THE QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE RETURNS…FROM MOONSTONE!!!
The Mix : What are people talking about today?
MOONSTONE CLIFFHANGER FICTION!!! THE CONCLUSION OF THE SPIDER: CITY OF THE MELTING DEAD!
 Moonstone Books and ALL PULP are proud to present the final chapter of MOONSTONE CLIFFHANGER FICTION!!!!
Let ALL PULP know what you think of MOONSTONE CLIFFHANGER FICTIONÂ on the Comments Page!!!
Want more Moonstone??? http://www.moonstonebooks.com/ !  And stay tuned at the end of this week’s chapter for a link to purchase the collection this story is featured in!
THIS WEEK ON MOONSTONE CLIFFHANGER FICTION-
CITY OF THE MELTING DEAD
A STORY OF THE SPIDER
BY MARTIN POWELL
featured in THE SPIDER: CHRONICLES
from Moonstone Books
PARTÂ FOUR
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âDickâ¦are you all right?â Nita lightly touched his arm, startled by the coiling sinews tensing beneath his coat.
Wentworth paled a moment, then gave her a quiet reassuring smile. âWeâve just become privy to an essential clue that the official police have missed,â his voice was pitched with excitement. âI knewâ¦or, rather, the Spider was very well acquainted with the late Bill Henry. The enemy has finally committed a fatal error.â
The Spider tightened his web around the throat of underworld. The darkened tenement hideouts were made blacker still by the invasion of his long, twisted shadow. None could escape him. No one could deny him. Small-time hoods and back alley predators literally wept in terror before the merciless onslaught of the Master of Men.
Nita, Jackson, and Ram Singh would remain vigilant, prepared for future catastrophes should Wentworth fail to return. This time the threat was different, far-reaching and devastating in its aimless goal of terror. He couldnât put them at risk. Not until the Spider gave his all, alone.
The trail itself had been elementary.
The deceased William Patrick Henry provided the light to show the way. Before falling upon such wicked days, âBourbon Billâ, was a first class crime reporter and an excellent covert contact to the underworld. The Spider had often gleaned invaluable information from the hard-drinking journalist that had ended the career of many a criminal mastermind.
Wentworth further knew that Bourbon Bill hadnât staggered more than ten blocks from his low-rent flophouse in over three years. Just a few weeks prior, the black-balled newsman had raised a stink over witnessing the kidnapping of the imminent scientist Doctor Emerick Berg. His former editors had merely laughed, assured of a pathetic ruse by the rummy to reclaim a byline.
It suddenly all made a kind of grotesque sense. The still-missing Dr. Bergâs area of expertise had been the advanced application of electromagnetism. Wentworth had read many of the scientistâs monographs, and they were brilliant.
Berg himself was once originally from the same neighborhood, which had since decayed into the bowery. Bourbon Bill, sober or not, could well have seen him there, perhaps heâd even observed his abduction. No one had seen Berg after that. Someone must be holding him, somewhere within those ten blocks, forcing the scientist into building some kind of terrible weapon. Berg might even be dead already, his temporary value fulfilled.
Lastly, there was something that even Commissioner Kirkpatrick had failed to notice. On that scrap of typing paper there had been a faint thumb print. Vague as it was, Wentworth immediately detected the faint scent of scorched skin coming from the paper. Once a man encountered the stench of burnt human flesh, as Wentworth had in many haunting circumstances, it was impossible to ever forget it.
If only someone had taken Henryâs claims about the scientist seriously, but just the week before heâd made a fuss over seeing sea serpents under the Brooklyn Bridge.
Even Wentworth hadnât listened, thenâ¦but now the Spider had no choice. One by one, using methods the official police force could not dare, the Spider got what he demanded. The petty thugs and gutter gangsters eagerly, sometimes literally, spilled their guts to the snarling masked man-monster. Finally, he learned of dim rumors of a reclusive megalomaniac called the Crucible, a fearsomely fitting name. Then, he got a location.
Justice was closing in.
The Spiderâs web was inescapable.
ã
The dwarf waited. It was all he could do.
Rain splashing on the high windows of the abandoned warehouse diffused the street lights, streaking shadows like a barred cage across the floor. It was a prison, all right. But, being the dwarf beside the giant, he had truly never known anything else.
