The Red Insects

by John Russell Fearn, Vargo Statten (Pseudonym)

Nick Hansley and his young wife and father-in-law soon find that 'The Cedars', the isolated country house Ena has inherited, has more than just a sinister appearance -- it radiates a positively evil aura. Soon after moving in, they are visited by a strange figure of a man -- Dr. Lexton, their nearest neighbour, who tries to persuade them to sell the house to him. But who is Dr. Lexton, and what was the nature of the secret experiment that Ena's deceased uncle, entomologist Cyrus Odder, had carried out at the house? It is not long before there is a mysterious death in the house, and then death spreads its net across the countryside -- and the entire world...

128 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1951

About the author

A prolific author in various genres under his own name, John Francis Russell Fearn also used these pseudonyms: Astron del Martia, Brian Shaw, Conrad G. Holt, Dennis Clive, Frank Jones, Geoffrey Armstrong, Griff, Hugo Blayn, John Russell, K. Thomas Mark Denholm, Paul Lorraine, Polton Cross, Spike Gordon, Thornton Ayre, Vargo Statten, Volsted Gridban, Dom Passante, John Cotton, Ephriam Winiki, Lawrence F. Rose, Earl Titan, Ephraim Winiki.

John Russell Fearn was an extremely prolific and popular British writer, who began in the American pulps, then almost single-handedly drove the post-World War II boom in British publishing with a flood of science fiction, detective stories, westerns, and adventure fiction. He was so popular that one of his pseudonyms became the editor of Vargo Staten’s Science Fiction Magazine in the 1950’s! His work is noted for its vigor and wild imagination. He has always had a substantial cult following and has been popular in translation around the world.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

"It became more than obvious to the trio as they followed the girl through the weird convolutions of the planet-sized termitarium that she was working to some kind of prearranged plan.
Progress continued at good speed, and yet with caution, through galleries that were unknown to the three but obviously familiar to Arona - until at last the emerged into a cavern stacked with all manner of strange machinery, illuminated by a pulsing red light not unlike neon. Here Arona turned in her quick, bright fashion.
"See that?" she asked, and she pointed to a machine not entirely unlike an electric chair - or perhaps an electric bed would have been nearer the mark. It was a long stretcher of crystaline substance with a queerly-fashioned helmet at one end, from which there snaked thick wires leading to generators and other quite incomprehensible electrical equipment.
"Upon that rests my hopes," she continued. "Termites, as you may know, even in this Age, are amazingly resourceful. Imagine, then, their power in 6890! When the body of one of their numbers - usually a neuter or soldier ant - gets out of action or badly hurt, but the brain remains unimpaired, his entire brain is changed instantly to another termite carcass from which the brain has already been removed..."
"Just like Uncle Cyris did," Ena put in quickly, and after her puzzled glance Arona continued,
"The body, of course, has not withered. It can be preserved in solution for an indefinte time, but the brain which formerly tenanted it has probably suffered irreparable injury and been destroyed. So, the instant change of brain from one body to the other provides that ant with a new body with which to carry on life. The process is entirely four-dimensional surgery. The brain is transferred without ever once coming into contact with anything material in transit: it is simply rotated through hyper-space to its new home. Every part of the operation is automatic and accomplished by the movement of a master-switch besiede the stretcher-table here. I happen to know because I´ve seen the operation many, many times."

Absolut hanebüchen, an den Haaren herbeigezogen, unlogisch, schrill, durchgeknallt....
Vargo Stattens THE RED INSECTS gehört zu den verrücktesten Pulpromanen, die ich kenne.
Dabei macht THE RED INSECTS zu Beginn noch einen beschaulichen Eindruck, fast möchte man glauben, eine Art Drei Fragezeichen-Story vor sich zu haben, etwas später schon eine frühe Fassung von Formicula. Nachdem sich die Story dann immer mehr zu einem apokalyptischen Endzeitszenario entwickelt, in dem die telepathischen Riesenameisen und ihnen dienstbares anderes Riesenungeziefer die Bevölkerung Englands ihrem grausamen Hunger opfern, wird die Geschichte immer abgedrehter.

Die Frage ist nicht, woher, sondern von wann die Riesenameisen kommen, heißt es an einer Stelle, und Vargo Statten läßt nichts aus, um der Story immer noch einen drauf zu setzen, bis sie sich mit Richard S. Shavers oder Ed Woods total durchgeknallten Stories messen kann:
Bewaffnete Kriegerameisen, Telepathie, Zeitreisen, Verpflanzung von Gehirnen durch den Hyperraum, Herrschaft der Insekten in der fernen Zukunft, nichts ist zu abstrus, um nicht in diese Story eingebaut zu werden, die als Weird Tale beginnt und als schriller SF-Roman endet.

Das Verrückteste von allem: mir hat der dünne Roman Spaß gemacht, er ist kurzweilig und unterhaltsam (nur das Nachdenken sollte man auf das unbedingte Minimum enschränken).

Empfehlung für Pulp- und Golden Age SF-Liebhaber, Freunde von Formicula, der Zeitmaschine und Ed Wood.

[Dennis · Rating 2 out of 5]

Giant red ants from 6000 years in the future combine with some invented by a mad scientist in the present aim to wipe out all human life. Fortunately they fail.