Tagged: DC

INTERVIEW WITH ALL PULP’S TOMMY HANCOCK!!!

  • News
  • October 15, 2010
TOMMY HANCOCK – Pulp writer/editor/Con Organizer/Stage Actor/Director

AP: Thanks for agreeing to take the Hot Seat, Tommy. First up, please, give us a little background as to your age, education and where you hang your hat these days.

TH: I guess it’s only fair that I take my turn, but man, I do like it better where you’re sitting. Well, I’m 38, I have a Masters’ in History with a certification in Secondary Education, but most of my work experience has been in the area of mental health, juvenile law, and marketing. As for where I hang my often tipped fedora, it has its own nail in my home in Melbourne, Arkansas (smaller than a small town) where I live with my three children, Braeden, my miracle, Alex, my gift, and Kailee, my angel, and their mother who there isn’t enough purple prose to describe how wonderful she is, Lisa.

AP:  Before jumping into Pulps, were you a comic book fan and if so, how much? Were you a big collector and con-attendee?

TH: Con attendee, no. I have hit a handful that were close to where I lived, the farthest away being Dallas. And I was a major comic book fan, focusing almost exclusively growing up on DC Comics, but not really the mainstream stuff. I’ve always had an interest in the Golden Age characters as well as obscure characters. Superman, Batman, etc. are great, but give me The Red Bee, Johnny Quick, and Brother Power, the Geek anytime. But your question was about me being a comic fan before jumping into Pulps…actually it was sort of the other way around.

AP: So how did you discover Pulps? And what was it about Pulps that made you want to get involved with the genre?

TH: The first two books I remember seeing areThe Bible and a Doc Savage paperback. I’m sure it was one of the Bantams, but I have no idea which one. I just remember the image on the front of this large bronze skinned man face forward, looking right at me. Comics came some time after that, but before them came the random Doc Savage novel, my tripping across a reference to The Shadow and other hints of Pulp, while also becoming completely enamored with black and white movies, old serials, and especially old time radio. I guess it’s no wonder that when I did get into comics, I was drawn to the obscure and the old.

What drew me into the Pulps is easy to answer. I grew up steeped in John Wayne, Sherlock Holmes, Steve McGarrett, Wyatt Earp, Hercules, Rick Blaine, Paul Bunyan, Han Solo, and Robert B. Parker’s Spenser among others. The story/myth/legend of the Hero has always been a part of my life and exploring that, adding to that, weaving my own tales of Heroic fiction…that’s one of only a few things I always knew I would do.
　
AP: What was your first real entry into the world of Pulps?

TH: As a fan, that first book. As a writer, it’s actually been fairly recent. I am a partner in a company, Pro Se Productions (www.proseproductions.com). My partner, Fuller Bumpers (Writer/artist/actor) came to me with an idea to get into production of some sort, originally video and audio. We worked on audio as well as developing some stage stuff, but I brought the focus of print work with me. It turned out after our first set of audio productions (all three of which are available for free on our site) that print in a lot of ways would be easier, more profitable, and better overall. That was more the editing side initially, although I do write.

My first published work was in an Airship 27 anthology, THE MASKED RIDER: TALES OF THE WILD WEST. I wrote a story focusing on my favorite Earp brother, Virgil. Fortunately, it was well received enough that not only am I writing another Virgil story for Airship 27, but the state paper did a story on my first published work as well as Pulp in general.

AP: Tell us more about Pro Se Productions. Where did the idea come from and was it realized exactly as you had imagined or did you have to adjust certain concepts to make it real?

TH: Well, Pro Se Productions is a company that Fuller, my partner, started after he returned to Arkansas from spending a few years as an actor and writer in LA. He brought me on board a year and a half year ago. Pro Se is a print (for now) production company focused on the publishing of monthly Pulp. The idea to go into print was largely mine in one respect, but also came out of Pro Se wanting to throw its net as wide as it could initially and then narrow the concept appropriately. That narrowing happened fairly quickly and our focus for the foreseeable future is Pulp related, print and conventions primarily.

