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THE THING'S INCREDIBLE! The Secret Origins of Weird Tales
by John Locke The Thing’s Incredible! is a sweeping revisionist history of the founding of Weird Tales, one of the most influential and entertaining pulp magazines of them all. Its first two years (1923-24) was a period of tumult and controversy unequaled in the pulps, before or since, an experience so painful to its creators that they immediately banished their memories to secrecy, their code of silence suppressing the story for almost a century. Here at last is the true saga, the unraveling of the many twisted threads which have bound the creation of Weird Tales in mystery. Who were Henneberger and Lansinger, the co-founders, and what circuitous chain of events brought about their doomed destiny? How did the first editor, the outspoken and uncontrollable Edwin Baird, become the wild man of the pulps? What dark secrets lay buried in second editor Farnsworth Wright’s haunted past that he never dared speak of? What was the significance of the constantly mutating “reorganization” that united two legends, world-famous magician Houdini and horror author H.P. Lovecraft, into a grand nexus of weird? How did Henneberger lose control of his slow-motion disaster of a magazine? And how did an all-out war behind the scenes lead to the long peace of the Wright years? This is the grand story of the challenges in establishing a radical, new magazine in the early 1920s—and not just any magazine, but the immortal Weird Tales. 310 pages . . . available at Amazon hardbound or softbound |
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PULP FICTIONEERS: ADVENTURES IN THE STORYTELLING BUSINESS
Edited by John Locke Published by Adventure House During the great Pulp Era, popular fiction magazines brightened America’s newsstands. To a great extent, the popular history of these magazines follows their subject matter: the rise and fall of the hero pulps, the Weird Menace pulps, the Spicys, the air mags, the oddball titles; the evolution of the detective, adventure, western, and romance genres. But there’s another, neglected, history of the pulps. Captured in this collection of vintage articles and ephemera—most never before reprinted—are behind-the-scenes stories of starving writers, crafty editors, and unscrupulous publishers—tales as dramatic as the stories they sold. Experience the world of the pulps through the eyes of the men and women who made them—the Pulp Fictioneers! This pioneering work includes pieces by H. Bedford-Jones, Pauline Bloom, Allan Bosworth, Arthur J. Burks, Hugh B. Cave, Allan K. Echols, George Allen England, Robert O. Erisman, Erle Stanley Gardner, William C. Gault, Hugo Gernsback, Walter Gibson, William Hopson, Henry Kuttner, Leo Margulies, Chuck Martin, Aron Mathieu, Carson Mowre, Joel Townsley Rogers, Joseph Shaw, Harry Steeger, Rogers Terrill, Tom Thursday, Robert Turner, Farnsworth Wright, and others. 240 pages, $20 . . . available at Amazon |
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PULPWOOD DAYS, Volume 1: EDITORS YOU WANT TO KNOW
Edited by John Locke Continuing the work launched by Pulp Fictioneers . . . Behind the flashy covers of the pulp magazines, below the famous names of the authors, toiled the hardworking, and usually anonymous, architects of the medium—the editors. Included in this collection from the writers’ magazines of the Pulp Era are their stories, articles by and about the editors, the lives they led, the difference they made. Ample biographical material accompanies the articles, illuminating dim, forgotten corners of pulp magazine history. Among the many editors covered: Frank E. Blackwell (Detective Story, Western Story), Ray Palmer (Amazing Stories, Fantastic Adventures), Robert A.W. Lowndes (Columbia Publications), Edwin Baird (Weird Tales, Detective Tales), Irma Kalish* (Romance Western), Freeman H. Hubbard (Railroad Stories), Harry Maule (Short Stories, West), Carson Mowre (Dell Publishing), Arthur E. Scott (Top-Notch), Daisy Bacon (Love Story), Harold Hersey, and Anthony Rud. 180 pages, $16 . . . Amazon * Irma Kalish was interviewed by Amy Poehler for Smart Girls (youtube). Irma's current endeavors are covered in this NPR report. |
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 What is the secret of the cover photo?
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PULPWOOD DAYS: Volume 2: LIVES OF THE PULP WRITERS
Edited by John Locke This unique collection mines the writers’ mags for those rare articles in which pulp writers looked back on their careers—how they broke in, their successes and failures, the glories and hardships of the pulp racket. These are hardboiled writing stories from the Pulp Era—when the greatest time in history to sell fiction—the 1920s—was suddenly followed by one of the worst—the ‘30s. Complementing the twenty pieces are all-new profiles of the subject authors. Who were they? What weren’t they telling us? What happened to them after the pulps died? We meet the writers and see how their lives were shaped by the times and the ever-shifting fortunes of the pulps. From all walks of life, they were as interesting as the characters they imagined—soldiers and sailors, a lumberjack, a daredevil aviator, a WWI ambulance driver, a beauty-contest emcee, a career criminal, and--why not?—a bandleader. Some of these names are remembered today; many are not. But they all left behind fascinating and enlightening glimpses into the great days when the pulps ruled the newsstands. Included are Eustace L. Adams, Ben Frank, Tom W. Blackburn, Arthur J. Burks, Edward Churchill, Tom Curry, Steve Fisher, Hapsburg Liebe, Chuck Martin, Harold Q. Masur, Walter Snow, Tom Thursday, Paul Triem, Jean Francis Webb, and others. Over 100,000 words of pulp history. 250 pages, $22 . . . Amazon |