Rob MacGregor's books

Indiana Jones and the peril at Delphi
Indiana Jones and the dance of the giants
Indiana Jones and the Seven Veils
Indiana Jones and the Genesis Deluge
Indiana Jones and the Unicorn's Legacy
Indiana Jones and the Interior World

and thats all Mcgregor, then theres Caidin

Indiana Jones and the Sky Pirates
Indiana Jones and the White Witch

and then Max MCcoy

Indiana Jones and the Philosophers stone
Indiana Jones and the Dinosaur Eggs
Indiana Jones and the Hollow Earth
Indiana Jones and the secret of the Sphinx

^^ thanks that helps alot. not to mention the 2009 Mcgregor novel: IJ and the Staff of Kings.

Jeremiah Jones said:

Well just finished
Indiana Jones and the Hollow earth
So heres my follow up review.

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Jeremiah Jones said:

...I'd recommend this book.

Its just, I don't believe it. Indy tends to stretch the limits of my belief simply by the nature of his adventures, but this had it snapped almost instantly. Its a fantasy novel, a very enjoyable one, with labyrinths, Giants, and Dragons, but its not really Indiana Jones. Character wise hes as well written as always, though his scepticism goes on a bit too long, but this never happened to Indiana Jones. I mean really.. Really? A frog man who IS a living labyrinth? Really? Still good though, but... more crazy fantasy.

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I agree. The whole interior world is not just implausible, but impossible. (By the way, you've mixed up the titles. Hollow Earth by Max McCoy was really good, in my opinion; Interior World is the one we're talking about here.)

Oh yeah, hollow earth, Interior world.. its funny cos I haven't even read the former yet.

In the middle of sky pirates. And I have to say its living up to its reputation, the sentence construction is unbelievably poor, and Indy's like some superhero, as opposed to flawed making it up as he goes Indiana Jones, hes the head of the forces of the world against an agency with name EVIL.. wha..?? Can't wait to get onto Max

Jeremiah Jones said:

Can't wait to get onto Max

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"Not if I have anything to say about it!"

Ah, the bear <I>was</I> a disappointing death scene. Laurels for making a joke about, Lao_Che.

Is That... !! The sheer shock of a deadly robotic Kodiak bear!! What I want to see is an indiana jones novel, maybe called, Indiana Jones and the attack of the Robo Kodiak Bear, or AOTRKB for short, where Indy enlists the help of Abraham Lincoln, and the rest of the Disney Animatronics, to defeat said Kodiak Bear in an epic brawl atop Mount Rushmore.

Yeah, that'd make sense

I just finished Peril at Delphi, and not realizing it read Hollow Earth about a year ago completely out of synch chronologically with the rest of the stories. All in all Peril at Delphi was not bad, but I agree with the criticisms listed here: killing off of characters in a rushed fashion, the description of Indy, characters from the beginning of the story magically reappearing in the final act, etc... To be honest I though it was a somewhat weak story McGuffin wise, but I did like the fact that the Omphalos had prophetic powers and ended up in Brody's museum(nice touch!). I just started Dance of the Giants, and I have all of the novel reprints waiting on my bookshelf to get through. If anything I've found myself surprisingly interested in revisting The Young Indy Chronicles, so once I get though these books that will be next on my list.

Webley said:

IJ and the Unicorn's Legacy.

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i just got done reading unicorns legacy , was pretty good , more of a mystery than action adventure but still a good read , love the part where indy is captured by the villain and totured, yeah you have to read that ,

I have a question: Are Mac Gregor's other IJ books are dull as Dance of the Giants? I mean I liked the classroom parts, I liked the archeological stuff, but it needed more action. There wasn't really any in that book. There was a climactic part, but even then that didn't have any action in it.


And I don't like Deirdre.

So are the other books of his more interesting? Do they have more action in them? I know action isn't what makes a book, but it's Indiana Jones. It needs action.

Also, since I'm a fan of the anime series Full Metal Panic and the book series Harry Potter, I am really looking forward to IJ and the Philosopher's Stone.

MacGregor's Books

I was always a little disappointed with MacGregor's books. I thought they had some good ideas but were never executed very well. Then came Martin Caiden. I was excited to see a new author, and boy, were they a HUGE letdown. Those books were more like Doc Savage than Indiana Jones. I didn't have a lot of hope when the series was turned over to yet another author, Max McCoy. But holy crap, he definitely got the spirit of Indiana Jones right. And it was about time! Philosopher's Stone is still my favorite, and it was his first outing. The only scene that bothered me in that entire book was when Indy for no real reason uses his whip to catch a ride on a hot air balloon. Other than that, EXCELLENT book. Dinosaur's Eggs was pretty good. Unfortunately I don't remember much of Hollow Earth. I think I should go back and re-read it. And finally, Secret of the Sphinx was pretty enjoyable, however the editing was extremely weird. I heard there was a time travel sub-plot in the original draft and Lucasfilm had it taken out. But some parts of it were still there (unexplainable memory loss, references of deja vu, etc).

