The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu

Rating:
Summary: More adventures of the Devil Doctor
Review: Fu Manchu is back in what was originally a series of short stories. Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie must stop his plot to destroy the enemies of the Seven. Contains the fiendish torture device called the Gates of Joyful Wisdom, perhaps the villains most grisly device. Nayland Smith is placedin a compartmentalized trap where rats will work their way up his flesh as each successive gate is opened.

Rating:
Summary: More adventures of the Devil Doctor
Review: Fu Manchu is back in what was originally a series of short stories. Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie must stop his plot to destroy the enemies of the Seven. Contains the fiendish torture device called the Gates of Joyful Wisdom, perhaps the villains most grisly device. Nayland Smith is placedin a compartmentalized trap where rats will work their way up his flesh as each successive gate is opened.

Rating:
Summary: Death by insect, ghost, cat....
Review: The plot follows Petrie, a doctor who has dealt with Fu Manchu before. After a mysterious death he is contacted by inspector Nayland Smith, who warns him that Fu Manchu is about. Together they investigate and try to prevent a string of exotic murders The Return of Dr Fu Manchu was written as a serial and it feels that way. The driving force in the story is wierd twisted things that Fu Manchu does to kill people. The characters and plot, which doesn't say much about Fu Manchu's ultimate motives, are just ways of describing this or that exotic death and how it was pulled off. As a serial this would work because the murder happened - cliffhanger. Then in the next installment the murder would be solved. As a novel it didn't work for me because it is so homogenous.

I had heard prior to reading this that Fu Manchu is sooo racist, but I hadn't taken it seriously because so much gets labeled racist by the PC people that I tend to ignore it. Having read this I do think the novel is racist. Fu Manchu's lack of motive is a major point. Basically he goes around killing people with exotic animals, and Smith and Petrie's only explanation for his actions are that he is a, "yellow devil bent on the destruction of the white race" So that was a little blatant for me.

I didn't like this novel because it was built around the gimics that Fu Manchu uses to murder his victims. Character driven is a term I would never ever apply to this book. Fans of Sax Rohmer will want to read this because they know the style and will like it. Fans of the adventure genre should move along.

Rating:
Summary: MORE OF THE "GOOD" DOCTOR
Review: This is the second of the 14 Fu Manchu books that Sax Rohmer gave us. Like the first, it is very episodic in nature, revealing its origin as a series of short magazine stories. A reading of the previous book WOULD be helpful for a full enjoyment of this volume, but is not absolutely necessary. Like the first book, this one is jam-packed with fast-moving action and bizarre adventure. It is surprisingly well written; sometimes even elegantly written. Just note the description of the seedy East End in Chapter 11 and you may want to upgrade your assessment of Rohmer as a wordsmith. Anyway, this particular installment of Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie's war against the evil genius Fu Manchu includes kidnappings, wire-jacket torture, poisonous cats, snake murders, albino peacocks, killer apes, quicksand, a haunted house, rat torture, mummy attacks and on and on. It's really remarkable how much stuff Rohmer packs into one short book. You won't be bored, that's for sure!