can you get college textbooks on kindle The Adventure MEGAPACK : 25 Classic Adventure Stories
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful. An assorted selection that's neither assorted nor selective enoughBy Karl JanssenWildside Press is a publisher that resurrects and reprints vintage genre fiction from the classic pulp magazines. They publish a wide variety of "Megapacks"--inexpensive omnibus collections of stories and novellas, each united under a common theme or author. The Adventure Megapack was published in 2012. "Adventure" is a pretty broad category, essentially covering anything that's not a western, science fiction, mystery, or horror story. Yet somehow, even with such wide latitude, this collection manages to feel homogenous and monotonous.I understand that once you disqualify every story with a trace of space travel, cowboys, detectives, or ghosts in it, the pool of available pulp fiction has dwindled quite a bit. Yet still the definition of "adventure" feels pretty narrow here. The vast majority of these stories are tales of 20th-century white guys punching and shooting their way through exotic locales. Some good examples of this are Robert E. Howard's "Son of the White Wolf," which features his character El Borak battling renegade Turks; "Stories of the Legion: Choc," by H. De Vere Stacpoole, a tale of the French Foreign Legion in Algeria; and "The Spirit of France" by S. B. H. Furst, in which British and French characters face a Muslim rebellion in Burma. Too many of these two-fisted tales, however, are predictable, politically incorrect, and just plain dull. The absolute nadir of this tough-guy category is "The Fighting Fool," by Perley Poore Sheehan, in which the lead character is an obnoxious jerk who all-too easily assumes the leadership of a submissive Tibetan tribe.To give credit for diversity where it's due, there are a handful of stories set in Asia, with Asian protagonists. Harold Lamb was famous for such stories, though his entry here, "Said Afzel's Elephant," is mediocre at best. Dorothy Quick's "The Black Adder," a romantic tale of India, and "The Mindoon Maneater" by C. M. Cross, about a tiger hunt in Burma, are two of the better selections. In his central Asian tale "Every Man a King," on the other hand, author E. Hoffmann Price clumsily tries to out-Kipling Rudyard Kipling in the local color department, and ends up delivering a story so crammed with proper nouns that it's about as much fun and intelligible as reading the Kandahari phone book.One story about auto racing ("Checkered Flag" by Cliff Farrell) was a nice surprise and a pleasant relief from the relentless fisticuffs. Another welcome departure was "Another Pawn of Fate," by F. St. Mars, a hunting story told from the point of view of a jaguar.My biggest complaint about this Megapack is that it's almost totally devoid of historical adventure. There were entire pulp periodicals devoted to such tales, yet this collection barely even dips its toe into the late 19th century, with the exception of one story of pirates in the Caribbean (J. Allan Dunn's "The Screaming Skull"). What happened to all the knights in shining armor, the swashbuckling Three Musketeers knockoffs, or the Roman centurions? If Wildside is saving up their historical adventure for some other Megapack I'm not aware of it. They haven't produced one yet, while they've already put out The Eighth Science Fiction Megapack.Obviously, you can't go wrong with the price of these Megapacks, but you don't just spend your money on books, you also spend your time. There are moments while reading The Adventure Megapack that you feel like your effort is well spent, but by the time you reach the end of the 25th yarn, you may find yourself wishing for a few hours of your life back.1 of 2 people found the following review helpful. The adventureBy William RoweThe stories reminded me of my youth and a simpler time. Very easy to read without thinking about the world as it is today.7 of 12 people found the following review helpful. The Adventure Megapack: 25 Classic Adventure StoriesBy RomanovThese are fairly old stories and would appeal to those over sixty rather than younger persons. Most of the stories are about sailing luggers, South Sea Islands and natives with an admixture of stories from India/Asia.