like selling the unwary customer a planet he can't even sit down on. It's all a matter of negative matter.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 43, No. 6, Aug. 1949: pp. 59-72)
Science Fiction 1949/Aug
200 Magazine cover Beyond the Black Nebula  -  (6th in “Conquest of Space” series)
Writer Anthony Twain—accused of being a charlatan—can restore his reputation only by going where no man has gone before: through the forbidding Coal Sack in space.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 20, No. 1, Sept. 1949: pp. 126-136)
Science Fiction 1949/Sept
201 Magazine cover Guns of Mark Jardine
Young Mark Jardine returns to the Arizona Territory to avenge the torture and death of his close friend, a landowner ambushed after striking gold. Faced with the task of single-handedly tracking down the unknown killers—and protecting the life of the landowner's beautiful daughter—Jardine sets out on a lone, perilous course of retributive justice.
(Western Action, Vol. 13, No. 6, Sept. 1949: pp. 6-65)
Western 1949/Sept
202 Magazine cover Blood on His Spurs
Two old antagonists—Bates and McLean—bury their feud long enough to save McLean's son and wipe out a band of rustlers.
(Thrilling Western, Vol. 60, No. 3, Sept. 1949: pp. 32-42)
Western 1949/Sept
203 Magazine cover The Automagic Horse
“Gadget” O’Dowd builds an “automagic” mechanical facsimile of the great racehorse Man-of-War for a movie, finally races it—and wins—at Santa Anita, then equips it with an anti-gravity device: all to deceive a beautiful accountant and conceal the secret building of a spaceship.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 44, No. 2, Oct. 1949: pp. 75-111)
Science Fiction 1949/Oct
204 Magazine cover The Planet Makers
Sleepy McGee isn't too accomplished as a poker player—but he has an ace in the hole for building new planets.
(Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 35, No. 1, Oct. 1949: pp. 123-128)
Science Fiction 1949/Oct
205 Magazine cover The Emperor of the Universe  (as René Lafayette) (7th in “Conquest of Space” series)
When Erskine encounters “The Emperor of the Universe,” again, the old man is dead, lying within yards of his disreputable old spacecraft and its extraordinary cargo—the seeds the “Emperor” has been sowing among the barren planets in preparation for man's coming among the distant stars.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 20, No. 2, Nov. 1949: pp. 132-141)
Science Fiction 1949/Nov
206 Magazine cover Man for Breakfast  (as Winchester Remington Colt)
Being robbed, almost hung, dry-gulched and wounded, is all in a day's work for young Johnny Purcell.
(Texas Rangers, Vol. 36, No. 3, Nov. 1949: pp. 76-82)
Western 1949/Nov
207 Magazine cover Stranger in Town
New in Dry Creek himself, Zeke Tomlin knows someone will ride in one day, looking for him. When the corrupt marshal arrives in pursuit, Zeke must deal with him and the town.
(Famous Western, Vol. 10, No. 6, Dec. 1949: pp. 46-54)
Western 1949/Dec
208 Magazine cover A Can of Vacuum
A cosmic practical joke backfires when Bigby Pettigrew actually brings back the “rudey rays” he was sent out to get—as a joke.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 44, No. 4, Dec. 1949: pp. 81-92)
Science Fiction 1949/Dec
209 Magazine cover Ole Mother Methuselah  (as René Lafayette) (7th and last in “Ole Doc Methuselah” series)
It's one thing when lions are bred on planet Gorgon as an environmental measure to deal with the feral cat beast population, but when a shipment of human embryos mysteriously finds its way into the lion breeding vats, the result is a race of beings with superhuman strength and powers. Ole Doc Methuselah discovers the alien origin of the embryos, then induces an allergy in the superbeings that changes their cell structure and their behavior.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 44, No. 5, Jan. 1950: pp. 80-104)
Science Fiction 1950/Jan
210 Magazine cover Hoss Tamer
An ex-circus horse trainer foils the Gopher Hole Gang's attempt to rob the Wells Fargo train by whistling at their horses.
(Thrilling Western, Vol. 66, No. 3, Jan. 1950: pp. 109-116)
Western 1950/Jan
211 Magazine cover Beyond All Weapons
When fugitive colonists return to Earth from the stars to administer retributive justice to those who had driven them into exile, they find man's most pitiless enemy, time itself, has done their work for them.
(Super Science Stories, Vol. 6, No. 2, Jan. 1950: pp. 70-80)
Science Fiction 1950/Jan
212 Magazine cover The Last Admiral  (as René Lafayette) (8th in “Conquest of Space” series)
The Admiral saves the Navy from extinction by intercepting a powerful pirate space vessel—at the sacrifice of his own life.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 20, No. 3, Jan. 1950: pp. 112-125)
Science Fiction 1950/Jan
213 Magazine cover
Magazine cover
To the Stars  (aka Return to Tomorrow)
They are the outcasts of time—space voyagers among the distant stars, rootless exiles from a world they left that has aged and passed away even as they remain young. Alan Conroy seeks understanding of his mission in life, in a world—unfamiliar, inhospitable—altered by the relative passage of time; at the end, he is the new commander of the symbolically named starship Hound of Heaven.
