Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Thrilling Adventures, February 1941

I always think of Emmett Watson in relation to his covers for various Munsey pulps, but he did some work for other houses, too, such as this cover for THRILLING ADVENTURES. It's not one of his best, but it's okay. And the contents look pretty good, too. The lead story is by my old editor and mentor, Sam Merwin Jr. It's always nice to see Sam featured on a cover. Also on hand are Louis L'Amour (with a Turk Madden yarn), Ray Cummings, Rolland Lynch, Whit Ellsworth (before he was the editor of all the Superman titles at DC), and a couple of lesser-known authors, Jack Terry and Clay Perry, who appear to have no connection other than the fact that their names rhyme.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: The Blue Book Magazine, May 1931

Yikes! This great cover by Laurence Herndon illustrates the first installment of the serialized novel "The Land of Hidden Men" by Edgar Rice Burroughs, which just happens to be one of the Burroughs novels I've never read. I have to get busy and catch up on some of this stuff. This issue isn't top-heavy with big-name authors, but there are still some very good pulpsters on hand including Seven Anderton, Clarence Herbert New (with a Freelances of Diplomacy story), Rollin Brown, Armand Brigaud (a JUNGLE STORIES stalwart later in his career), and Conrad Richter, whose work appeared in the pulps occasionally even though he was better known for his stories in the slicks and, later on, his Pulitzer Prize-winning novels. Also on hand were some writers unknown to me: Ewing Walker, William F. Sturm, Henry LaCossitt, Albert Dorrington, Wilbur Hall, and Arthur K. Akers. What's this, an issue of BLUE BOOK without a single H. Bedford-Jones story, let alone two or three under his various pseudonyms? I thought that was against the law! 

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Action Stories, May 1929

This issue of ACTION STORIES comes from the days when the magazine featured other kinds of adventure fiction along with Westerns. The cover featuring a tough-looking Foreign Legionnaire is by H.C. Murphy Jr. The story it illustrates is by Francis James, a pseudonym for James A. Goldthwaite, a prolific pulpster who wrote a lot of adventure, detective, Western, and Weird Menace stories. Speaking of prolific, Walt Coburn, Theodore Roscoe, T.W. Ford, and Eli Colter are on hand as well, as is Andrew A. Caffrey, the least-known author in this issue. It looks like a good one.  

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Adventure, October 1946

I think I'll start using this Malvin Singer cover as my author photo. There's a certain resemblance, and that's the way I feel a lot of days when I'm trying to write. By this point in its run, ADVENTURE featured a mix of well-known authors and others whose names aren't really familiar to me. This issue includes Sidney Herschell Small with a Koropok story (I have the collections of that series but have never read them), Nard Jones, who wrote some well-regarded historical novels and historical non-fiction, veteran pulpster Kenneth Perkins, Ted Stratton, who wrote paperbacks as Terry Spain, and Dave Grubb, who as Davis Grubb wrote the popular novels THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER and FOOL'S PARADE, both of which were adapted into movies. Also on hand are R.G. Emery, Douglas F. Young, and Henry John Colyton, the authors who fall into the unfamiliar category for me.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Street & Smith's Top-Notch, March 1933

This issue of TOP-NOTCH has a good cover by John Coughlin, an artist I associate more with DETECTIVE STORY MAGAZINE, whether that impression is correct or not. The lead novella is by an author whose name wasn't familiar to me, R.E. Dupuy. But a little investigation revealed a pretty interesting story. Richard Ernest Dupuy was a newspaper reporter who served as an artilleryman in World War I, then stayed in the army and made a career out of it. But he had sold a few pulp stories before the war and took it up again in the late Twenties, placing a story in WEIRD TALES but concentrating on war and adventure yarns for various pulps. That came to an end when World War II began and Dupuy became the Director of Public Information at the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force, where he reported directly to General Eisenhower. It was Dupuy who announced to the world via radio when the invasion of Normandy began on D-Day. Pretty good for an old pulpster. After the war, Dupuy retired as a colonel and wrote military history books. I've never read anything by him, as far as I recall. There are only three other pieces of fiction in this issue of TOP-NOTCH, all of them by authors who wrote a lot of Westerns: Galen C. Colin, J. Allan Dunn, and Walker A. Tompkins, who has one of his Ozar the Aztec/Lost Race novelettes in this issue under the house-name Valentine Wood. Dunn, of course, wrote a lot of other genres besides Westerns, but he was a stalwart in that field. Quite a few issues of TOP-NOTCH can be found on-line, but this doesn't appear to be one of them.

