It’s not easy being a superhero in the best of circumstances, so pity the poor man whose powers derive from a demon — and whose mother is dating one of the nation’s leading evangelical preachers. And when that young unfortunate’s name is Chesney Arnstruther, well…that’s someone whom you would not want to switch places with.
Chesney is the superhero of Costume Not Included, second novel in a trilogy called “To Hell and Back” — though it means that more puckishly than most fantasy books would — and I’ll direct you to my review of the first novel, The Damned Busters, for the precise details of how and why Chesney made that deal with the devil, how he did it without forfeiting his immortal soul, and why an actuary wanted to be a musclebound superhero in the first place.
There are two kinds of trilogy-middles: the ones that lose the energy of the first volume and mark time until the finale, and the ones that are happy to have gotten the scene-setting out of the way and leap into creating ever more complications to keep things interesting. Costume, luckily, is of the second type: the first book took a little while to get going, but this one hits its wry tone right up front and charges forward at exactly the right pace.
Really, how could you put down a novel that begins like this:
“I thought you weren’t speaking to me,” Chesney Arnstruther said into the phone.
“I’m not speaking to you,” said his mother. “I’m telling you something for your own good, is what I’m doing.”
I’ve spent the last several years haranguing anyone who wanders into Antick Musings about how essentially funny and entertaining a writer Matthew Hughes is — see my other reviews of Hughes books, all of which you should buy, read, and love, in approximately that order: The Other, Hespira, Template, The Spiral Labyrinth, and Majestrum — so I’ll leave that part as read: Hughes came into the SFF field writing Vance-inspired far-future books, but his influences were always deeper than Vance (not that being able to write as smoothly and sardonically as the great Jack Vance isn’t a monumental achievement to begin with), and he’s since shown that his essential qualities shine through in a variety of subgenres.
So, anyway: Chesney is a superhero, and he’s been doing well at it. Too well, actually: he’s wiped out pretty much all of the Golden Age-style street crime (guys in suits and fedoras robbing banks, muggings, and so forth) in his city, and his deal only extends so far. He can’t directly stop the sources of crime — which, in best superhero fashion, lies with a shadowy cabal that secretly runs that city — and his put-everything-into-the-right-boxes mind is not happy leaving a job undone. (His new girlfriend, Melda, is also pushing him in slightly different directions; she’s like to see him have a higher media profile and perhaps make some money from being the Actionary.)
Adding to the complications is that his mother’s new boyfriend — that noted thriller writer turned TV evangelist, Reverend Hardacre — has his own new, and very odd, theory about the secret cosmology of the world, and it’s becoming more and more clear that Hardacre is right. And the Devil is not entirely happy with the deal with Chesney — that lack of a soul coming his way vexes him, and the Devil’s whole raison d’etre is to trick and twist and sneak — and the Devil has deal with other folks who may help him cause trouble for Chesney.
So complications — very idiosyncratic, unique complications, of the kind only Hughes could create — proliferate, until Cheney finds himself chased closely by a smart police detective, meeting a Jesus Christ, (not the Jesus — not the current one, at least — but a prior, historical version) and having himself proclaimed as a new prophet by Hardacre. But Chesney still has Melda, and his demon Xaphan, on his side, plus his own inextinguishable drive for truth and justice. And there’s still one book to come in this trilogy.
Not to sound like a broken record, but Matt Hughes is a great, wonderfully entertaining writer — his dialogue pops, his people are quirky and real, and his situations could be written by no one else in the world. If you don’t like his work, there’s got to be something wrong with you.
Carrie Vaughn is best-known for her “Kitty Norville” urban fantasy series — about a radio talk-show host turned reluctant werewolf — but she’s also written other things. Just last year, for instance, she came out with [[[After the Golden Age]]], a superhero novel about Celia West, the completely unpowered accountant daughter of the two most popular and powerful heroes of Commerce City.
