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Post by dem bones on Dec 1, 2010 10:06:55 GMT
Ha! Let's see how long it takes for this one to run out of steam! Welcome to Vault's fab Advent Calendar! Circumstances willing, each day in the run up to Christmas, i'll attempt to upload a PDF or something equally horrible for you to download (you'll need to be logged in). Without exception, said PDF's will have been ripped off from far better sites/ boards/ blogs than this one, so - when possible - i shall provide links to where i found 'em by way of very scant compensation. On to today's offering, and what better than to get us underway than a shudder pulp which even the unflinching Robert Kenneth Jones" recognised as "an extreme case. Very few stories reached this level of repugnance .... it is extremely depraved, and certainly not for the squeamish." I speak, of course of Russell Gray (Bruno Fisher)'s Fresh Fiances For The Devil's Daughter, one of hundreds of glorious vintage pulp classics you can download for free from Larry Estep's indispensable PULPGEN! Attachments:
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Post by andydecker on Dec 1, 2010 11:45:03 GMT
Now that is a good idea. Thanks for the effort. I myself toyed with the idea of this yeatrs Playboy Advent Calender, but the chocolate is so bad and the pics so tiny. This is much better! And that story is a must-read I always ask myself what would have been be the better decade to make a movie out of this The 40s a la Most Dangerous Game or the 05 a la SAW
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Post by dem bones on Dec 1, 2010 12:24:50 GMT
there you go, boys and girls, follow Andy's example. Ditch Playboy and make Vault your one stop shop for festive fun this Christmas! i've tomorrows treat ready to go, a real change of style (am planning to make 'em as varied as possible). time permitting, i'll be sending begging PM's and threatening emails to certain of our authors requesting permission to feature a sample of their work so be sure to set your spam filter to 'block everything from that creep demonik' I always ask myself what would have been be the better decade to make a movie out of this The 40s a la Most Dangerous Game or the 05 a la SAW i'd have loved Andy Milligan ( The Body Beneath Guru, the Mad Monk, The Rats are Coming! The Werewolves are Here! etc.) to have attempted a faithful adaptation of Fresh Fiances ..., or if he was too busy with other warped commitments, perhaps Peter Walker. would make a dream double bill with House of Whipcord!
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Post by dem bones on Dec 2, 2010 7:31:08 GMT
In complete contrast to yesterdays pioneering torture porn extravaganza, here's Richard Middleton (1882-1911) with the sad, sad story of what happened when, under immense pressure, a second-rate stage magician performed the trick of his career. You will find several examples of Middleton's genius at HorrormastersAttachments:
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Post by Johnlprobert on Dec 2, 2010 8:38:26 GMT
This has to be the best idea for an advent calendar since those Russian Roulette alcohol miniature ones where you never knew if you were going to get a bottle of cyanide.
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Dec 2, 2010 10:06:24 GMT
Fine story.
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Dec 2, 2010 10:12:42 GMT
This has to be the best idea for an advent calendar since those Russian Roulette alcohol miniature ones where you never knew if you were going to get a bottle of cyanide. Advent calender is a top idea.
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Post by andydecker on Dec 2, 2010 19:07:41 GMT
Nice and effective little story!
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Post by dem bones on Dec 3, 2010 6:23:21 GMT
Apologies if many of you are already familiar with the selections to date. Today's guest contributor is William Spencer Churchill with Man Overboard!, a delicious conte cruel from Harmsworth's Illustrated Magazine, Dec. 1898-January 1899. Found this facsimile on Dr. SkySkull's marvelous Skulls In The Stars. Dr. Skyskull "is an associate professor of physics, specializing in optical science, at UNC Charlotte. The blog covers topics in physics and optics, the history of science, classic pulp fantasy and horror fiction, and the surprising intersections between these areas." Attachments:
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Post by Craig Herbertson on Dec 3, 2010 10:29:12 GMT
Apologies if many of you are already familiar with the selections to date. Today's guest contributor is William Spencer Churchill with Man Overboard!, a delicious conte cruel from Harmsworth's Illustrated Magazine, Dec. 1898-January 1899. Found this facsimile on Dr. SkySkull's marvelous Skulls In The Stars. Dr. Skyskull "is an associate professor of physics, specializing in optical science, at UNC Charlotte. The blog covers topics in physics and optics, the history of science, classic pulp fantasy and horror fiction, and the surprising intersections between these areas." Good story, quite laconic and terse with atmosphere
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Post by dem bones on Dec 4, 2010 8:23:07 GMT
Thomas Burke - The Chink And The ChildLillian Gish as Lucy in D.W. Griffith's silent film adaptation of Burke's story as Broken Blossoms (1919) Found a scan of this at another of my regular haunts, the mighty Miscellanea. If you've missed Thomas Burke (1886-1945), you're in for a treat! God knows, i've read one or two short stories this year, but few made quite so powerful an impression as Burke's relentlessly bleak melodrama, The Chink And The Child from Limehouse Nights. Enjoy? it depends on what you call enjoyment, but, once read, i doubt you'll forget this still shocking tale ... Attachments:
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Post by dem bones on Dec 5, 2010 7:05:07 GMT
It's the download sensation they're all talking about! Variety being the spice of life, etc., today's terrifying treat is a short play (or, as he would call it, "a slice of death") by the celebrated André de Lorde, as in: "If anyone was responsible for the GRAND GUIGNOL's ascension from a local Parisian sensation to an international success, it was the playright and essayist André de Lorde, known in his lifetime as “Le Prince de la Terreur" - Mel Gordon: The Grand Guignol: Theatre Of Fear And Terror. André de Lorde - At The TelephoneIt's 1902, and Marex has just cause to pride himself on the installation of a telephone at his remote country house. When his business takes him to Paris, he need fret no longer over the safety of nervous wife Martha and little Pierre! This e-text retrieved from Stephen Davies and Diana Patterson's GASLIGHT, "an Internet discussion list which reviews one story a week from the genres of mystery, adventure and The Weird, written between 1800 and 1919." "Have some of that, nice-looking woman who is being released tomorrow!" Further evidence of André de Lorde's genius. Two pivotal scenes from A Crime In The MadhouseAttachments:
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Post by marksamuels on Dec 5, 2010 15:25:45 GMT
That download was a good 'un.
Lord & Lady P should stage it ...
Mark S.
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Post by Johnlprobert on Dec 5, 2010 17:00:31 GMT
That download was a good 'un. Lord & Lady P should stage it ... Mark S. The advent calendar's shaping up to be splendid stuff and yes Mark - who knows? Maybe one day. But we have to do Horror Express first (we had yet another request for it at Reading yesterday!)
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Post by dem bones on Dec 6, 2010 9:09:30 GMT
William Mudford - The Iron ShroudW. B. McDougall Lord & Lady P should stage it ... Mark S. my sentiments entirely! so far, not much by way of supernatural fiction and nothing at all by women ! we shall put both right over the rest of this week after which it will be the turn of certain contemporary authors. But today it is back to our Gothic roots with William Mudford and his immaculate gloom-fest The Iron Shroud from Blackwood's Magazine, August, 1930, this swiped from yet another excellent resource for macabre fiction, The Literary Gothic. Trust dem, this is classic Pan Book Of Horror Stories fare 130 years early! N.B. The W. B. McDougall illustration is from The Eerie Book and depicts the predicament of Otto at the Castle of Solitude in G. W. M. Reynolds' The Iron Coffin. As they are essentially the same story, i hoped nobody would give one if i resurrected it here. Attachments:
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