A corroded window latch gave way, falling almost noiselessly to the filthy floor. The dwarf smiled faintly as the Spider masterfully infested the chamber, gliding wraithlike down a silken rope with a heavy automatic in the other hand. Had the dwarf not been expecting him, doubtlessly the entrance of the slouched black figure would have been virtually invisible among the shadows.
The dwarf shuddered as the Spiderâs piercing eyes regarded him with bitter hatred. Another gun had appeared in the other hand, thumbs cocked hammers, barrels unerringly aimed at the little man and at the still, silent monstrosity heaped beside him.
âThe Crucible is dead,â the little man breathed. âI murdered him two days ago.â
Wentworthâs quick eyes detected a blood-crusted claw hammer laying some distance from the victim and his confessed killer. He also observed the smashed remains of a weird cannon-like machine composed of coiling copper wires, shattered vacuum tubes, and fitted with a machinegun tripod.
âYou found us sooner than I expected,â the dwarf continued. âThe Spider deserves his formidable reputation.â
Awe saturated the diminutive voice, although, strangely, there was no hint of fear.
Wentworth advanced, his savage fangs gritted. âWho are you?â he furiously hissed.
The dwarf glanced sympathetically to the giant mass beside him. âJust two brothers, cruelly used by this world,â he sighed with a sob. âI did love him, you know, even through all his torment and torture. He was all I had.â
Wentworth took in the strange sight of the withered dwarf protectively clumped next to the grey festering corpse of the giant. At last, he saw everything clearly and his rage diminished.
The Crucible had been an ogre, indeed, with the arms of a gorilla and the chest of a buffalo. Most of the brutish skull had been smashed into pulp. The little man breathed with a shuddering effort. He, too, Wentworth observed, was dying. It was inevitable. The reek of decay hung heavy in the air.
â The whole scheme was hisâ¦the kidnappingâ¦the machine ⦠the murdersâ¦â the dwarf confessed, wracked with emotion. âMy brother had a cruel, peculiar genius for such things. He wasâ¦what the world had made of him.â
Guns slid soundlessly back into concealed holsters, and Wentworth knelt at the dwarf âs side.
âYet, you had the courage to stop him,â it was Wentworthâs soft voice, not the Spiderâs ugly rasp, which now issued from the fanged lips.
Tears streamed down the little manâs doll-like cheeks. âHe was going toâ¦aim that damnable machine at the whole skyline. I couldnât stand it anymore. Maybe I finally went mad, too. No oneâ¦will ever understand.â
Wentworth clasped the small trembling hand held out to him. The mottled greyish flesh felt more dead than alive.
âI think I do,â his tone was comforting.
The dwarf attempted a smile, though his weakness prevented it. Wentworth could hear the rattle in the little manâs lungs. He was fading fast.
âP-pleaseâ¦â the small, tormented eyes implored. ââ¦please donât let them find us like thisâ¦donâtâ¦donât let themâ¦â
Wentworth nodded, and the little man was gone.
Kerosene and a lighted match fulfilled the final wish of the Crucibleâs last victim. No one would stare at them. No one would gawk. No awful exhibition. No one would ever know.
Wentworth watched mournfully as the flames consumed the secrets of the giant and the dwarf. The brothers passed from the world as theyâd been born into it, togetherâ¦as Siamese twins fused at the spine, bound forever in their prison of flesh and blood.
Their life-long internal conflict was over. Wentworth envied them.
The Spider could never rest.
END OFÂ CITY OFÂ THE MELTING DEAD!
NEXT TIME ON MOONSTONE CLIFFHANGER FICTION-
MEET THE SEDUCTIVE, ELUSIVE DOMINO LADY
as written by Ron Fortier!!
To purchase THE SPIDER: CHRONICLES anthology containing this story and more, go to http://moonstonebooks.com/shop/item.aspx?itemid=414Â today!!