MacGregor did set up a pretty decent backstory for Indy, and his books weren't terrible, just a bit bland, in my opinion. Peril at Delphi wasn't bad. I was very dissapointed with Dance of the Giants and Seven Veils. Then came my favorite MacGregor outing, Genesis Deluge, but a lot of people don't seem to like that one for some reason. This one was followed by the Unicorn's Legacy, which I don't remember much about, but I seem to remember that Genesis Deluge, Unicorn's Legacy, and Interior World were kind of a loose trilogy. Despite having elements from the previous two books, Interior World turned out to be completely ridiculous. I thought MacGregor was hitting his stride about the time Genesis Deluge was released, but capping off with Interior World broke that idea. Maybe the next one he does, the Staff of Kings, will be better, and a return of the Indiana Jones we like so much. I wish more adventures were set in the 30s and 40s, compared to the "Young Indiana Jones" years. That's probably why I liked Max McCoy's books so much better.

So should I read them in order? Because I was disappointed by the lack of action in Dance of the Giants. I'm kind of wanting to read the Max McCoy books now. But I've only read #2 of the MacGregor books (reading 1 now...it's a long story of why I read 2 first.)

Dyonus said:

So should I read them in order? Because I was disappointed by the lack of action in Dance of the Giants. I'm kind of wanting to read the Max McCoy books now. But I've only read #2 of the MacGregor books (reading 1 now...it's a long story of why I read 2 first.)

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You don't have to read them in order but it helps, especially because there are some recurring characters in some of the books. Max McCoy's four novels all involve a crystal skull (not the one from the film) and its story-line plays a (very) minor role in the books.

The first time I read the novels I read them out of order and didn't have too much trouble. However, I find them to be the most satisfying when read in chronological order.

Dyonus said:

So should I read them in order? Because I was disappointed by the lack of action in Dance of the Giants. I'm kind of wanting to read the Max McCoy books now. But I've only read #2 of the MacGregor books (reading 1 now...it's a long story of why I read 2 first.)

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I started with #2 as well because it was the only one I had. Then I finally got the rest and started with Delphi. Right now I'm in the middle of Interior World. I would recommend reading Unicorn's Legacy before Interior World, they seem to be the two that go together the most; basically a part one part two story.

Yeah, I noticed there were mentions of Peril at Delphi in Dance of the Giants and it kind of spoils Peril at Delphi for me. I just didn't know that worked across authors, though.

I just finished Dance of the Giants and The Seven Veils, and all in all they were so-so! I liked DotG better considering I already have a strong interest in Celtic mythology, but even though Veils tapped into similar themes it just didn't feel like an Indy story, it was just way too out there! There's definitely some good moments, and I found it interesting to know where Indy learned to fly... but not land. Hopefully they'll get better!

One thing is for sure the covers are great, but they usually don't mesh with the story at all, and not mention they're covered with pictures of Ford not Flannery. Also they're all just painted stills from the original films, and I honestly would've liked to have seen Struzan stretch his artist's chops a bit, much like Dave Dorman did for the Dark Horse comics.

The Genesis Deluge is next.

deckard24 said:

I just finished Dance of the Giants and The Seven Veils, and all in all they were so-so! I liked DotG better considering I already have a strong interest in Celtic mythology, but even though Veils tapped into similar themes it just didn't feel like an Indy story, it was just way too out there! There's definitely some good moments, and I found it interesting to know where Indy learned to fly... but not land. Hopefully they'll get better!

One thing is for sure the covers are great, but they usually don't mesh with the story at all, and not mention they're covered with pictures of Ford not Flannery. Also they're all just painted stills from the original films, and I honestly would've liked to have seen Struzan stretch his artist's chops a bit, much like Dave Dorman did for the Dark Horse comics.

The Genesis Deluge is next.

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I think you'll like Genesis Deluge quite a bit. It feels much more like an Indy adventure.

The Magic Rat said:

I think you'll like Genesis Deluge quite a bit. It feels much more like an Indy adventure.

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Cool, I've heard good things about that one!

I definitely recommend reading them in order, though it can be difficult maintaining interest for casual fans all the way through. MacGregor's novels are all ok, some much better than others, but none are terrible. Still, by the sixth one, even his brisk pacing and absorbing style as an author (which worked so well early on) was wearing thin. However, I still enjoy MacGregor's run overall. Some really good stuff came out of those six novels.

Then came Martin Caidin, who wrote flight manuals with light shadings of Indiana Jones as James Bond. WTF? It took me more time to read these two novels than the other 10 combined, merely because they were so ludicrously boring, the characters unbelievably uninteresting (and Indy not being Indy at all), and the writing was paced like a crippled snail.

Max McCoy's were all quite good, easily the best author overall. Everything that's been said about McCoy's has been said, but its worth reading these four novels.

If you can't be bothered to wade through the first 8 books to get to McCoy's final four in the series, then just skip MacGregor's and Caidins (skip Caidin's no matter what, you'll be better off for it) and read McCoy's. Again, overall, though, MacGregor's six books are all worth at least a read.

The Magic Rat said:

I think you'll like Genesis Deluge quite a bit. It feels much more like an Indy adventure.

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Genesis Deluge is excellent. Not only is it my favorite of the MacGregor novels but it might just be my favorite Indy novel period. I enjoyed all of his Indy novels but that one really stuck out for me.