PULP ROOM 101 CLUB

TRASH PULP 101 Club

Another revival, from early 2006, but we've had many come and go in the meantime and it seems only fair that the newer arrivals should suffer along with everyone else.

Killercrab:
To get the proverbial rolling - here's a first few essentials to me - we can add and elaborate as we go:

1) THE COVER. A trash fiction book must have a suitably tasteless cover - preferably suggesting violence and sex if possible - whatever the genre. The cover will however not necessarily be representative of the contents and extra points are allocated to *salesmanship* .

2) A book should be no longer than 128 pages long - to be deemed a trash gem - being able to be devoured in as few sittings as possible and leaving a bad taste in the mouth - due to trash content *or* trash writing hack ability. Both these characteristics are to be applauded. Books longer than 128 are admissible on occasion ( THE RATS) - but any book longer than 200 pages is verging on literature in my view



Severance:
Re 1) THE COVER - In my view, you can't beat a painted cover, just look at some of the masterpieces from Richard Clifton-Dey, Tony Masero, Bruce Pennington etc dotted around these boards. A Trash Pulp demands a painted cover! I demand a painted cover!



Killercrab:
Ah yes - a good addition to the tenet - Clifton Day is a prime example. I'd however suggest the tacky photocover has it's place - I could cite PAN Horror here in my argument and VILLAGE OF FEAR and BUBASTIS are firm camera centric favourites !

Not forgetting the Mick Norman / Peter Cave and Hadley Chase photo visuals. Have you guys seen how much Chase's novels go for on ebay - blimey!



Franklin Marsh:
Having my roots in the Skinhead/Hells Angels/Confessions/Pan Horror reprints I'd have to go for photocovers. Except in the case of Savage West/Viking/Gladiator stuff (I nearly said any historical cover then Ms Jumboperm of Witches 1 seeped into my unconscious)



curt:
When I'm hunting for Groovy Age material, I look for horror or sleaze paperback originals from the '60s-'70s period, with beautifully trashy painted or photo covers, and nothing by "name" authors like King. Page count never factors into my considerations, though most fall somewhere below 200.



demonik:
COVERS. Doesn't matter to me if they're photo's or paintings - I'm sure we all have treasured examples of both - but they do have to look as if some thought went into them. My only strong opinion on the subject is a big NO to embossed titles - they look rubbish. If a photo, extraordinary face pulling on the part of both the semi clad young woman and smirking love interest/ drooling werewolf/ decomposing corpse (depending on which is bothering her at the time), is always appreciated.

PAGE COUNT: Not too worried if they break the 120 page mark, but it depends on the author. Laymon usually weighs in around the 400 page mark and I breeze through them, but the 128 page restriction certainly works fine for Robert Lory, Donald Glut and Peter Saxon to name but several.

Not exactly prerequisites, but the following usually work for me;

If novel not set in city then only other option is a VILLAGE. Village must only have one pub, the landlord preferably embittered (possibly due to DEAD WIFE), superstitious, and pathologically hostile to outsiders (especially Londoners), his regulars likewise. Bonus point if there's been generations of interbreeding, leading to unfortunate physical and mental traits peculiar to their district.

Landlord is duty bound to have BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER who dresses provocatively, works behind bar, mocks the regulars for living in the past and hooks up with hero.

Said BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER is required to flee topless across the marsh/ through the woods with creature/ psychopath/ village idiot in hot pursuit at least once during the proceedings.

Entirely gratuitous PRODUCT PLACEMENT - especially of author's choice tipple and favoured cigarette brand - is major plus point.

Author should feature a FILM CREW in at least one of his/ her novels, but preferably several. Producer's wife is a nympho, having affairs with entire crew purely to destroy him. Everybody else on the set loathes each other. Gradually picked off one by one by Vampire/ Werewolf/ Slime Beast. Producer's wife has sex with it.

SCIENTISTS: Evil variant must have woefully sadistic streak and conduct unnecessary, hideous experiments on fully-conscious victims. Philanthropic equivalent must be of pensionable age, become obsessed with the monster he's trailing, eventually protect it from soldiers when it's been badly wounded, patiently explain that he's a friend and wants to help, be yanked off ground in creature's grip and have head twisted off for his pains.

No pulp novel should progress more than five paragraphs without author giving us an update on what the heroine's BREASTS are doing. When he has exhausted his stock descriptions of same - "heaving globes", "ripe half-melons", "quivering mounds", etc. - it is time to call in the army, destroy the monster and wrap up the book.



Killercrab:
No pulp novel should progress more than five paragraphs without author giving us an update on what the heroine's BREASTS are doing. >.

This is an absolutely essential to a good trash read in my view. I also liked your VILLAGE setting suggestion too - preferably in Wales if *possible*. Speaking of stock characters ( surely a heading all to itself) - the kindly hidden psychopathic VICAR is a *must* - ergo the least offensive character must ultimately be the most heinous .. and kill lots of people heinously.



Dr. Terror:
Guys, you shouldn't be posting this here, but publishing it as the Vault of Evil How to Write Trash Horror Fiction guide book.



Killercrab:
Popular Stock characters.

Following on from Dem's observations :

1) The sexually alluring female with provocative globes.

2) Psychopathic , seemingly benevolent Vicar ( who can make bombs out of weedkiller and detergent etc).

3) The *Specialist* - be it in the supernatural , crabs or what have you.

4) The *failed* Exorcist Priest ( a different animal to our Vicar) - a person ( usually a man) trying to atone for his passed uselessness by killing the Slime Beast or somesuch innocent menace.