So, the first question is: what comes after the Golden Age? Whether you’re Hesiod or Jack Kirby, the obvious answer is “The Silver Age.” And After the Golden Age is a quite Silver Age-y book, full of gangsters (organized into teams, with spiffy nicknames, and I would not be at all surprised if many of their gangs had dress codes) who politely kidnap Celia repeatedly in the vain hope of using her as a shield against her parents. (This is seen to never work, but — in best Silver Age fashion — the gangsters keep doing it, because they need to follow the essential Weisinger plots or else they are nothing.)
This is lucky for Celia; if this were an Iron Age story, she’d be in pieces in the fridge before page ten, and we wouldn’t have much of a novel. But she does live in a more genteel age, with defined standards of behavior for both heroes and villains, and so her kidnappings tend to just disrupt her schedule and horribly frustrate her.
(Vaughn lampshades the inevitable question: Celia doesn’t leave Commerce City because she doesn’t want to — sure, she has no relationship with her parents, and has a career that usually takes young public accountants through extensive travel around the country for the first few years of their careers, but, by gum! she’s going to stay right there in Commerce City because the plot requires it no villains will drive her out!)
The rest of the book is agreeably muddle-headedly Silver-Agean like that: Celia starts dating a young police detective, Mark Paulson, whose father is the city’s Mayor, with the usual obvious parallels between their parents. Celia’s ur-kidnapping was by the Olympiad’s (her parents’ superteam) greatest foe, the Destructor, as a young teen, and she ran away to join the Destructor’s gang not long afterward, in a fit of teenage pique at sixteen. (And this is endlessly brought back up throughout the novel, as though this was a superhero world in which no one had ever made a heel or face turn even once — let alone dozens of times a year, as in the modern era.) Celia is given primary responsibility to build a forensic accounting case against the Destructor (even though he’s old, possibly senile, and has been locked up in not-Arkham for a while now) as part of a major criminal case against him, for no obvious or specific crimes, and even though her multiple conflicts of interest would make any opposing counsel salivate at the thought. The whole plot, in fact, is entirely second-hand: it’s all standard superhero furniture that seems to be in this novel because it belongs somewhere in a superhero story, and not because Vaughn had specific reasons for wanting any of it.
Vaughn keeps it all going with her narrative voice, but it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense if you spend any time thinking about it. But, remember: in the Silver Age, stories aren’t supposed to make sense. Celia has more than the recommended level of angst, and is batted around by events — she’s supposedly driven and responsible, but her accountancy work isn’t dramatic, so Vaughn just mentions it now and then, and it really doesn’t add up to much.
Celia bounces off the supers of her hometown — her parents, Captain Olympus and Spark; Arthur Mentis, the telepath who was a late addition to their team; Annalise, aka Typhoon, a water-powered hero her age — as she slowly learns about the requisite sinister plot. And, of course, she gets kidnapped in the furtherance of that plot, but it all turns out all right in the end — city saved, true love found, the whole nine yards.
After the Golden Age is a pleasant if slightly musty-feeling superhero story; it’s based on several-decade-old tropes and doesn’t bear a whole lot of resemblance to what superhero stories look like these days. (Of course, superhero stories have looked horrible for much of the last two decades, so not looking like that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.) Vaughn makes it entirely an enjoyable read, but this isn’t a book to think too deeply about motivation or realism as you’re running through the pages.
Pulp Ark 2013, the official New Pulp Creators’ Conference and Convention, created and sponsored by Pro Se Productions, a Publisher of Heroic Fiction, tales of multiple genres, and New Pulp, announced today one of its many fantastic guests already making plans to attend the third annual event in its new location, Springdale, Arkansas, April 26-28th!
“It’s a big year for us,” Tommy Hancock, Founder and Organizer of Pulp Ark stated. “We’re moving, expanding, bringing in old friends and new favorites, so we want any and all news we have to go out as often as it can, to keep Pulp Ark in the forefront of everyone’s mind. And this guest is definitely news.”
