Leroy Yerxa 1 hr 7 min read

In the crowded Owl Limb Night Club at midnight, boss Jim Drake slumps drunk over the linen while his right-hand man Puffy Adams tries to steer him out, before the strange trouble begins.

Leroy Yerxa's 1943 story opens on hard-boiled nightclub atmosphere before its space-opera adventure unfolds. Colorful, driven golden-age pulp. Read it for a rousing tale that carries its unlikely heroes from a smoky nightclub into a wild quest for a queen and her flaming diamond.

In its time

Published in 1943, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

1 hr 7 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).