I'm trying in this series to concentrate on issues that have some personal meaning to me. In this case, MSMM was certainly important to me, although about twenty years later. But this is the first issue, and as it happens, I once had a copy of this one. Notice that it's called MICHAEL SHAYNE MYSTERY MAGAZINE, rather than the tougher and more laconic MIKE SHAYNE MYSTERY MAGAZINE. The first six issues carried that title before it was shortened. Sam Merwin Jr., not that far removed from his pulp editing and writing days, was the editor, as he would be again years later when he started buying stories from me, and he also wrote the Shayne novelette in this issue under the Brett Halliday house-name. MSMM was a fine magazine, and I'm sure you'll be seeing more covers from it in this series.
10 comments:
Publisher Leo Margulies often hired Sam Merwin, Jr. for the first issues of a new magazine. Merwin edited the first few issues of Fantastic Universe in 1953 (and probably the first issues of The Saint Detective Stories in 1953 but I can't find my copies to check), and the first two issues of Satellite SF in 1956.
Margulies gave Merwin what was probably his first editorial position in the Thrilling pulp group in the late 1930s.
I'm a big fan of MSMM, which was pulp in everything but size.
Richard Moore
Just checked the FictionMags index and Merwin did edit the first three issues of The Saint Detective Stories magazine in 1953.
Richard Moore
Memories, memories. I bought number one and kept going until the late sixties or so then picked up again when Bill Pronzini and you and some others started appearing. I had no idea who you were. I just knew you could WRITE.
MSMM has a special place in my heart!
RJR
That was where you made your first sale, wasn't it, Bob?
Were any of the Shayne stories from the digest collected in book form?
Not that I know of, although I think one or two of them by Dennis Lynds were expanded into full-length Shayne novels. Pretty sure Lynds did the expansions, too.
Dennis Lynds sold Michael Shayne Mystery Mag his first Slot Machine Kelly story, then Leo Margolis invited him to try a Shayne novelelet, He wrote one at 40,000 words, when they were only supposed to be 20,000. In Dennis' defense, no one had given him a length. Margolis paid him anyway, and then David Dresser purchased the story, and turned it into the novel Too Friendly, Too Dead.
David Laurence Wilson
Thanks for this info, David. I knew Lynds had something to do with one or two of the full-length novels but wasn't certain of the details.
James, MSMM did, indeed, publish mjy first story, but that's probably where I first read you, Joe Lansdale, Lew Shiner, LOTS of Pronzini, as well as Gary Brandner, Talmage Powell, Ed Breese, Frank Sisk, and countless short story writers 've enjoyed over the years. It was always my favorite mystery magazine because it really published what I wanted to read and write.
RJR
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