Death Quest (Mission Earth Series) [Abridged] [Audio Cassette]

L. Ron Hubbard (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1986 | Series: Mission Earth Series (Book 6)

A monumental work -- acclaimed as agenuine masterpiece -- L. Ron Hubbard's 1.2-million-word-ten-volume MISSION EARTH dekalogy brilliantly blends science fiction and action/adventure on a vast interstellar scale with stinging satire -- in the literary tradition of Voltaire, Swift and Orwell -- on the world's foibles and fancies.

A true publishing phenomenon -- precedent-setting when each volume, in turn, became a New York Times and then an international bestseller -- MISSION EARTH has already sold more than five million copies and continues to appear on bestseller lists in contries throghout the world.

Winner of France's Cosmos 2000 Award and the Nova Science Fiction Award in Italy, and nominated for a Hugo Award, MISSION EARTH is an epic narrative of a secret invasion of Earth as seen-and vividly recounted -- by the aliens who, unrecognized, already live and work among us. It is a novel crowded with sharply memorable characters and with places and events cloaked in splendor, menace and mystery: Palace City, Joy City, the forbidden prison fortress of Spiteos, the violent fall of the Voltar Confederation.

The Voltar Confederation has a long-range plan to use Earth as a strategic staging area in its continuing conquest of the galaxy. However, with the discovery that Earth is being destroyed by pollution, drugs and other menaces, Combat Engineer Jettero Heller is sent on a top-secret mission to save the planet from self-destruction. Unknown to Heller, another Voltarian faction (the Coordinated Information Apparatus) has secretly been using Earth as a supply base for drugs. It dispatches its own counter mission to thwart Heller's plans.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The comic nightmare continues in book six of Hubbard's 10-volume broadside, Mission Earth. Our Dudley Do-Right hero, Jettero Heller, is having trouble starting his Everglades launching pad for the spores that will clean up atmospheric pollution. To aid him, his fiancee, Countess Krak, fakes evidence certifying him as an illegitimate son of oil baron Delbert John Rockecenter, the world's wealthiest and most powerful man. Meanwhile, Heller's nemesis, the ineffectual spy chief Soltan Gris, makes another series of attempts to end Heller's good deeds. Gris first hires a hitmanwho is killed by his own mother. Next he has his PR man go in for character assassination, and finally he files false lawsuits and criminal charges against Heller, which sends the police after him. This is every bit as tedious and heavy-handed as the first five volumes but will no doubt join them on the bestseller list.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"A wicked satire...more addictive than salt and peanuts!" -- Gene Wolfe

"The 'Mission Earth' books are a wild compound of science fiction action, political satire and sexual comedy." -- Cincinnati Post

"The comic nightmare continues ..." -- Publishers Weekly --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: Galaxy Pr Llc; Abridged edition (June 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1592120628
• ISBN-13: 978-1592120628
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 4.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,523,150 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

With 19 New York Times bestsellers and more than 230 million copies of his works in circulation, L. Ron Hubbard is among the most acclaimed and widely read authors of our time. As a leading light of American Pulp Fiction through the 1930s and '40s, he is further among the most influential authors of the modern age. Indeed, from Ray Bradbury to Stephen King, there is scarcely a master of imaginative tales who has not paid tribute to L. Ron Hubbard.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Scheme of Sabotage Continues..., June 24, 2000

By 

Michael Delaware - See all my reviews

This review is from: Death Quest (Mission Earth Series, Vol 6) (Paperback)

Death Quest continues the exciting tale of the hero Jettero Heller methodically working to save Earth, and his adversary Soltan Gris who seeks to sabotage everything he does. This time Soltan hires a hit man named Torpedo Fiaccolla, a killer so loathsome even the mafia has blacklisted him! He sends his to take out the Countess Krak, Jettero Heller's devoted love. Only the scheme does not turn out as Soltan plans, and everything goes out of control! This book takes the reader violently through the hills of Virginia and then to the open sea and climaxes dramatically in the waterways of Atlantic City. Meanwhile Soltan commits bigamy, and has his plans turned all upside down by a bubble-gum popping teeny-bopper as well as many other outragious exploits involving a pig farm and tons of gold! Death Quest keeps the tale rolling forward and keeps the story alive with wild untamed adventure around every corner. The creative and unusual characters will make you smile and laugh as the story continues to unfold. Hubbard's wit and humor are constantly present in this wonderful satire and science fiction dekalogy. Mission Earth book 6 is great fun! When you make it this far into the series, you will really love this one!

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars satire this?, November 9, 2000

By 

Richard Claypool - See all my reviews

This review is from: Death Quest (Mission Earth Series, Vol 6) (Paperback)

When I was a lad of some 12 years of age, I enjoyed this and all the others in the series. Now, after reading much science fiction, I am bored to tears. Satire is wonderful only when it serves a point and this does not. The first couple of books were and still are enjoyable. However, when we reach this book I fear it has degraded into a bloated work that goes no where. We've already seen countless times that psych is evil, sex is perverted, and countless other replayed points. I reread up to this book and just couldn't go on! I suppose if one treats the series as a source of cheap thrills it's not all that bad. I for one would rahter listen to Zappa's catalog for some good old satire whit and inteligence.

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars The endless series plods on and on and on..., November 17, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Death Quest (Mission Earth Series, Vol 6) (Paperback)

Other classics of science fiction and satire give us characters that entertain us, delight us, and romance us...the Stainless Steel Rat, Jerry Cornelius and Jherek Carnelian, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Hiro Protagonist and Y.T., and so many others. What do we get with L. Ron Hubbard and book six of this seemingly endless series? We get Teenie Whopper, a genuine underage teenage nymphomaniac who exists solely to have sex with Soltan Gris and provide the reader with some sordid sex fantasies. And that's the highlight (if you could call it that) of "Death Quest," as Hubbard drags his subplots across yet another few hundred pages while we wait and wait and wait for something interesting to happen. Soltan Gris hires a hit man to kill Countess Krak (the so-called "quest" of this book), but of course he screws it up; while he does so, Jettero Heller fights back against the plots of J. Walter Madison and his idiotic "Whiz Kid" PR campaign. Oh, and of course we get more Hubbard ranting against psychology and psychiatry, as voiced by Dr. Crobe.

If you've managed to survive the first five books of this series without slipping into a coma, then you might enjoy the sex and occasional violence that permeates this book. Lord knows there's little else to recommend it...but at least we're past the half-way point of the series. Only four more books to go...