Captain Midnight Chronicles

by John J. Nance

Born in the blazing crucible of war, but sworn to fight for peace, the mysterious obsidian aviator known only by the code name Captain Midnight flies again! An ace pilot, super secret agent, and astounding scientific genius, the heroic Captain Midnight ruled the radio airwaves and starred in comic books, film serials, and a classic television series. Now, when we need him most, he has returned, along with his legendary Secret Squadron, to battle spies, saboteurs, and the mercenary armies of the evil warmonger Ivan Shark and his delectably deadly daughter, Fury.

Featuring New York Times best-selling aviation novelist John J. Nance, the Captain Midnight Chronicles boasts a squadron of talented contributors, including Stephen Mertz, Robert T. Jeschonek, Mark Justice, Chuck Dixon, Robert Greenberger, Trina Robbins, Tim Lasiuta, Win Scott Eckert, Howard Hopkins, and Christopher Mills.

Genres: Pulp, Anthologies

Audible Audio

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

John J. Nance is an American pilot, aviation safety expert, and author. He served in the USAF during the Vietnam War and also as a Lt. Colonel in Operation Desert Storm.

Reviews

[Trike · Rating 1 out of 5]

I picked up this book on a mad dash through the bookstore so I didn't give it the once-over I usually do. I so wish I had, because it's just not good. It's at least honest about its pulp roots, as you can see right on the cover. I was in the mood for some good pulp fiction but this failed to deliver on the "good" part of that.

Captain Midnight Chronicles is a collection of new short stories based on the popular classic radio character who later was translated to movies, TV and comic books. I've never seen the earlier incarnations, but surely they must be better than this if the tales of the Secret Squadron had millions of fans and spawned a multimedia franchise. Some of the stories in this book are passable while others are just downright terrible, as bad as the worst fan-fiction you'll find on the internet. The tales range form the outlandish to the downright silly, but overall they're just not good.

Each story has a drawing to kick it off, and almost without fail the drawings bear no resemblance to the stories. The pictures are clearly based on the stories but the artist either didn't read the relevant passages or he just didn't care, because they don't match the descriptions at all. Which is a shame, because the drawings are actually extremely good.

I get annoyed by typos in books, but worse offenders are grammar and punctuation errors. A couple of these getting through the writing, rewriting and editing process are understandable. Captain Midnight Chronicles has the most egregious amount of typos and misspelling I've ever seen in any book, ever. Internet fan-fiction is actually preferable in this regard. One story was almost literally a long string of typos and mistakes with hundreds of those weird little figures one gets when dumping a Word document into any program. That sort of thing is simply inexcusable because it doesn't take someone with any understanding of English, just someone who has eyes.

Another thing that has just been irking me immeasurably is the fact that this character is a pilot yet there has not been a single time where they've spelled "hangar" correctly. I mean, seriously guys, it's not an "airplane hanger." That just looks stupid. It makes me leery of ever wanting to pick up another book from this publisher, Moonstone.

Avoid.

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really glad to find out that this book existed and was excited to read it but was left a little disappointed. Aspects and characters from all of the iterations of Captain Midnight are included, which is good, and all of the stories have a very nice illustration, though I thought the cover was not up to par. The stories are all pretty good, none sticking out as especially terrific or bad, though I didn't much like the last one in the book. There are quite a few typography problems, especially in the second story which was rendered almost incomprehensible. My biggest complaint is the inclusion of several contemporary phrases in the dialog that never would have been part of the 1930's; silly anachronisms that should have been edited out. My favorite stories were by Trina Robbins, Robert Greenberger, Howard Hopkins, and especially Chuck Dixon, who wrote an Airboy-Captain Midnight crossover.

[Randy · Rating 5 out of 5]

James "Red" Albright was a flying ace in The Great War(WWI). He earned the nickname Captain Midnight, dubbed by a general, when he returned from a dangerous mission at exactly midnight. After The war, He made it his mission to stamp out Wars all over the world to prevent another world war. He led the Secret Squadron from a base in the American southwest.

Flyers using planes of his and his mentor's designs. Aristotle "Tut" Jones had been Albright's college professor before joining the crusade.

Others in the squadron were Lt. Joyce Ryan, daughter of one of the Captain's comrades in the war. Teenager Chuck Ramsay, the Captain's adopted son(his father had been killed in the war on a mission and the Captain had fallen in love with widow while looking out for her and the boy.

The Captain even has his arch villain, Ivan Shark and his equally evil daughter, Fury.

In this collection of new tales, we get bits and pieces from all the versions that had appeared(radio, comic books, movie serials, and a fifties television series where the Captain became Jet Jackson Flying Commando because of contractual rights).

The Captain even meets Airboy, a comic book flying ace in one tale.

A fine set of stories even though there were some oddities. The Captain's adopted son, in one story, is referred to as his stepson, then a few paragraphs later adopted son. Another story has the Captain himself calls hin his stepson. There's also one where a murder victim is called the granddaughter of a woman being forced to use her psychic
powers, then morphs into her daughter near the end of the story, only to be back to granddaughter at the very end.

Pulp style tales of good quality nevertheless.

[Axel M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eine der Freuden des Internets ist, es, Neues zu entdecken, und mit einem schnellen Blick auf die Re-sellerlisten, sogar preisgünstig. Ich hatte nicht viel von diesem oder anderen obskuren Pulphelden der 30er erwartet, wurde aber angenehm überrascht. Es hilft natürlich auch, wenn moderne Autoren mit dem Wissen der Gegenwart sich dem historischen Material annehmen. Also, Captain Midnight ist tatsächlich kein Superheld, auch wenn sein Name so klingt, sondern etwas, was heutzutage kaum noch interessant scheint, ein Fliegerheld aus dem 1. Weltkrieg, der zwischen den Kriegen mit selbstgebauten Flugzeugen und "Superwissenschaft" der damaligen Zeit Kriegstreiber, Warlords und verrückte Wissenschaftler bekämpft. Oder auch mal den Herrscher des Saturn, ein gasförmiges Wesen mit Vulkankopf, das jede Form annehmen kann. Ach, wie herrlich unkompliziert war das damals...

[Glen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good anthology about Captain Midnight, an aviator/inventor superhero who was featured on the radio, in comics, and in a serial.

Most of the stories are very good, and there's an appearance of Xog, King of Saturn, my favorite foe of the good Captain. All the stories actually focus on the Captain. Too many anthologies that revive characters from this era include stories about supporting characters, a pet peeve of mine.

[Jeff J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great collection of short stories featuring pulp hero Captain Midnight. The stories are uniformly good (kudos to the editor), but I particularly enjoyed John Nance's contribution and Chuck Dixon's team up with Airboy.

[Don Massi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun read. A little on the light side but a good introduction to Captain Midnight.