Collins, Colin
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
Pseudonym of UK author Oliver Merland (? -? ), author of a number of anonymous contributions to the Sexton Blake Library after World War One, and of work from the first decade of the twentieth century under other names, including Singleton Pound, some others almost certainly unidentified. As Colin Collins, he published three identified sf novels in book form: The Human Mole (1909), an adventure tale chock-full of Inventions, mainly the eponymous subterranean boring machine; The Blinding Light: A Tale (1910), the Invention in this case being a Ray so powerful that it pierces solid objects; and Four Millions a Year (1911), whose protagonist, after criticizing John D Rockefeller, is forced by a bequest to spend the Rockefeller fortune for good, which causes turmoil in both America and Britain. It has been speculated by John Eggeling that these three novels may have appeared in earlier versions, under other titles and with differing pseudonyms, in the Boys' Paper Fun and Fiction. [JC]
Oliver Merland
born
works
- The Human Mole (London: Greening and Co, 1909) [hb/Ernest Smythe]
- The Blinding Light: A Tale (London: Greening and Co, 1910) [hb/]
- Four Millions a Year (London: Greening and Co, 1911) [hb/]
links
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