An anthology of 20 stories all involving zeppelins, those archaic airships of yesteryear? Oh, the humanity!
At least that was my initial thought. Truth is, ALL-STAR ZEPPELIN ADVENTURE STORIES is a big, gaseous bubble of pulp-style fun. Given its unusual theme – dirigibles, for goodness sake! – you’d think the book would be utterly repetitive, whereas it’s just the opposite. Zeppelins take center stage in some stories and the background in others. You get pirate zeppelins, haunted zeppelins, zeppelins held hostage and more, all spread across several literary genres with a marked lean toward the fantastic.
In keeping with the pulp-fiction concept, Jed Hartman offers “The Last of the Zeppelins,” a rip-roaring, tongue-in-cheek, serial-style tale covering the exploits of hero Hugh Betcha, and his attempts at stopping the Nazis’ plans for constructing a death ray. Along these same lines is Richard Lupoff’s “The Jewels of Lemuria,” featuring a costumed hero named the Crimson Wizard, who scours the skies of his metropolitan city in an invisible blimp. On a more sci-fi bent, two men accidentally time-travel onto the Hindenburg on the day of its ill-fated final voyage in “Where and When,” courtesy of James Van Pelt.
Other stories are more (and please forgive the pun) grounded in reality, like Carrie Vaughn’s “This Is the Highest Step in the World,” a fictional account of Joseph Kittinger Jr.’s record-setting high-altitude balloon jump, which is both thrilling and poetic. Lawrence M. Schoen provides “The Sky’s the Limit,” a clever crime story about an in-the-air poker game; it proves to be a real highlight. But the best of the bunch is easily Michael Manis’ “A Perilous Warm Embrace,” about a mentally challenged zoo janitor who forges an unusual bond with the captive apes. So what’s that have to do with zeppelins? Ah, but therein lies the surprising and startling conclusion.
Of the 20 stories here, all are originals save for Howard Waldrop’s “You Could Go Home Again,” which the cover calls a “classic” even though it was written only 11 years before this collection’s publication last year. Only about a quarter of the stories are skippable, which still makes for a pretty good track record, especially for a book with such a way-out, love-it-or-hate-it premise. I happen to love it, though I wish the book would’ve included biographical information about the writers, most of whom are complete unknowns to me. There’s some real talent in ZEPPELIN ADVENTURE STORIES – not your average, everyday anthology, of which this world needs more.
Related posts:
- Star Wars: The New Jedi Order – Agents of Chaos I: Hero’s Trial
- The Encyclopedia of Exes: 26 Stories by Men of Love Gone Wrong
- Star Wars: The New Jedi Order – Dark Tide I: Onslaught
- Star Wars: The New Jedi Order – Vector Prime
- Star Wars: The New Jedi Order – Dark Tide II: Ruin
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