Review: Queen's Own - George C. Appell

I’d read several Western pulp stories by George C. Appell and enjoyed them, and I own some of his Western novels that I haven’t read yet, but I didn’t know he had written any historical novels until I came across this one, which was published as a paperback original by Dell in 1955 and never reprinted as far as I know. The great George Gross cover caught my eye immediately, and I was intrigued enough to go ahead and read it.

The story takes place in India during the 1897 uprising by the Afridis and the Pathans against British colonial rule. The nominal protagonist is Captain Ian Macleod, a Canadian/Scots officer in the lancer regiment tasked with keeping the peace in part of the Northwest Frontier. QUEEN’S OWN really has an ensemble cast, though, with characters ranging from its commanding officer to a younger officer who’s rivals with Macleod, a beautiful half-caste dancer who’s a spy, her gun-running father, the beautiful young American woman who’s engaged to Macleod’s rival, and the leader of the uprising who wants to wipe out the British.

If you’re thinking this sounds like it would have made a good movie, you’re right. I can easily imagine it as a fairly big budget production in the Forties or Fifties. You can cast it in your head as well as I can, according to your own preferences, except for the commanding officer who has to be C. Aubrey Smith. I won’t budge on that one.

But I was talking about the book. Well, Appell was a good writer. I always thought his style was a bit more literary than most Western pulpsters, and he gives that free reign here, creating a very vivid setting and inhabiting it with complex, fully developed characters. The problem with QUEEN’S OWN is that there’s very little action in it. The first two-thirds of the book is almost all political intrigue and soap opera. It’s well-written, no doubt about that, but even so, I was waiting for something else to happen.

The final third of the book is much more eventful, but even there, a frustratingly large amount of the action occurs off-screen. However, the ending is pretty satisfying, the characters are interesting, and the historical background is handled well. The whole thing just needed a little more oomph, I guess you could say.

I’m glad I read QUEEN’S OWN, and I think that overall it’s worthwhile, but if you’re going to give it a try, you should know it’s not quite the sexy, action-packed, historical adventure that the cover promises.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Far East Adventure Stories, January 1931

I don't know who painted the cover on this issue of FAR EAST ADVENTURE STORIES, but it's pretty eye-catching. That's a tough-looking Cossack. I assume he's the protagonist of Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson's serial "The Red Cossack". This issue has a sterling lineup of authors that also includes H. Bedford-Jones, Hugh B. Cave, Lawrence G. Blochman, Chart Pitt, and Jack D'Arcy (D.L. Champion). Also on hand are W.C. Harding, better known under his pseudonym Anson Hard, along with H.C. Langer, real name Hedwig Langer (never heard of her), and newcomer H. DeWitt Thomason, who has no other credits in the Fictionmags Index, so his story here may well be the extent of his career. FAR EAST ADVENTURE STORIES didn't last long, only a dozen issues, but it published some good stuff.

Review: American Treasure Hunters: The Pirate and Alamo - Andrew M. Dare

I really enjoyed the first two books in the American Treasure Hunters series, THE HUNT FOR CONFEDERATE GOLD and THE BOSTON TEA PARTY CONSPIRACY, but I’ve been especially looking forward to the third book, THE PIRATE AND THE ALAMO, since, as you can tell from the title, it takes place in Texas.

It’s safe to say I was not disappointed. At all.

This one finds our teenage protagonists, Ben Prescott, Porter Rockwell, and Latch McCrae, in San Antonio with Ben’s wealthy uncle, who plans to bid at an auction for a Corvette Stingray that once belonged to an astronaut. But of course things become more complicated than that when they come into possession of an antique powder horn that might have belonged to Jim Bowie. And, also of course, that powder horn has some sort of cipher etched into it and another secret lurking inside, as well. Before you know it, the guys are untangling a mystery that involves not only the battle of the Alamo but also the notorious pirate Jean Lafitte, and once again they find themselves in danger from forces that want to uncover the truth first, for their own nefarious ends.

