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Post by dem on Apr 26, 2024 16:29:10 GMT
Out now!Justin Marriott [ed] — Paperback Fanatic #48 (Paperback Fanatic, April 2024) COLUMNS
Paperback News — News of media related to vintage paperbacks and made by people we like.
Paperback Views — We have letters! Well two emails, which I guess counts?
Artists Assemble — Tom Tesarek on Wally Wood's work for the SF digests and paperbacks.
The Auctioneer — Jules Burt takes in recent prices realised at eBay.
The Sleazy Reader — Tom Tesarek takes the controls for a look at a prescient paperback.
Hortwitz Paperbacks — Jeff Popple's column on the cult Australian publisher takes on spies.
Haunted Love — Justin Marriott continues his pointless obsession with gothic romance paperbacks.
Naval Gazing — Justin Marriott commences a pointless obsession with naval adventure paperbacks
Robot Roy Speaks — Roy Nugen on cult film director Fred Olen Ray and his paperback influences
Book of the Movie — John Peel on James Bond. Insert shaken not stirred pun of your own choice
The Vault of Pulp Horror — Tom Tesarek tackles an issue of Ace Mystery Magazine.
The Horror! the Horror! — Steve Carroll on the vampire police procedural.
Hot Lead — Steve Myall on the Wilderness series by David Robbins.
The Manly Man's Manly Book Cave — Steve Carroll reviews a recent issue of Men's Adventure Quarterly.
ARTICLES
Shark!— James Doig on the wave of shark—exploitation in Australian paperbacks during the "Summer of Jaws.
The Panther Crimeband — Jules Burt on the distinctive "Crimebands" from UK publisher Panther.
When Eight Bells Toll I Sit Up and Pay Attention — Jim O'Brien shares life lessons on the difference MacLean and Hemingway.
I Wanna Be A—DAW—ed — Justin Marriott showcases his picks from the first 100 DAW Books
Strangers in a Strange Land — Justin Marriott on authors who worked in genres you wouldn't associate them with
The Filth and the Fury — Justin Marriott on horror giant John Farris, who mixed sleaze and hi—brow in his unique horror books.
Bloody Kids! — Justin Marriott's A—Z of Children's Horror in the UKAvailable via *m*zon. ukA*m*z*n.com Was only planning usual initial flick through but then I hit Shark!, the children's horror six pager, the interviews with Chris Mikul and Steve Holland, the pulp fair report, assorted Aus pulps .... thoughts on these and much else herein to follow over coming days ... Thanks and very well done to Justin & contributors!
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Post by humgoo on Apr 29, 2024 6:35:08 GMT
Have never seen Mr Marriott interviewed. Lovely. Thank you Mr Burt!
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Post by andydecker on Apr 29, 2024 12:52:24 GMT
Thank you so much for this, humgoo. Great to see Justin in the flesh.
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Post by jamesdoig on Apr 29, 2024 20:21:59 GMT
Have never seen Mr Marriott interviewed. Justin is certainly a natural in front of the camera - very well done! |
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Apr 29, 2024 20:23:19 GMT
Have never seen Mr Marriott interviewed. Justin is certainly a natural in front of the camera - very well done! Yes, very nice. |
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Post by dem on Apr 30, 2024 9:22:21 GMT
I'm sure he fitted in more than 25. Thought the tributes to Michel Parry and Lawrence James were particularly lovely. The Peter Haining interview - think it was the very last before his death - remains my favourite single Fanatic article. In case anyone missed it, there's a companion video. Jules Birt & Justin preview Paperback Fanatic #48 HERE |
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Post by dem on May 2, 2024 8:42:26 GMT
