TO WORLDS UNKNOWN
First Published in 1960 - 157 pages
This
book starts with everybody already in the Tavona.
The nine people onboard consist of our usual heroes, Rex Clinton, Tiger
Clinton, Professor Lucius Brane and Toby Paul, together
with their alien friends, Gator, the commander of the Tavona,
Borron, the navigator and Vargo
Lentos, who is effectively the interstellar relations officer. The other two
are the skeleton crew for the Tavona namely Nibo, a signals expert and Lesta,
a mechanic. The object of this voyage, a few months after the last adventure,
is merely a trip to Mars to see how the work of restoration is progressing. On
the journey, the Professor spots a new planetoid and the Tavona
lands to investigate. Here everybody is captured by small gorilla like
creatures, but our heroes are able to escape when the creatures eat tablets
from the medicine cabinet and become unconscious. Leaving for Mars, this
strange world is named Nomad by the Professor. On the journey to Mars, Rex sees
a strange face staring in at one of the windows on the Tavona.
The mystery is solved when they arrive at Utopia on Mars and a Martian called Pavlo collects a sketch that he had previously left
onboard. Somehow it had been a reflection of the sketch that Rex had seen.
Going on to Mino, our heroes hope to meet with their friend Multova
and find out more about the secret of the extraordinary long life of the people
of Dacoona. Before they go to Mino, however, they go
with Pavlo in his space ship, the Miconda,
to explore the planet of Golcana. Here the friendly
people exist in pairs, each pair being identical twins. The Miconda
is destroyed in an electrical storm and this maroons the explorers. Other
aggressive natives then attack the friendly natives and Tiger uses his rifle to
fight them off. Rescued by the Tavona, our
heroes go on to Mino and meet with Multova. Rex gets
to spend some time with Morino. Rex bumps into Rolto and he tells Rex about a planet in the Third Region
called Lila which, Rolto says, contains some of the
earlier inhabitants of Earth and they speak Hebrew. Multova
tells everybody about the latest research into the longevity of the Daccoonians. It appears that they can only live on their
own planet and fall ill when taken to another. Rex tells everybody about what Rolto has said and they all resolve to go to Lila to
investigate Rolto's claims. They travel in Multova's faster spaceship, whose name translates as 'Grey
Lady' and the Tavona is to follow on. When
they stop at the planet Lut for water, Rex goes for a
paddle in a brook and finds himself trapped in a cement
like substance, known as Klantz. Freed, the journey
to Lila is resumed. At Lila communication commences with the use of the word
'Jehovah', the Hebrew name for God and an initial hostile atmosphere, (thanks
to Rolto's previous visit), is defused. When the Tavona arrives later, it contains a messenger from Terromagna called Nargil, who has
come to order Multova's immediate return, as he is
urgently required. A visitor from the planet of Romunda
in the Fourth Region has arrived at Terromagna
seeking help. Romunda is near to a planet called Parvo and the satellite of that planet has gone out of
orbit and is going to crash into Parvo. Every
available spacecraft is needed to evacuate as many people as possible from Parvo to another planet named New Parvo.
Travelling urgently in the Grey Lady to Romunda,
where they have very advanced spacecraft, they meet up with a Romundian named Dominov. A short
delay allows Dominov to demonstrate a device that the
Romundians have that transmutes one metal into any
other metal. Our heroes then go and save the last of the inhabitants of Parvo when no other ship dares land. Returning to Romunda, they find a great fleet of ships used in the
evacuation, including the Tavona in which Rex
returns to Mino to spend some time with Morino. The
others follow on later after experiencing the wonders of Romunda
and Terromagna. Some ten days later, the Tavona returns our heroes to Glensalich
Castle back home in Scotland.
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here to see the story illustrations from this book
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advertising leaflet for the Science Fiction books
To Worlds Unknown
Subtitle - Further adventures in Space for Rex Clinton and his
friends, this time culminating in the evacuation of the threatened planet Parvo.
Publication Details - published by Hodder and Stoughton
First Edition
Frontispiece
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Original First Edition Boards