5) The Pub Landlord ( see Dem's description).



demonik:
The *failed* Exorcist Priest has, of course, lost his faith, and spends most of his days totally pissed. For some inexplicable reason, he always rides a bicycle.



Killercrab:
Page count never factors into my considerations, though most fall somewhere below 200. >>

I'm a firm believer in short is sweet myself - one of my biggest bugbears is modern genre works that resemble bricks because nobody seems capable of editing any longer. I do read some of them - but love a good 128 page turner - something resembling a plot ( on a good day) - but lashed together with exploitational devices - what more do you need ?



Severance:
The failed priest should try and reaffirm his faith by confronting the vampire/werewolf/slimebeast with a cross and holy water - and promptly gets f****** ripped to pieces.
The pub landlord should be embittered as his wife ran off with the woman who runs the local mobile library service.
There should be a survivalist nut in the village as well, with a state-of-the-art arsenal - which ultimately proves useless.
All the women should have great breasts.



demonik:

The failed priest should try and reaffirm his faith by confronting the vampire/werewolf/slimebeast with a cross and holy water - and promptly gets f****** ripped to pieces.>>

Certainly singing from the same hymn sheet on that one, Sev.

Other musts:

The wino who builds a fire out on the swamp, and is promptly disemboweled by the Thing. This all takes place in the prologue.

The killer rat/ cat/ maggot/ who is injured during the mass onslaught on the hero's bolt-hole. His colleagues eat him.

All Rats rip offs must feature an epilogue in which a lone baby killer slug, rabbit or croc is seen frolicking in the cellar/ field/ sewer. This is especially required if novel is so crap that author has no chance of publisher contracting them to write another novel, let alone a sequel.

In confrontations between army and swarming hordes of mutant vermin/ insects/ household pets, a young private on guard duty must be overcome and reduced to a skeleton before the battle proper can commence.

No sex scene, however prolonged, should be in the slightest erotic. At point of orgasm, the wall should cave in under pressure from starving rat army.

Johnny Foreigner/ circus freaks/ anyone with a physical defect is either a top Satanist or slavering henchman of same because they're not normal. Hunchback's must endure horsewhipping from 'the master' for nearly being nice to heroine when she's chained up in dungeon.



Franklin Marsh:

Pub Landlord should also hate any kind of young person,non-local or parties of more than three - and have a cosh/truncheon/shotgun (loaded or not) behind the bar.
The Police! One of three different types
Charles Penrose style, porky,apple cheeked, jocular - couldn't solve a crime if it happened in front of him - comedy relief and/or cannon fodder.
Fascist sadistic nutcase.
Avuncular pipe smoking tweedy sloth - seems inept but, just when you least expect it will prove handy with fists or have brilliant case solving idea.

In addition to mad scientist, mysterious man from ministry is also useful for calling in army,police,tactical nuclear weapons etc - for use on Rodent mutations and Hells Angels.

Another must-have would be rave reviews or leering slogans printed on the cover. I've just finished Elizabeth by Jessica Hamilton (Sphere 1978), a subtle and non-involving story of a young lady haunted by a vision appearing in various mirrors which may (or may not) be one of her ancestors who may (or may not) have been a witch. It's very underplayed, nothing graphic - all done by allusion. What, you may ask, caught Marsh's attention with this one? Comments on the cover such as ' More terrifying than The Omen!' and the superb 'She's the girl next door...if you live next door to hell!'



demonik
Very true, FM! Who would have thought, for example, that John Tigges' Vessel is "Horror at it's chilling best - makes Count Dracula look like a schoolboy!"?

Likewise, Victor Samuels' The Vampire Women promises more, so much more than it delivers by screaming "The blood-drenched fangs of living death!" from the back cover and "Gorged on an Orgy of blood" within. And from Phil Strong's The Other Worlds: 25 Modern Stories Of Mystery & Imagination (Garden City, 1942)

" Almost every classic from Moses to Mark Twain has had a try at these fictional fugues. Yet from the vast output of such stories the author appraises a few which are included in this anthology as superior to any that have ever been written - even better than FRANKENSTEIN, THE HORLA and THE MASK OF THE RED DEATH."

Then you see the contents, which include Ralph Milne Farley's "The House Of Ecstasy", Seabury Quinn's "The House Where Time Stood Still", Paul 'Dr. Satan' Ernst's "Escape" ...

I'm sure there's a kind of sub-genre too. Quotes by people you've never heard of from publications you've never heard of proclaiming "Move over Stephen King! Author you've never heard of is here!"



Killercrab
Of course the most obvious requirement is a suitable title and the pulpier the better in my view ( even if the book fails dismally to match it's moniker).

Titles like THE SLIME BEAST , THE SUCKING PIT , CRABS ON THE RAMPAGE , DRACULA AND THE VIRGINS OF THE UNDEAD and even BATS OUT OF HELL are all ace choices. You can say them out loud with much histrionic theatricality - " I'm reading THE SUCKING PIT" - always gets a reaction!

You then get titles like THE FOG , THE RATS , SLUGS , ALLIGATORS , CARACAL - what I term descriptive monikers that don't aim to titillate as much as describe the threat in basic terms. Mainstream horror titles in fact.

Finally you get titles like THE RAGING or THE FESTERING that don't describe a specific threat as much as a nebulous fear.

Of course we all know that CRABS ON THE RAMPAGE is the *best* title of them all...