Saturday, September 21, 2013

The Spider 006 - Citadel of Hell

The Spider 006
Citadel of Hell
Norvell Page as Grant Stockbrdge
March, 1934




The Spider faces a conspiracy of firebugs that threaten to destroy America's food supply.  Not a lot of detection in this one - the first full half of the book is one extended action sequence as the Spider tries to find clues while evading the police, who are after both the Richard Wentworth and the Spider for murder.  He gets close, gets captured by the police, does something clever to escape, his ruse falls through, gets captured by the police, wash, rinse, repeat.

The scale of the menaces the Spider faces has been steadily increasing as the magazine goes on, and by this issue thousands are killed and the entire nation is starving.

Aside from the manic pace, what stands out is massive car chase involving the police, the gang cars, the Spider in a double decker bus, and an absurd amount of firebombs and explosions.

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