(Astounding Science Fiction,
Part 1, Vol. 44, No. 6, Feb. 1950: pp. 5-45;
Part 2, Vol. 45, No. 1, Mar. 1950: pp. 78-123)
Science Fiction 1950/Feb-
Mar
214 Magazine cover Devil's Manhunt
Jumped by a pair of bandits, Tim Beckdolt is forced to work his claim at gun-point, knowing when his work is done, his reward will be a bullet.
(Famous Western, Vol. 11, No. 1, Feb. 1950: pp. 8-23)
Western 1950/Feb
215 Magazine cover The Kingslayer
A brilliant young engineer is kidnapped by a member of a revolutionary group, told of the existence of “The Arbiter,” the person responsible for all the world's evil, and sent on a mission to find and destroy him. Discovery of the true identity of the Arbiter, and of the real purpose of the engineer's mission—and destiny—provides an ending of startling dimensions.
(Two Complete Science-Adventure Books, No. 1, Winter 1950: pp. 102-144)
Science Fiction 1950/
Winter
216 Magazine cover Greed
Far in the future, two Earth empires—separated physically by a weapon-projected “wall of space”—are poised for war. A space-navy lieutenant becomes a space raider, turns the weapon against the evil empire and destroys it.
(Astounding Science Fiction, Vol. 45, No. 2, Apr. 1950: pp. 53-68)
Science Fiction 1950/Apr
217 Magazine cover The No-Gun Man
Monte Calhoun returns to Superstition, uncovers his father's killer, survives a murderous assault, and brings the guilty man and his three sons to stern justice.
(Thrilling Western. Vol. 62, No. 2, May 1950: pp. 11-38)
Western 1950/May
218 Magazine cover Vengeance Is Mine!
Whitney administers harsh vengeance, only to find, with cruel irony, that he has killed unjustly.
(Real Western Stories, Vol. 16, No. 1, June 1950: pp. 34-44)
Western 1950/Jun
219 Magazine cover Battling Bolto
When a strong man pretends to be a robot named Battling Bolto to sell fake robots, and discovers his “boss” is a robot pretending to be human, it touches off a series of curious events, including a prison stint in the mines for Battling Bolto.
(Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 36, No. 3, Aug. 1950: pp. 84-92)
Science Fiction 1950/Aug
220 Magazine cover Final Enemy
The threat of the mysterious invaders that have wiped out millions of people on two planets unites the nations of Earth and spurs collective space exploration. The invaders, paradoxically, prove to be from Earth, itself.
(Super Science Stories, Vol. 7, No. 2, Sept. 1950: pp. 119-126)
Science Fiction 1950/Sept
221 Magazine cover The Masters of Sleep
An older Jan/Tiger and Alice/Wanna rediscover adventure and each other, and Jan/Tiger finally merges into a single entity—master of day and night, of the parallel worlds of sleep and waking. (Sequel to “Slaves of Sleep” #135)
(Fantastic Adventures, Vol. 12, No. 10, Oct. 1950: pp. 6-83)
Fantasy 1950/Oct
222 Magazine cover Tough Old Man  -  (9th and last in “Conquest of Space” series)
Moffat is sent for final training under the Senior Constable of the Frontier Patrol, old Keno. When Moffat—subjected to severe tests—discovers why Keno doesn't feel extreme cold or heat, and never seems to eat, he succeeds the old policeman as senior constable.
(Startling Stories, Vol. 22, No. 2, Nov. 1950: pp. 116-129)
Science Fiction 1950/Nov

 
Go back Published works of fiction (1981-99)

# Cover Story title & synopsis Genre Issued
223 The Were-Human
The metamorphosis of a human being into a “were-human”—a creature of murderous hate, not unlike a werewolf, that was human but is now something else. The title is a conscious play-on-words.
(Fantasy Book Enterprises Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 1, Oct. 1981: pp. 42-44)
Fantasy 1981/Oct
224 Book cover Battlefield Earth  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
It is the year 3000 A.D. and Man, in the judgement of his cruelest tormentor, is an “endangered species.” The Earth has been ruthlessly ruled for a thousand years by a space-plundering race of nine-foot high, gas-breathing conquerors from the planet Psychlo. One of these creatures, the security guard Terl, plans to enslave a man-creature, force him to mine Earth gold, teleport the gold to Psychlo and then return in stolen comfort back to the planet himself.
That slave emerges in the person of Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, a member of a community of human survivors—there are no more than 35,000 left on Earth—hiding in the mountains near Denver. Terl captures Jonnie, cages him, teaches him to use the highly advanced Psychlo machinery, but does not share with Jonnie the secret of teleportation. Jonnie, under Terl's direction, recruits a band of Scots to mine the gold, but secretly enlists their help to overthrow Terl and the Psychlo tyranny. Jonnie discovers that deposits of uranium in the Rocky Mountains have been enfeebling his people, and that uranium is unstable and explosive in the presence of the gas the Psychlos breathe. When Terl finally prepares to teleport his gold in coffins to Psychlo, Jonnie and his collaborators replace the gold with uranium. Psychlo is destroyed, the multi-galactic empire of the Psychlos is irretrievably broken, and Terl is subdued and imprisoned.
