Happy Fourth of July!

 

The art on this cover is by Robert Gibson Jones, who did a bunch of covers, most of them excellent, for FANTASTIC ADVENTURES. William Brengle, author of the lead novella, is a house-name, and the actual author behind this one is Howard Browne. Also on hand in this issue are William P. McGivern, Robert Bloch (twice, once as himself and once as Tarleton Fiske), Don Wilcox, Harold Lawlor, and Leroy Yerxa. That's a pretty good line-up. I don't own this issue, but you can find a PDF of it here, along with a bunch of other issues of FANTASTIC ADVENTURES. In the meantime, Happy Fourth of July to everyone reading this in the United States, and I hope it's a great day for you and everyone elsewhere in the world, too.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Fantastic Adventures, October 1942

I don't think J. Allen St. John's cover on this issue of FANTASTIC ADVENTURES is one of his best, but it's still pretty darned good and is intriguing enough to make me want to read the story it illustrates, so I guess it did its job. The whole issue is on-line here, along with lots of other issues of FANTASTIC ADVENTURES. Will I ever get around to reading it? Who knows? But there's a good group of writers inside including Robert Bloch, Nelson S. Bond, Don Wilcox, Ross Rocklynne, Leroy Yerxa, Dwight V. Swain (writing as Clark South), James Norman, and Robert Moore Williams (writing as Russell Storm). The lead novel is by house-name E.K. Jarvis, so there's really no telling who actually wrote that one.  

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Amazing Stories, August 1942

A nice, colorful, eye-catching cover by H.W. McCauley on this issue of AMAZING STORIES. G.H. Irwin, the author of the lead novel, was actually editor Raymond A. Palmer. I don't believe I've ever read any of RAP's fiction. There are some good authors in this issue, including Henry Kuttner, Nelson S. Bond, Ziff-Davis stalwarts Leroy Yerxa and David Wright O'Brien (writing as John York Cabot), old-timer Miles J. Breuer ("The Sheriff of Thorium Gulch"? Really?), John Russell Fearn, Festus Pragnell, and a couple I've never heard of, Jep Powell and Richard O. Lewis. Probably no classics here, but I'll bet it's an entertaining issue. 

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Amazing Stories, May 1943

I like the cover by Harold McCauley on this issue of AMAZING STORIES. It's hard to go wrong with a floating skull and a sexy redhead, even though she's probably evil. I mean, she's the "Priestess of the Floating Skull", which sounds pretty sinister. The author of this featured story is Edwin Benson, which was a Ziff-Davis house-name, so there's no telling who actually wrote it. Perhaps Leroy Yerxa, who also has a story in this issue and was very prolific, or Robert Moore Williams, also on hand under his own name. Other authors in this issue are Nelson S. Bond (with a Lancelot Biggs story), Ross Rocklynne, and Festus Pragnell, a name that's always sounded like a pseudonym to me but evidently wasn't. None of these authors are particular favorites of mine, but I'm sure I would have enjoyed this issue anyway, had I plucked it off the newsstand in 1943.