As mentioned above, first piece I read through was James Doig on Aus pulp's glut of gloriously terrible Jaws rip-offs and cash-ins at the height of mid-seventies killer shark mania. Informative and hilariously macabre, James' article also features my second favourite of the issue's cover scan selections. Shouldn't be too hard to guess the first. This time out, Tom Tesarek devotes his shudder pulp column to one of the subgenre's lesser titles, namely Ace Mystery Magazine, for May 1936. From Tom's capsule reviews, this issue doesn't sound too hot, though given the opportunity I'd certainly attempt John H. Knox's contribution, The Corpse Queen's Lover and, truth be told, most likely all the rest — even Cat-Man. According to Dave Saunder, the cover artist is Howard J. Sherman. No accompanying interior illo's this time - is that because Ace Mystery didn't use them (genuine enquiry, if anyone can help). On a similar ish note, Ray Nugent celebrates filmmaker Fred Olen "Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers" Ray's several forays into pulp horror fiction; "clearly he writes the stuff he wants to read" — with lurid cover art to match. Sticking with the horrors, Steve Carroll on two 'sixties modern day vampire novels, Leslie H. Whitten's Progeny of the Adder and Jeff Rice's The Night Stalkers, the latter introducing beat up, whisky-reeking, investigative newshound Carl Kolchak as a kind of degenerate anti- Columbo/ accidental occult detective who nobody will listen to. Overall personal standout of #38 is the editor's six page A—Z of UK '70s-'80s children's horror and ghost paperback anthologies, many of them known and loved by certain of our readers, including two sides devoted to those who made "noteworthy contributions" to the cause — but can you spot the glaring omission? On a related note, Chris Mikul cites the Piccolo True Adventures series, Richard Garrett's Great Sea Mysteries in particular, as "my introduction to a whole host of Fortean subjects" and "the beginning of my book collecting." My beef with the interviewees is that they — and their wares — are too bloody interesting by far. Bad enough we already had to add a load of appalling killer shark nonsense to our too terrifying to even contemplate wants lists, now we've Steve Holland's history of Badger Books, Andrew Nette's Horowitz Publications: Pulp Fiction and the Rise of the Australian Fiction and the entire back catalogue of Chris Mikul's Biblio Curious and Bizarrism zines to join them. And there's the risk you run; to read an issue of Paperback Fanatic is to realise every book you ever bought is crap and you need an entire new library. TBC
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Post by dem on May 2, 2024 18:21:49 GMT
Re: Jules Burt video above;
Justin Marriott's Twenty five Books That Made Me
Handy checklist
1. Richard Allen, Skinhead
2. Peter Haining, The Monster Trap & Other True Mysteries
3. James Herbert, The Rats
4. Don Pendleton, The Executioner's War Book
5. H. P. Lovecraft, The Haunter of the Dark & Other Tales of Terror
6. Peter Cave, Chopper
7. Jeremiah Jack, Train Wreck
8. George G. Gilman, Adam Steele #49; The Long Shadow
9. Guy N. Smith, Killer Crabs
10. Robert E. Howard, Valley of the Worm
11. Dean Ballinger, Gannon #3: Blood Beast
12. Leo Kessler, Wotan #22: The Outcast
13. Edgar Rice Burroughs, A Princess of Mars
14. Karl E. Wagner, Darkness Weaves
15. Trudi Maxwell, Diary of a Female Wrestler
16. Richard Matheson, I Am Legend
17. Frank Scarpetta, Slaughter House
18. Robert E. Lory, The Witching of Dracula
19. Andrew Quiller, The Eagles: City of Fire
20. Doug Masters, TNT
21. Graham Masterton, The Heirloom
22. Peter McCurtin, Body Count
23. Gerard de Villiers, Malko; West of Jerusalem
24. James Marvin, Crow #8: A Good Day
25. Nick Carter, Vatican Vendetta
Bonus:
26. Mick Norman, Angels from Hell: The Angel Chronicles
#12 would have been a Sven Hassel WWII novel, but he forgot where he kept them.