Then, in an audacious financial transaction, Terl “sells” Earth to Jonnie's bitter competitor, and—unaware that Psychlo no longer exists—blasts off haplessly into oblivion, leaving his teleportation apparatus behind. An interplanetary banker appears, claiming Earth as collateral on a multi-trillion dollar Psychlo loan, now in obvious default. Psychlo's former subject planets are accepted as an alternate settlement of the loan. A vast congress of planetary emissaries—summoned by Jonnie—agrees to universal peace.
(New York: St. Martin's Press, 1982, cloth, 819p.)
Science Fiction 1982/May
225 Magazine cover He Found God
When Dr. Joshua Reynolds, the evangelist with an enormous galactic following, finds God, the corrupt and decadent galactic empire is doomed.
(Meta SF Magazine, Vol. 1, No. 1, Sept. 1982: pp. 5-9)
Science Fiction 1982/Sept
226 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 1: The Invaders Plan  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Prefaced by an anxiously “official” disclaimer (by one Lord Invay) that such a place as Blito-P3 (Earth) actually exists, or has ever existed, Mission Earth begins with the brilliantly complex, self-expiatory, rowdily satirical first-person “confession” of the jailed Soltan Gris (pronounced “grease”). Gris is a former executive of the forbidding Coordinated Information Apparatus (CIA), of the planet Voltar.
Gris claims that Earth has long been targeted for invasion by the planet Voltar as a supply base on its space route to further galactic conquest. When prodigously gifted Fleet Combat Engineer Jettero Heller discovers on a scouting mission that Earth is polluting itself so rapidly it may become uninhabitable—hence, unusable—long before the invasion date, Heller is sent on a subsequent mission to covertly slow the process. This jeopardizes the plans of dreaded Apparatus chief, Lombar Hisst (as reptilian as his name) to subvert and overthrow the 110-planet Voltarian Confederacy with drugs he has cached on Earth. He enlists Gris's help to sabotage Heller. At Spiteos, the Apparatus's notorious mountain prison, Heller meets and falls in love with the beautiful wild animal trainer Countess Krak.
Unknown to Heller, secretly implanted devices in Heller's head allow Gris to “see” and “hear” through Heller himself. Piloting the spacecraft “Tug” and its “will-be-was” time-drive, Heller departs for Earth with Gris as a passenger. The people of Earth are, of course, unaware of the invasion that clandestinely has already begun.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1985, cloth, 559p.)
Science Fiction 1985/Oct (written 1981-82)
227 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 2: Black Genesis  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Equipped with papers falsely identifying him as the son of John Rockecenter, the richest man in the world, Heller reaches Washington, D.C., meets Rockecenter's lawyer, and escapes an attempted assassination. Heller then moves into gaudy splendor near the United Nations building, acquires a Mafia bodyguard, and encounters a man who wants to build a corporate empire around him.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1986, cloth, 431p.)
Science Fiction 1986/Mar (written 1981-82)
228 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 3: The Enemy Within  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Dismayed by Heller's progress, Gris sends for the Countess Krak and the infamous Dr. Crobe (a “cellologist” of sorts who specializes in creating biological freaks), hoping that one of them will disrupt Heller's mission. Then, when Jettero begins work on a device that will power an automobile without gasoline, and thus drastically reduce pollution, Gris informs Rockecenter about this threat to his control of world oil supplies. A plan to discredit Heller with publicity—or eliminate him at a challenge car race—takes sinister shape.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1986, cloth, 393p.)
Science Fiction 1986/Apr (written 1981-82)
229 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 4: An Alien Affair  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Heller—but not his car—survives the car race. Gris, in desperation, flees to his Turkish base to escape hounding creditors. He undergoes a Voltarian regeneration process that among other things heightens his libido. When Countess Krak and Dr. Crobe finally arrive on Earth, Gris imprisons the Doctor, and implants the same “audio” and “viseo” monitors in Krak's head as he has implanted in Heller's. Ready to send her to the United States to find Heller, Gris falls asleep.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1986, cloth, 329p.)
Science Fiction 1986/Jul (written 1981-82)
230 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 5: Fortune of Fear  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Gris wakes up to find that Krak has escaped and gone off to find Heller. The arrival of a shipment of gold makes Gris rich enough to not only destroy Heller and Krak, but to satisfy his creditors. Meanwhile, an impecunious Jettero Heller, now reunited with Krak, uses a space-flight device that enables him to see into the future to break the bank at an Atlantic City casino. Heller then makes a killing in the commodities market, while Gris, chased by women who have discovered the wonder of his Voltarian “rejuvenation,” flees to New York. Discouraged by his persistent failure to destroy Heller, he decides the Countess is the real problem and retains professional help to dispose of her.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1986, cloth, 365p.)
Science Fiction 1986/Oct (written 1981-82)
231 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 6: Death Quest  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Gris hires a Mafia hit man to assassinate Krak, but the attempt hilariously misfires. Heller, now pursuing an air decontamination project, continues to be the target of a defamatory public relations campaign run by the notorious potentate of PR, J. Walter Madison. Sued by women, once again penniless, Heller makes his peace with the Countess Krak, who goes off to prove the lawsuits are false—using a “hypno-helmet” to elicit the truth.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1987, cloth, 351p.)
