Category Archives: Pulp Friday

Pulp Friday: Trouble Is My Name by Stephen Marlowe

Posted on November 18, 2011 by Andrew Nette| Leave a comment

“Instead of bourbon in the file I keep the savage ghost of murder.”

As front cover blurbs go, that’s a pretty good one.

Today’s Pulp Friday offering is Trouble is My Name by Stephen Marlowe, published by Five Star Paperbacks.

There’s no publication date on this book.

Through the wonder of the Internet, I discovered that Five Star Paperbacks was the pulp in-print of Mayflower paperbacks.

It did produced a range of crime, horror, Gothic romance and science fiction books in the late sixties and early seventies. I found a nice little selection of some of their titles at an interesting site called Vault of Evil, if you want to check them out

Five Star Paperbacks also licensed a number of hardboiled mysteries and thrillers from the famous US pulp publisher, Gold Medal Books, including Trouble is My Name.

Marlowe was a US crime writer, best known for creating Chester Drum in 1955. He wrote science fiction and crime under at least five pseudonyms that I have been able to find.

Trouble is My Name featured Drum and was originally published in 1957.

I’d be curious to know whether the back cover blurb on the original was as salacious as that on the Five Star Paperback version:

“My Code?… Read more

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Posted in Crime fiction, Pulp Friday, Pulp paperback cover art, Vintage pulp paperback covers

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Pulp Friday: The Brat by Gil Brewer

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Andrew Nette| 1 Comment

This week’s Pulp Friday offering is for all the hardcore noir fans out there, Gil Brewer’s The Brat.

Brewer really is the aspiring pulp writer’s pulp writer. The author of dozens of sleazy sex/crime/psychological thrillers, he began his career writing for Gold Medal Books in the early fifties, also wrote under the Ellery Queen by-line, as well as using the pseudonyms Eric Fitzgerald, Bailey Morgan and Elaine Evans.

He kept up a punishing work schedule, once writing a book in three days. Between books he churned out hundreds of short stories for mystery and pulp magazines.

He died in 1983, after years of alcoholism, mental health problems and financial stress. Like most of the most accomplished pulp novelists, he only gained critical attention well after his death.

There’s a great site about Brewer, done by his estate, which includes full listings of his work, bio details and some great photographs. It’s called Gil Brewer, Noir Fiction Writer.

The Brat was first published in 1957. The edition above is 1958 and appears to be an overseas in-print judging from the currency denomination on the top right of the cover.

The Brat features femme fatale Evis Helling. The narrator, Lee Sullivan, is in for one hell of a surprise when marries Evis.… Read more

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Posted in Crime fiction, Fawcett Gold Medal Books, Gil Brewer, Pulp Friday, Pulp paperback cover art, Vintage pulp paperback covers

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Pulp Friday: Triple Shot of Carter Brown

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Andrew Nette| 2 Comments

“A cold corpse becomes a hot assignment to curvy blonde, Mavis Seidlitz.”  

Today’s Pulp Friday is a triple shot of covers from one of my late father’s favourite pulp authors, Carter Brown.

Carter Brown AKA Alan Geoffrey Yates was a Australian-British author who wrote a massive 317 novels in a career that spanned from 1958-1985. Tens of millions of these were sold all over the anglo world.

Most of his stories were crime, although at the beginning of his career he also wrote horror and Westerns under the alias Tex Conrad. His books were published in Australia by Horwitz and in the US by Signet.

Cops and private investigators were his staple characters, the stories a mixture of sex and action, leavened with a bit of tough guy humour. The writing’s not brilliant, but, hey, that’s no surprise given how fast he churned books out.

His first Horwitz contract stipulated two novellas and one full length novel a month. He could write as much as 40,000 words overnight, reputedly with the assistance of Dexedrine which he used to stay awake for periods of up to 48 hours.

As was common practice on the part of Australian pulp writers in the fifties and sixties, all of his books were set in the United States.… Read more

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Posted in Australian crime fiction, Australian pulp fiction, Carter Brown, Horwitz Publications, Pulp Friday, Pulp paperback cover art, Vintage pulp paperback covers

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Pulp Friday: Playback by Raymond Chandler

Posted on October 12, 2011 by Andrew Nette| 1 Comment

This week’s Pulp Friday offering needs no introduction, Raymond Chandler’s Playback.

Playback was Chandler’s last book, published in 1958, a year before his death, and based on a screenplay he had written several years earlier. It features his iconic creation Philip Marlowe.

This is an Australian version of the book, published locally by Horwitz Publications in 1961.

Based in Sydney but with offices in Melbourne, Horwitz Publications was established in 1921. It started out doing trade publications and sporting magazines, but by the fifties had branched into popular and pulp fiction, including mystery, thrillers, romance and westerns.

The company published locally sourced stories, as well as Australians editions of overseas works. Well know authors included Carter Brown, Marshall Grover and Marc Brody. Some of its best known names were pseudonyms used by multiple writers.

Horwitz ceased producing fiction in the late nineties.

Although Playback is considered the weakest of Chandler’s seven novels, I’m sure you’ll agree with me the cover is a beauty.

The blurb on the back is also a vintage hard boiled prose.

“The Redhead didn’t look like a tramp, not did she look like a crook.

But when hard-boiled Philip Marlowe was paid to tail her he got plenty besides information.” … Read more

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Posted in Australian pulp fiction, Horwitz Publications, Noir fiction, Pulp Friday, Raymond Chandler, Vintage pulp paperback covers

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Pulp Friday: Open House

Posted on October 7, 2011 by Andrew Nette| 4 Comments

“To protect her young daughter she would have to expose the truth of her own affair with their virile young boarder.”

Sounds complicated.

This Friday’s pulp offering is Open House by Joan Ellis. It was published by Star Books, Crow’s Nest Sydney, and printed by Griffin Press in South Australia. There’s no publication date.

To the best of my knowledge, Star Books was a local outfit that did Australian mass market print runs of overseas pulp authors. It was active in the late sixties and early seventies. One day I’m actually going to have to spend a bit of time and track down the details of some of these local pulp publishing houses, as I’d love to know more about them.

Through the wonder of the Internet I discovered Ellis certainly was a prolific author, mainly erotic pulps and campus exploitation tales very popular in the US in the early sixties. So prolific, in fact, I suspect it was name used by several authors to ghost under.

I’m not sure whether Joan did her own titling. If so, she certainly had an talent for creative sleaze. Some of the titles I was able to track down, included Campus Pet (“With her one-track mind and breath taking body, she was bound to be a hit on campus”), Campus Jungle (She wondered if he’d still want her once he found out about the things she’d done at a not-so-private campus party”), High School Hellions, Faculty Wife and Cool Co-Eds (“They came in search of knowledge, the kind not found in text books…”), and Third Street (The place where questions were asked, the street where few men were ever seen”).… Read more

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Posted in Australian pulp fiction, Pulp Friday, Vintage pulp paperback covers

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