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Post by jamesdoig on May 3, 2024 9:20:42 GMT
Overall personal standout of #38 is the editor's six page A—Z of UK '70s-'80s children's horror and ghost paperback anthologies That was my favourite too - lots of fond memories there, especially the Piccolo paperbacks. |
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Post by jamesdoig on May 5, 2024 8:59:44 GMT
Not sure if Jeff Popple's blog has been posted here before, but definitely one for Vaulters: murdermayhemandlongdogs.com/ Latest post includes a review of PF48. |
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Post by dem on May 7, 2024 7:49:38 GMT
Overall personal standout of #38 is the editor's six page A—Z of UK '70s-'80s children's horror and ghost paperback anthologies That was my favourite too - lots of fond memories there, especially the Piccolo paperbacks. A companion children's horror & supernatural novels from same period might be good for two pages? As someone who care's nothing for a book's "collectability" - in fact, I prefer those that aren't - I'm giving Scott Carlson quote of the issue for "Please don't turn PAPERBACK FANATIC into a price guide." I much prefer Mr. Burt's report on what must be the best-attended London Paperback & Pulp fair of the past decade (likely twice that) and, even more so, the interviews with the Fanatic on his youtube channel. A copy of the Tandem The Abduction has been festering on the shelves of shame for an age. On the strength of Tom Tesarek's Sleazy Reader piece, that's likely to continue a good while yet. Is it another of those books that are more interesting to read about than read? Been failing abysmally to come up with decent suggestions for Stranger in a Strange Land, "works by authors in genres you typically associate them with." Best I could think of were Dennis Wheatley's solitary sci-fi novel Star of Ill-Omen, and royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell's foray into cryptozoology, The Loch Ness Story (though in terms of peculiarity, it's not a patch on Alex Harvey's spoken word 'solo-album' devoted to same theme). |
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Post by pulpjuggler on Aug 24, 2024 20:10:46 GMT
Hi. Tom Tesarek here. To answer your question, there were interior illustrations for Ace Mystery Magazine, but my copy is rather fragile, so I didn't want to damage it by making interior scans and we weren't able to find any of the illustrations on the internet. Given that the cover is so striking, Justin decided to just go with a full-page reproduction, which I think worked really well.
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Post by dem on Aug 26, 2024 6:25:09 GMT
Thanks Tom — good to hear from you! If your copy is not too brittle to check, are the interior illo's credited or recognisable as the work of regular shudder pulp artists (I'm assuming the cover painting is unsigned). From your comments, Ace Mystery sounds a bit of an also ran like Eerie Stories?
Loving the new look, large format PF.
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Post by humgoo on Aug 31, 2024 8:45:00 GMT
Loving the new look, large format PF. It's the right size, and I hope Mr. Marriott won't change it back to the smaller sizes. Reader Jonathan Allen certainly has a point (see "Paperback Views" in PF #47) when he says that a smaller size will make the 'zine survive better during US Am*z*n's sorry-we-don't-use-any-packaging-material shipping process (UK and Japan Am*z*n did use a box last time I bought from them, not sure about other countries), but personally I'd rather have a dented but large-format PF. On the other hand, I certainly agree with Mr. Allen concerning the font currently used, which doesn't really differentiate between a full-stop and a comma (okay, perhaps you can tell them apart if you have really good eyes!). I kept pausing at wrong places when reading the last few issues and found that a bit annoying (seems that Mr. Marriott began to use this font in Paperback Fantastic Vol. 3: Horror).
Speaking of technical matters, I don't usually care too much about typos (at least in the case of PF, they're more endearing than annoying), but "Horwitz" is spelled "Hortwitz" (for Mr. Jeff Popple's column) in the ToC in the last three issues, and I think it should be amended (unless it's some pun that is lost on me).
Can't wait for the next issue to come out!
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Post by pulpjuggler on Sept 5, 2024 3:30:55 GMT
The cover painting for Ace Mystery is by Howard Sherman. Per David Saunder's great pulpartists.com website he did a few other pulp covers and also did some comic art, drawing Dr. Fate in 1940 and Tommy Tomorrow in 1947 for DC.
All nine stories have a title page illustration, but only "The Horde of Silent Men" is signed. It is hard to make out-maybe Jaysin Wilson?
With regards to proofreading of the Fanatic, I do my best, but as I don't have any Horwitz books and am not that familiar with the publisher, I am afraid that I just missed that on the ToC. I am sure that Justin just uses the prior issue as a template, so that is why it keeps getting repeated. I will get that fixed for issue 49. I am not fond of the font as well. It does make it hard to proofread the punctuation.
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