Science Fiction 1987/Jan (written 1981-82)
232 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 7: Voyage of Vengeance  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Jettero Heller returns to cleaning up the air on Earth; Gris takes off with Madison on a globe-girdling yacht, and Heller's imposter “double” is kidnapped on national television by a specially trained calico cat. Gris finally believes he has disposed of Heller and the Countess permanently. He is soon to find out how wrong he is.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1987, cloth, 381p.)
Science Fiction 1987/May (written 1981-82)
233 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 8: Disaster  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
From the spacecraft Tug One, Heller disables the world's refineries, takes control of the world's oil industries when the bottom drops out of the stock market, captures Gris, and with Countess Krak returns to Voltar. Gris escapes on Voltar, and voluntarily goes to prison. Here, the narrative confession by Gris ends. It is now one hundred years later; the Gris manuscript has been found by Monte Pennwell who seeks out the rest of the story: Heller and Gris have clashed; Heller kidnaps the drug- addicted Emperor of Voltar and, with Countess Krak, returns to Earth.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1987, cloth, 337p.)
Science Fiction 1987/Jul (written 1981-82)
234 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 9: Villainy Victorious  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
Rockecenter dies in a car crash. Madison, now on Voltar courtesy of Gris, meets Lombar Hisst, is given carte blanche and money to run his anti-Heller public relations campaign on Voltar and persuades Hisst to declare himself Emperor. Heller—convinced now, by the Countess, of the menace posed by Hisst, Madison and the Apparatus—comes to Voltar, saves his sister Hightee, and is declared an outlaw when Gris goes on trial and blames everything on him.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1987, cloth, 419p.)
Science Fiction 1987/Sept (written 1981-82)
235 Book dustcover Mission Earth Volume 10: The Doomed Planet  (edited by Robert Vaughn Young)
In a swirling climax to the foregoing events, Gris exposes the machinations of the Apparatus during his trial. Riots break out and Voltar begins to disintegrate. Heller chases now Emperor Hisst from Spiteos to Palace City, then destroys a small, time-warping black hole that has kept the city invincibly fifteen minutes in the future, returning it to the present time so that the city can be—and is—attacked. Hisst is captured and put on trial; Madison is exposed and exiled; and, having been found guilty, both Hisst and Gris are sent to a distant prison camp. In a sardonic epilogue, Monte Pennwell urges an invasion of Earth to capture its resources, then exchanges letters with his publisher questioning the wisdom of releasing Mission Earth.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, 1987, cloth, 331p.)
Science Fiction 1987/Nov (written 1981-82)
236 Book cover Mariner's Mate  -  (previously unpublished)
The captain of a disabled freighter and his only passenger—the obnoxiously spoiled daughter of the ship's owner—battle a torrential South Pacific typhoon together.
(Ron: The Master Mariner, Issue 1, Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, Inc., June 1991: pp. 15-33)
Adventure 1991/Jun (unknown when written)
237 Model Gentleman  -  (previously unpublished*)
(for story synopsis see at 51b in list)
(Legacy, Premiere issue, 1992. Los Angeles: Author Services, Inc.: pp. 7-8.)
*Take note! This was listed in ‘The Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard: A comprehensive bibliography’ (1994) as not previously having been published. It appears however that this was published earlier in The Pittsburgh Press for 17 Feb. 1936 on page 32. See at 51b in list.
Romance 1992/Jan (earlier published 1936/Feb)
238 Hired Assassin  -  (previously unpublished)
A sharpshooting old sheriff shrewdly—and terminally—turns the tables on three New York gangsters who unwittingly hire him to assassinate himself.
(Legacy, Issue 2, 1992. Los Angeles: Author Services, Inc.: pp. 7-8.)
Western 1992/Jun (unknown when written)
239 Book cover Gift from Heaven  -  (previously unpublished)
Two well-intentioned but cheerily intoxicated old space pirates—commandeering a space tug that can move asteroids around—decide to present Earth with another moon; but in the process, almost remove their beloved home planet from the solar system.
(Ron: The Writer, Issue 2, Bridge Publications, Inc., 1992: pp. 18-37)
Science Fiction 1992/Jun (unknown when written)
240 The Secret of Skeleton Creek  -  (previously unpublished)
An old prospector's shack and the waters of Skeleton Creek conceal a secret that spells wealth for a desperate rancher, and defeat for his adversary, the ruthless boss of Gunsmoke.
(Legacy, Issue 3, 1993. Los Angeles: Author Services, Inc.: pp. 7-10)
Western 1993/Jun (unknown when written)
241 Book cover Ai! Pedrito!—When Intelligence Goes Wrong  (comedy screenplay, novelized by Kevin J. Anderson) Two identical look-a-likes, one a straight-laced Navy lieutenant and the other a devil-may-care South American, become embroiled in a dangerous game run by opposing intelligence agencies. Played out against the backdrop of South American mountains and plains, this sophisticated spy spoof is based on a true story.
