The Strange Enemy of our new book Captain Philip Strange: Strange Enemies, Fraulein Doktor, pops up in the oddest places. Here she is causing trouble in Frederick C Painton’s “Soft Thunder” a year and a half before her first appearance in Donald Keyhoe’s Philip Strange stories.

We’ve posted a number of Frederick C. Painton’s stories in this space already including a few of his Dirty Dozen-esque Squadron of the Dead stories. He’s a great writer with a background in newspapers as this short autobiography from the April 1942 issue of Blue Book Magazine attests:

Click to enlarge in a new window.

Unfortunately he died of a heart attack on a Guam airfield while covering the Pacific war.

He was just a kid who played Tennis to those two hard-boiled soldiers—but there was stuff in his make-up that kept him battling in the flaming skies. It was a grim game they played—they stuck to the rules and played like sports, but they knew that the loser would find flying death. And then into their game kited a kid who seemed soft—but there is lightning with even soft thunder.

• Download “Soft Thunder” (December 1932, Sky Fighters)

We have more of Chris Kalb’s great splash page designs for the second volume of our Captain Philip Strange series. It was hard to pare it down to only three, so we’re throwing in a bonus wallpaper and making it four! So we have the cross-shapped daggers raining down from Devil’s Bait; Strange vs the giant black Zeppelin of Raid of The Red Reaper; the flame belching U-boat of Dromes of Hades; and the the Bat Staffel itself from Drome of the Bat Staffel! Of course you can check out all of Chris’ designs from Strange Enemies on the Strange Enemies Design page!

They are available in our Age of Aces Desktops Gallery in a variety of aspect ratios—pick the one that best suits your computer!

 
 
The latest volume of our Captain Philip Strange series collects the eight stories featuring Philip Strange’s strangest enemy—Fraulein Doktor. The good Doktor is Germany’s loveliest spy and an instructor of spies in Antwerp. But they had a history together—a history from before the war. For before she had become Fraulein Doktor, she was Karol von Marlow—a slender, dark-eyed girl on a small Mecklenberg estate on a fragrant June night where a young Philip Strange had been given refuge…

    Strange did not hear the rest. He was back in the year before the war—a frightened youngster, pursued from Berlin by a money-grubbing uncle. A scene in Mecklenburg, a hideout from the police inspired by the uncle’s posted reward. An injury to his ankle, and a German who had taken him in at his small estate. A kindly man, Herr von Marlow, and his lovely French wife. And there had been a daughter, a slender, dark-eyed girl, his one bright memory of those unhappy days.

    There had been a bond between them. She, too, spoke several languages, but it had been more than that, this bond. They had written frequently—and then the war had come. He had not forgotten. In his desk at his Chaumont retreat was a small picture of a dark-eyed girl, smiling. On the back, words had been written by a feminine hand:

    “To Philip, in memory of happy days—Karol von Marlow.”

    Fate had played them a scurvy trick. By a hideous mistake, the parents of Karol von Marlow had been shot as spies by the French. Fired by desire for vengeance, she had offered herself as an agent. The flame of revenge had died, he knew, but not until she had become the famous Fraulein Doktor, noted alike for her daring and her skill as a teacher of spies.

    That same mocking Fate had made him an enemy, cursed by the Boche as the “Brain-Devil of G-2,” with a price of twenty-five thousand gold marks upon his head.

Somehow the “Brain-Devil of G-2″ and Fraulein Doktor manage to help one another avoid death or capture and still fulfill their respective missions while keeping just this side of treason. In one of the stories, Strange is Court Martialed for his perceived assistance of the enemy! They both still hold their love for one another in their hearts, even though this may be in conflict with their loyalty to their countries.

    A bloody war lay between them—but some day, when it was over, they would meet again…

We’ll be debuting the second volume of our Captain Philip Strange series at PulpFest on Friday. So if you’re in attendance stop by our table and meet the Age of Aces crew and pick up a copy of Captain Philip Strange: Strange Enemies (and The Three Mosquitoes: The Thunderbolt Ace if you haven’t yet).

He hope to see you there!

We can’t stop harping on about the excellent art work that doesn’t get enough credit in our books. Frederick Blakeslee and John Flemming Gould were masters at rendering airplanes in flight while our own Chris Kalb’s inventive designs are simply the coolest out there.

In our books the spine breaks up the tableaus—and in the interior art galleries we present the art as it was originally published. We spend some time mending the images back together to create a complete image—with a majority of our work ending up in the gutter of the book anyway. Some of these images are just so good we felt the needed to turn them into desktops for you to enjoy on your computer everyday. And we’re getting the ball rolling with three of Chris’ splash page treatments from our latest book, Captain Philip Strange: Strange War. You can choose from the plane vs. pterodactyl of Scourge of the Skies; the bullseye cocarde of Cocardes of Courage; or the green flaming bombs, in black and white here, of The Unholy Horror!

They are available in our Age of Aces Desktops Gallery in a variety of aspect ratios—pick the one that best suits your computer.

We plan to add to the gallery with images from previous books as well as those to come!

Yes, the first book in our new series, Captain Philip Strange: Strange War is here and just in time for the 80th Anniversary of the publication of his first appearance in Flying Aces Magazine in August of 1931!

We were at the PulpFest in Columbus, Ohio this weekend premiering our new book. Strange War has six exciting stories of “the Phantom Ace of G-2″ with an introduction by Sid Bradd and all beautifully wrapped up in an exciting new design by Chria Kalb. Keyhoe’s Brain-Devil takes on all manner of pterodactyls, flaming fire balls raining down from the sky and demon aces with the help of Tom and Noisy Jay—the twin aces of G-2 affectionately known as the Jay Birds.

The Captain Philip Strange stories ran for nine years—from 1931 through 1939—in the pages of Flying Aces magazine. And we’re already preparing the second volume which will collect the Fraulein Doktor stories—Strange’s former love, now nemesis due to circumstances brought about by the war. (This book will be out later this year.)

Strange War should be available at Amazon very soon—it sometimes takes a day or two for them to add the book to their system. And speaking of PulpFest, for those who couldn’t attend, here are some links to download the various flyers he had out for people to pick up:

• Our General Aviation Titles Flyer
• Captain Philip Strange: Strange War
• The Adventures of The Three Mosquitoes: The Thunderbolt Ace

Age of Aces will be at Pulpfest in Columbus next week where we will be unveiling our latest exciting book—Captain Philip Strange: Strange War by Donald E. Keyhoe.

In Donald E. Keyhoe’s imaginings, the stormy skies of World War I are filled with giant pterodactyls, mystic fireballs and demon aces. But America has it’s own unnatural secret weapon: Captain Philip Strange. A mental marvel from birth, he was so terrifyingly effective that the Allies referred to him as “The Phantom Ace of G-2.” But to the Germans he was “The Brain-Devil,” whose penetrating green eyes were both a legend and a nightmare.

Keyhoe’s Philip Strange stories ran for nine years—from 1931 through 1939—in the pages of Flying Aces magazine. This first volume in our new series contains six exciting tales of terror skies! It also features an introduction by Sid Bradd and is beautifully wrapped up in an exciting new design by Chris Kalb!

So stop by our table and meet the crew and check it out or pick up any of our other titles at special Pulpfest discounts. If you can’t make it—keep your eyes on ageofaces.net to find out more about our new book.