Justin’s Newsletter: January 2026
Vol. 6, Issue 1
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What’s Up With Me
I’m nominated as a finalist for another two video awards, for the Gerry Adams episode of my TV show “Well Read“ and for the January 2025/Eaton Fire episode of my TV show “Pasadena Monthly,” in the Alliance for Community Media West’s WAVE (Western Access Video Excellence) Awards! Award ceremony is next month.
Watch the latest episode of “Pasadena Monthly with Justin Chapman.” This episode features a review of the month’s top stories, a history segment, and a discussion with Michele Zack, author of Altadena: Between Wilderness and City and former Altadena Town Councilmember (at the same time I served on the Town Council) who lost her home in the Eaton Fire. Read more here.
Around Town
Great Reads
Here are some recommendations for interesting books I’ve read recently:
Unholy Alliance: A History of Nazi Involvement with the Occult—Peter Levenda
This deep dive into Hitler’s and the Nazis’ obsession with their warped version of paganism and the occult is essential reading for anyone who’s interested in World War II. Levenda goes further than that, though, and connects a throughline to modern day neo-Nazis and other far rightwing groups that carry on those heinous beliefs today. He makes eerily prescient predictions about where society’s heading that ring all too true right now. Terrifying stuff. And, gonzo-style, he inserts himself into the story by describing his trip to Colonia Dignidad, a German colony in Chile to which high-profile Nazis fled after the war and where Pinochet’s cronies kidnapped, tortured, and murdered his political opponents. Levenda barely escaped with his life.
Danger Man—Various authors
I’m obsessed with the 1960s TV show “Danger Man” (known in the United States as “Secret Agent”—you would know the U.S. theme song: “Secret agent man, secret agent man, they’ve given you a number, and taken away your name.”). Patrick McGoohan plays a “moral spy,” a kind of anti-James Bond that doesn’t womanize and doesn’t use a gun unless in self-defense. Six “Danger Man” books were written in the 60s: Target for Tonight (1962, Richard Telfair), Departure Deferred (1965, W. Howard Baker), Storm Over Rockall (1965, W. Howard Baker), Hell for Tomorrow (1965, Peter Leslie), The Exterminator (1966, W. A. Ballinger), and No Way Out (1966, Wilfred McNeilly). The books are concise, between just 125 to 190 pages, but each of them pack a serious punch. Each can pretty much be read in one sitting. But they’re well written—better than one would expect from a 1960s TV tie-in novelization series written by multiple authors—and loaded with as much suspense as any of the great “Danger Man” television episodes. I’ve written an article about the books that I’m hoping to get published soon. I’d love to see a “Danger Man” revival—but could anyone truly replace Patrick McGoohan?
Spotlight on My Past Stories
With a new band, Evil Island, formed by members of the defunct Blood Brothers, releasing its first album soon which I’m really excited about, here’s my 2006 interview with frontman Johnny Whitney who also sings in the new band.
And read all of my journalism here.