Crime fiction and New Pulp writer Gary Phillips has written short stories for Moonstone’s Kolchak: The Night Stalker Casebook, the Avenger Chronicles and the Green Hornet Casefiles. His most current novel is Warlord of Willow Ridgewhich Booklist said of the work, “Phillips is a veteran crime novelist who creates a plausible postapocalyptic scenario in which the safety of middle-class America can dissolve in a moment. Exciting, violent, and entertaining.” He has also written essays for the Robert B. Parker tribute book, In Pursuit of Spenser and for The Wire: Race, Class, and Genre, as well is the creator behind the popular detective character Nate Hollis, first seen at Vertigo and most recently in the Moonstone collection Angeltown. Currently with Tommy Hancock and Pro Se Press, Philips is co-editing and contributing to Black Pulp, pulp stories featuring black main characters, and editing and contributing to a themed linked anthology of short stories, Night of the Insurgents, showcasing America’s super spy before Bauer and Bourne, Jimmy Christopher, Operator 5, for Moonstone.
Phillips will be a guest at Pulp Ark 2013, participating in Panels as well as visiting with fans, interacting with other creators, and finding all the action there is to be had at Pulp Ark 2013!
For more information on Pulp Ark 2013, go to http://www.pulpmachine.blogspot.com/p/pulp-ark.html ! Stay tuned to that page for early registration, guest and vendor applications, and more!
Author Aaron Smith has made quite a name for himself in the last few years, practicing his craft in various genres for various companies. ALL PULP felt it was high time that Pulp fans caught up with what Aaron, an All Pulp supporter and fan favorite, was doing.
AP: Aaron, share some background on yourself, both personal and writing.
AS: Well I’m thirty-five years old, I live in New Jersey, and I’ve been seriously writing for about five years now. I was recruited into the pulp community by Ron Fortier of Airship 27 Productions, to whom I will always be grateful for giving me a start. Ron got me going writing for Airship’s series of Sherlock Holmes anthologies, which was a dream come true for me, since Holmes is my favorite character in all of fiction. From there, I started writing other pulp characters like the Black Bat and Dan Fowler and some westerns and war stories. I was allowed to create a few of my own original pulp characters too, which was great fun. After a while, I started branching out into other areas of writing and, as of today, I’ve had over twenty short stories and three novels published, so I think I’m doing pretty well so far. For anyone not familiar with my work, they can find information on it at my blog: www.godsandgalaxies.blogspot.com
Regarding personal stuff, I’m married to a great wife who somehow manages to put up with all my eccentricities and creative mood swings and highs and lows and all the other occupational hazards of living with a writer! I’ll never figure out how she does it. For almost twenty years, I’ve been running produce departments for a major supermarket chain. While that doesn’t sound like a very exciting job, it’s really great training for a writer because of the fact that everybody needs to eat, so everybody has to buy food. I’ve been around the rich and the poor, the old and young, the polite and the rude, and all races, ethnicities, backgrounds and professions you can imagine because I work with the public. It gives me so many opportunities to observe those very strange creatures called human beings in their natural habitat!
AP: You published a rather interesting take on vampires this past June, 100,000 Midnights. What makes this work stand out from other vampire novels and how did it come about?
AS: 100,000 Midnights has a slightly convoluted history. It began as a short story of the same title, originally published in Pro Se Productions’ Fantasy and Fear magazine back in October of 2010. A month later, it’s sequel short story was published in the next issue of the same magazine. I intended to do a whole series of stories there. I had eight of them written when I looked at the whole set of files one day and it dawned on me that it might actually work better as a novel.
At about the same time, a new e-publisher called Musa Publishing began looking for submissions to start up its line of books and it looked like a very good opportunity. I sent the novel to Musa once I had combined all the short stories into one book (with the very gracious permission of the stories’ previous publisher) and they accepted it. I made some changes along the road to the novel being released. I did some heavy editing, both alone and with the help of the editors at Musa, and I lowered the protagonist’s age by a decade because his particular eccentricities seemed to stand out more if he was younger than I had originally made him. The book came out in June of this year, as an e-book only; it doesn’t exist in a print edition, although I’d like it to someday, and it’s sold some copies and received some nice reviews, so it’s worked out well.
