Prose: Challenger Storm in The Isle of Blood

By Nick Ahlhelm | June 28, 2012 - 12:28 pm | Prose

Airship 27 is probably the best company currently in the new pulp field when it comes to reviving classic pulp heroes. And while they have introduced several new heroes in their two Mystery Men (& Women) anthologies, classic characters have always seemed to be their focus.

Challenger Storm: Isle of Blood is one of several novels that looks to change that. Challenger Storm is something of a Doc Savage sort, a heroic adventurer with a crew of allies and a desire to help those in need. He’s an exceptional man, a talented pilot and an all around Renaissance man.

His first adventure takes him to La Isla de Sangre, the Isle of Blood mentioned in the subtitle. He’s there to rescue a kidnapped young woman from a guerilla force, but he quickly finds he’s in the middle of an all out war. Ultimately, he and his men must take on the murderous Villalobos brother, would be conquerors of the entire island.

Don Gates develops a solid tale for the first adventure of his new hero. Challenger seems like a genuinely interesting character to lead the story. Unfortunately the tale sometimes feels like it gets bogged down with too many viewpoint supporting cast members. While reading, I couldn’t help but yearn for more Challenger in the book that carries his own name!

While this is Gates’s first novel, his artistic collaborator is far from a rookie. The book features a painted cover and interior line drawings by the legendary Michael Kaluta. Kaluta’s fantasy art is almost legendary in the field, but long time pulp fans might remember his classic, and gorgeous, work on both the 70s and 90s incarnations of the Shadow.

To be honest, Kaluta’s art is worth the price of the book alone. But Gates keeps up as best as he can with the superstar artist and delivers a solid adventure yard. While Challenger Storm: Isle of Blood walks little new ground, it is a rip-roaring adventure yarn, well worth a look by any new pulp reader.

The book is now available for $14.99 in print or for a cool $3 as a PDF download from the Airship 27 Hangar.

About Nick Ahlhelm

Nicholas Ahlhelm has let his love for superheroes as a concept pretty much overwhelm his good sense. A fan of super-powered prose fiction since he discovered Wild Cards at twelve. Since then, he has expanded his reading and viewing to cover superheroes through every means he can find, whether comics, prose fiction, movies, television, or transmedia sources. In the mean time, he regular maintains three fiction-producing website publications: Metahuman Press, Pulp Empire, and The Dead Walk Again. At the same time, he writes the weekly web comic Arc with artist Jay Rainford-Nash, published every Tuesday. (Other comic works are in various stages of production.) He lives in Eastern Iowa with his wife and two daughters, in an increasingly small house.

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