Review: ‘Superf*ckers’
[[[Superf*ckers]]]
By James Kochalka
Top Shelf Productions, 144 pages, $14.95
Reading the reviews about previous editions of James Kochalka’s Superf*ckers I was thinking this was going to be an amazing satire of the super-hero genre, poking fun at teams from the Justice Society of America to the Thunderbolts. Over the years, Kochalka had been doling out one issue at a time, starting with Superf*ckers #271 in 2005 and released a fourth issue in 2007. Top Shelf has collected the four issues with the previously unpublished [[[Jack Krak #1]]] in a new collection released earlier this year.
I don’t get the praise. Not at all. Kochalka’s robbery figurework is good for his childrens’ books and other independent works but when it comes to super-powered, hyper-sexualized characters, it feels entirely wrong.
Over the course of the collection, these spoiled, nasty would-be heroes act like whiny, horny, spiteful high school students. None seem to be using their powers for the public good, but instead, to outperform each other in the hopes of gaining acceptance in the club. They are a uniformly unlikeable bunch and the satirical elements are so broadly played they’re more slapstick than witty commentary on modern comic book tropes.
Kochalka cuts between combinations of heroes one-upping each other, excreting with abandon and he paces these various threads nicely enough. He crams each page with plenty of panels and action, brightly coloring everything in what must have been a painstaking manner.
Amazingly, at the outset, Kochalka thought this might be an all-ages title but as he got further into this, he couldn’t prevent his annoying heroes from cussing so it has remained a book aimed at older readers. “And it makes the action more dramatic,” he told Comic Book Resources. Not at all. The cursing and invective permeates every pages as do the acts that should never be attempted at home.
I remain baffled why anyone things this is a laugh-out loud must-read series. In the same interview he said, “On the surface it’s fun and breezy romp, but underneath it’s a layered satire of American society, the comic book scene, power and pathos and the human condition.” That might have been his intent but the execution fails to measure up.
ECHOES AWARD WINNERS AND THEIR AWARDS!
From Tom Johnson:
 |
| ECHOES Winner Ric Croxton |
The recent recipients of the Echoes Awards relax with their plaques and certificates in front of bookcases packed with many of their favorite books. Dr. Art Sippo and Ric Croxton look forward to interview future guests on The Bookcave, so writers and publishers get those books to them for commentary during the Podcasts.
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| ECHOES Winner Art Sippo |
Fortier Reviews DRACULA LIVES!
ALL PULP REVIEWS
By Ron Fortier
DRACULA LIVES
By Joshua Reynolds
Pulp Work Press
171 pages
ISBN: 1452817456
EAN -13 9781452817453
Jonas Cream is a former British spy who now works for himself, selling his deadly services the highest bidder. When an old colleague named Harry Lime offers him a lucrative job of collecting a wooden box from a Rumanian auction house, Cream, although weary, accepts the assignment. Shortly thereafter he is approached by the Psychic Branch of the British Secret Service. They want Cream to act as a double agent, carrying out his mission for Lime while actually obtaining the box for them instead. Then he is attacked by a group of foreign assassins known as the Order of the Dragon. They make it quite clear they do not want him to succeed, let alone continue breathing.
The first half of Joshua Reynolds’ fast paced thriller reads very much like any modern day spy versus spy novel with all the traditional elements of a Robert Ludlum and John LeCarre espionage mystery. Then it gradually begins to morph into a horror tale as Cream learns exactly what it is all these different factions are after. The box contains the skull of Vlad the Impaler, better known as Dracula. Now Cream finds himself caught in the middle of a deadly tug-of-war between those who want to see the skull destroyed and those who believe, through black magic, the Lord of the Vampires can be brought back to unholy life.
Reynolds keeps the action moving at hyper-speed and clearly has fun toying with his all too familiar cast of characters. It takes a great deal of panache to swipe a character from a classic movie. For the uninitiated, actor Orson Wells portrayed American spy Harry Lime in the film THE THIRD MAN. Which is why he is portrayed on the book’s cover, a really wonderful painting by M.D. Jackson. Other players in this book are also named for well known literary spies while others like Ms. Harker are taken from the original DRACULA novel by Bram Stoker.
The only weak part of this thoroughly enjoyable book is the fact that it is but the first in a series and the conclusion doesn’t end the story. In fact one could look at the entire novel as only the first chapter in the larger saga Reynolds has planned for the blood-sucking Count. Readers not fond of continued series would do well to avoid this book. As for the rest of us willing to invest our time in an original, gripping horror adventure, I say bravo Mr.Reynolds and where’s book number two?