As far as adjusting concepts, you bet. As I said before, we started out producing audio and for a variety of reasons changed that direction to print. Our original plan was to produce three monthly magazines and although we had the material for it, time was a major factor as were the general issues with putting together one print project, much less three. We are extremely lucky in that we have a formatter, Ali, a good longtime friend and supporter of mine and an absolute genius at putting our books together. His work is art all by itself. Still, three issues a month is a load, so after we got the original debut issues of each title out, we readjusted our plan.

AP: How many different titles is Pro Se doing and what’s the schedule?

TH: OK, well, let’s start at the beginning. We debuted three number one issues two months ago. After those, we determined we would be better off putting out one magazine a month, so we created one title with three rotating ‘subtitles. Pro Se Productions puts out PRO SE PRESENTS monthly, around the middle of the month give or take. The three subtitles (PECULIAR ADVENTURES, MASKED GUN MYSTERY, AND FANTASY AND FEAR) rotate under that banner, retaining their original numbering. PRO SE PRESENTS PECULIAR ADVENTURES 2 came out in September. PRO SE PRESENTS FANTASY AND FEAR 2 will be out early next week. PRO SE PRESENTS MASKED GUN MYSTERY 2 will be out in November, then the rotation starts again.
Also, starting next year, Pro Se will be producing collections, anthologies, original books, and comics.

AP: I alluded to your Theater experience. Before getting into the other Pulp stuff, how about some info about your work in community theater. Are you solely a producer, or do you direct and act as well?

TH: It’s funny being called a producer at all because I’ve never really seen myself as such, but I guess I am. I organized, started, and ended a community theater in my area in the past three years. We are still an acting troupe of sorts, held together in case Pro Se ever steps back toward the stage arena. I am also the Drama Director for our church drama ministry, ACTS OF FAITH. I direct, act, write, stage manage, costume design, pretty much I do it all as is the wont when you are in community theater. Now, if you are asking how well I do it all, I’m definitely the wrong guy to answer that.

AP: Okay, now for the real big topic. Where in the hell did you get the idea to launch a full blown weekend Pulp Convention? And did your friends and family think you were crazy when you first suggested it?

TH: They thought I was crazy before then for writing, jumping into a production company, starting my own theater, and all the other wild things I’ve somehow been associated with in my lifetime. As for where the idea came from, part of it has to do with that just being who I am. Anything I become involved in, I’m always looking at how to do it more, what the next level is, and how I can get there. A bigger contributor, though, to the genesis of Pulp Ark has to do with the local interest and support. Once the article about my first publication came out, people, both individuals and groups, came to me and congratulated me. Some suggested getting these ‘Pulp writers’ together and doing readings and such, then some others took that a step farther and suggested some writers workshops and the like. Well, all that stirring of ideas mixed together in my head and came out as Pulp Ark.

And let’s clarify, Pulp Ark is not simply a convention. It is that, most definitely, but it is also designed to be a conference for writers and artists of Pulp fiction. Even if a single fan does not walk through the door (God forbid), the action is so designed that this will be an opportunity for us as a community to learn, grow, and work together to improve the craft we call Pulp.

AP: Do you have a ballpark tally of just how many Pulp creators are going to be attending the first ever Pulp Ark? What kind of con events will be happening at this show?

TH: The show is May 13-15, 2011 in Batesville, AR, about 90 miles straight north of Little Rock, three hours from Memphis, five hours from St. Louis, six hours from Dallas. Right now, looking at the guest list that I know is confirmed, we have over 20 creators that will be present. I have sort of an informal goal of having 50 different creators minimum at this thing and I really think we can get to that. In hopes of doing that, we are offering free tables to Pulp writers, artists, and publishers. Vendors we are charging, but its a very small fee. And let me say, although we don’t have any vendors yet per se, this is an extremely vendor friendly conference/convention.

