Plasma Pulp: Lost Worldsedited by
Lawdog
(Raconteur Press, January 21, 2026, 268 pp., kindle, pb)
“Johnny Dhane, Jet Pilot #14” by CE Hugues
“Team Calamitous and The Princess of Vezphinae” by Spearman Burke
“Fettermen of the Planet Mingo” by Lee Allred
“A Princess of the Stars” by Dean Stone
“Tyrant of the Iron Sargasso” by Malory
“Duke Rockwell vs The Gopher Men from Planet X” by Ted Begley
“Soul Kings of Desarra” by Craig A. Reed, Jr
“Princess of the Starways” by Alan Wolfe
“Spire of Doom” by MD & Bam Boncher
“A Twist of Fortune” by Ken Lizzi
Reviewed by Eric Kimminau
According to publisher Ian McMurtie in his introduction, the second Plasma Pulp anthology celebrates the “Raygun Gothic” aesthetic through ten short stories that blend retro-futuristic technology with the classic spirit of heroic adventure. I have never read this type of anthology before so I am looking forward to it.
Set upon a vibrant, prehistoric world teeming with reptilian adversaries and enigmatic queens, “Johnny Dhane, Jet Pilot #14” by CE Hugues follows the perilous journey of Auguste d’Agard and his companions as they navigate a landscape where disparate eras of human history collide. After rescuing a mysterious woman whose arrival suggests a technological advancement far beyond their own 19th-century origins, the group is thrust into a volatile conflict between rival factions vying for territorial dominance. Filled with prehistoric predators and the looming threat of an imperial invasion, this story, written in the style of a choppy, Saturday morning matinee in the American 1920’s, was extremely hard to follow and several times jumped from one story line to another to another without warning. It made for a difficult to understand and, at times, hard to follow story that ended just as abruptly with a promise of more unrelated sub-plots in the next episode. Not a fan.
In “Team Calamitous and The Princess of Vezphinae” by Spearman Burke the narrative follows the high-octane exploits of Team Calamitous, an elite group of interstellar specialists led by the formidable and genetically enhanced Broc Calamitous. The story opens in the midst of a high-stakes rescue mission within a massive alien hive. What begins as a straightforward extraction of a diplomat quickly spirals into a complex mystery, as the team discovers that the internal strife of the alien kingdom is being manipulated by a shadowy external force. As tensions mount between human colonists and the hive, the team must race against time to prevent an all-out planetary war while grappling with a personal threat that targets their leader’s unique physiology. The story emphasizes themes of duty and sacrifice, culminating in a daring assault where the team must overcome overwhelming odds to save a civilization and protect one of their own from a calculated, personal vendetta. Where the first story was chopped and hard to follow, this action-packed thriller, while definitely in the over exaggerated pulp style was engaging and fun. I loved it!
In “Fettermen of the Planet Mingo” by Lee Allred the narrative follows Captain “Grif” Griffon, an augmented space explorer thrust into a high-stakes espionage mission by his “Security spook” handler, Carthage Smythe. Upon reaching the throne world of Mingo, Grif must navigate a bizarre reality, utilizing both advanced quantum teleportation gadgets and his own enhanced physical reflexes to survive the hostile environment. After being captured by mindless “Fettermen” and narrowly escaping a forced interrogation, the mission culminates in a tense scene where the team must coordinate a synchronized sabotage effort, leading to a direct confrontation with a ghostly tyrant. This “Buck Rogers”esqe trope just tries too hard to be edgy and innovative, throwing out detective style dialogue in poorly edited purple prose full of thesaurus clichés that just made me lose interest. Who would ever describe outer space as “treacle”? And monstrous alien brutes named “Ryan” and “Thomas”? The ear slug translator from “Hitchhiker’s Guide” was just the final straw and it was before the action even started. Two thumbs down.
Next up, in “A Princess of the Stars” by Dean Stone, Captain Sienna Sidera, the notorious “Pirate Queen of the Cosmos,” finds herself in the unlikely position of a savior after the fall of the Galactic Commonwealth to the Tarjan Empire. She embarks on a high-stakes infiltration mission of the palace on the planet Starwell to navigate the archaic, sewage-filled tunnels beneath the estate and to rescue a kidnapped Ikai princess. The mission takes a sharp turn when they encounter a treacherous figure from Sienna’s past. The narrative emphasizes the tension between old rivalries and the desperate need for cooperation to ensure the survival of their fledgling civilization. This is BY FAR the best story I have read within this anthology. Excitement, gripping, flowing and tying together past, present, humans and alien races, anger and vengeance. This is my kind of science fiction!