I raced through this novel and had an absolutely great time reading it. The fast-paced prose and intricate plot from author Andrew M. Dare would have been very entertaining regardless of where the book was set, but having it take place in areas I know fairly well made it even more enjoyable. For example, when there’s a great chase scene along the River Walk, I couldn’t help but think of the time I had supper with Bill and Judy Crider at one of the restaurants right there by the river. I’ve been to the Alamo and inside the Menger Hotel many times. When the trail leads to the Lost Pines area in central Texas, I know what it looks like because I’ve driven through there many, many times (in a different location than the scenes in the book, but in the same stretch of pines that runs through that part of Texas). I always get a kick out of fiction set in places I know, and this book is a prime example of that. Andrew M. Dare, mentioned above, is actually a house-name, and the author of this one is David Afsharirad, a Texan his own self, so he knows what he's talking about.

Throw in the fact that the three protagonists are just so dang likable, and I can’t help but feel like THE PIRATE AND THE ALAMO is one of the best books I’ve read so far this year. It’s available on Amazon in e-book, hardcover, and audio editions, and I give it a very high recommendation.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Sea Novel Magazine, November 1940

SEA NOVEL MAGAZINE was a Munsey pulp that lasted for only two issues. This is the first. You can't blame its brief run on Rudolph Belarski, who provided a great cover, and I'd be willing to bet that the novel by J. Allan Dunn that takes up almost the entire issue was pretty good, too, based on Dunn's track record. As far as I can tell, "Northwest to Mutiny" was never reprinted, and this issue doesn't appear to be posted anywhere on-line, so I doubt if I'll ever read the story, but dang, it sounds good, doesn't it? There are some poems and one short story in this issue, as well, by authors I've never heard of: Ethel Talbot Scheffauer, Bob Ferris, Thomas J. Murray, and William Slavens McNutt.

A Rough Edges Rerun Review: Hot Cargo - Orrie Hitt

HOT CARGO is a very different sort of book from PUSHOVER, the first Orrie Hitt novel I read. It’s the story of Hank Storms, a tough American sailor working on a boat that’s dredging out a channel in the river flowing through a port city in a Pacific island nation that seems to be loosely based on the Philippines. At one time, Hank was the captain of the boat, but he’s been replaced and demoted because of an accident that occurred while he was in charge.

That’s not all he has going on, though. It seems that there was a recent coup in the island’s government, and Hank is also smuggling guns to the followers of the deposed leader, who plans to stage a counter-revolution. Plus there’s the mistress of the guy who replaced Hank as captain. She’s actually more interested in Hank, and doesn’t mind proving it. And the beautiful native girl he meets in a bar who claims to be a virgin. And the mistress of the island’s current dictator, who’s also involved in the counter-revolution. And Hank’s beautiful but estranged wife, who shows up unexpectedly with a suitcase full of money. Throw in a sinister Dutchman, drug smuggling, pornography, blackmail, a lot of boozing, and a hurricane, and you can see that Hitt’s packed a heck of a lot into this yarn.

And “yarn” is a good description of this book. It’s definitely larger-than-life, an updated version of the sort of story that might have appeared in the pulp SPICY ADVENTURE during the Thirties. As such, although it’s plenty gritty, it lacks some of the realistic edge that can be found in PUSHOVER. However, the style is faster-paced and has a really nice terse rhythm to it, making it a prime example of what I’ve started calling hardboiled sleaze. Hank is a fine character, tough and definitely amoral about 99% of the time . . . but there’s that one per cent when he finds that he does have a sort of code after all and has to do the right thing even though he doesn’t really want to.

Several fans of Hitt’s work have told me that this isn’t one of his better books, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. That’s just me, of course. I have a fondness for South Seas yarns to start with, and a story can’t get too pulpy for my taste. From what I’ve seen, HOT CARGO isn’t really typical of most of Hitt’s novels, and it’s true that the ending isn’t really all it could be (endings seem to be a bit of a problem for Hitt, from what I’ve read and what other readers have told me). But it’s one of those books that resonated with me, for whatever reason, and I’m certainly glad that I read it.

(This was the second Orrie Hitt novel I read, and since this post first appeared on April 11, 2009, I've gone on to read many more of Hitt's books, of course. A commenter on the original post pointed out that the cover is by Howell Dodd and was used originally on the February 1958 issue of the men's adventure magazine Valor for Men. HOT CARGO has never been reprinted, possibly because it's really not very typical of Hitt's work, but I still think it's well worth reading if you come across a copy. I think it's a shame he didn't write more Spicy Adventure yarns like this.)