As for events, well, there’s quite a few and news will be forthcoming on even more…but there will of course be panels of all types from Pulp writers and artists. There will be writers’ and artists’ workshops as well because I don’t care how long you’ve done this, something can be learned by all of us all of the time. There will be evening events as well. And since this is being done on Main Street Batesville, there are events being planned for family members of attendees as well as for guests and vendors up and down the street.

Also, there will be an interactive drama that will take place the entire weekend. It utilizes my troupe of actors and it is a live action Pulp adventure that will take place without warning throughout Pulp Ark. Other things in the works include a gallery showing of Pulp Art as well as an art auction, and the First Annual Pulp Ark Awards will be presented. And yes, there will be more information on all of this hitting the newsstand in the coming days.

AP: You have a reputation for being the hardest working creator in Pulps today.
After everything else you were doing, what was the inspiration behind starting All Pulp and what do you see as its primary mission?

TH: The idea for All Pulp has been with me for a long time. Having been a comic fan, I’ve frequented the website Comic Book Resources quite a bit and have thought for at least two or three years that Pulp needed a site to do for it what CBR does for comics. Now, don’t get me wrong. The definitive site for listing what is available for purchase in the Pulp field has existed for a long time and Bill Thom’s Coming Attractions is still a weekly stop for me and always will be. What All Pulp is designed to be is the step beyond Coming Attractions. All Pulp is the news venue for Pulp, the behind the scenes peek at the creators, the history, all of it, and delivered in a variety of styles. Its mission is pretty evident in its name and in the content the Spectacled Seven, that’s the crew, myself included, behind All Pulp, have been putting on the site. To deliver all the news and more that can be called Pulp.

AP: There’s been a little internet flak concerning the team you recruited for All Pulp.
Would you like to explain your reasoning for choosing this particular group?
This is simple, really. The six people who make up the Spectacled Seven with me were, at the time that All Pulp became a reality the six people I talked to within the Pulp genre more than anyone else. When I decided to do All Pulp, it was because discussions with these six people, all individually, never as a group initially, often went toward discussing the need for a one stop shop for news and such for Pulp. Did I discuss it more with some of them than others, yes, but it was a discussion I had with people I was talking to, most of them nightly, because they were my friends and the people I talked to.

And, in their own rights, these guys are no slouches. Each one brings a different set of skills and benefits to the table. Now, does that mean that they were the only people that could have been a part of this crew? No, and trust me, some people have not been shy about telling me and others that. Within the past five weeks, every member of the Spectacled Seven, myself included on multiple occasions, has been mentioned by someone as ‘not being qualified to be a part of a news site’ or that there is ‘someone more qualified to cover Pulp news than him.’ Well, as far as more qualified, I will guarantee you there are people in this field that have been at it longer, know more, and have given far more to it than I have at this point. There is absolutely no argument there. And the six people that helped me start this were not chosen for any reason other than they shared my interest in getting this done and we actively talked about it and they each brought talents with them. I am likely not the most qualified, although I don’t know of a list of ‘qualifications’ that exists anywhere, to front a Pulp news website. The fact of the matter is, though, that I have done just that.

The Spectacled Seven will remain the same seven people until one or more of them moves on. Having said that, though, All Pulp welcomes writers to present articles on history, events, etc. There will be guest writers in the future, guaranteed. I have discussed this with several notable names in the field and have been told by at least two that I will be receiving work from them soon. All Pulp, I hope, has done a good job of showing that it is fair and open for the entire Pulp community and I definitely welcome submission of articles from guest writers. But I’m also supportive and glad to be a part of the Spectacled Seven with the six men working with me.

AP: Back to personal focus now. Is there a particular classic Pulp hero you enjoy more than others and why?

Peculiar Oddfellow, drawn by Erik Burnham

TH: Not a particular hero, no…but a particular type of hero. I may be in the minority, but I am a major fan of obscure, little known and/or little used characters. Now, do not mistake me. I am a Doc Savage/Shadow/Spider/etc. fan and always will be. But as far as writing and creating, I am fascinated with taking a character that has a bit of history, that has the makings of something great, and trying to weave that something great out of what little is there. So, yes, the less known, the more appealing to me.