“Tyrant of the Iron Sargasso” by Malory (a single named author, spicy!) follows the defiant Captain Rex Dart, a cocky pilot who finds himself trapped in the “Sargasso,” a sprawling interstellar graveyard where a mysterious nebula harvests unsuspecting ships. After his own vessel is dragged into this drifting continent of wreckage, Rex must navigate a treacherous landscape populated by scavengers and ancient alien flora to reclaim his ship and find a way out of the magnetic trap.
Rex escalates the stakes when he joins forces with a daring princess to confront Lord Rust, a tyrannical cyborg ruler who plans to weaponize the graveyard’s salvaged technology to conquer the solar system. Their survival hinges on a desperate infiltration of a dreadnought palace, where they must use their wits before they are permanently integrated into the growing expanse of scrap metal.
Holy smokes! “Dutch” Schaefer mixed with Han Solo and teams up with Taarna the Taarakian. “So, Your Highness. I possess a cargo hold of antique gold, a ship that smells like an abattoir, and no flight plan. Where does a princess go when her kingdom vaporizes?”. The response is true legend and connected straight to the heart of this Star Trek fan. If the previous story was top notch, THIS is the Pinnacle! Malory, you have earned the single name status!
“Duke Rockwell vs The Gopher Men from Planet X” by Ted Begley mirrors the “Retro-Futurism” of the 1930s and 40s, blending high-tech concepts like atomic power and spaceplanes with an aesthetic rooted in the World War II era. It features classic tropes such as the square-jawed hero, the “eccentric scientist,” and a fast-paced, episodic plot filled with strange planets and mysterious alien civilizations.
In this high-stakes interstellar adventure, Captain “Duke” Rockwell and the crew of the spaceplane Viking are diverted from their return trip to Earth when an irresistible gravitational beam ensnares their ship. This force pulls them toward “Planet X,” a mysterious tenth world hidden within our solar system. Upon entering the atmosphere, the crew is immediately thrust into a localized planetary conflict between two distinct factions: the surface-dwelling Kestrel Mountain People and the subterranean Fossorians. Duke forms an uneasy alliance with the Kestrel leaders, who reveal a desperate history of planetary survival and a looming threat to Earth. With time running out, Duke and his team must navigate alien politics and technical peril to protect their home planet from an ambitious emperor’s conquest. While the previous installment, “Fettermen of the Planet Mingo,” struggled to capture the essence of the “Buck Rogers” Saturday matinee style, “Duke Rockwell vs. The Gopher Men from Planet X” succeeds brilliantly. The author masterfully employs period-accurate technical terminology and dialogue that feels authentic to the era’s science fiction roots.
Furthermore, the story’s structural pacing is exceptional, creating a compelling narrative flow that keeps the reader consistently engaged. Although the high standard set by earlier entries makes it difficult to rank this as the definitive best, it remains a highly enjoyable and effective addition to the series.
“Soul Kings of Desarra” by Craig A. Reed, Jr blends elements of high-stakes planetary adventure, advanced technology, and supernatural elements. Garth Kinston, an Earth-born man from New Jersey has ascended to the role of Emperor Consort on the alien world of Desarra. When his wife, Empress Elara, is abducted by a mysterious and ancient race known as the Soul Kings, Garth assembles a diverse team of loyal companions, including a master archer, an assassin, a warrior woman, and a mad scientist to launch a high-speed pursuit across a vast desert. Utilizing “windrunners” (beautifully illustrated before the story) which are specialized vessels that combine sails with anti-gravity technology, the crew engages in a tactical naval-style battle against the kidnappers’ ship to recover their ruler and protect their empire from a rising historic threat.
Professional and resolute, the story captures the group’s transition from a successful rescue mission into a dangerous infiltration of a hidden rock-carved city. Thick with tension, they approach the confrontation with a powerful god-king and his albino cobra-men minions, whose return threatens to enslave the planet’s modern civilizations.
Reading the first true SF Fantasy story of this anthology came at the perfect time. I repeatedly experienced flashes of Robert Lynn Asprin’s “Thieves Guild” series, elegantly mixing technologies into old world charm and swashbuckling adventure. I very much enjoyed this romp through the desert and truly wished there was more! “Princess of the Starways” by Alan Wolfe features the classic hallmarks of the Space Western genre: a ragtag crew on a “junker” ship, a high-stakes galactic conflict, aristocratic drama, and a melodramatic villain who blends mad science with biological horror following a cynical smuggler with a hidden past, whose routine run spirals into a galactic crisis when his mysterious cargo is revealed to be a warrior princess fleeing an arranged marriage to a terrifying warlord obsessed with forced galactic biological evolution. Can you say “predictable”?
