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Read Tarzan At The Earth's Core (Tarzan, #13) (2006)

Tarzan at the Earth's Core (Tarzan, #13) (2006)

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Series
Rating
3.83 of 5 Votes: 1
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ISBN
0803262566 (ISBN13: 9780803262560)
Language
English
Publisher
bison books

Tarzan At The Earth's Core (Tarzan, #13) (2006) - Plot & Excerpts

It's clear at this point that Burroughs was tired of writing about Pellucidar. Though his writing evinces more and more social reflection about the nature of man and the wilderness, Tarzan at the Earth's Core has lost some of the wild swashbuckling joy of the earlier books in the series, resorting to a never-ending chase between multiple parties.That said, his skill here is much improved over the earlier stories, even if the narrative material isn't at all fresh--he carefully interweaves several different narrative threads and has paths cross and recross in enjoyable ways.The first 100 pages or so of the book follow a pretty entertaining "everyone suddenly agrees that there must be a hollow world in the middle of the earth and they decide to build an airship out of a propitiously-discovered material and go there" set up, with about fifty pages of action where the heroes, not accustomed to Pellucidar, make book-defining mistakes that set up the rest of the action. Burroughs then wrote an amiable, ambling 100 page spread of chase and escape and capture. It's pretty clear around the 250 page mark that he suddenly realized that he had a narrative to resolve, so he does so with 30 pages of coincidence and mostly alluded-to action. The satire present in the ending are clear that even Burroughs recognizes he's phoning it in at this point.There's two more books in the Pellucidar series and I have heard that they are basically chase narratives. So I think I will leave the series with David and Dian reunited and Jason and Jana falling in love and not worry myself with any later trials and tribulations.

This was a book I loved when I was fifteen. It involves Tarzan joining an expedition to the hollow world at the Earth’s core, the dinosaur haunted setting of Burroughs Pellucidar novels, to rescue David Innes from the clutches of the Korsars. It’s an odd book which features a lot of running around, cliff-hanger endings and prehistoric monsters. It ends abruptly as if Burroughs had reached his contractual word count for the project and just shut the whole thing down. There is no real structure, very little characterisation and the writing is clumsy. And still, I not only finished the book, I enjoyed it. Some of it was nostalgia for sure but some of it was the sheer efficiency of Burroughs story-telling and some of it was the pure pulpy joy of reading about adventures in a stone age world full of dinosaurs and sabre-tooth anachronisms.

What do You think about Tarzan At The Earth's Core (Tarzan, #13) (2006)?

I read several of the Pellucidar books, but this one sticks in my memory. I tend to say that Burroughs never let facts (or his ignorance thereof) interfere with his narrative. The laws of physics, the facts of biology, or geography, or optics--all ignored. Bur this is something of an oversimplification. Much of what Burroughs said (about the behavior of nonhuman apes, for example) was not known to be untrue in the literature of the times when he wrote, and he often did correct things when he learned more accurate versions.Many current scientists, science fiction authors, etc started with Burroughs as children--so he succeeded in getting to the curiosity and sense of exploration that children naturally have, and directing it toward the sciences, in many cases. Not a legacy to be despised.
—Valerie

This is a cross over pulp novel. It's actually Tarzan #13, but also Pellucidar #4. It's actually more relevant to the latter as the main plot is an expedition to rescue Tanar of Pellucidar.Some good pulp era speculative science here. Lord Greystoke and Jason Gridley build an vacuum power airship and fly into Pellicidar via the hole at the Earths north pole. Once they get there they get split up and the story follows them on their adventures from the two POVs. As you might expect, they all meet up again in the end, the good guy gets the girl etc, etc.I'm going to finish the Pellucidar series as they are not so well known as most of ERB's other works. The only problem being that they are not that easy to find. While reading these books, it's useful to have a map of Pellucidar, of which there are several on the internet.
—AndrewP

All right, I admit, this is not great literature, but it is a terrific Tarzan adventure. Scientists discover a super light super strong metal, and don't waste their time figuring out the ways it could completely transform society - that would be boring, I guess. Instead, they build a giant blimp and head out on a high risk adventure to explore the earth's core. And, being wise, they invite Tarzan along to help out. It's amazing - the earth turns out to be hollow with a mini sun suspended in the middle, and animals from all sorts of eras running around. Apparently gravity is reversed inside the earth's hollow skin, so there is no fear of falling to your death. There are the usual excellent battles, awkward love story, and embarrassingly racist attitudes (although Burroughs seems to have toned it down in this one). It was the stegosaurus episode that clinched that 5th star. A vicious stegosaurus decides to attack and eat our hero, so he spreads his plates flat, leaps from the top of a cliff, and glides down in a deadly flight. Paleontologists may object on many counts, but it is my favorite dinosaur description ever.
—Janet

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