Category Archives: Pulp fiction

Pulp Friday: Avakoum Zahov Vs 07 and Soviet spy fiction

Avakoum Zahov versus 07 cover

“A battle to the death between two crack Secret Agents of East and West!”

This week’s Pulp Friday is one of the strangest cultural artefacts to come out of Australian pulp publishing in the sixties, the spy thriller Avakoum Zahov vs 07 by Bulgarian author, Andrei Gulyashki.

While spies first came to prominence as popular culture figures during World War One, it was the first Bond novel, Casino Royale, published in 1953, that really kick-started the modern fascination with spies. A host of well known authors as well as a legion of lesser know writers and pulp imitators, all followed in Bond’s wake.

These days it’s easy to view Bond as little more than a clotheshorse with a few snappy lines of dialogue and a lot of high-tech gadgets, facing off against the latest embodiment of the West’s global fears.

But in the fifties and sixties, Bond was a blunt weapon in dinner suit whose sole purpose was to smash the West’s enemies. He was also the epitome of sexual and social permissiveness, licensed to kill and swing. The casual sex, alcohol consumption, fine living and travel to exotic destinations were all potent symbols of the West’s economic and cultural affluence in the sixties.

Not only were the Soviet authorities aware of the global popularity of James Bond, they saw him as a major propaganda coup for the West.… Read more

Pulp Friday: the pulp of John D MacDonald

The Empty Trap popular Library 1957“He Sold His Soul For Another Man’s Wife.”

This weeks Pulp Friday is a selection of covers from the prolific US thriller writer, John D MacDonald.

MacDonald got his start writing for pulp magazines in the late forties, then rode the paperback boom that occurred in the fifties and early sixties. He was the author of over sixties books, as well as numerous short stories and articles.

He is probably best know for creating the fictional private investigator Travis McGee, who featured in 21 of McDonald’s books.

A number of his books have been adapted for film and television. His novel The Executioners was filmed as Cape Fear, starring Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum and Polly Bergen, in 1962, and again by Martin Scorsese in 1991. One of the McGee books, Darker Than Amber, was made into a film of the same name, starring Rod Taylor, in 1970.

The following selection of covers spans the late fifties to the early seventies and include many of the Fawcett Gold Medal editions of McDonald’s work, as well as the UK Pan paperback additions.

Enjoy.

April-Evil3 You Live Once Fawcett Gold medal 1957

Cape Fear Coronet Books 1960

Death Trap Pan 1958

The Only Girl in the Game Fawcett Gold Medal 1960

The Only Girl in the Game Pan Books 1960

One Monday We Killed then all Fawcett Gold medal 1961

On The Run Gold Medal Books 1963

The Drowner Fawcett Gold medal 1963

The Quick Red Fox Pan Books 1964

Dress Her in Indigo GM version Fawcett gold medal 1969

Darker than amber. Pan Books 1966jpeg

The Damned Fawcett Gold medal

The Neon Jungle FG medal 1988Read more

Pulp Friday: Wild Beat, a tribute to Australian pulp writer Carl Ruhen, 1937-2013

The Rebels

Most people think of pulp publishing as American. But for several decades in the second half of the last century, Australia had a significant pulp paperback industry that produced a large range of popular fiction.

By the mid-to-late sixties, Horwitz, Australia’s largest pulp publisher, was producing up to 16 titles a month with initial print runs of 20,000 copies. Black magic, hippies, juvenile delinquents, spies, bored suburban housewives looking for thrills, and evil Japanese and German prison guards – nothing was off limits. Local pulp publishers pounced on mainstream society’s fantasies, fears and obsessions and turned them into cheap, disposable paperback thrills.

Carl Ruhen was at the centre of this industry and continued to ply his trade as a writer until the late eighties. AustLit, the Australian Literature Resource database, credits him with 78 books. He also penned numerous short stories and magazine articles.

On November 28 last year, Carl Ruhen died after a long illness, aged 76.

I’ve long been aware of Ruhen’s work. Unfortunately, I never met him. I found out about his passing in late December when an acquaintance who’d been in sporadic contact with Ruhen emailed me with the news. The only mention I’ve been able to find of his death was a short notice in the Sydney Morning Herald, dated December 2, 2013.

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Pulp Friday: Key of Corruption

Keys of Corruption“She wanted her man to be sophisticated and successful – but there was a price to pay.”

Life is busy at the moment, but not so busy I don’t have time to post a little Pulp Friday offering for your enjoyment.

Key of Corruption was published by Horwitz Publications in 1963. Rene Crane was one of several pseudonyms for Rena Cross, a regular Horwitz author.

Cross featured in a previous Pulp Friday post as the author of Flat  4 Kings Cross. Flat 4 Kings Cross originally appeared in 1963 under the name Geoffrey Tolhurst, and was was republished twice by Horwitz.

Key of Corruption is of interest because it’s a local book that gives an Australian take on one of pulp’s favourite obsessions in the sixties – wife swapping.

Here’s what the back cover says about the story:

“The key of corruption is a dangerous game and the stakes are high. Meet the players…

Marilyn and Keith – unsophisticated young newlyweds, fresh from the country, anxious to get ahead and be accepted by the city;

Jo-Anne – Marilyn’s pretty teenage sister, brimming over with youthful enthusiasm, ready to dare anything for a thrill;

Grant – the too-experienced older man whose charm Marilyn accepted at face value;

Greda – fabulous, sophisticated, beautiful divorcee, leader of a fast set… who organised the game for kicks… “Read more

Pulp Friday: Night Squad by David Goodis

Night Squad“They gave him back his badge – and sent him down into the brutal throbbing heart of the slums.”

The first Pulp Friday for 2014 needs no introduction, Night Squad by the legendary US noir writer, David Goodis.

The cover above is from the first printed edition of the book, by Gold Medal Books in 1961.

I love the seamy noir atmosphere created by this cover. I also love the back cover blurb:

“The loneliest man on earth.

The Night Squad wanted Corey on its team, and the racket boys wanted him, too.

The trouble was that Corey wanted them both. But the cops had offered Corey only a badge, while Walter Grogan had bribed him with big money. Both sides were brutal, both knew as much about the slums as the rats infesting it. And Corey Bradford walked a tightrope between them, not knowing whether the man who smiled at him one day would be aiming a bullet at his head the next.”

Enjoy.

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