The Avenger: Pulp Reprints from Sanctum Books

The raging flames of personal tragedy forged Dick Benson into something more than human -- the scourge of the underworld known as The Avenger! With his Justice, Inc. team, the man of steel wages war against super crime.

A clever premise and fantastic adventures. Definitely classic pulp stories. Sanctum Books has been reprinting these delightful stories, two novels per volume. Since there were 24 novels, I assume only 12 volumes are going to be printed. A complete list is provided below.

Justice, Inc. (published September 1, 1939)

The Yellow Hoard (October 1, 1939)

The Sky Walker (November 1, 1939)

The Devil's Horns (December 1, 1939)

The Frosted Death (January 1, 1940)

The Blood Ring (February 1, 1940)

Stockholders in Death (March 1, 1940)

The Glass Mountain (April 1, 1940)

Tuned for Murder (May 1, 1940)

The Smiling Dogs (June 1, 1940)

River of Ice (July 1, 1940)

The Flame Breathers (September 1, 1940)

Murder on Wheels (November 1, 1940)

Three Gold Crowns (January 1, 1941)

House of Death (March 1, 1941)

The Hate Master (May 15, 1941)

Nevlo (July 1, 1941)

Death in Slow Motion (September 1, 1941)

Pictures of Death (November 1, 1941)

The Green Killer (January 1, 1942)

The Happy Killers (March 1, 1942)

The Black Death (May 1, 1942)

The Wilder Curse (July 1, 1942)

Midnight Murder (September 1, 1942)

A museum becomes a killing zone when an ancient Egyptian curse is revived by the deadly rituals of The Blood Ring, an unholy partnership between Big Business and Organized Crime results in a deadly trail of murder in Stockholders in Death. Chicago skyscrapers collapse after The Sky Walker is seen above the city, sparking fears of an alien invasion. All this and much more should demonstrate the variety of fantastic plots. 

The foreword by Ron Goulart in volume four was a great read. Will Murray's informative essays (featured in each of these pulp reprints) are great but I wish he would not include those non-trivial "speculative" facts such as theorizing The Sky Walker "might" have been the inspiration for Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. Instead of speculating, why not write to George Lucas and verify a definite yes or no? Seems more like padding to me.

Volume four included an old radio script from The Avenger radio program. I am aware that the radio producers featured adaptations from the pulp stories so why not include a radio script adapted from one of the two novels included in the same volume? In fact, why not explain why the radio script was included? No history or brief mention of what was significant of the script was included. Sadly, I suspect Sanctum Books is taking on more than they can handle. Typographical errors are becoming more common than they used to. In volume 2, for example, bottom of page 60 reads, "such an airplane was announced a practical." Shouldn't that be "announced as practical"?

In 1972, Warner Paperback Library reprinted most of The Avenger novels in a series of paperback editions, all credited to Kenneth Robeson. After reprinting the 24 original novels (by Paul Ernst), Warner ignored the short stories of Tepperman (which have not yet been reprinted in Sanctum's books and I don't know why as they should be in the reprints), and instead commissioned Ron Goulart  to produce an additional dozen (new) titles. These fit chronologically after the six stories by Tepperman, but are numbered by Warner starting from #25.

The initial price tag of $12.95 was not bad, when you consider the fact that The Avenger novels were reprinted in paperback format and you can get them for $5 or $6 a piece. (I bought four for $10 last week.) But the recent issues are now retailing $14.95 and unless you want the historical write-ups and essays that supplement the pages in each reprint, you might want to shop around. Especially since the final page in volume two, a biography of Paul Ernst, is the final page of volume four. Yes, some of the supplemental features are reprinted from previous reprints. (Sanctum has been doing this a lot in their Shadow reprints and is becoming very annoying.)

The Avenger reprints should be read in chronological order. The formation of Justice, Inc. is made up in the first three issues, so volumes one and two reprint them in the correct order. Beginning with volume three, the pulp novels are reprinted out of sequence but they appear to be making an "attempt" to reprint them in order because the first seven appear in the first four volumes. Why are they slightly out of sequence?

For the enjoyment of great pulp stories, I recommend you start with volume one and read them progressively. But use my list above to know which ones to read in the proper sequence.