Guy d'Armen was a contributor the early French science fiction magazines of the 1920s and 1930s such as L'Intrépide and Sciences & Voyages. In addition to his classic his classic La Cité de l'Or et de la Lèpre, Armen also wrote Les Géants du Lac Noir [The Giants of Dark Lake] (1931), in which the villainous Khyzil Kaya rules a secret city protected by giant spiders, microbes and mutants. With the character of Doc Ardan, Armen refined the archetype of the heroic scientist adventurer looking for lost cities and defeating mad scientists armed with deadly weapons. Under the pseudonym of Francis Annemary, Armen penned Le Semeur de Cyclones [The Seeder of Tornados] (1931), in which another mad scientist controls a captive volcano. novel: Doc Ardan: City of Gold and Lepers (2004)