“The Monster-God of Mamurth”
The Edmond Hamilton Megapack
Wildside Press
ebook $0.55

On this date, October 20, Edmond Hamilton was born in the year 1904.  While he isn’t the only writer of the fantastic with a birthday today, I think he’s the most important.

Hamilton is best known today as a writer of space opera (and husband of one of our favorite writers, Leigh Brackett), so it might seem that this tribute would be more appropriate over at Futures Past and Present.

What isn’t as well known is that, in addition to publishing muc of his early science fiction in Weird Tales, Hamilton also wrote some weird fantasy adventures stories.  In fact, his first published story, “The Monster-God of Mamurth” is just such a tale.

The story appeared in the August 1926 issue of Weird Tales.  It’s a lost city yarn, about a city that best left lost.

Hamilton structures his story as a tale within a tale, with a framing device in the first person and the main story told by a different character, also in first person. This is a narrative device that fortunately has fallen out of fashion but was quite popular in the 1920s.

the story opens with two traders in the Sahara sitting around their campfire one night when a dying man stumbles in out of the desert.  They give him some water, and he revives enough to tell his tale.

The dying man is an archaeologist. He’d been scouring the desert for ruins of Carthaginian settlements, when he came upon a stone bearing an inscription on a stone.  It had been written centuries earlier, warning travelers to stay away from the city of Mamurth, which lay further along the archaeologist’s path.  The inscription warned of sacrifices in a great temple.

Edmond Hamilton

Of course the archaeologist sets off in search of this city.  To his regret he finds it.  Mamurth is in a hidden valley.  It’s nothing but ruins, and the temple seems to be missing.  There are images of something that looks like a cross between a spider and an octopus carved on all the ruins.  The first night there, holes appear in the sand, approaching his camp.  The archaeologist throws a brand from the fire, and whatever is making the holes goes away.

The next day, on the eastern edge of the city, the archaeologist discovers two large statutes at the entrance to a road lined with sculptures of strange creatures.  Unfortunately, Hamilton doesn’t give any details .  At the end of the road is a perfectly flat circle of sand, surrounded by dunes.  He soon realizes he’s found the temple, only it’s invisible.  He goes into explore, making his way to the top level.

As the sun is setting, he sees the holes returning and realized to his horror what they are.  They are the tracks of the creature whose image is carved all over the place.  And they’re heading directly towards the temple in which he is now trapped.

“The Monster God of Mamurth” is not my favorite Hamilton story.  That would be “What’s It Like Out There?”  This is still a good tale.  Hamilton’s invisible spider (or whatever it is) is an effective monster.  Hamilton imbues the whole situation with a nice level of creepiness.  As a first effort, it’s nothing to be ashamed of.  It is one of the more popular and reprinted of Hamilton’s stories.

The price of The Edmond Hamilton Megapack is not a typo.  It really is only 55 cents.  It’s only available in electronic format, so those of you who prefer print (I’m looking at you, David.) can find it in The Baen Big Book of Monsters.  It’s edited by Hank Davis, so you know it’s good.

Hamilton was one of the best pulp writers of his day and deserves to be rediscovered.  (He also wrote for DC comics after the pulps vanished.)  I looked at “The Man Who Evolved” as part of the Pre-Campbell SF Challenge.  I’ll be looking at more of Hamilton’s work.  And no, I haven’t forgotten about the Challenge.  It’s been delayed due to Life Happening, but I will come back to it.