OK fantasy, much like his Mars books. ( )

El resplandeciente planeta Venus, cubierto de nubes, esconde un maravilloso secreto: el sorprendentemente hermoso pero letal mundo de Amtor. En Amtor, ciudades de seres inmortales florecen en árboles gigantes que alcanzan miles de pies en el cielo; bestias feroces acechan en el desierto de abajo; raros destellos de luz solar precipitan tormentas devastadoras; y los habitantes creen que su mundo tiene forma de platillo con un centro ardiente y un borde helado.
Varado en Amtor después de que su nave espacial se estrelle, el astronauta Carson Napier se ve arrastrado a un mundo donde la revolución está madura, el amor de una princesa tiene un alto precio y la muerte puede provenir tan fácilmente de la hoja de una espada como del rayo de una futurista pistola.

I'm relatively new to the work of ERB, but it seems to me he just keeps writing the same story over and over. This was not as much fun as [b:The Moon Maid|2690100|The Moon Maid|Edgar Rice Burroughs|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1240177406s/2690100.jpg|432893], was a real struggle to finish, and ends on a cliffhanger. ( )

Despite the various trodden and untrue tropes, not so old at time of writing, I was surprised by the level of the prose in this book. The bits of wry humour sparingly sprinkled improve the quality of the read still more. Even the female lead, though familiar to readers of fainting-women-burly-men fiction, has more chutzpah (and fighting skill) than you might expect for the 1930s. ( )

It is hard not to compare Carson Napier with Edgar Rice Burroughs's other interplanetary adventurer, John Carter of Mars, though the two have very little in common. While Carter and Barsoom represent an American audience looking back on the conquering of the frontier, Napier and Amtor very much represent the social concerns of the 1930s. The John Carter books feature a self-assured hero and a pervading sense of nostalgia for a world near its end. Pirates of Venus lacks a cohesive plot and, though Carson Napier is a more realistic protagonist than John Carter, he feels less interesting and exciting for this. The world of Amtor is jumbled and so is the story of Pirates of Venus.
Here again, Burroughs creates a unique world. His Venus is Amtor, not the Cosoom of the John Carter series. The inhabitants are geographically separated with little linking them physically or culturally. And they are completely unaware of their planet's spherical shape! The series requires the same suspension of disbelief as Burroughs earlier John Carter books since the modern reader will know that Venus could never have supported life except possibly very shortly after its formation and that its day, rather than the 26 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds of earth time that Burroughs ascribes to it, is actually 116 days and 18 hours in earth time. The ray-based weaponry and ever-present swords will remind readers of the weapons of Barsoom, though the description of its function uses a more up-to-date understanding of radiation. Finally, Burroughs spends an inordinate amount of time interrupting what plot there is to explain the language of Amtor, whereas in the John Carter books he briefly described any necessary terms so the reader could picture the subject or left it up to context to define the terms.
Carson Napier, rather than a poor knock-off of John Carter, is Burroughs's attempt at an autobiographical character. Readers and Burroughs himself would like to be John Carter or Tarzan, but most are actually more like Napier. For the fan of Burroughs, Pirates of Venus is interesting, but it is unlikely to appeal to the casual reader, especially as it ends like a serial film without a proper resolution. ( )