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Short Stories, October 25, 1928

I'm sure there must have been some other air war covers on SHORT STORIES, but this one by Edgar F. Wittmack is the only one I recall coming across. It's a good one, too, very dramatic and colorful with that red sun in the background. There's a fine group of authors in this issue including Ernest Haycox, Hulbert Footner, Robert Carse, Tom Roan, Kenneth Perkins, Frank L. Packard, and Carson Mowre.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Thrilling Stories, March 1930

Despite having "Thrilling" in the title, as far as I know THRILLING STORIES was not part of the Thrilling Group. Instead, it was a short-lived adventure pulp from 1929-30. This is the fourth and final issue with a cover by an artist I'm not familiar with, John Hoff. His three covers for this pulp are his only credits in the Fictionmag Index. Likewise, the authors inside are mostly unknown to me. I recognize Achmed Abdullah and Bob du Soe, and that's it. The others are Owen Atkinson, W.P. Gardner, Kenneth Duane Whipple, Arthur Styron, Allison W. Ind, Jasper B. Sinclair, and Edward F. Medosch. Their stories may be good for all I know, but it's doubtful that I'll ever find out because I don't expect to have a copy of this pulp in my lifetime.

Review: American Treasure Hunters #2: The Boston Tea Party Conspiracy - Andrew M. Dare

I really enjoyed the first book in the American Treasure Hunters series, THE HUNT FOR CONFEDERATE GOLD. The second book, THE BOSTON TEA PARTY CONSPIRACY, finds our three teenage heroes—brainy Ben Prescott, brawny Porter Rockwell, and jack-of-all-trades Latch McCrae—investigating another historical mystery. This time they’re trying to discover whether Samuel Adams had an ulterior motive for orchestrating the Boston Tea Party. Evidence has surfaced that Adams was really after some sort of treasure that may have been hidden among the tea, and striking a blow of American independence may not have been the reason he organized the Sons of Liberty.

So off go the trio of treasure hunters from their homes in North Carolina to Boston, where their investigation involves them with a tech mogul, a pretty history professor (there’s not even a hint of romance despite the fact that she’s only about ten years older than the guys, because these are very clean books), assorted bruisers who also believe there’s a treasure to be tracked down, some Freemasons, and at least one 250-year-old murder to be solved. Author Andrew M. Dare keeps the action racing along and also peels away the layers of the mystery in very satisfying fashion.

I think I enjoyed THE BOSTON TEA PARTY CONSPIRACY even more than the first book in the series. There’s more action as the boys find themselves up against some ruthless adversaries, and the historical mystery is intriguing and well-developed. I also liked the fact that all three of our heroes pitch in on the brain work. They’re all very likable guys. The large supporting cast from the first book is mostly absent this time around and I kind of missed them, but it was also nice seeing Ben, Porter, and Latch operating mostly on their own.

If you’re an old codger like me and grew up reading boy’s adventure series such as Rick Brant, the Hardy Boys, and the Three Investigators, the American Treasure Hunters series definitely should be on your radar. If you have young friends or relatives who are big readers, or even who aren’t, these books are aimed squarely at them. The hardcover edition of THE BOSTON TEA PARTY CONSPIRACY is already out, and the e-book edition will be released on July 7. I had a great time reading it and give it a high recommendation.

And next time around, the guys are headed for Texas and the Alamo. I can’t wait.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Short Stories, May 25, 1942

I don’t have this issue of SHORT STORIES, and I’m not particularly fond of that Pete Kuhlhoff cover, but Wildside Press just reprinted the lead novella, “Master of Dragons” by E. Hoffmann Price in paperback and e-book editions, and since I just read it, I want to write about it.

Price is a long-time favorite of mine. Some of his stories are better than others, of course, but it seems like he always brought a solid effort to everything he wrote, no matter what the genre or market. Many years ago I got my hands on a copy of FAR LANDS, OTHER DAYS, a massive collection of his adventure stories from various pulps, and I absolutely loved it. I own a copy of that volume now, and I ought to reread it one of these days.

