From the introduction to Rick Lai's Complete Chronology of Bronze:
This book is a heavily revised version of an earlier Doc Savage chronology that was published as The Bronze Age: An Alternate Doc Savage Chronology (Fading Shadows, 1992). At that time, the chronology consisted of the 181 novels originally published in the pulps and written by Lester Dent and other writers as well as three original paperback novels, Dent‘s The Red Spider, Philip Jose Farmer‘s Escape From Loki and Will Murray‘s Python Isle.
During 1992-1993, six more novels were written by Will Murray were published. All of Mr. Murray‘s novels incorporated material found in the papers of Lester Dent. This material ranged from outlines to drafts of novels. All of the new novels are included in the second version of this chronology.
The Complete Chronology of Bronze
$10.00 plus $2.50 postage/handling
(Foreign Orders please add an additional $5 P/H, US funds)
Make checks out to;
Paul McCall
5801 West Henry Street
Indianapolis, IN 46241
(This is a scholarly examination of the Doc Savage novels and in no ways infringes upon the copyright of Conned Nast copyright holders of Doc Savage.)
Comments (2)
Is there any way for my credit card to be charged for this item, rather than having to send a check?
Posted by Javier Walters | November 22, 2003 11:48 PM
Posted on November 22, 2003 23:48
Let me tell you that finally I have gotten Rick Lai’s Doc Savage Chronology (The Complete Chronology of Bronze, ACES Publication, 1999, CD PDF format), and I have to recognize you were totally right when you told me it was excellent.
Lai’s job of coordinating all the adventures is great, achieving to establish a convincing equilibrium between fiction and reality for each situation established in the novels.
Nevertheless, I have been able to realize; that even though a coherent chronological sequence can be established, the discrepancies and continuity errors are inevitable. The latest points are very logical, due to the fact that in the original series the authors who wrote Doc’s adventures were several; increasing in this way the possibilities of making continuity mistakes (for example; Laurence Donovan inaccurately described Habeas Corpus as being from Australia, rather than Arabia; or in The Living Fire Menace, Harold A. Davis, described Doc returning from a six-month stay at the Fortress of Solitude, which is not possible, because of the difficulty of creating a six-month gap in Doc’s adventures during 1937.) Nevertheless Lai showed to possess a great imagination to establish sustainable theories that could explain these and other discrepancies.
Another interesting aspect of this chronology, is that he didn’t excluded any of the 190 novels published so far, contrary to the chronology proposed by Farmer, where he eliminated several novels, due that they were not adjusted to his criteria, considering him those “totally fictitious”.
Also Lay knew how to establish a very defined borderline between the “real and the speculative”. In Doc’s biography, by Farmer, he considered as real many totally speculated by himself facts, and that have not been mentioned in any novel (for example his theories about the Newton family).
To summarize I strongly recommend this chronology, not only for those who want to know the order in which the adventures took place, but for the huge amount of trivia data that Mr. Lai gives us Doc Savage’s fans.
There are several points I would like to talk about with Mr. Lai, and some theories that could enrich his chronology, so I would like to get in touch with him. If any of you know how to reach him please let me know; I’d really appreciate it.
Julián Puga V.
CHILE
Posted by Julián Puga Vasquez | August 1, 2004 8:52 PM
Posted on August 1, 2004 20:52