A Victorian Sci-fi classic!

I have only ever seen the (very loosely) based on 2012 film that this book is based upon, as much as I enjoyed and liked the film the original is even better! I have a love of classic literature and authors such as Robert E Howard, HP Lovecraft, Arthur Conan Doyle and now Edger Rice Burrows! It is a fantastic tale of heroics, an alien world, love and adventure!

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

Everything's coming up John Carter!

(Be warned, there will be spoilers throughout - but I would have to point out that it has been available to read for over a hundred years now.)

Do you remember The Story of Tracy Beaker? I know that seems an odd question, but it is relevant. There was an episode of the TV series in which a game called 'Fortunately/Unfortunately' was played. The idea was to create a story in a group of people, by moving around each person, and having them start the next section of the story alternately either with 'fortunately' or 'unfortunately.' Based on this book, I believe that game was invented by Edgar Rice Burroughs and that he used it throughout his writing process.

No matter what difficulties or problems John Carter encounters throughout the story, he either finds an easy solution or is immediately and (incredibly conveniently) saved. Need to access a seemingly inaccessible building? That's fine, because John Carter just happens to know one of only two people on the whole planet who can tell him of a secret entrance.

The titular Princess of Mars, Dejah Thoris, is being held in the heavily guarded home of Villain Guy (can't remember his name now, sorry) and being forced to marry his son... uh, Villain Guy Jr. Carter arrives in a huge city and almost immediately finds somebody he knows and who can help him. Carter then joins the military and straight away saves somebody so important he becomes personal bodyguard to Villain Guy. How lucky!

He's barely been at this job for five minutes before (fortunately) Dejah Thoris is on the scene, something we're already expecting from the title of the chapter. He tries to find her room, but (unfortunately) gets lost in a maze of corridors. Fortunately, he finds her room anyway. Unfortunately, he emerges in the next room where there are four guards. Fortunately, he's so amazing at fighting that he kills them all very quickly. The whole book is like this.

This also brings me onto the skills of John Carter. He can:
1. Jump high and far enough to impress everybody he meets, to the point he is almost immediately accepted into a completely alien society.
2. Fight well enough that not only can he defeat all opponents, but defeat them with such great ease that fights are hardly worth mentioning. Usually he begins to fight and then 'mere moments late my attacker lay dead on the ground.' You'd think John Carter being forced to fight in a colosseum would be exciting, but we're merely told he fights all day and beats everybody.
3. Read minds. Of course, that's common on Mars, but it would be a disadvantage for John Carter if anybody could read his mind - so he can read minds, but his mind cannot be read. Everything has to be easy for John Carter.
4. His amazing luck. I know I've mentioned this above, but seriously, it's beyond ridiculous. It becomes funny just how many times the exact right pieces for this guy to succeed happen to fall into place. Eventually, it stops being funny and becomes annoying. Take the following:

John Carter steals a flying craft that can travel at around 200mph, becomes hopelessly lost, and then flies all night. He ends up being shot down and crash landing in the middle of a huge battle. That doesn't sound good, does it? Well, it is, because (as well as walking away from the crash without injury) he finds himself next to not only a character he knows, but the character he would be best to find at that point in the story. How lucky to fly over a thousand miles blind and end up, out of a whole planet, with the person you need to find - and just in time to save the life of that character!

There is no tension or intrigue in this book whatsoever. There's concern that Dejah Thoris might be dead at one stage, but we've already been told that her John Carter will spend the next ten years together, so clearly she's fine. There's a point where John Carter needs to scale the exterior of a thousand foot high building, but don't worry, as we're told the architectural features of the building make 'an almost perfect ladder' and then he's at the top. John Carter's mighty plot armour would have saved him if he fell anyway, so what does it matter?

I did enjoy some of the details about Mars and its various cultures, but these didn't entirely make senses. There are houses, for example, that are raised up at night for security. You might think this is stop thieves, but it's to stop assassinations - which struck me as odd on a planet where you can accurately shot from over two miles away.

Before I finish, I must return to the colosseum fights. Whilst in captivity, John Carter makes a friend, who he must ends up having to face in the arena. Is John Carter forced to kill his new friend? Must he finally struggle to succeed? No, because they fake him getting stabbed by putting the sword under his arm, which the crowd (who were definitely expecting bloodshed) believe is real, for some reason. Then, when the bodies are being removed... wait, no, that doesn't happen either. John Carter merely lies on the ground until it gets dark and then walks away.

John Carter rises easily through Martian societies, raises an army without any trouble, wins a war without breaking a sweat
and ultimately makes peace between two tribes who've been fighting for thousands of years with the greatest of ease - and it's all so very boring.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful