A Rough Edges Rerun Review: Kingdom of Blue Corpses - Brant House (?)

“Kingdom of Blue Corpses”, from the December 1935 issue of the pulp SECRET AGENT X, is one of the more oddball entries in the series. It’s very comic-booky (if that’s a word), with a master villain who calls himself the Blue Streak and wears a blue rubber suit, somewhat like a frogman’s outfit, emblazoned with a lightning bolt. His minions – every self-respecting master villain has to have minions, of course – wear black rubber suits that look even more like frogmen and drive around in a sinister black hearse. The Blue Streak’s weapon in his campaign of terror is an electrical cannon that fires lightning bolts, and as a side effect, the corpses of the people struck by it turn bright blue. No explanation is forthcoming for this side effect, but that’s all right. This yarn isn’t very rigorously plotted, even by pulp standards.

Which doesn’t mean it’s not a lot of fun, as Secret Agent X tries to bring the Blue Streak to justice in a series of extremely fast-moving, action-packed confrontations. As usual, “X” employs several different disguises, and his girlfriend/assistant, beautiful blond reporter Betty Dale, even gets in on the act this time, as “X” disguises her so she can take the place of a young woman he suspects of being involved with the Blue Streak.

The actual identity of the author behind the “Brant House” house-name on this one hasn’t been established, as far as I know. The first part of the story reads like it could be by Paul Chadwick, the creator of the Secret Agent X character and the principal author in the series in its early years. The style changes somewhat during the course of the story, becoming more terse and action-oriented, which has led some readers to speculate that maybe Chadwick started the novel and from some unknown reason, another author finished it. This seems possible to me as well, but at this point, we just don’t know. Whoever wrote “Kingdom of Blue Corpses” did a good job of keeping things moving, even if they don’t always make complete sense.

(Since this post originally appeared in a somewhat different form on May 28, 2010, "Kingdom of Blue Corpses" has been reprinted twice, once by Adventure House and once by Altus Press. The Altus Press edition includes several other Secret Agent X novels. In the comments on the original post, there was some discussion about who actually wrote this one. Some pulp scholars lean toward G.T. Fleming-Roberts, while others think it might be the work of Paul Chadwick. Based on my reading of the story at the time, I even suggested that Chadwick may have started it and Fleming-Roberts completed it. I honestly don't know the answer, but you pays your money and you takes your choice!)