This issue, TMIS begins to introduce new fiction, and it's not half-bad. The lead novella teams up John Carter of Mars with the Shadow (each of them have their names only slightly changed in the text - just enough to make it annoying) against a villian who was hopelessly outmatched by Tarzan in a previous (authentic Edgar Rice Burroughs) story, and is even more hopelessly outmatched here. Our writer strives too hard to sound like ERB's strained John Carter narration and it becomes even more stodgy than ERB's. But the action and the flow carry the story (ignore the occasional "cutsie-poo" references such as Margot's sister being a reporter for a Great Metropolitan Newspaper) and the characters remain, pretty much, in character. A good beginning.

The next story gives us an original character -- only scanned it so far, but it appears free of the cutsie-poo self-references -- and the character actually has some gaming references (skills descriptions) in the back of the zine.

The final story is what appears to be the first 1/2 of ERB's *Chessmen of Mars* and you just can't go wrong with a Burroughs' Mars novel. Serializing it, as long as TMIS doesn't cease publication, hearkens back to the Mars stories' days of serialization in the old pulps. And a nice illustration to introduce the story too, straight from the original *Argosy* cover.

The cover of TMIS #3 itself doesn't hold up as well, though we can't imagine any better on TMIS's budget. Perhaps the editor should consider running old pulp covers (esp. the covers which featured the reprinted items) on TMIS's cover.

All in all, an excellent bargain for your $2.00! (Plus another 50 cents or so if you decide to print it out. Don't use your expensive colour ink!)

*jeep!

--Chet