Midnight Mass [Mass Market Paperback]

F. Paul Wilson (Author)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback
• Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates (2004)
• ASIN: B000NIHCP0
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,016,027 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I was born toward the end of the Jurassic Period and raised in New Jersey where I misspent my youth playing with matches, poring over Uncle Scrooge and E.C. comics, reading Lovecraft, Matheson, Bradbury, and Heinlein, listening to Chuck Berry and Alan Freed, and watching Soupy Sales and horror movies. I sold my first story in the Cretaceous Period and have been writing ever since. (Even that dinosaur-killer asteroid couldn't stop me.)

I've written in just about every genre - science fiction, fantasy, horror, a children's Christmas book (with a monster, of course), medical thrillers, political thrillers, even a religious thriller (long before that DaVinci thing). So far I've got about 33 books and 100 or so short stories under my name in 24 languages.

THE KEEP, THE TOMB, HARBINGERS, and BY THE SWORD all appeared on the New York Times Bestsellers List. WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS won the first Prometheus Award in 1979; THE TOMB received the Porgie Award from The West Coast Review of Books. My novelette "Aftershock" received the 1999 Bram Stoker Award for short fiction. DYDEETOWN WORLD was on the young adult recommended reading lists of the American Library Association and the New York Public Library, among others (God knows why). I received the prestigious Inkpot Award from San Diego ComiCon and the Pioneer Award from the RT Booklovers Convention. I'm listed in the 50th anniversary edition of Who's Who in America. (That plus $3 will buy you a girly coffee at Starbuck's.)

My novel THE KEEP was made into a visually striking but otherwise incomprehensible movie (screenplay and direction by Michael Mann) from Paramount in 1983. My original teleplay "Glim-Glim" first aired on Monsters. An adaptation of my short story "Menage a Trois" was part of the pilot for The Hunger series that debuted on Showtime in July 1997.

And then there's the epic saga of the Repairman Jack film. After 14 years in development hell with half a dozen writers and at least a dozen scripts, THE TOMB is finally moving toward production as "Repairman Jack" from Beacon Films and Touchstone. The plan is to make Jack a franchise character. (Gotta tell you: all the years of this has worn me out.)

I've done a few collaborations too. One with Steve Spruill on NIGHTKILL, and a bunch with Matthew J. Costello. Matt and I did world design, characters, and story arcs for Sci-Fi Channel's FTL NewsFeed, a daily newscast set 150 years in the future. An FTL NewsFeed was the first program broadcast by the new channel when it launched in September 1992. We took over scripting the Newsfeeds (the equivalent of a 4-1/2 hour movie per year) in 1994 and continued until its cancellation in December 1996.

We did script and design for MATHQUEST WITH ALADDIN (Disney Interactive - 1997) with voices by Robin Williams and Jonathan Winters, and the same for The Interactive DARK HALF for Orion Pictures, based on the Stephen King novel, but this project was orphaned when MGM bought Orion. (It's officially vaporware now.) We even wrote a stageplay, "Syzygy," which opened in St. Augustine, Florida, in March, 2000.

I'm tired of talking about myself, so I'll close by saying that I live and work at the Jersey Shore where I'm usually pounding away on a new Repairman Jack novel and haunting eBay for strange clocks and Daddy Warbucks memorabilia. (No, we don't have a cat.)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great horror tale by a master writer, March 30, 2004

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midnight Mass (Hardcover)

There were vampires living in Eastern Europe that nobody knew about and when the Iron Curtain fell, a power vacuum developed. The vampires were quick to feed on the vacuous world leaders turning political, industry, and religious figures into vampires. Next they shut down electricity and telephone service leaving humans isolated and fearful. Finally they recruited humans to act as their watchers in the daylight hours, promising to turn them into vampires after loyal servicing of ten years.

They overran Western Europe, Asia and Africa and now have turned their attention to the eastern seaboard of the United States. They used the same tactics they did in the old world and it looked like they were winning until a resistance was started by father Joe. He and the members of his parish join forces to throw the vampires out of the church making it a place of refuge from the creatures of the night. He, a commando nun and his lesbian niece form a plan that if it succeeds will give hope to the rest of humanity that vampires can be eradicated from the earth.

This is not in any sense a Repairman Jack novel but in tone and substance it will remind reader of THE KEEP. This is a true horror novel because the vampires are so evil with no redeeming equalities see human beings as a food supply for their blood hunger. F. Paul Wilson creates a new world order with vampires as the leaders, the human collaborators tantamount to Quislings with other humans on the bottom of the food chain. MIDNIGHT MASS is horror at its very best.

Harriet Klausner

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars They're baaaacckk!, December 22, 2005

By 

Anthony Hogg (VIC., AUSTRALIA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midnight Mass (Hardcover)

I just finished reading the book today and almost felt a sadness at its end - the problem was, I didn't want it to finish!

The book is a bit rocky, prose-wise, but that doesn't stop it from being an compelling read that offers engaging characters and a great fight against the undead.

As Wilson makes clear in his all-too-brief author's note, he's bringing back the evil, cross-fearing vampires of old - represented too far and few between by standouts like the "From Dusk Till Dawn" flicks - and crapping all over Rice's "Byronic aesthetes" (as depicted in "Interview With the Vampire", et. al.)

It was quite a joy to read this book for that reason alone.

Bring back the *real* vampires and a sequal to this great book!

19 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars everything old is new again in this page turner..., May 22, 2004

By 

Timothy Capehart "Review-a-holic" (Dayton, Ohio USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midnight Mass (Hardcover)

I have enjoyed Anne Rice's vampiric, pained aesthetes and Tanya Huff's funny, noble vampires as much as the next reader...but loving the boogeyman or laughing with him gets old after a while. I still love Tanya Huff; don't get me wrong...though I think I have outgrown Rice. I want to be horrified by my horror these days. In this horror show of a world we've been dropped in to, it's...comforting to dwell for a time in a world worse off than our own.

I was overjoyed that Wilson (obviously one of my favortie writers if you've seen my other reviews) decided to make vampires scary again. I believe he has succeeded admirably in this page-turning thriller. Vampires have taken over Europe and are now they are sweeping across America...or they're trying to. Life as we know it has ended on the east coast. Roving bands of mortal henchemen calling themselves "Cowboys" hunt during the day for their undead masters. Wilson's vampires are eerie and scary (monsters with enough humanity to magnify their nastiness). Those few who fight both Cowboys and vampires are a great set of characters themselves: Father Cahill and his tough-as-nails niece Lacey. Rabbi Zev and Sister Carole...a seriously scary nun (who used to teach science).

The Booklist review above was right to compare this to 28 Days Later. There is a definite similarity. Really the best new take on vampires since...well...The Keep by Frances Paul himself! Why isn't this man on the top of the bestsellers lists? You'll wonder too if you give this or Sims or The Select a try.