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT
(written by special guest tipper, Alex Hancock for ALL PULP’S TAKE YOUR KID TO WORK DAY)
MURDER AT MIDNIGHT
By Avi
2009, Scholastic Press
(written by special guest tipper, Alex Hancock for ALL PULP’S TAKE YOUR KID TO WORK DAY)
MURDER AT MIDNIGHT
By Avi
2009, Scholastic Press
This book, Murder At Midnight, is not a murder mystery at the beginning. It happens in the town of Pergamontio, Italy way before electricity and other technology. Except for the really old type of printing press. Magic was not allowed and the king thought things like the printing press were magical devices.
The main character is Fabrizio, the servant to Mangus, a magician who does illusions, not real magic, like stage tricks we would see today. Mangus is accused of magically copying a paper about treason against the King. He was accused because all the treason papers spread around the city looked exactly the same down to the loop and line. Because he’s the only stage magician in town, the king accuses him of using magic and being hired by someone to copy the treason papers.
Governor Delvino, an official in the city, said that Fabrizio and Mangus had to collect all the papers, find out who planned the treason, and stop practicing magic or leave the city. Sent out by Mangus to collect the papers, Fabrizio ends up getting captured by Delvino’s soldiers with the papers on him. They thought he was posting them. Fabrizio is then sent to the executioner, but he tricked the executioner into freeing him. He escapes and meets up with Maria, the daughter of the people who own the printing press.
Together, they work to find out who is plotting treason, end up having to solve a murder, and have to race to the last minute to save Mangus from a trial that could get him executed.
This book was good. Fabrizio was a good hero because he was smart and clever. The mystery was good, but I had it figured out about three quarters through the book. This book was also full of villains and it was interesting to figure out who was good and who was bad. Although the big mystery was who the plotters against the King were, there were little mysteries all through the book. I really really liked this book, but there weren’t enough action scenes in it for me.
Borrowing his dad’s hat, Alex gives MURDER AT MIDNIGHT-
4 out of 5 Tips of the Hat-It was really good, but more action would have been better
Review: ‘Sondheim! A Birthday Celebration’
You are no doubt wondering why ComicMix is reviewing [[[Sondheim! The Birthday Celebration]]], the DVD edition of the 80th birthday celebration that aired this past week on PBS. Believe it or not, we believe in covering significant events in popular culture, not just the fads and the celebrities, but people who have made contributions that have proved influential to today’s creators. Stephen Sondheim, for over fifty years, has been elevating the musical theater art form, and his music and lyrics have found their way into books, film, and yes, comic books.
Musical theater in America came into its own in 1927 with [[[Showboat]]], co-written by Jerome Kern with book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. Its next evolutionary step came with [[[Oklahoma]]] in 1943, from Hammerstein and Richard Rogers. Living down the hall from the lyricist was a young boy named Stephen Sondheim. Their relationship helped Sondheim develop his ear for music and lyrics, letting him burst into the public’s ear with his lyrics to [[[West Side Story]]], the musical that propelled theater to a new era. His influence remains strong today.
What sets Sondheim apart from other playwrights and lyricists is the intelligence of his words. He expresses mood, feeling, emotion and character with a sophisticated use of language that has helped elevate the art form. More than that, he rarely repeats himself so the shows he has created on his own sound nothing like one another. He dares to explore subjects dark ([[[Sweeny Todd, Assassins]]]) and the more whimsical ([[[The Frogs]]]).
Given the lengthy number of shows he’s been involved with and multiply that by the number of memorable songs he has crafted, him impact is immense. To celebrate the occasion this year, he has annotated his works in the recently released[[[ Finishing the Hat]]]: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) With Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes. The world has honored him with numerous performances including two special nights at Lincoln Center in March which was recorded and formed the special we’re talking about.
Performing his works are stars young and old, familiar and unknown, but
all singing with affection (and some amazing diction). These include
Michael Cerveris, Joanna Gleason, Nathan Gunn, George Hearn, Patti
LuPone, Marin Mazzie, Audra McDonald, John McMartin, Donna Murphy, Mandy
Patinkin, Bernadette Peters, Elaine Stritch and Chip Zien. Paul
Gemignani, Sondheim’s longtime colleague, was conducting the New York
Philharmonic and the evening was hosted with wit by David Hyde Pierce.
