Men's Adventure Quarterly #9: Croc Attack! - Robert Deis and Bill Cunningham, eds.

Editors Robert Deis and Bill Cunningham deliver another winner in CROC ATTACK!, the ninth issue of MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY, the beautifully illustrated journal that reprints the best of the Men’s Adventure Magazines from the Fifties, Sixties, and Seventies. Authors included in this collection of stories about humans battling with crocodiles and alligators are paperbacker Robert Edmond Alter (one of my favorites), pulpster Brian O’Brien, and MAM veteran Leon Lazarus, along with a number of pseudonyms concealing unknown authors. And plenty of wonderful artwork, of course. A gorgeous package and great fun to read, as always. Highly recommended, available in paperback and e-book editions at Amazon.

Maneaters: Killer Sharks in Men's Adventure Magazines -- Robert Deis and Wyatt Doyle, eds.

I've never been a big fan of the ocean. I like sitting on the beach and looking at it, but that's about the extent of the appeal for me. I'm as big a landlubber as you're going to find. And the stories in the latest volume from the Men's Adventure Library Journal do a good job of explaining why I feel this way: there are things out there under the waves. Dangerous things.

Like all the books from editors Robert Deis and Wyatt Doyle, MANEATERS: KILLER SHARKS IN MEN'S ADVENTURE MAGAZINES, is a beautiful production featuring dozens of great pieces of artwork, including covers and interior art from some of the best artists in the genre.

The stories, mostly fictional, are also highly entertaining. The situations vary widely, but all feature perilous, usually bloody encounters between humans and sharks. My favorites were "The Giant Shark That Guarded Rommel's Treasure" (FURY, January 1961) by Peter Fall (probably a pseudonym), which reads like an early Jack Higgins adventure novel in miniature; "E Mao Ariki" (ARGOSY, July 1968) a South Seas adventure yarn by the consistently excellent author Robert Edmond Alter; and "The Madman Who Ruled a Killer-Shark Pack" (MAN'S WORLD, January 1976) by Bret Harper, also likely a pseudonym, about a husband who finds a unique way of taking revenge on his cheating wife.

In addition, each story is followed by comments from a variety of shark experts, explaining what the author got right, got wrong, or made up entirely. These commentaries are informative and a lot of fun.

Overall, MANEATERS is a great collection. Reading it isn't going to make me more likely to go in the water--just the opposite, in fact--but I had a fine time with it anyway. You know, it would be a pretty good book to read while sitting on the beach. Well up on the beach, away from the water . . .

The Digest Enthusiast, Book Seven - Richard Krauss, ed.

THE DIGEST ENTHUSIAST continues to be one of my favorite current publications, and the recently released Book Seven is no exception. Once again it provides an in-depth look at a variety of digest publications from past and present, leading off with a lengthy interview with Rick Ollerman, editor of DOWN & OUT: THE MAGAZINE, as well as the author of several well-received suspense novels and many top-notch introductions and essays from Stark House reprints of classic hardboiled, noir, and mystery fiction. The interview covers all these aspects of Ollerman’s career and is very informative and entertaining.

Other highlights for me include Peter Infantino’s continuing issue-by-issue survey of the iconic crime digest MANHUNT; a look at all the stories by Robert Edmond Alter (an author I really like) published in ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE, also by Infantino; Josh Pachter’s look back at ESPIONAGE MAGAZINE, a publiction with which he had a personal connection (and which I remember buying faithfully off the magazine rack at the local grocery store); and an article by Joe Wehrle Jr. on the Telzey Amberdon science fiction stories by James H. Schmitz, some of which I’ve read, and this article makes me want to collect and read the rest of them. All in all, THE DIGEST ENTHUSIAST is well worth your time and money if you have any interest in these magazines at all, and if you don’t, it just might change your mind. Highly recommended.