The Flying Beast by Walter Masterman

[timothymayer]

Review:
z7hq.blogspot.com/2009/12/flying-beast-by-walter-s-masterman.html

[cw67q]

Thanks for posting this, Timothy, I just read and enjoyed "the Yellow Mistletoe" and "the Green Toad" (particularly the former) and plan to pick up the other Ramble House editions soonish (post-xmas budget permitting :-)).

- chris

[cauldronbrewer]

Jan 6, 2010 19:39:56 GMT cw67q said:

I just read and enjoyed "the Yellow Mistletoe" and "the Green Toad" (particularly the former) and plan to pick up the other Ramble House editions soonish (post-xmas budget permitting :-)).

- chris

I just finished The Yellow Mistletoe and enjoyed it, too. Though KEW included it on his list of the thirteen best supernatural horror novels, I would call it more of a blend between the detective and lost race genres. Either way, it's both ridiculous and highly entertaining.

For anyone who has read Walter S. Masterman, Mark Hansom, Jack Mann, and/or R. R. Ryan, how would you rank them against one another? So far, Mann is my favorite, but I've read five of his compared to only one apiece for Masterman and Hansom (The Sorcerer's Chessmen). I just ordered a copy of Ryan's Echo of a Curse; that will be the first of his for me.

[jamesdoig]

Dec 16, 2012 22:51:49 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

For anyone who has read Walter S. Masterman, Mark Hansom, Jack Mann, and/or R. R. Ryan, how would you rank them against one another?

Masterman is more adventure than weird/gothic - The Flying Beast is another lost race novel with some sf, and sadly the beasty is an aircraft, not a creature.

Ryan's novels are completely batty and over-the-top, and therefore worth reading - I reckon Echo of a Curse is the best of his novels. Hansom is pretty ordinary. Jack Mann can at least write a reasonably competent novel. There are lots of other supernatural thrillers from that period - publishers had stables of prolific writers who wrote the occasional supernatural or horror thriller, but of course few reached any high standards. You should try Frank Walford's Twisted Clay. Michael Arlen's Hell! Said the Duchess is another KEW title that isn't bad.

I'm not sure if you can still do it, but with the earlier online catalogue of the British Library you could search by publisher and year - it's really interesting to see the numbers of books published by the likes of Wright & Brown (which published Hansom and Mann), Herbert Jenkins (which published Ryan), Jarrolds (which published Masterman), Philip Allan etc etc, and the forgotten authors who wrote dozens of mysteries and thrillers for them.

Here's a row of this sort of thing:

[Craig Herbertson]

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Dec 16, 2012 22:51:49 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

Here's a row of this sort of thing:

Wow. I want all of your books

[cauldronbrewer]

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Masterman is more adventure than weird/gothic - The Flying Beast is another lost race novel with some sf, and sadly the beasty is an aircraft, not a creature.

I liked The Yellow Mistletoe enough that I'm going to give The Flying Beast a shot.

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

You should try Frank Walford's Twisted Clay.

Based on your descriptions elsewhere, this one sounds like a winner. Reading it might be tricky, however--so far, my options seem to be spending US$2,000 on the one copy for sale or driving down to the Library of Congress, which has a copy.

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Michael Arlen's Hell! Said the Duchess is another KEW title that isn't bad.

I like the subtitle: "A Bedtime Story."

Dec 17, 2012 14:52:25 GMT Craig Herbertson said:

Wow. I want all of your books

Me, too.

[timothymayer]

Nice collection!

[cauldronbrewer]

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Masterman is more adventure than weird/gothic - The Flying Beast is another lost race novel with some sf, and sadly the beasty is an aircraft, not a creature.

The fact that the beast is an aircraft (albeit a strange one) may be a letdown, but I had a fun time reading the book. I'd call it a hybrid between the lost race and murder-mystery genres (with a little sf and horror, but not much of the latter). In any event, Masterman didn't undertake the slightest bit of effort at making the story plausible, and I enjoyed it all the better for that.

Having read The Flying Beast, The Yellow Mistletoe, and The Green Toad (a rung below the other two, but still entertaining), I'm wondering whether any of his other books are also worth reading. The Border Line looks like the "weirdest" of the rest--does anyone have an opinion on it?

[cw67q]

May 9, 2013 23:15:39 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Masterman is more adventure than weird/gothic - The Flying Beast is another lost race novel with some sf, and sadly the beasty is an aircraft, not a creature.

The fact that the beast is an aircraft (albeit a strange one) may be a letdown, but I had a fun time reading the book. I'd call it a hybrid between the lost race and murder-mystery genres (with a little sf and horror, but not much of the latter). In any event, Masterman didn't undertake the slightest bit of effort at making the story plausible, and I enjoyed it all the better for that.

Having read The Flying Beast, The Yellow Mistletoe, and The Green Toad (a rung below the other two, but still entertaining), I'm wondering whether any of his other books are also worth reading. The Border Line looks like the "weirdest" of the rest--does anyone have an opinion on it?

I'd have to say: No, I don't particularly recommend the Borderline. It is one of his weird novels, but it isn't very good.

I like Masterman (I once liked a Masterman facebook page and found out I was the only likee at the time, does that mean that someone set up the page but didn't then like it? Or are these pages automatically generated by fb?).