There were some nice running gags that kept things light and you could
tell the performers were thrilled to be there.
It’s ‘TAKE YOUR KID TO WORK DAY’ on ALL PULP!!!
A special feature today on ALL PULP!!!! Today, reviews and other articles will be posted on ALL PULP throughout the day that are either written by, co-written by, or inspired by the juvenile offspring of the Spectacled Seven!!! That’s right, kids are running up and down the halls of the ALL PULP sanctum, offering their opinions on tales told full of pulpy goodness! You think kids don’t know pulp? Well, after today, ALL PULP thinks you’ll learn that kids have much more exposure to this field we love than we think they do!
To kick it off, here’s my review (stepping outside my book reviews for this one, folks) of WIZARD OF OZ, co written in interview style with my five year old angel, Kailee….Enjoy!
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT
(with special guest tipper, Kailee Hancock)
THE WIZARD OF OZ
Directed by Victor Fleming
MGM, 1939
Pulp is an interesting genre. There are stories that fall definitely in the realm that anyone would call pulp. Then there are those that have hints of pulp in them, an aspect of the genre sorta slipped in for good measure, but don’t really meet the bar most fans set. Then there’s that third interesting creature, the tales that are pulpy from beginning to end, rifled with larger than life heroes, major action, and vile villains, but that somehow, largely due in part I think to when they originated and/or how they’re pigeonholed, don’t get seen as pulp.
With this being ‘Bring Your Kid to Work’ Day on ALL PULP, I thought I’d tackle one of these elusive Pulp chameleons, a wonderful cinematic action adventure tale that has masqueraded as family friendly kids fare for over seventy years. And to help represent that kid contingent, my five year old angel, Kailee, is my expert of reference on this movie gem. So through a series of questions and answers (with commentary by me afterward), I now present the review inspired and ‘written’ by Kailee Hancock of ‘The Wizard of Oz!’
AP- “Kailee, who’s the good guy, the main hero, in Wizard of Oz?”
KH- “Dorothy”
(Clearly little Ms. Gale is the central character and the hero of this movie. She doesn’t throw punches, only melodies, and carries no gat, just all the emotional encouragement you could stand. But she is the protagonist thrown into a situation that would cripple most normal people, I mean come on, her house falls ON a witch and that’s just the beginning! And she has an unimaginable quest to undertake in a land that before Baum brought it into reality was beyond most imaginations. So, Dorothy clearly qualifies as the hero of this tale.)
AP-”Kailee, does Dorothy have a sidekick or work with a team?”
KH- “Yup. Toto is her sidekick and Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly lion help her a lot.”
(Not only does this grand epic have a hero, but she has an assistant, a sidekick, a constant companion. And Toto is not just window dressing. Actually in the movie, Toto is sort of the impetus of the whole thing with his ongoing battle with Elmira Gulch kicking off the action. He also comes to Dorothy’s rescue by escaping the witch’s castle and going for help (He is even more active in the Baum books). And who does he go to for help. Why, Dorothy’s intrepid team of experts in their fields. Well, maybe not, but they are each representative of certain types of people and, even with their own weaknesses, show through as clear examples of what they are seeking-Intelligence, Emotion, and Courage. Clearly the Scarecrow, Tin Man, The Lion, and yes, even Toto qualify as a team as much as most other pulp combinations would!)
AP- “Kailee, who is the bad guy in ‘Wizard of Oz’ and why is she bad?”
KH -”The Witch and she’s bad because she wants the ruby slippers and her sister was killed by Dorothy’s house.”
(There are very few villains in literature and especially in movies that out villain the Wicked Witch of the West. She is green, ugly, and on many levels malevolently evil. She also, however, qualifies as a pulp villain on a couple of other levels. Her goal is Oz domination, to be all powerful in the land, and to that end she pursues the ruby slippers that Dorothy now has. Also, she is out for vengeance for an imagined wrong committed against her. Well, the house landing on her sister wasn’t imagined, but the fact that Dorothy somehow did it intentionally was. So we have a wild looking, evil villainess who seeks to seize control of her world and feels like she’s entitled because of something she thinks the heroine did to her. Yep, sounds like pulp to me.)