As for what makes it stand out among vampire novels, I’d have to say that the main thing I tried to put into it was fun. Yes, it’s a horror story and it has its bloody, grim moments, but it has a lighthearted side too. In fact, I tried to hit all kinds of moods rather than sticking to one type of vampire story. It has some humor, some romance, a lot of action. It’s not only a vampire story either. While it focuses on a young man and the vampire woman who pulls him headfirst into a world he never knew existed, I threw a lot of other horror-related concepts in there too. On one hand, I think it works as my love letter to many of the great archetypes of horror fiction, and I hope I managed to put a little of the charm of old horror movies like the Universal and Hammer films into the story. But on the other hand, I tried to mix in the things that make modern vampire stories appeal to audiences. The vampires in the story all differ from one another. Some are good, some are evil, and some fall between the two extremes. There’s violence, a bit of sex, and a lot of different elements included in the novel. Poor Eric, the protagonist, gets in one supernatural mess after another. He’s lucky he’s got a three-hundred-year-old vampire girl by his side for most of the ordeal!
AP: You’ve also built up a good reputation as a writer of Public Domain characters, particularly the Pulp type. What work have you done recently in this area?
AS: In 2012, I’ve had three stories released by Airship 27 Productions. There’s my Ki-Gor story in Jungle Tales Volume 1, which was great fun to write. I’ve liked jungle adventures ever since my grandfather introduced me to Tarzan when I was little.
There’s my second Black Bat story, in Black Bat Mystery Volume 2. This one was actually written before the story that appeared in Volume 1, which was a choice the editor made and which was fine with me. I also have at least one more Black Bat story coming in the future.
And there’s my second Hound-Dog Harker story. A little background on that: a few years ago, I wrote the Dr. Watson novel, Season of Madness. I needed a short backup story for that book, so I came up with Hound-Dog Harker. He’s the son of Jonathan and Mina Harker of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula. It’s the 1930s and he’s grown up to be an agent of the British government. I try to tie each Harker story to a classic novel. The first one is connected to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and the second one, “Hyde and Seek,” is related to both “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” and HG Wells’ “The Invisible Man.”
“Hyde and Seek” appears as the backup story in Dr. Watson’s American Adventure, in which the main story is written by Erwin K. Roberts.
To drop a few hints about my future Public Domain character works, there will be more Sherlock Holmes, and I’ve also got something coming up featuring another famous adventure character that I’m not yet at liberty to name, but it’s a big name!
AP: What appeals to you about writing Public Domain characters? Do they have a place in the hands of modern readers?
AS: To answer your second question first, the fact that Public Domain characters have a place with modern readers is evidenced every time someone buys (and hopefully enjoys) one of our books featuring those characters.
As for what appeals to me about writing such characters, almost everything does. We’re able to bring back into the spotlight characters that might otherwise fall into a bottomless pit of obscurity. The Black Bat, for example, is a wonderful superhero-type character and there’s no reason he shouldn’t be able to find an audience among those readers who enjoy Batman or Daredevil. And using these characters again also brings their original creators back into the public view, which is always a good thing. Many of the pulp writers of the past have been forgotten and if our work in the present makes their names known to new generations, I think that’s good thing.
