His parents, Doctors Weldon and Katherine Rice, grew frustrated with the short attention spans of the American people of the year 2500 we’re informed this short attention problem began in the 1970s, but by the 26th Century nothing lasts, all is ephemeral, everything is just a flash in the pan. And yet Conway’s writing, due to that too-heavy plotting, is in a way similar to that of Manning Lee Stokes.īalzan is around 22 years old and is the lone human on an alien planet in capably-dispensed backstory, we learn he had a Superman-esque origin story. Conway wrote mainstream comics and he brings that same sensibility to The Blood Stones, as the novel has none of the softcore nature of the Richard Blade novels. The story is heavily plotted with a lot of melodrama and action but zero sex. It was interesting knowing this, as Conway’s tale would be perfectly at home in a Marvel comic of the time. It’s fair for what it is, just an average piece of mid-‘70s sci-fantasy, but it’s nothing remarkable.Īccording to the internet, “Wallace Moore” was really comics writer Gerry Conway. I’m betting it was a combination of the two, because The Blood Stones, the first novel in the series, really doesn’t have much to recommend it. Howard, Balzan takes its inspiration from Edgar Rice Burroughs, particularly John Carter of Mars and Tarzan (who is even referenced on the cover).Īnother difference is that Richard Blade lasted a whole lot longer Balzan only amounted to three volumes, and whether that was due to the series being a bomb with readers or the fact that Pyramid Books folded in 1976 is unknown. But whereas that series took inspiration from the Conan stories of Robert E. Yet another series produced by book packager Lyle Kenyon Engel, Balzan Of The Cat People is along the same lines of an earlier Engel production, Richard Blade. Balzan Of The Cat People #1: The Blood Stones, by Wallace Moore

The Blood Stones by Wallace Moore