Reliance on the antagonist, “Doctor Octavius,” whose character design, complete with grafted tentacles, a transparent and uninspired trope, serves as the first major disappointment. This design choice feels less like a creative vision and more like a derivative nod to established villains. Then the subplot involving the ship’s AI achieving sentience through a female-to-female romantic fixation on the princess feels forced; it is an irreverently unlikely development that adds little to the core plot and feels fundamentally unnecessary. The story’s immersion completely breaks with the reveal of the protagonist’s “secret” identity. Once “Buck” is unmasked as the conveniently titled “Prince Buccaneer,” the narrative loses all credibility, pivoting from a gritty space-western into a predictable drama. This lack of originality is compounded by the blatant lifting of Commander Taggart’s iconic “Never give up, never surrender!” line from Galaxy Quest, which feels more like a theft than a tribute. Ultimately, the story is bogged down by predictable grifts and modern platitudes, punctuated by a final line of dialogue: “Let’s go be different together” that serves as a testament to its hollow and formulaic execution. Two thumbs WAY down.
Merging Victorian aesthetics with advanced technological jargon, “Spire of Doom” by MD and Bam Boncher follows Zhene DuLair—a privateer equipped with communicator-integrated hoop earrings and a predictable Cajun dialect and the mysteriously combat-proficient “teacher,” Vivien Vine, as they are pulled into the “Bermooda Anomaly,” a mysterious storm concealing a hidden world. Stranded in this prehistoric yet technologically enhanced “Inworld,” the duo joins forces with a human-led tribe of mouse-like humanoids engaged in a conflict with rat-like creatures, utilizing triceratops-drawn carriages and “searay” lizard-birds to navigate toward a crystalline city. This stronghold is ruled by Kathan, an “Outworlder” tyrant who employs a massive energy spire to subjugate the local tribes, prompting Zhene and Vivien to execute a daring infiltration within a classic rebellion framework to liberate a civilization they have only just discovered. The narrative increasingly resembles a derivative, artificially constructed pastiche that lacks internal cohesion, utilizing a “kitchen-sink” approach to world-building in a transparent attempt to obscure a highly formulaic plot. By haphazardly layering disparate elements, such as fireball-launching avian beasts, saurian transport, sapient rodent and plant humanoids, the authors create a world that feels cluttered and inorganic rather than immersive. Ultimately, the story suffers from an over-saturation of tropes that fail to harmonize, resulting in a setting that is too conceptually fragmented to maintain credibility.
“A Twist of Fortune” by Ken Lizzi masterfully blends high-tech interstellar travel with the swashbuckling adventure of a survival epic, following Dryllan “Drill” Watts, a cynical former naval officer turned smuggler, as he transitions from a pilot to a frontier scout after a catastrophic drive malfunction leaves him marooned on an uncharted planet dominated by massive flora and lethal predators. The narrative shifts into a high-stakes rescue mission when Drill intervenes to save an indigenous princess from the reptilian Antheg, inadvertently shattering a fragile truce between rival factions and forcing him to navigate a brewing planetary war while seeking a way off the world. This original and engaging fantasy tale features a unique mix of kilt-wearing, spacefaring Scottish royalty battling lizard men with tail-powered crystal blasters and culminating in a completely unexpected ending and a tantalizing tease for the next adventure. Definitely worth the read and I sincerely hope I have the opportunity to see more from this author!
This Lost Worlds anthology achieves its greatest heights when blending high-octane action with imaginative world-building. “Team Calamitous and The Princess of Vezphinae” is lauded as an engaging thriller that utilizes an exaggerated pulp style to deliver a fun, high-stakes rescue mission. Similarly, “A Princess of the Stars” is hailed as the premier entry of the anthology, praised for its gripping narrative flow and its ability to seamlessly weave together complex themes of vengeance and cooperation between human and alien races. “Tyrant of the Iron Sargasso” represents the pinnacle of the collection for its legendary character dynamics and heart-pounding infiltration of a dreadnought palace. Furthermore, “Duke Rockwell vs. The Gopher Men from Planet X” succeeds by masterfully employing period-accurate technical terminology and exceptional pacing that authentically honors the roots of the genre.
The latter half of the anthology introduces successful ventures into science fiction fantasy and survival epics. “Soul Kings of Desarra” provides a refreshing “romp” through a desert landscape, effectively mixing “old world charm” with swashbuckling adventure and unique anti-gravity technology. I particularly appreciated the seamless integration of technologies reminiscent of classic fantasy series. “A Twist of Fortune” is noted as an original and engaging tale. It distinguishes itself through a creative premise involving Scottish royalty and reptilian adversaries, culminating in an unexpected conclusion that leaves the reader eager for subsequent installments from the author.
I have enjoyed this Plasma Pulp anthology and I particularly enjoyed the fantastic black and white illustrations prefacing each story. They set the scene, offering a tantalizing vision for the mind’s eye in anticipation of the stories to come.
Eric Kimminau is a BBS geek turned IT professional seeking the next Great Adventure. Let’s Go!