There’s also another side to using Public Domain characters and it has to do with responsibility and the preservation of certain concepts as they were intended by their original authors. Let’s take Sherlock Holmes as an example. Holmes is among the most famous characters in literature and in the past few years there’s been a tremendous resurgence in his popularity among the general public. That’s good and it’s bad. Holmes is open to many interpretations, but not all fans of the character agree with all those versions. There are three big ones in film and TV now and they all stray to one extent or another from Arthur Conan Doyle’s original stories. We have the British series Sherlock which brings Holmes and his cast into the twenty-first century and modern London. At first I was skeptical about such an updating, but after seeing it I was very, very impressed because it maintains the spirit and essence of what made Doyle’s work so thrilling. Benedict Cumberbatch (I love that name!) is a superb Holmes and everybody acts just like they should. Then you have the Robert Downey movies which seem to have added a more action-oriented take to Holmes. And there’s also the new American TV version, Elementary, which I won’t watch. Turning Watson into a woman and taking Holmes out of England turns the whole thing into a version which isn’t really Holmes at all. They’re just borrowing the name! But, because Holmes is available for many different interpretations, thanks to the Public Domain status, there are some writers and publishers out there who are sticking to pure Doyle-style Holmes material and that’s important. Sure, it’s okay to do something new with old characters (within reason), but I’m glad to be among those who work within the format established by Doyle. I’ve made a vow to myself that whenever I actually use Holmes in a story, I will use him, to the best of my ability, as Doyle seems to have intended. I have no interest in modernizing him, pitting him against supernatural forces, or otherwise straying from formula (the Dr. Watson novel was a little different, but it didn’t actually feature Holmes, just mentioned him). So with all the variations of certain Public Domain characters out there, I’m glad some of us see fit to present them as they’ve traditionally been portrayed. If the Public Domain status didn’t exist and Holmes (or others) could be monopolized, we might run the risk of losing the traditional versions to somebody’s ambitious (and maybe unnecessary or even blasphemous) updates. With the way it is now, everybody wins. Everybody can find the Sherlock Holmes that suits their interests.
AP: Being a varied writer, you’ve also ventured into the Young Adult arena recently. Talk about that a bit.
AS: That was a very happy accident and one of the best moves I’ve made as a writer. Occasionally, I’ll come across an anthology or magazine that’s looking for a specific type of story. I’ll make a mental note of it and let it sit in my mind and see if something pops up that fits. So I was browsing one day and came across a call for paranormal stories that took place at the prom. I didn’t really think I’d have anything for the theme, but it sank into my brain and an idea developed a few hours later. I’d never written anything for the so-called Young Adult audience before, but I went through with it, submitted the story, and was very pleasantly surprised when it was accepted.
So I found myself working with a great company called Buzz Books and it’s been a fantastic experience. Malena Lott, who runs the show, is one of the most enthusiastic, encouraging publishers I’ve met so far, and Mari Farthing’s attention to detail as an editor brings out the best in my work. So far I’ve had two short stories published with Buzz Books: “A Kiss on the Threshold,” in an anthology called Prom Dates to Die For, and “Spectral Media,” in a collection called Something Wicked, which was released recently, just in time for Halloween.
Jumping into the Young Adult arena with those two anthologies was an interesting experience. When I was a teenager, you never saw a Young Adult section in the bookstore. It wasn’t a term we really used. You had children’s books, adult books, and the classics that sort of intersected age categories. Honestly, when aisles of “Young Adult” material started to appear in the big bookstores a few years ago, I found it a little odd. Did we need that middle category? But now I realize that anything, even if it’s just a category label, that gets people of any age to seek out books is a good thing. And writing for that audience isn’t very different than writing for adults. It’s PG-rated, but that’s not really all that much of a restriction. Readers, no matter how old or young they are, want the same things from stories: interesting characters in dramatic situations that bring wonder and suspense to the experience of reading about them. As long as a story keeps you turning the pages, who cares what aisle of the bookstore it happens to be placed in?
AP: Why a writer? What motivates you to tell stories? What is it about Pulp specifically that draws you in as a creator?
AS: My writing, or at least the constant use of my imagination, began as a defensive thing, a shield. When I was a kid in school, I didn’t really fit in, I felt out of place, and I got picked on. It was uncomfortable. So when I needed strength, I used my imagination to get me through the day. In my mind, I was someone else, maybe Captain Kirk on an alien planet or Peter Parker walking around with the knowledge that I was secretly stronger and braver and nobler than the other kids. Later in life, when I was long past those insecurities, my imagination kept working overtime and eventually I turned it into real writing, as opposed to just mental clutter. Now I tell stories because, rather than hiding behind them, I want to share my ideas and dreams with the people who experience them through the books I write.
