Quote:
Originally Posted by goldshirt9
You mean the original Tarzan books  |
Yep. Before the term "science fiction" was coined, Burroughs was labelled "scientific romance." The first three books in the John Carter (Mars) series are highly romance-driven, as are the first two Pellucidar (Earth's core) books. I'm sure he did it in the Venus and Caspak series as well, but those don't stand out as strongly in my memory (from reading them 30+ years ago). A few others pop up along the way in all of the series, mostly when a new male protagonist is introduced--he needs a love interest to keep him motivated!
In his stand-alone books,
The Monster Men,
The Cave Girl,
The Girl From Hollywood and
The Efficiency Expert come to mind quickly as having significant romance mixed in with the action.
Marcia of the Doorstep is supposed to be a "traditional" romance. I have it sitting on my shelf, but haven't started reading it yet.
(oh yeah, warning: many of these are written from a first-person perspective. I got past that. I think you will too--none of these men brag about their exploits. They're pretty much universally idiotic in their wooing. Which, of course, is a large part of what leads to more adventures.)
I'll put the wikipedia entry for
Master Mind of Mars below, in spoiler tags, to give you an idea of a typical plot...
Spoiler:
On Mars, Paxton is taken in by elderly mad scientist Ras Thavas, the "Master Mind" of the title, who educates him in the ways of Barsoom and bestows on him the Martian name Vad Varo. Ras has perfected techniques of transplanting brains, which he uses to provide rich elderly Martians with youthful new bodies for a profit. Distrustful of his fellow Martians, he trains Paxton as his assistant to perform the same operation on him. But Paxton has fallen in love with Valla Dia, one of Ras' young victims, whose body has been swapped for that of the hag Xaxa, Jeddara (empress) of the city-state of Phundahl. He refuses to operate on Ras until his mentor promises to restore her to her rightful body. A quest for that body ensues, in which Paxton is aided by others of Ras' experimental victims, and in the end he attains the hand of his Valla Dia, who in a happy plot twist turns out to be a princess.