In the meantime, “Master of Dragons” is a World War II espionage yarn. Naval intelligence agent Gil Jordan undergoes plastic surgery to make him look like a shady Australian who may be working as a spy for the Japanese in the Dutch East Indies in the days shortly before Pearl Harbor. When the man is murdered, Jordan takes his place and finds himself up to his neck in a dangerous investigation involving a Japanese society of assassins, a beautiful and mysterious blonde who can’t be trusted, hidden airfields, and a date with a firing squad. Price keeps things moving along briskly, and although there are definitely some pulpish elements, this reads a little more like a serious espionage story of the type that would become more prevalent in the Fifties and Sixties.

I have a strong hunch that it was written a short time before Pearl Harbor, when people suspected the Japanese were about to do something but weren’t sure what, and then the ending was revised before the story was published in May 1942. But like I said, that’s just a hunch. Either way, it’s a good story and I enjoyed it.

Elsewhere in this issue, there’s a really strong line-up of authors, including H. Bedford-Jones, Day Keene, William MacLeod Raine, Caddo Cameron, Robert R. Mill, S. Omar Barker, H.S.M. Kemp, and Phil Richards. SHORT STORIES was a consistently top-notch adventure pulp and this appears to be an above-average issue.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: North-West Romances, Summer 1941

Nothing like a Norman Saunders cover on an issue of NORTH-WEST ROMANCES. The two go together perfectly. This issue features a story by one of my favorite authors, Frederick Nebel (a reprint from a 1932 issue of ACTION STORIES), as well as yarns by William Byron Mowery, Ralph R. Perry, Owen Finbar (who was really A. DeHerries Smith, who wrote a lot of stories for the Northerns under his own name), Dan O'Rourke (who was also A. DeHerries Smith), Reg Dinsmore, Evan M. Post, and house-name John Starr (quite possibly A. DeHerries Smith, too). I love Northerns and ought to read more of them.

Review: American Treasure Hunters: The Hunt for Confederate Gold

I’ve written here before about how much I enjoyed the boy’s adventure series I read as a kid, especially Rick Brant, the Hardy Boys, Tom Swift Jr., and the Three Investigators. As far as I know, that sort of series hasn’t existed for a long time. Until now.

THE HUNT FOR CONFEDERATE GOLD is the first book in a new series called AMERICAN TREASURE HUNTERS, written by Andrew M. Dare and published by Ark Press. The publisher’s website does a better job of summarizing it than I can, so I’m going to quote it:

“Ben Prescott, Porter Rockwell, and Latch McRae couldn’t be more different. Ben is a home-schooled brainiac. Porter is the starting quarterback for the Ridgeport Raiders, and Latch is a grease-smudged prodigy who never saw an engine he couldn’t take apart and set to purring. Yet the three have been friends forever, drawn together by a shared passion: treasure hunting for the forgotten loot of American history. 

During a raucous Fourth of July fireworks battle, the trio stumbles onto a lost Confederate blockade-runner. Locked inside: a rusted safe, a sealed pouch, and the first breadcrumb to a vanished fortune in Confederate government gold, missing since the final days of the War Between the States. 

They’re not alone. A bitter ex-employee of Ben’s father and a well-funded outsider are willing to lie, steal, and threaten to take the treasury for themselves, and wipe out the story of its origin. 

Now the hunters must face danger and work their way through knotty clues and ciphers as they seek a long-lost map drawn in invisible ink on the back of a letter from General Robert E. Lee himself! It’s a map that may point to one of America’s richest lost treasures.”

My reaction to reading this book is pretty simple. If I’d read it when I was 13 years old, I would have thought it’s one of the greatest books ever written. From the perspective of being 60 years on down the road from that point, I still thoroughly enjoyed it and think it’s an excellent yarn. Ben, Porter, and Latch are fine protagonists, and the story moves along at a fast pace through a well-constructed historical mystery.

Of the vintage series I mentioned above, the one I’m most reminded of by THE HUNT FOR CONFEDERATE GOLD is the great Rick Brant series. Like Rick and Scotty in those books, the heroes of this series are old enough and athletic enough to take care of themselves in the action scenes, and there are a few hints of espionage and intrigue, the way Rick and Scotty used to find themselves helping out JANIG, the Joint Army Navy Intelligence Group (that’s right, I remember what the initials stand for after 60 years). The emphasis in this series is more on history than on science, but you get the same mixture of educational stuff with action, mystery, a little romance (that angle is handled quite well), and a little humor.

I enjoyed this book a lot and look forward to the others in the series. It’s available on Amazon in e-book and hardcover editions, or you can get it directly from the publisher’s website here. If you’re looking for a book a teenage boy would find entertaining, or you’re an old geezer revisiting your own reading as a kid, I highly recommend it. 