Pulp is just pure fun, for the writer as well as the reader. In the wider world of publishing, I see a lot of people worrying about “rules” when they should be devoting their time to actually writing. “You shouldn’t use exclamation points.” “That point of view or type of narration is unacceptable.” “There’s no audience for that type of story.” Now while some of those rules or assumptions might be true in certain sections of the world of literature, no rule or restriction should ever be considered definitive. If it tells the story in the best way the writer can achieve, how can it be wrong? The new pulp community seems to thrive on having fun with our writing. A good pulp story is driven by excitement and adrenaline and not wanting to slam on the brakes. Pulp, just as it was many years ago when writers who later went on to be huge names in other genres started out there, is a great place to learn and to share a sort of home with others who thrive on trying to generate that same sort of excitement with their words and characters.
Pulp is where I learned how to write, where I’ve had the guidance of some great editors and colleagues and friends, and where I gained the confidence to try to go beyond and test the waters in other areas of writing. So now I’m working in other sorts of anthologies and pitching novels to other publishers and exploring various markets for my work, but Pulp began it all for me and welcomed me with open arms. It’s a genre and style that I’ll never get tired of participating in.
AP: You have a work in an altogether different genre coming up soon. Without saying too much, what can you tease our readers with?
AS: I’ve finally written a novel in one of my favorite genres, that of spies and espionage and secret agents! I’ve been a fan of that type of story ever since I saw my first James Bond movie when I was five or six, so I was eventually going to take a shot at writing that kind of book. The novel’s done, it’s been accepted by a publisher (one of the outfits I’ve worked with before in the New Pulp world) and just needs the editing process and all the trimmings before it’s ready to roll. I’m very excited about it. Without giving away more than the basics, it’s about an American intelligence officer who tries to leave government service after suffering a tragedy in his life and going rogue, but gets sucked back into the game and winds up working on missions that are too sensitive for the FBI or CIA or the other usual agencies. Dangerous situations, ruthless villains, beautiful women, and exotic cities are a hell of a lot of fun to write about and this will not be my last visit to that genre.
About The Golden Age: Published from 1939-56, the Standard/Better/Nedor characters are largely forgotten by today’s comic book fans. Now, pulp author and comic aficionado Jeff Deischer brings these classic heroes back in an all-new adventure.
In 1942, the world is at war. Spies and saboteurs seem to lurk around every corner in America. But, in the shadows, real danger awaits. Following the Battle of Midway, the Dragon Society of Imperial Japan sends agents on a secret mission to knock the U.S. out of the war. And only the superheroes of the Auric Universe can stop them.
Join the superheroes of the Golden Age in this epic new saga that legendary pulp author and interviewer Art Sippo called “a terrific read–it doesn’t get any better than this!”
Includes an Introduction by comics and pulp historian Will Murray.
Stark House Press, in the business of reprinting some of the best mysteries and supernatural fiction of the past 100 years, is pleased to announce the publication and launch of 3 STEPS TO HELL, an omnibus of three hard-hitting novels by Arnold Hano.
Many know Arnold’s name as the editor of noirmeister Jim Thompson at Lion books – Hano was the man who guided Thompson during his most productive period. Others may know Arnold penned A Day in the Bleachers, the seminal book about baseball from a fan’s perspective centered around “The Catch” by Willie Mays in the 1954 World Series. But what few may not be aware of is that Hano, under his own name and several aliases, wrote novels featuring driven, flawed characters.