AP -”Dorothy is trying to do what in the movie? What is she trying to find? And once she finds it, what does she have to do?”
KH- “She wants to go home. The Wizard. He makes her go get the Witch’s broomstick.”
(Not only does Dorothy have her own personal quest, to get home, but she has to undertake a different one, to find the Wizard, to meet her own need. Along the way she picks up friends, enemies, and when she finally does locate the Great and Powerful Oz, the talking head gives her yet another, even more death defying mission to complete. I don’t think most pulp heroes have to complete THREE missions in their stories. Whew, give that girl a fedora.)
AP- “Are there weird creatures or monsters in ‘The Wizard of Oz’?”
KH- “Oh yeah! Munchkins, flying monkeys work for the Witch, trees in the woods whack at them. And then there’s a horse in the city that changes colors!”
(Fantastical beings, monsters hell-bent on the destruction of the heroine and serving the villainess blindly, and a tiny civilization living under the threat of a great evil….need I say more?)
AP- “Who wins in “The Wizard of Oz”? How does the good guy beat the bad guy?”
KH- “Dorothy! She melts the Witch with water!”
(Not only does the hero win, but the viewer is given a great climactic final confrontation scene where the villain is not simply beaten, but MELTED out of existence! And the hero doesn’t bring this end about intentionally, but out of a sense of trying to help the Witch, to save her life. Yeah, clearly defined good guy and obvious bad guy. To the end.)
Now, remember, this review is on the movie. We haven’t even addressed the multiple books Baum wrote in the ‘Oz’ series and the fact that although they didn’t appear in pulp magazines, they did appear as newspaper serials initially, sort of the precursor of pulp fiction.
So, you make the call. As for me and Kailee, “The Wizard of Oz” isn’t JUST a good kid and family movie.
It’s also one great pulp romp!
RATING-
As determined by Kailee, Five Tips of the Princess’ tiara-The best of the best for a five year old. Her dad has to agree.
Nicholas Cage Teaches ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’
Nicholas Cage is an incredibly gifted actor who continues to display his passion for genre works by appearing countless adventure films. This past summer he was the mentor in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and is next seen in January’s Season of the Witch. In this interview, courtesy of Walt Disney Home Entertainment, Cage talks about last summer’s film, coming out on DVD Tuesday.
Question: How did you get involved with The Sorcerer’s Apprentice? Nicholas Cage: The Sorcerer’s Apprentice began with my desire to play a magician in a movie. I played a magician of sorts in a movie called Next, which is when I became fascinated with ancient mythologies and philosophies from England. I loved the subject, so I had a conversation with Todd Garner – the producer of Next – and I said to him, “Boy, I’d really like to play a sorcerer from the times of King Arthur.” The very next day he said to me, “Nic, I’ve got it. Why don’t we create a movie around the sorcerer’s apprentice from the Fantasia movie?” It was perfect.
Question: How important was it to transform your look for your role in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice?
Nicholas Cage: Actors often change their looks for roles and I’m certainly part of that school of thought. In fact, I want to transform myself every time I get a new role. I’ll wear wigs, I’ll wear nosepieces, I’ll wear green contact lenses… I’ll do whatever I need to do to create a character. That’s what acting’s all about. That’s the fun of it.
HANCOCK REVIEWS MYSTERY MEN (AND WOMEN)!!!
TIPPIN’ HANCOCK’S HAT-Reviews by Tommy Hancock
MYSTERY MEN (& Women)
by Barry B. C Bell, Aaron Smith, David Boop, Barry Reese
Cover by Ingrid Hardy, Interior Art by Rob Davi
Published by Airship 27 Productions/Cornerstone Book Publishers
One thing that most fans, especially those of us who become writers, of Pulp fiction have in common is the deep desire to have created a character back in the hey day of pulps. Masked figures haunting criminal ridden streets saving cringing citizens from thievery..or worse, we all have an idea for our own. Although none of us will ever get the chance to go back in time and write in the era, the current resurgence in Pulp gives us the chance at the next best thing. Fortunately Airship 27 and Cornerstone have snatched up the chance to bring in talented modern writers to create new heroes set in that Golden Age of fiction.