AP: Aside from your own Pro Se, you have worked for other Pulp outfits. What can we expect from your fantastic imagination in the near future fiction wise?

TH: Well, due to some medical issues I’ve struggled with for a while and am still dealing with-I’m basically fighting a battle with diabetes and who’s winning depends on the day- I have had to cut out some writing projects (And thank you by the way to all within the community who have been supportive and understanding and encouraging while I’ve been dealing with this). Basically what I had to do was trim my writing commitments down to what was already in progress, to the projects I had actually put words on the page for. Even with doing that, though, the list of what’s coming in the next year or so is pretty substantial.

Age of Adventure, Wayne Skiver’s company, has a ‘VAMPIRES VERSUS WEREWOLVES’ anthology due out around Halloween and I have a story, “Beastly and Bloody” in that collection. I also have two stories that have been done in the last few months centered around my concept THE MAN FROM SHADOW LIMB that have appeared in issues 1 and 2 of Age of Adventure’s SIX GUN WESTERN.

I have three projects in various levels of progress for Airship 27. Two short stories, the previously mentioned follow up to my Virgil Earp tale and one set in the South Seas for a collection entitled TALES FROM THE HANGING MONKEY. I also have my first full length novel in the works for Airship. It’s centered around an obscure Pulp character and is entitled FUNNY FACE: RICH MEN KILL EASY.

The Shipman from YESTERYEAR
Art by Fuller Bumpers

I’m also working on adapting a whole universe of characters of my own creation, my take on golden age characters entitled YESTERYEAR, into audio scripts for Brokensea Audio Productions. Some of these characters have already appeared in prose form in magazines from Pro Se, including one in a story penned several years ago by Derrick Ferguson.

Speaking of my own magazine, I am writing the adventures of one of our flagship characters, Peculiar Oddfellow for each and every issue of PRO SE PRESENTS PECULIAR ADVENTURES. I am also working on one third of what is being called THE SOVEREIGN CITY PROJECT, the other two thirds being done by Barry Reese and Derrick Ferguson. My character is DOC DAYE, 24 HOUR HERO. I have a third series in the works as well that will debut next year in the Pro Se lineup. That series will focus on a character by the name of Jameson Journey…more on that later.

Ad for ‘Peculiar Oddfellow’ Comic
due 2011 from Pro Se
Art by Lou Manna
Colors by John Palmer IV

Also from Pro Se, scheduled to debut early next year, will be a four issue comic mini series entitled THE VARIED ADVENTURES OF PECULIAR ODDFELLOW. I’m very excited about this as Pec is a character that I’ve had ready to go for almost ten years now. The artwork on this book is done and most masterfully so by comic veteran Lou Manna. This will be a pleasure to see, trust me.

I’m also working on the outline for ‘THE CASE OF THE BLOODY PULP’ which is the story at the center of the interactive drama at Pulp Ark next year. The story will be plotted by me and co written with Bobby Nash.

And then there’s a project, one of those ‘I’m not at liberty to discuss it yet, but when I am…’ things…Actually, there’s two of those…

AP: Tommy, thanks so much for taking time out from your always busy schedule to take the hot seat and best of luck with all your great endeavors.

TH: Thanks a ton for interviewing me. Now…uh…can I have my chair back on THAT side of the table please?

