mct16:
A friend pushed me into reading "The Yellow Mark" before I'd even thought of trying the others because he said it was the best of the bunch.
I think that’s a very good example of the benefits/ problems of the whole thing, really. I think your friend may be right, as far as the Jacob’s
B&M books are concerned, but as you rightly say, it makes Olrik a less-than-convincing adversary for our heroes.
I read
The Yellow M first as well, and while the art might be first rate, I found the story to be a bit of a plodder; I then read the first two Comcat books -
Time Trap and
Atlantis Mystery, and again I could admire the art, but wasn’t that taken with the stories.
Next I read
Secret of the Swordfish and that was
amazingly dull (even allowing for the fact that I was reading it in French, and therefore some of the problems might have come from my lack of ability).
I’d probably not have bothered with
The Yellow M if I’d read the three volumes of
Swordfish first, and I only read all three of those because I bought an omnibus edition…
So were the books to have been published in order, in single editions, I’d have stopped at volume one of
Swordfish, and gone no farther. I’m not certain that the two books which Comcat chose would have inspired me, but they weren’t an immediate turn off.
The Yellow M, however, at least got me to try others in the series, albeit with a confused idea of why their main villain wasn’t actually much cop.
mct16:
Alright, I get the message. I'll book a meeting with my shrink tomorrow.
Nah, no need for that: we’ll just get Septimus to apply a little
Yellow M-style Mega Wave mind-control to you with his telecephaloscope…