MYSTERY MEN (& WOMEN) is an anthology of original works by four different authors. Each story highlights an original character created by each writer who fights crime and villainy in the 1930s. The stories are as follows-
THE BADGE OF THE BUTCHER by B. C. Bell is a fantastic follow up to TALES OF THE BAGMAN, a collection published earlier this year by Airship/Cornerstone. This adventure of ‘Mac’ McCullough, mobster turned masked hero, has all the pieces a pulp yarn needs, including a conflicted good guy, conflict with bad guys, interesting supporting characters, and a plot that grabs you from the first word and doesn’t let up on its choke hold until THE END. The Bagman has done a lot to end the hold of the mob on his neighborhood, but new forces have moved in to fill the void and it turns out they may just be members of Chicago’s finest. Bell weaves a tale of a man
driven to desperate measures to insure justice in his corner of the world and he weaves it as tightly as any writer I’ve ever seen.
5 out of 5 tips of Hancock’s Hat for this one indeed.
HELL HATH NO FURY by Aaron Smith has police connections as well in this introduction of his heroine, The Red Veil. A tough young policeman’s widow relies on her tough, self taught street skills and survival techniques to discover who killed her husband. She fights her way to the truth in a costume of her own making and from behind a red veil. The Red Veil is a character I definitely hope to
see again, a woman who balances emotion and violence well in her pursuit of justice. Having said that, this debut story could use wit ha little mroe consistency. The first half shows our heroine as having built herself a new image, then falling back on her upbringing in an almost transformative way. This I thought was a good hook a different way of a character tapping who she needs to be. The problem is Smith doesn’t use this wonderful metamorphosis technique again. Regardless, the Red Veil is an avenger of the downtrodden that IO hope to see for several stories to come.
3 out of 5 tips of Hancock’s Hat, definite potential for this one.
FIRST DOWN by David Boop is almost as much horror story as it is pulp tale. A football quarterback is propositioned by local mobsters to throw a game and, when he refuses, he is tortured and transformed into a hulking, seemiongly emotionless beast. This take on the pulp hero archetype is weird and off kilter with definite gothic overtones. Boop’s description of his protagonist is terrible and his internal struggle is agonizing. Equally so, the bad guys are deserving of hte pounding that they get. This story is full of unexpecteds, but still manages to be true to the pulp formula.
4 out of 5 Tips of Hancock’s Hat, reserved for a special few.
THE SACRED AND THE PROFANE by Barry Reese exposes readers to the myeterious, enigmatic Dusk. This femme carries fatale to a whole new level due to the unexplained horrific effects of evil men looking upon her uncovered face. Reese utilizes an old trope of cop tales, having a policeman and his secretary, both attractive and intelligent get involved in the hunt for a religious relic. The back and forth of the relationship is a real thrill in this story and makes for a good balance to the pulsing action and final retribution when Dusk is on the scene. The story builds and builds and ends exactly as it should, with an explosive twist that made me want more.
5 out of 5 Tips of Hancock’s Hat, awesome stuff.
Interior illustrations on this book are top notch. Davis delivers in each and every story, some of the best work I’ve seen of his, both in art and how it adds to the impact of the tale. Ingrid Hardy also delivers a cover that is well done technique wise. A major issue I had with the cover, however, had nothing to do with Hardy’s work, but more with the subject. Boop’s Gridiron is on the front, a damsel in distress behind him. Instead of looking like the monstrous hero that I read within the story, this portrayal is almost comical and if not that, it is distracting in a ‘Just what is this’ way, not a ‘Oh, this is something i want to know more about’ way. The cover would work for me if Gridiron had a little more of the Quasimodo feel portrayed in the story than the hooded Joker the cover hints at.
3 out of 5 Tips of Hancock’s Hat, it’s a good looking book overall.
Overall rating for MYSTERY MEN (& WOMEN)
4 out 5 Tips of Hancock’s Hat-Definitely a wonderful homage to the pulps of yesteryear by the writers and artists of today.