As I said I like masterman, but after reading 10 of his novels I have come to the conclusion that his work varies somewhat in quality. Even at his best masterman isn't great literature, and many plot elements or motifs get recycled between tales, but he can be great fun and most of the novels are very readable. Of the books that I have read I'd rate them into three broad tiers of quality/fun:

1) The best: Yellow Mistletoe & Flying Beast are preposterous adventures both highly enjoyable with YM being the better of the two. Both do have quite similar structures though and it is probably best to not read them one after the other without a break. A third book I'd add to this top tier is the perjured alibi, a resolutely non-weird courtroom drama / mystery novel. This is not usually a genre of great appeal to me, but I think this is the strongest of masterman's works that I've read, the tension is well maintained thought. There is a minor technical issue that has bugged me both times I have read this book (the second occasion aloud to my wife), but it isn't enough to derail the plot.

2) Diverting reads but not quite up to the standards of those above. I'd put the Green Toad & Death Turns Traitor (a far fetched international conspiracy story) at the top of this batch . Three other mystery/thriller novels while not quite as memorable still fit here: the Mystery of the 52, a relatively low key story about a mysterious house; 2LO a murder mystery involving a set of actors/writers; and the Curse of Cantire which is a cursed family/castle novel.

3) Weaker books: the Borderline was a big disappointment, a book that gave no sense of conviction and one that I struggled to finish; the Curse of the Reckaviles (aka the Crime of the reckaviles) a mess of a book with a very odd structure and no real sense of drama or mystery.

I'd love to read opinions on the other random House reprints, or indeed any of the other novels (or even further indeedy on those included above . Anyone want to speak up regarding the Wrong Verdict? the Wrong Letter? Bloodhounds Bay?

In the meantime if you have already read YM, tFB & tGT and are happy to try a book with no (genuine or fake) weird content, then I'd recommend the Perjured Alibi.

Cheers - Chris

[cauldronbrewer]

Thanks, Chris. That's disappointing to hear given that the premise of The Border Line sounds promising. Your takes on The Yellow Mistletoe, The Flying Beast, and The Green Toad are highly similar to mine, so I think I'll skip it.

I generally stick to "real or at least faked weird" genre, so I don't know if I'll get around to the other Masterman titles. Still, I'd be interested to hear other opinions on them too. Along with Timothy's blog, the Vault seems to have become the place for commentary on Masterman, Mann, Ryan, and company.

[cw67q]

You are welcome cauldronbrewer, although I wouldn't necessarily recommend taking my opinion as overly reliable
John Pelan did write very highly of the Borderline, which perhaps contributed to my disappointment.

I do very much like Ramble House though. I would have picked up more of their books by now, but my book buying has slowed greatly in these financially precarious times. Too hard to justify large numbers of bulky packets of books to the other family members

- Chris

[cauldronbrewer]

Dec 17, 2012 1:18:38 GMT jamesdoig said:

Michael Arlen's Hell! Said the Duchess is another KEW title that isn't bad.

I just read Valancourt's attractive edition of this book, and at the very least it was an interesting exercise in mood shift. The first three quarters read like social-political satire with a few dark edges; the last quarter feels more like Machen's "The Great God Pan." I also got a strong Oscar Wilde vibe throughout; I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Arlen was a big fan of Dorian Gray.

[pulphack]

I don't know about Wilde, but Arlen certainly bailed out Noel Coward when The Vortex was in trouble - before everyone turned round nd called it a classic - to the tune of £250 which was no small sum in 1924!

Haining was veery fond of Arlen's The Ghoul Of Golders Green, which pops up quite a lot and features some of the recurring characters from his most well-know series of books. Shelmerdene is a socialite with lots of young men around her, and Arlen uses this to satirise society. His most famous book is The Green Hat, which was a huge bestseller but also knackered his career as everything after got poor reviews. I wonder if the reviewers and readers realised the ultra-British but Armenian born Arlen was an outsider with a jaundiced eye? I loved Young Men In Love (the panned follow-up to The Green Hat) and These Charming People, which is less novel and more short stories linked up, but none the worse for that. They're sharply witty, and the elliptic style was pastiched beautifully by the later comic writer Peter Tinniswood in Shemerelda (I loved Tinniswood at one time, and that's how I discovered Arlen). His main claim to fame now is that he wrote a short story about a gentleman burgular called The Falcon, which was the basis of Tom Conway's post-Saint film series for RKO (and very god they mostly are, too, if interchangeable with his Saint movies).

Vault's fave villain Sydney Horler once said of Arlen that he was the only Armenian who had never tried to sell him a carpet. Arlen replied that of course Mr Horler was every other inch a gentleman...

Arlen went to the USA and wrote for movies and TV - some Alfred Hitchcock Presents stuff is based on his work, apparently, though I'v never seen them to comment - and died in 1956 after not really writing for 10 years. He'd had intermittent writers block after worrying about how he could follow up The Green Hat's success. His reception in following years only made that worse. Nonetheless, for a number of reasons he's a writer worth looking back at once more.

[claytwisted]

Please don't buy this book! I realize that's an unusual request to come from an editor, but the fact is that if you haven't already purchased a copy of Masterman's The Flying Beast you will be well served by holding off for a month or two. You see, I've recently discovered a sequel of sorts that seems to have eluded previous bibliographers. We'll be publishing an expanded edition of The Compleat Flying Beast under the Dancing Tuatara Press imprint with a new introduction by yours truly. Ramble House has recently entered in to an agreement with the Masterman estate to be the exclusive publishers in the English language of all Masterman's  works. Rest assured, anything that hasn't been reprinted thus far, will be sooner or later. We're still having a bit of trouble locating his last five novels (published in tiny editions only in the UK) but we have hopes that they'll turn up eventually.

[helrunar]

I'd never heard of Walter S. Masterman. I noticed this chapter available for free from The Yellow Mistletoe:

www.ramblehouse.com/yellowmistletoechapter.htm

This book was originally published in 1930. Masterman died in 1946.

cheers, H.