3 Steps to Hell reprints for the first time three of Arnold’s books. The Big Out was his first novel and was set, appropriately, in the world of baseball. The story features major league players, gangsters, bribes and the outlaw teams of Canada. In So I’m a Heel, a WWII vet, with plastic for a jaw shattered by a sniper’s bullet, seeks to blackmail a rich man over his terrible secret, but the scheme goes way wrong. And in Flint, a western inspired by Jim Thompson’s Savage Night, a tormented gunslinger takes on one more job to kill for money.
This edition also features an introduction by crime novelist Gary Phillips (The Warlord of Willow Ridge) and a Q & A with Arnold conducted by his longtime friend, playwright Dan Duling. 3 Steps to Hell can be obtained via your local bookstore or direct from Stark House Press —http://www.starkhousepress.com/hano.html
Sequential Pulp Comics has released the title and credits page for the upcoming THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES graphic novel, coming your way this February from Sequential Pulp/Dark Horse Comics. Reserve your copy today!
Written by Martin Powell and illustrated by Jamie Chase, The Hound of the Baskervilles is based on the classic Sherlock Holmes mystery by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and is published by Sequential Pulp/Dark Horse Comics to be released on February 20, 2013 for the retail price of $12.99.
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT- Reviews of All Things Pulp by Tommy Hancock
TEN-A-WEEK STEALE by Stephen Jared Solstice Publishing 303 Pages
It isn’t very often that an author comes along who simultaneously truly evokes the style and temperament of classic Pulp while adding modern sensibilities and more sophisticated phrases and tricks to the package. We all strive for it and some of us have moments of it, but very rarely does a writer show up that does it well, consistently, and every time he puts his name on a book.
Meet Stephen Jared.
Author of TEN-A-WEEK-STEALE, Jared is a creator of all sorts. He’s a writer of course, but he’s also done a bit of time in front of television and film cameras. He has a love affair with acting and moreso with Hollywood, not Hollywood Today, but Hollywood bygone. The time when people dreamed in black and white and movie moguls captured those fantasies on celluloid. And Jared’s not just a devotee of the films of Hollywood. He’s very much a historian of sorts, fiction being his tool to ferret into fact. In his work he shows you the hubris, the horror, and the humanity that made Classic Hollywood both the Heaven and Babylon it truly was.
Stephen’s first book, JACK AND THE JUNGLE LION, took a look at the fantasy and fallacy of the classic Matinee idol. TEN-A-WEEK STEALE pulls the curtain even farther back on the reality behind Hollywood by inserting a no nonsense lead character into the fray. Walter Steale, a World War 1 Veteran, works as muscle for his brother, a politician with great aspirations and appetites, in the Los Angeles of the 1920s. Almost by accident while handling what should be a small job for his brother, Steale stumbles into a tangle of murder, conspiracy, politics, and corpses as he goes from being hired help to Most Wanted by both sides of the law.
TEN-A-WEEK STEALE has been lauded as being a fantastic work in the tradition of the old Pulp/Noir masters and it is indeed that, but it is something else entirely. Jared infuses every single word of this book not only with the past, but with the anxiety, the falsity, the need for truth of today. Steale isn’t just a lost soul of the Great War, he’s an everyman pulled by no fault of his own really into situations that are far beyond him. And, unlike many such types today, Steale doesn’t blend in, fade away, or go with the flow. He comes out fighting, shooting, punching to maintain something that many today feel they’ve lost. Being his own man.
If you enjoy great noir, this is the book for you. If you thirst for a novel that balances Past and Present, go get TEN-A-WEEK STEALE by Stephen Jared.
FIVE OUT OF FIVE TIPS OF HANCOCK’S HAT- The best of the best here, kid.
Girasol Collectables Inc, known for top quality reprints and replicas of Classic Pulp Tales, and Radio Archives,LLC, a leader in Pulp Audiobooks, eBooks, Old Time Radio, and Pulp Reprints, revealed today results of recent negotiations.
Girasol and Radio Archives have a long standing history of doing business together. Due to this already strong relationship, Radio Archives has purchased Girasol’s The Spider double novel product line. This line, containing double novels numbered 1 through 25, has thrilled enthusiasts with its high quality and consistent publication and introduced new fans to the exploits of the Master of Men, The Spider. Girasol will continue publishing their extremely popular The Spider Pulp Replicas product line which is the Finest reprint of the Spider ever done.