(Los Angeles: Galaxy Press, hardcover, 1998, 206p.)
Adventure 1998/June (written 1981)
242 Book cover A Very Strange Trip  (time-travel comedy screenplay, novelized by Dave Wolverton) A dim-witted but likable army private attempts to deliver a truck to an army base thousands of miles away. But unknown to him, the truck is actually a time machine--and the adventures that befall him when the machine is accidentally triggered are both unexpected and hilarious.
(Los Angeles: Bridge Publications, hardcover, 1999, 300p.)
Science Fiction 1999/May (written 1981)

 
Go back Unpublished works of fiction

# Story title & synopsis Genre
U:1 The Ace of Alcazar  (aka War Correspondent)
Unable to get his news dispatches out of the war-torn city of Toledo, Spain, a war correspondent discovers after the battle that he himself has become headline news around the world.
Adventure
U:2 At the Front
A war correspondent believes he has sent out an incorrect story about the outcome of a major battle, only to discover when he reaches the scene of the battle to verify it personally, that his version of the fray was right all along.
Adventure
U:3 Banana Oil
A man deceptively puts oil on his property to make it more attractive to a prospective buyer—but the buyer isn't interested.
Adventure
U:4 Banners of the Brave
An army private, bravely confused about what makes a hero, defeats the enemy in a single-handed encounter, getting and then happily losing a girl in the process.
Adventure
U:5 Beating the Broadcasters
A banjo player convinces a radio station to let him play his music on the air for nothing. A scheme to ensure that people call in with requests goes awry—but real listeners call in anyway and he gets the job.
Adventure
U:6 The Boat from Nowhere
An adventurer encounters a corpse, a private yacht, a fierce tiger, an equally fierce knife-wielding bearded man, and a cargo hold filled with wild animals, before rescuing the captain and his crew.
Adventure
U:7 Clipped Wings (Holograph manuscript)
An aerial dogfight, in a European combat setting, is recounted by a pilot blinded during the battle.
Adventure
U:8 Death's Lieutenant
A legionnaire in North Africa, deceived by the death of his friend into deserting his post, striking an officer and fleeing to the enemy, foils a plot to disgrace him and is vindicated.
Adventure
U:9 Diamonds are Dangerous
Unjustly accused, an American fugitive in Africa stumbles across a dying man, a cache of what he erroneously believes are diamonds and a wanted murderer who pursues him to get possession of the stones.
Adventure
U:10 The Diplomat of Taranpang  (aka Taranpang)
A U.S. Army engineer in the Philippines turns into an adroit diplomat when a reckless killing angers the local tribespeople.
Adventure
U:11 Elephants on Wheels
A soldier of fortune helps the local inhabitants defeat the tanks—“elephants on wheels”—of an invading army.
Adventure
U:12 Forest Fire  (See also “Forest Fire Fighter,” next)
A young man, who has run away from home because he has accidentally damaged the family car, helps put out a raging forest fire and earns enough money to pay for the automobile's damaged fender.
Adventure
U:13 Forest Fire Fighter
This is a revision of “Forest Fire” above.
Adventure
U:14 Fortress of the Dead
A daring, self-employed commercial pilot in North Africa, a fellow American and his pretty niece in grave danger, and precious gold hidden in a castle-fortress, lead to romance and a hair-raising escape by plane.
Adventure
U:15 From the Seas!
A mutinous seaman and the crew of a merchant vessel turn pirate and capture a sloop, but are vanquished by its navigator and brought to justice.
Adventure
U:16 Frozen Blood  (aka The Golden Totem)
Falsely accused of murdering a miner for his gold, hounded by the real culprit, and near death from the cold and the snow, Ken Morane turns on his pursuer, then is freed by the Mounties for disposing of a wanted killer.
Adventure
U:17 Ghost Gotha
An American fighter ace in World War I, taking to the air against a mysterious, giant Gotha bombing plane that can apparently hit targets with deadly accuracy in the dark, unravels an intricate plot and captures the “Ghost” ship and its supposedly dead pilot.
Adventure
U:18 Ghosts of the Mitumbas
A river steamer captain and his hulking sidekick, a beautiful heiress who temporarily loses her sight, and a sinister army officer come together on a dangerous safari to write a new ending to an old Bantu legend.
Adventure
U:19 The Great Wall of China
Seated in a watch tower on the Great Wall of China, the author lets his imagination play across great moments in the history of the wall.
Adventure
U:20 Guns for Kiang
An adventurer in war-torn China rescues an American girl from enemy troops and two feuding warlords. They escape to freedom on his tramp steamer.
Adventure
U:21 Hard-boiled Marine
A young marine complains loudly about a tough marine officer he has heard of but never met. To his chagrin—and deep regret—the man he is complaining to turns out to be the very officer he is complaining about.
Adventure
U:22 He Didn't Come Back
A dead fighter pilot is mourned in different ways by fellow fliers, friends and family.
Adventure
U:23 High Danger
A famed adventurer-pilot seeks both to regain the South American diamond mines once wrested from his father and to rescue the young woman he loves from an unwanted marriage.