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Oriental Stories, Winter 1932

A classic cover by J. Allen St. John graces this issue of the legendary adventure pulp ORIENTAL STORIES. And speaking of classics, this issue contains the story "The Sowers of the Thunder" by Robert E. Howard, a poem by REH, a collaboration between Otis Adelbert Kline and E. Hoffmann Price, and stories by Warren Hastings Miller, S.B.H. Hurst, G.G. Pendarves, and the lesser known James W. Bennett, H.E.W. Gay, Grace Keon, and Lt. Edgar Gardiner. I have some reprinted issues of ORIENTAL STORIES, and of course I've read quite a few stories, by REH and others, that appeared there originally, but I don't think I've ever seen a copy of an actual issue, or of its successor, THE MAGIC CARPET. But that's okay. This whole issue is available on the Internet Archive if I ever decide to read it. I know I ought to, but there are just so many pulps and so little time . . .

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Thrilling Adventures, March 1939

Pith helmet alert! I think the cover on this issue of THRILLING ADVENTURES may be by Richard Lyon, who did a lot of them for various Thrilling Group pulps in the Thirties. It's a striking cover, that's for sure. An oddity about this issue is that all the authors except one are best remembered for their Westerns: Philip Ketchum, Edward Parrish Ware, Rolland Lynch, Ben Conlon, and Harold F. Cruickshank. The one author who wasn't a prolific contributor to the Western pulps, Ray Millholland, is the only one who appears to have written a traditional Western yarn in this issue. I say "appears to" because I'm just basing that on the story titles. I don't have this issue and haven't read it. The Cruickshank story is kind of a Western, since it's an animal story and part of a series about a white wolf. I really ought to read more stories from THRILLING ADVENTURES. Most of the issues look great!

Review: Rex Brandon #1: Death Warriors - Denis Hughes

Sometimes I’m just in the mood for a jungle adventure. In 1951 and ’52, British author Denis Hughes wrote twelve novels under the pseudonym Marco Garon about Rex Brandon, a two-fisted geologist, explorer, and big game hunter, and his adventures in Africa. These were published by a British paperback publisher, and these days, the first six in the series are available as paperbacks and e-books from Bold Venture Press. They’ve been sitting on my Kindle for quite a while, so I figured it was time I read one of them.

The first book in the series, DEATH WARRIORS, finds Rex acting as an agent for the British and French governments. (I assume Rex is British, but you know, I’m not sure it ever says that in the book.) It seems that several years earlier, a geologist named Georg Traski located a deposit of a rare ore called irikum, which is more valuable for making nuclear weapons than uranium. But Traski disappeared somewhere in the jungle, and an expedition sent to look for him, led by another geologist and his beautiful daughter, never came back, either. Now Rex is going in to this dangerous area to locate the irikum deposit and find out what happened to the previous expeditions.

Well, you know with a set up like that, there are going to be plenty of adventures with wild animals (leopards, lions, and a rogue gorilla with an ear for music, in this case), despicable villains, and a madman or two. And so there is. Does it all play out about the way you’d expect? Sure it does. Is getting to all the expected destinations fun? You bet! DEATH WARRIORS has a lot of action, a stalwart protagonist in Rex Brandon, a couple of colorful sidekicks, and a beautiful, competent young woman. All the ingredients for a very entertaining jungle adventure yarn in the grand tradition. If you’re a fan of such things, like I am, I give it a high recommendation, and I look forward to reading the other Rex Brandon novels that are available.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Top-Notch, February 1936

I don't know who painted the cover on this issue of TOP-NOTCH -- Tom Lovell, maybe? -- but it's pretty dramatic. TOP-NOTCH was getting near the end of its long run by this point but was still publishing some very good authors. In this issue are stories by Arthur J. Burks, Major George Fielding-Eliot, William Merriam Rouse, Samuel Taylor, and Robert H. Leitfred. The other authors aren't familiar to me: Paul Randell Morrison, Edmund du Perrier, Hal Firanze, and Kurt von Rachen. Wait a minute, Kurt von Rachen was L. Ron Hubbard, so I guess I've heard of him after all. Controversial though he may be, I like Hubbard's pulp stories for the most part, and for all I know, those other guys were fine writers. So this is probably a decent issue.