Series:Perry Rhodan (US)

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This is an ISFDB Bibliographic Comments page for the Perry Rhodan (US) series. This page may be used for a list of the titles in the series, bibliographic comments or extended notes about the series, or discussion on how to organize and/or record the works in the series. The link above leads to the ISFDB series record for Perry Rhodan (US). To discuss what should go on this page, use the talk page.

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Bibliographic Notes for Series:Perry Rhodan (US)


Full cataloging of the Perry Rhodan series will need to wait until ISFDB has better series support. The issues are that

  • The original series is in German and has 2400 issues
  • In English we are most likely to see the Ace Books translations but The Ace editors/translators apparently chose to not follow the German series order and apparently also skipped some German issues.
  • Also in English was a start at a magazine format translations by Vector (4 print and 1 electronic issue). These issues were unrelated to the Ace issues.
  • The overall series is divided into named "cycles" and at present they are in the 27th cycle. It's not clear if Ace also used the cycle system when they were publishing.

Web Resources

Perry Rhodan #6 - The Secret of the Time Vault

This section is about that ISFDB has both type collection and magazine publication records for this issue. The series entries seem to be inconsistent in the same way. Probably a Community Portal issue but it's being discussed here for now.

It appears from the wiki article that the initial German editions were published/sold in magazine format. The publication I have looks very much like a paperback book. I personally lean towards filing these as collections as ISFDB's magazine type causes some pain in terms of getting the ISFDB record to accurately reflect what's shown in the publication.
I'm going to write up some details from the publication here so you can see how/why the magazine record in ISFDB is worded the way it is.
  • The front cover looks like an Ace book with Ace catalog #65975. Probably the only exception to this is the large "6" in the upper right corner. I don't recall seeing other Ace books that displayed a series # so prominently.
  • The spine has "Ace Books logo, Perry Rhodan #6 * The Secret of the Time Vault 441-65975-060" and again looks like a book except for the prominent #6.
  • The back cover starts out with reading rather bookish and pulp magazine.
The Science Fiction Series that has sold 60 million copies in Europe!
Interstellar battle in the thrilling tradition of "Doc" Smith!
A ravaging race of intelligent reptilians threaten the conquest of the far distant world of Ferrol...as a prelude to the invasion of our own Earth!
(remainder snipped)
  • Un-numbered page 1 is a list of characters
  • Un-numbered page 2 is a magazine style masthead:
Perry Rhodan: Peacelord of the Universe
Series and characters created and directed by Karl-Herbert Scheer and Walter Ernsting.
Ace Books Edition
Editor: Donald A. Wollheim
Managing Editor: Forrest J Ackerman (Wollheim's credit on the previous line is with the period and Ackerman's credit is without)
Translator: Wendayne Ackerman
Art Director: Charles Volpe
Illustrations for this novel: Mike Gilbert
  • Un-numbered page 3 is the title page
Perry Rhodan
------------------
The Secret of the Time Vault
by Clark Darlton
------------------
Ace Books / A Division of Charter Communications / 1120 Avenue of the Americas / New York, N.Y. 10036
  • Un-numbered page 4 is the copyright page
The Secret of the Time Vault
Copyright ©, 1971, by Ace Books.
An Ace Book, by arrangement with Arthur Moewig Verlag.
All Rights Reserved
Printed in U.S.A.
  • Un-numbered page 5 is the table of contents. One item to note is that the stories are numbered and the essays/editorials are not.
  Rhodan's Rebirth page 7
1 Rhodan "Conquers" Galacto-City page 9
2 The Key to Eternal Life page 29
3 "To Live Longer Than the Sun" page 53
4 The Greatest Mystery of the Universe page 83
5 The Infinity Box page 97
  Scientfilm World page 119
  The Perryscope page 123
  • Un-numbered page 6 is blank
  • Pages 7 and 8 are an essay. Apparently issues 1 through 5 of the series had been printed in 1969 and part of 1970 and then it stopped without explanation. This essay explains the one year absence was due to contract negotiations. It also says that they intend to publish a new issue every month. This wording is relevant to magazine vs. book
“Editorials. This is one of them. There'll be another next issue. Ooops!—did I say issue? I was thinking of this as a monthly magazine. Well, it almost is. A magabook. Or a bookazine. Take your pick.”
The essay is signed "Your hyper-pal, Forry Rhodan (signature)". Note that the signature could be interpreted as "Torry Rnodan" as it's somewhat stylized but the name Forry Rhodan is used/printed clearly several times in the last essay in this publication.
The five stories are short stories but at the end of each is "50 Adventures from now you will meet The Blue Dwarf" with the number of adventures being 50, 100, 200, and 400. The title of the episode or who/what also varies. The implication is an exponential increase in the number of stories.
At the end of the last story is a one paragraph blurb about the next issue. One puzzling thing is that it ends in "... along with the pursuit of the relentless alients in–K.-H. Sheer's The Fortress of the Six Moons." I suspect wording like this is why there is so much confusion as to who actually authored the stories.
  • Pages 119 through 122 is an essay about specfict movies. It's signed "4sJ" which is a pseudonym for Forrest J Ackerman and it's pretty obvious Ackerman wrote this.
  • Pages 123 through 126 read like a "Letters to the Editor" with "Forry Rhodan" answering each letter.
To add to the confusion as to who wrote what - the essays occasionally drift into managerial territory such as mentioning that the writer discovered this or that artist. Thus I'm wondering if perhaps they were written by Donald A. Wollheim and Ackerman. The Scientfilm World column positively reeks of Ackerman and in rereading Rhodan's Rebirth it makes it sound like the same person as who wrote Scientfilm but I suspect Wollheim wrote this but have created the fictional Forry Rhodan to be the "I" that's both DAW and Ackerman. I suspect DAW did The Perryscope.
Ackerman's Wikipedia article makes it sound like he was the main editor and so it's possible DAW's hand was minimal and I could attribute Forry Rhodan as just Forrest J. Ackerman. Marc Kupper (talk) 14:31, 18 Mar 2008 (CDT)
Keep in mind that this series started out as a vehicle for translating Perry Rhodan fiction (with a few departments thrown in), but eventually morphed into an anthology series with numerous non-Rhodan stories, essays and serials. AFAIK, Ackerman did most of the editorial work, but it's hard to be sure when pseudo-"house names" like "Forry Rhodan" are involved (cf. Captain Future). Also, Ackerman usually signs his name "Forrest J Ackerman" and occasionally "explains" that his middle name is just "J", but that's just a joke that got old decades ago. A larger problem is that the Ackermans published the series out of order and at some point we will need to identify all German titles (there are over 2,000 of them at this point), assign series numbers and create variant titles for the English translations. Ahasuerus 14:51, 19 Mar 2008 (CDT)
I would seriously recommend leaving Perry Rhodan till we have Multiple Series support. I've tried this sort of thing before on smaller (under 100 titles) (sub-)series and this took a few days to sort out, even with tight coupling between publishers. Just because you have a book with a clear series number on it doesn't mean it's going to be easy... BLongley 18:25, 19 Mar 2008 (CDT)
I also just finished reading Perry Rhodan #6 - The Secret of the Time Vault and say it's more like a novel with named chapters though I'm still undecided on if I want to change this from a collection to a novel. Part of what's nudging me to keep them as separate short stories in a collection is the thing at the end of each story
Title Blurb at end of story/chapter Notes
1 - Rhodan "Conquers" Galacto-City 50 Adventures from now you will meet The Blue Dwarf Issue #62 in the German series as Die blauen Zwerge which is apparently Perry Rhodan #54: The Blue Dwarves: Colonists Story #2 by Kurt Mahr.
2 - The Key to Eternal Life 100 Adventures from now you will meet The Man with Two Faces Issue #112 in the German series as Der Mann mit den zwei Gesichtern which is apparently Perry Rhodan #104: The Man with two Faces by Kurt Brand in the Ace series.
3 - "To Live Longer Than the Sun" 200 Adventures from now you will meet The Micro-Fortress Issue #212 in the German series as Die Mikro-Festung
4 - The Greatest Mystery of the Universe 400 Adventures from now you will meet Danger from the Sun! Issue #412 in the German series as Gefahr von Sol
5 - The Infinity Box Next month ... K.-H. Scheer's The Fortress of the Six Moons Book #7 in the Ace series
I added the "Notes" column as I was writing this which pushes the issue back to that these are chapters in the Rhodanverse and not and that they number the novels/issues. My book #6 is apparently German issue #12 Das Geheimnis der Zeitgruft. Marc Kupper (talk) 22:31, 20 Mar 2008 (CDT)
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