Lester Dent

Lester Dent (1904-1959) was an American author of pulp fiction. He is best known for his contributions to the Doc Savage series (writing as Kenneth Robeson). Dent went to college for business, intending to be a banker. While he was standing in line to apply, he discovered that telegraph operators made $20 more than bankers, so he decided to major in telegraphy. It was as he was working as a telegrapher for the Associated Press that he noticed how much writers made by writing for pulp magazines and began writing during slow hours. It wasn’t long before he was writing exclusively for Dell Publishing for $500 per month. Following Dell ceasing publication of their pulp magazines, he was contacted by Street and Smith Publications about writing a pulp magazine for an adventure hero – a hero that would end up becoming Doc Savage. Although the magazines were published under the house name of Kenneth Robeson, Dent was paid $500 (and later $750) per novel. Lester Dent became a published author in 1933 with the Doc Savage novel The Man of Bronze. After that, new novels were published monthly until 1947. While Dent wrote the lion’s share of the Doc Savage novels, other authors contributed as well. We have only included the novels attributed to Lester Dent. For the rest, please see Doc Savage. Dent also wrote standalone novels under his own name, starting in 1946 with Dead at the Take-Off. Below is a list of Lester Dent’s books in order of when they were originally published: Notes: Ost was re-published as The Magic Island for its Bantam re-release. Repel was re-titled The Deadly Dwarf for its Bantam re-release. According to Plan of a One-Eyed Mystic was shortened to One-Eyed Mystic for its Bantam re-issue. Violent Night was re-published as The Hate Genius by Bantam. The Spook Legion was also titled The Ghost Legion. Radio Western Adventures also includes a bonus story by Donald F. Glut.