A review by branch_c
Thuvia, Maid of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

3.0

I picked this up from a library giveaway shelf and went in with low expectations - somehow I'd never read anything by Rice Burroughs before, and it was long after reading some of the Dray Prescot books that I realized how transparently derivative they were of the Barsoom stories. I should have known, with ERB's work being wildly popular and remaining so about 100 years later, that there must be something to it. And sure enough, the world-building is surprisingly creative, and the story impressively well-plotted, with twists and turns to match much of modern SF/fantasy writing. The downside, of course, is the archaic narration style, the excessive references to the "clean limbed fighting man" and the "slender figure of the girl" with the "shapely shoulders", not to mention the rather silly romantic interplay between the characters. Then there's the pinup-girl cover art and the name that could have come from a pharmaceutical marketing department. But getting past all that, the technologies, the politics, and the undiscovered wonders of Mars make this worth the read. The encounter with the Lotharians reads like an original Star Trek episode - though again, considering the timing, it's actually the other way around. Yes, I realize I should have read the first three books first, but general familiarity with the world of John Carter and Dejah Thoris from numerous other cultural references were enough of a foundation for this one, and I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it.