Adventure
U:24 The Last Frontier
An engineer sent to his home town to complete the building of a dam succeeds in bringing needed water to the parched cattle country he grew up in, despite bitter opposition even from his own family.
Adventure
U:25 Last Laughter
Bert Colorado pursues practical joker Tommy Jackson for having stolen his beautiful girlfriend, only to discover that someone else has won the girl in the end.
Adventure
U:26 The Lion Tamer
A scheme to embarrass a lion tamer by pacifying his lion with a perfume-scented handkerchief backfires when the audience loves it, and the lion tamer and his act end up with star billing.
Adventure
U:27 Meteors of Death
World War I fighter pilot Bart Austin, after a bloody scuffle with his own commanding officer, goes after the enemy squadron that wiped out his wingmates with murderous incendiary bullets.
Adventure
U:28 No Quarter
A ruthless mercenary pilot is taught a powerful lesson in mercy by the flier he has shot down.
Adventure
U:29 Once a Turkey Short
Old Daniel outfoxes the canny, covetous, cantankerous Mr. Noah—and saves his small plot of land in the bargain—when a flock of turkeys comes up one gobbler short.
Adventure
U:30 Patent Medicine
When a man offers a potion that heals dogs as a treatment for human ailments, the city first denounces then rewards him.
Adventure
U:31 Peace
To earn the respect of the African villagers and win an ironic peace, Terry O’Flanning first has to beat his formidable native adversary.
Adventure
U:32 Rat Trap
A World War I fighter pilot is suspected of fatally shooting his wingmate, until a fistfight with his commanding officer exposes the place in the wall where rats have cached his personal effects—and his dead wingmate's suicide note.
Adventure
U:33 The Rendezvous
The town's most responsible citizen and only undertaker decides, at last, to renounce his humdrum life and follow his adventurous brother on a gold-seeking expedition to the Yucatan. But when a telegram arrives from there, the message is unexpected—and shocking.
Adventure
U:34 Revolt in the Plaza
When the newest, revolutionary Santo Dominican government comes to power, an unemployed American mining engineer unexpectedly finds himself appointed to the president's cabinet.
Adventure
U:35 Schemes Everyone Can Use Shooting Celebrities
(See “Shooting Celebrities” below, #272)
Adventure
U:36 Shades of Captain Kidd
A map to Captain Kidd's legendary treasure on Mona Island leads two U.S. engineers in Puerto Rico to a hidden cache of a vastly different—but dangerously valuable—kind.
Adventure
U:37 Shooting Celebrities
Longer version of “Schemes. . .” above, #270. In both versions, the same news photographer photographs the wrong person.
Adventure
U:38 Sinner Take All
The painfully young third mate of a China steamer discovers that dice can be crooked, waterfront bars can be dangerous, and not all chief engineers are honest.
Adventure
U:39 Sky Trap
False landing lights lead an air mail pilot with a pouch of valuable government papers into peril on the wrong side of the border.
Adventure
U:40 Stowaway Deluxe
A personable, quick-thinking young man charms his way aboard an ocean liner, outwits a bunch of gamblers trying to steal a set of pearls, and disembarks somewhat richer but as carefree as ever.
Adventure
U:41 Strategy
A dog enlists the help of other dogs to subdue the local canine bully.
Adventure
U:42 Strictly Confidential
A man buys up the land around the site of a proposed government dam, only to be duped into surrendering his claims.
Adventure
U:43 Suicide Preferred
Falsely accused of stealing a general's bankroll, faced with suicide or torture, a soldier of fortune in occupied China is exonerated when he captures the true culprit.
Adventure
U:44 Sultan O’SuIlivan
An American soldier of fortune in North Africa and his reporter girlfriend become sultan and sultana when he uses disguise and a brilliant ruse to bring down a treacherous but powerful enemy.
Adventure
U:45 Things That Pass in the Jungle  (aka Completed Pass)
An injured, big-time professional football player saves the life of a fellow American and his own career, when he throws lethally accurate forward passes with coconuts, as if they were footballs, to drive off marauding bandits.
Adventure
U:46 The Token of Torture
A resourceful reporter for the Oriental Press in China discovers the true identity of the Mysterious River Dragon, the man who has been ruthlessly robbing and then blowing up passenger ships.
Adventure
U:47 The Typhoon Treasure
A hunt for a buried pirate treasure on Typhoon Island in the Philippines leads to rivalry, romance and sudden death.
Adventure
U:48 War on Wheels
The decades-old “war on wheels”—violent accidents on the nation's highways—is the immediate issue in a brisk exchange of views between a powerful U.S. senator and an average American citizen with innovative ideas for solving problems.
Adventure
U:49 Whispering Death
An American adventurer in the South Pacific overcomes deadly headhunters, poisonous snakes and a terrifying witch doctor to rescue his friend and retrieve a bag of precious pearls.
Adventure
U:50 Winged Rescue
When a young woman pilot saves her father's cattle by flying food to them through a blinding snowstorm, she changes his mind about flying as a career.
Adventure
U:51 The Wrecking Crew
A daredevil race car driver and his more cautious, safety-minded brother feud bitterly for years until a nearly-fatal accident during a dangerous crash test brings about a reconciliation.
Adventure
U:52 Brand of Cane
Convicted of crimes he did not commit, Bob Hoffman comes to grips with the man who framed him during a struggle in the deadly bowels of a sugar cane shredding machine.
Mystery/
Detective
U:53 Dash, the Reporter, Gets Fired  (Holograph manuscript)
A cub reporter is duped by a rival into publishing the wrong story.
Mystery/
Detective
U:54 Death Caverns
A series of baffling cliffside murders is solved by a treasury agent.
Mystery/
Detective
U:55 A Demijohn Demon  (Holograph manuscript)
Her superstitious dread of a witch doctor's grave frightens a woman to death.
Mystery/
Detective
U:56 Eye for an Eye
When John Masey takes final revenge on the hit-and-run driver who blinded him and crippled his young daughter, he makes a belated—and cruelly ironic—discovery.
Mystery/
Detective
U:57 Fangs of the Tiger
A bungling, corpulent police detective solves the mystery of the maharajah's missing false teeth and brings the most wanted criminal in New York City to justice.
Mystery/
Detective
U:58 Mixed Up Spies in China  (Holograph manuscript)
Two British spies are duped by the man they are pursuing into unwittingly killing a fellow agent.
Mystery/
Detective
U:59 Murder at Pirate Castle
(Basis for the successful Columbia Pictures screen adaption Secret of Treasure Island [1937].)
An FBI agent, posing as a private investigator, solves a series of mysterious “flame and blue smoke” murders at Pirate Castle and unmasks the pirate ghost of El Tiburon.
Mystery/
Detective
U:60 Murder for Murder
A priceless tapestry causes the strange deaths of three men.
Mystery/
Detective
U:61 Paper Traitor  (See also “A Paper Traitor,” next entry)
A belated pardon leads ironically to the recapture of an escaped convict.
Mystery/
Detective
U:62 A Paper Traitor  (Holograph manuscript)
The convict in this, possibly earlier, version of “Paper Traitor,” is a former gangster.
Mystery/
Detective
U:63 Passenger Fifty-One
Disguised as a passenger aboard a Zeppelin flight to New York, an American detective solves a murder, witnesses another, locates the missing documents he had been falsely accused of stealing, finds a fortune in stolen emeralds, parachutes from the dirigible, and is still in time for luncheon with his girlfriend at the Waldorf.
Mystery/
Detective
U:64 The Return of the Doomed
The electrocution of three convicted criminals becomes the key to a bizarre plot to destroy a district attorney.
Mystery/
Detective
U:65 Stunt Pilot
A strange crash, stolen money and the accidental death of a passenger leads a young airmail pilot to prison, then to a new career as a movie stunt flier who is threatened by the vengeful schemes of an unsuspected enemy.
Mystery/
Detective
U:66 The Tailor-made Spy
Disfigured in a crash, deliberately given a new face by plastic surgery in an enemy hospital, an American fighter pilot in World War I is mistaken for a German spy who looks just like him, and is sentenced to be shot.
Mystery/
Detective
U:67 Take a Poison from One to Ten
An insurance claims adjuster investigates the deaths of three members of the same family, all of whom had recently been heavily insured, apparently by the newly-wed wife of one of the victims.
Mystery/
Detective
U:68 Torch Murder
When the reform candidate for mayor is torch murdered—and burned beyond recognition—an ace detective sets out to prove the guilt of the corrupt incumbent mayor, then makes a startling discovery.
Mystery/
Detective
U:69 Witch's Rocking Chair
When the elderly woman the local town people had called a witch dies, she leaves an apparently haunted rocking chair and a valuable secret concealed in the stuffing of the chair.
Mystery/
Detective
U:70 All South American
Mistakenly believing that his girlfriend admires giant football players at an American school, a short-but-doughty Peruvian bullfighter proves he can play and win with the big boys, only to discover—to his delight—that his girlfriend's real passion is bullfighting.
Romance
U:71 A Bedtime Story
Set in the sixteenth century, this charming historical romance tells the “bedtime story” of a beautiful young woman who, fleeing from parents who want her to wed a rich but ugly suitor, encounters a handsome nobleman, bests a rival, is rescued from wolves, and lives happily ever after.
Romance
U:72 He Had to Marry the Girl
When a young man mistakes one sister for another, he comes uncomfortably close to losing both the one he really loves and a sizeable inheritance.
Romance
U:73 The Insignificant Obsession
Believing the man she loves is dead, a woman falls in love with a second man, a painter, for whom she poses. When the first man unexpectedly returns, she lies to him about her relationship with the painter and trouble ensues.
Romance
U:74 No Greater Love
When a young woman pilot braves adverse weather to fly emergency medical supplies to the scene of a mine disaster, she bests her movie star rival for the affections of an aviator boyfriend and earns the money to pay for needed surgery on her father's injured leg.
Romance
U:75 The Perfect Life
When a man and woman are rescued after being shipwrecked together on a desert island, they separate and their lives take different directions. Reunited years later, they decide to return to the island.
