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Captain Midnight: The Secret Squadron vs. The Terror of the Orient
Better Little Book telling the adventures of the radio show heroes during the war between China and Japan.
425 pages, Board book
First published January 1, 1942
About the author
Russ Winterbotham
62 books1 followerRussell Robert Winterbotham (1904-1971) was a writer of western and science fiction genre fiction, and the author of several Big Little Books under the name R. R. Winterbotham. He also wrote crime under the pen names J. Harvey Bond and Franklin Hadley.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 19, 2024
My very first Big Little Book!
I’ve always been curious about those tiny hardback children’s books from the 1930s, so I decided to try one featuring a character I'd never heard of before: Captain Midnight. I thought it would be a fun blast from the past, and I was not disappointed. This story is pure action from start to finish, and the black-and-white illustrations are uniformly great.
Captain Midnight was a pilot during World War II who worked with a network of allies called the Secret Squadron. For this book, he crosses through China in an effort to steal a gangster’s secret plans to help Japan bomb Hawaii again. It’s pulpy nonsense, but the plot speeds along so quickly that I just went with it.
Thankfully (and surprisingly), there’s not a lot of racism for a book from its time period. Some of the words are outdated and the Chinese side-characters talk in gibberish Engrish, but outside of that, there wasn’t anything that made me cringe. It’s such a simple, easy-to-read kids’ story that there’s no space for racial politics.
It feels dated in other ways, though. The title character comes across as a bit too paternal and stuffy for what modern readers would expect from a pulp hero, especially in how he talks to his younger partners. I’m guessing that’s a big reason Captain Midnight has been more-or-less forgotten to time while his pop culture contemporaries (The Shadow, Batman, Dick Tracy) have retained more relevance. (That, and how much his persona is tied to WWII.)
Taken by itself, this book is a fun, family-friendly adventure from a bygone era. It didn’t blow my mind, but I was good enough to make me want to read more Big Little Books.
I’ve always been curious about those tiny hardback children’s books from the 1930s, so I decided to try one featuring a character I'd never heard of before: Captain Midnight. I thought it would be a fun blast from the past, and I was not disappointed. This story is pure action from start to finish, and the black-and-white illustrations are uniformly great.
Captain Midnight was a pilot during World War II who worked with a network of allies called the Secret Squadron. For this book, he crosses through China in an effort to steal a gangster’s secret plans to help Japan bomb Hawaii again. It’s pulpy nonsense, but the plot speeds along so quickly that I just went with it.
Thankfully (and surprisingly), there’s not a lot of racism for a book from its time period. Some of the words are outdated and the Chinese side-characters talk in gibberish Engrish, but outside of that, there wasn’t anything that made me cringe. It’s such a simple, easy-to-read kids’ story that there’s no space for racial politics.
It feels dated in other ways, though. The title character comes across as a bit too paternal and stuffy for what modern readers would expect from a pulp hero, especially in how he talks to his younger partners. I’m guessing that’s a big reason Captain Midnight has been more-or-less forgotten to time while his pop culture contemporaries (The Shadow, Batman, Dick Tracy) have retained more relevance. (That, and how much his persona is tied to WWII.)
Taken by itself, this book is a fun, family-friendly adventure from a bygone era. It didn’t blow my mind, but I was good enough to make me want to read more Big Little Books.
December 13, 2011
Nearly forgotten now, Captain Midnight and his Secret Squadron kept children enthralled with their aviation adventures on the radio (1938-49) with his greatest popularity coming in 1942 in a movie serial (1942), a comic strip (from 1942), comic books (1941-8), a novel (1942), Big and Better Little Books (1941-6), and eventually on television (1954-6).
This Better Little Book presents art by Erwin L. Hess, the artist of the comic strip, and may be a novelistic expansion of one of the comic strip stories. As junk entertainment goes, it is excellent. The story is very TERRY AND THE PIRATES, with the Captain and his Squadron trying to help the Chinese government against the Japanese invaders. While doing this, they discover a second planned attack on Perl Harbor. Will they be able to stop it?
The story is genuinely thrilling, a lot of fun, and Hess is an excellent artist for this material. Oddly, he can be very detailed with everyone but Captain Midnight, who appears to be very lightly sketched. That aside, BLBs are just cool, but this is an exceptionally cool BLB.
This Better Little Book presents art by Erwin L. Hess, the artist of the comic strip, and may be a novelistic expansion of one of the comic strip stories. As junk entertainment goes, it is excellent. The story is very TERRY AND THE PIRATES, with the Captain and his Squadron trying to help the Chinese government against the Japanese invaders. While doing this, they discover a second planned attack on Perl Harbor. Will they be able to stop it?
The story is genuinely thrilling, a lot of fun, and Hess is an excellent artist for this material. Oddly, he can be very detailed with everyone but Captain Midnight, who appears to be very lightly sketched. That aside, BLBs are just cool, but this is an exceptionally cool BLB.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews