Sale, Richard - Murder at Midnight (1950)

Another book of the same name was written by Gregg, Cecil Freeman

Murder at Midnight contains two novellas, which did not appear in specialized mystery pulps. They presumably originated in either general purpose pulp magazines, such as Argosy, or in the slicks. The heroes of both stories are involved in radio, at that time the most high tech communications medium in the world. Although the radio background of the tales is only tangentially involved with the mystery plots, it still makes for interesting reading. Sale was a ham radio operator in real life, and during World War II became involved in radio-based civilian defense work. Neither tale is at all hard-boiled. Instead, both have a young man who gets plunged into a frightening situation. The first half of each novella is filled with mystery. Gradually the puzzling events get explained. By around the midpoints of the stories, a clearly identified villain has emerged, and the last sections of the tales turns into a pure adventure and suspense thriller. I enjoyed the opening mystery sections of both works more than their finales. Neither novella is a classic, but both make pleasant reading. "Murder at Midnight" (1945) is a more conventional mystery, with a setting amid the New York City upper crust. "Cape Spectre" (1941) is set on an isolated wild island on the Florida coast. Its Caribbean setting, and elements of spy fiction in a World War II context, resemble Lawrence G. Blochman's Blow-Down (1939) and Helen McCloy's The Goblin Market (1943). The radio messages of "Cape Spectre" and the telegrams of The Goblin Market introduce readers to now obscure media of specialized communication. There is also much about radio in Blochman's Blow-Down. Many of these novels also have heroes who are traveling under false pretenses, who look like ordinary workers, but who have an agenda to investigate an already murderous situation.

Mike Grost