Romance
U:76 The Price of Lust
When Sven masquerades as Griselda's dead brother to keep her near him, he risks losing her love forever, until an act of courage reveals the truth and reunites them.
Romance
U:77 Stormalong
Swashbuckling historical romance of the last days of the Spanish Main which follows the colorful exploits of the fiery buccaneer, Stormalong, as he defies the powerful English nobleman who has sworn to capture or kill him.
Romance
U:78 The Alkahest
A historian in the far distant future recounts the story of the long-vanished Earth (an area on astronomical charts now marked only as “Avoid—Dangerous”) and of the Earthman who invented the “alkahest,” the universal solvent that dissolved the Earth forever.
Science Fiction
U:79 Cap of Doom
A judge puts on an extraordinary telepathic cap that persuades him—by showing him apparent memories of his own family's unsavory past—to free a young man unjustly accused of murder. The judge does not know that the memories are really not his, but those of the scientist operating the cap. But justice—despite bitter opposition even from his own family in a surprise story twist—has in fact been served.
Science Fiction
U:80 Double Talk
A magic elixir brings a famous ventriloquist's equally famous dummy to life.
Fantasy
U:81 Due Process of Thought
The humdrum life of Henry Bronson is shattered forever when he invents a telepathic transmitter and discovers what his wife and son really think of him.
Science Fiction
U:82 The Miseries of Mike
It's not the fillings in his teeth that are making Mike Williams say things he hadn't intended to say. He discovers he, himself, has become the receiver and the voice—the “mike”—for other people's thoughts.
Fantasy
U:83 The Soul of a Plane  (Holograph manuscript)
Faced with the prospect of having his beloved plane carted off to a museum, a young flier watches as the plane mysteriously takes its fate into its own hands.
Fantasy
U:84 They Shall Inherit
A young man discovers after a serious illness that he is the last person left alive in the world, and that he has unwittingly helped the mean—not the meek—inherit the Earth.
Fantasy
U:85 Tickets
A fascinating “time-trap” fantasy that begins when a beautiful woman walks into a travel agency, pursued by a man with a gun. The travel agent—named Johnny Aldrich—shoots the pursuer with a gun he keeps under the counter for protection, then flees with the woman, first to Miami and then onto an ocean liner. Thrown overboard, Aldrich hurtles into nothingness, only to suddenly find himself back in the travel agency. A beautiful woman walks in, pursued by a man with a gun. . .
Fantasy
U:86 The Tombstone
All his life, Joshua Prout had done everything in a big way—the biggest house, the biggest fortune, the biggest car. But when Judgement Day comes and the dead are summoned from their graves, Joshua discovers his passion for bigness has followed him to the bitterest end—his tombstone is too big for him to move.
Fantasy
U:87 Unlucky Pistols
A ghost tells the ill-starred story of a pair of pirate pistols and a dying man's curse.
Fantasy
U:88 The Adventures of Bobby Mathews
(written in 1921)
Ten-year-old Bobby Mathews uses toy cap pistols instead of real guns to corral two renegade farm hands.
Western
U:89 The Bandit and the Button  (Holograph manuscript)
When a bandit fleeing from the law rescues a ten-year-old boy he affectionately calls “the button” from outlaws who had killed the boy's father, the bandit wins over a pursuing marshal.
Western
U:90 The Black Rider
Disguise and mistaken identity play a near-fatal role in this lively yarn of two Damon-and-Pythias-type partners who wipe out the Black Rider and his gang of outlaws.
Western
U:91 The Dead Man
As an old prospector, convinced that people are trying to cheat him of his gold, lies dying of thirst and hunger in the desert, the light of the moon reveals the ironic truth—the load of rock in his wagon contains gold nuggets after all.
Western
U:92 Desert Mercy
A bankrupt ex-prospector, miraculously saved by cactus water from dying of thirst in the desert, helps his daughter and the son of his former partner stave off the guns of the town's ruthless sheriff and his gang of killers.
Western
U:93 Dogged Vengeance
Kit McLean is saved from being hung for crimes he did not commit when his dog, Nugget, fearlessly attacks the real culprit, the town's crooked sheriff, just as evidence of Kit's innocence arrives in town.
Western
U:94 The Galleon of Ghoul Mountain
In a search for treasure and a fabled Spanish galleon in the desert, a young man and his father encounter outlaws, subsequently capture them, and receive a real treasure—a $10,000 reward.
Western
U:95 A Sheep in Wolfs Clothing
Mo Scanlon, a vagrant and a gifted liar, deceives everyone in town with his tall tale about how he captured the man who had stolen money from Wells Fargo, only to steal away with the money himself.
Western
U:96 Signed with Lead
Okay Collins has to prove he is the real owner of the Thirty-Thirty Ranch and that he's not guilty of robbery and murder.
Western
U:97 Tit for Tat  (Holograph manuscript)
The man who saves a young preacher from a lynching turns out to be the same man who robbed the Wells Fargo stage—but the grateful preacher has already helped him escape the sheriff.
Western
U:98 Two Guns from Texas
A sinister masquerade and a dangerous case of mistaken identity complicate the plot when a Texas cowboy and a range detective are sent by the Cattleman's Association to unmask a criminal.
Western


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