Neil and Leigh Mechem, owners of Girasol Collectables, Inc. stated, “We’re especially pleased to have Radio Archives taking over the handling of sales of our Spider Pulp Doubles. The scope of the pulp related material they have to offer, combined with their excellent customer service, make them the ideal one-stop shopping venue for pulp fans. We’re proud of the 25 issues we produced, and seeing them managed diligently helps enormously while we concentrate on the prep work required for our Pulp Replica line.”
Recognizing this and the overall quality of Girasol’s work, Radio Archives is proud to add The Spider Double Novel line to its already impressive lineup of not only Pulp, but specifically Spider related material. “This product line,” said Tom Brown, Owner of Radio Archives, “dovetails so well into our Spider Audiobooks and eBook product lines.” The purchase includes existing inventory, intellectual property, and substantial amounts of artwork and other material.
Radio Archives and Girasol have also formed a strategic relationship for future projects that will insure the cooperation of the two companies continues on and that top quality Pulp products will be available to fans and enthusiasts for years.
Wholesale dealer inquiries are now accepted at Radio Archives for this product line. Email Radio Archives at Service@RadioArchives.com or call 1-800-886-0551.
The Terror of Fu Manchu (2009) by William Patrick Maynard, Black Coat Press REVIEW BY BRAD MENGEL
Fu Manchu is a character that has been around for a century now (the original stories first appeared in magazines in 1912 before they were collected in 1913). Over the years the character has been subject to controversy with charges of racism.
William Patrick Maynard has some big shoes to fill writing the first authorised Fu Manchu novel in over twenty years, taking over from Sax Rohmer and his protégé Cay Van Ash. But I am really pleased that he does a great job with this novel. It’s been some time since I last read any of the Rohmer or Van Ash novels so I can’t comment how close to the style Maynard got but this is a rattling good adventure,
The story revolves around John Daniel Eltham, a former missionary in China during the Boxer Rebellion about to publish his memoirs which are initially thought might reveal something about the history of Fu Manchu. I was quite impressed by Maynard’s recreation of the Boxer Rebellion and I was pleasantly reminded of Moonraker’s Bride by Madeline Brent (Peter O’Donnell), that is both Maynard and O’Donnell manage to evoke similar experiences for people in the same situation at the same time.
While Fu Manchu and the Si Fan want the manuscript there is another group The Brotherhood of the Magi who also want it. What secrets does the manuscript hold the key to? Who is responsible for the snowmen containing dead bodies found on various lawns? And who is responsible for the series of Abominable Snowmen attacks on several locations? These two new and exotic threats fit beautifully with the various threats that have been included in the series before now.
It’s interesting to see the Si-Fan fighting against a rival group. It highlights something of Petrie and Smith’s tunnel vision that Fu Manchu initially gets the blame for everything.
Surprisingly Fu Manchu’s archenemy Denis Nayland Smith disappears in the middle portion of the book as he sends Dr Petrie to Paris to follow several leads. Not to fear Petrie meets Gaston Max another Rohmer detective who works with Petrie during his time in Paris.
Maynard has created a really good adventure with Petrie in real danger on several occasions. The Brotherhood of the Magi are strong enough villains that they could have carried the book on their own but they make worthwhile rivals to Fu Manchu.
Maynard has another Fu Manchu novel The Destiny of Fu Manchu now available that looks just as good.
It’s not easy being a superhero in the best of circumstances, so pity the poor man whose powers derive from a demon — and whose mother is dating one of the nation’s leading evangelical preachers. And when that young unfortunate’s name is Chesney Arnstruther, well…that’s someone whom you would not want to switch places with.
, a superhero novel about Celia West, the completely unpowered accountant daughter of the two most popular and powerful heroes of Commerce City.