                                     __________________________

Reviews from the 86th Floor by Barry Reese: Doc Savage # 7

  • News
  • October 14, 2010

doc7-2554709
DOC SAVAGE # 7
DC Comics
Doc Savage – Ivan Brandon, Brian Azzarello & Nic Klein
Justice Inc. – Jason Starr & Scott Hampton

Another month, another issue of DC’s Doc Savage series. At some point, you’d suspect that DC might accidentally stumble onto a formula that works — but there’s no sign of it yet. This one continues the “Belly of the Beast” storyline and has Doc and his aides knee deep in the Middle East, still in pursuit of a friend of theirs that they all believed was dead. There’s a bunch of pointless fighting in this and several pages of decompressed storytelling where Doc and the gang talk about how amazing their friend was. It was during those pages where I hit upon a key problem that I have with Brian Azzarello’s take on the pulp characters in this First Wave universe: pacing. Azzarello is quite obviously “writing for the trade,” which in comic book terms means that he stretches everything out so that it fills 6 to 7 issues, which just so happens to be the standard size of a comic book trade paperback. The problem comes from the fact that this sort of storytelling (typified by pages of talking heads, where the characters speak “naturally” in small bursts of words, as occurs multiple times in this issue) does not fit with the pulp paradigm. Doc Savage was many things but it was never slow, boring or ponderous. It was quick, exciting reading and that’s where all of Azzarello’s First Wave work is falling extremely short.

That and the fact that the plots don’t make sense. That’s a pretty big one, too. After all the issues of First Wave and seven of Doc Savage, I find “The War” to be a muddled mess that should either be better defined or ignored and the characters seem like pale reflections of their actual selves. Really — is anybody reading this Doc Savage series and coming away with a clear view of who Doc or his aides are? I can’t imagine how, since the storytelling leaves no room for characterization. I know — how can there be pages of talking heads but no characterization? Pretty easy. People talk and talk but they don’t say anything that illuminates them as people. And aside from Monk and Ham’s snarky comments towards each other, most of the dialogue could be cut and pasted between characters and nobody would notice. The end of the main story sees the arrival of the Siamese twins we were teased with earlier in the arc and I assume we’re supposed to be excited by their arrival but given the fact that they, like everyone else in the book, has been given no personality, I was like “Oh, they’re finally doing something with them” as opposed to “Wow! Can’t wait to see what happens when Doc fights a pair of Siamese twin children.”

Yeah, it’s pretty dumb.

In the back-up, Smitty continues to track down a murderer and rapist, intending to kill him at some point. Now, Smitty is still never identified by name which continues to be an awesomely stupid writing mistake. If this was your first issue, you would not know who this character was. Hell, I’ve been reading for seven issues and I don’t know who this character is — because it sure isn’t Smitty.

Anyway, Smitty tracks the bad guy for days and — get this — never once disguises himself. Oh, he says he’s trying to be cool about it, but he’s following the man for days. Without disguising himself. So is it a shock when the bad guy says “Hey, that fella over there — I think he was at the Track. And the so-and-so. And the so-and-so. Isn’t that weird?”

A member of Justice Inc. just follows a guy for days without disguising himself. He follows him to clubs, to a racetrack, even to the freakin’ bathroom… Without. Disguising. Himself.

Needless to say, he gets ambushed and arrested by some cops on the take. Benson (you remember him? The star of Justice Inc.? He’s here for one page) finally arrives but doesn’t bail Smitty out of jail because he’s so angry that one of his gang would plan a murder.

Sigh. I can’t express to you how much this sucks. On the plus side, the art is real pretty.

This issue gets a whopping 1 out of 5 stars.

INTERVIEW WITH ANDREW SALMON, WRITER/CREATOR!

  • News
  • October 12, 2010
 AP:  Andrew, it’s a real treat that you dropped by to visit with ALL PULP.  Can you share a little background on yourself?
AS: It’s a real pleasure to be here! All Pulp may be relatively new but it has already become THE place to be for all the latest breaking pulp news. As for my background, I was born and raised in Montreal, Canada but moved to Vancouver with my wife in the hopes of becoming a professional writer. I’m also a lifelong movie fan and work as an extra in the thriving film industry here, being a small part of such films as WATCHMEN, the first Fantastic Four and the A-Team along with numerous TV shows/movies over the years. I’m a voracious reader of pulp and hardboiled fiction. I have a massive Spider-Man collection which I won’t be adding to any time soon since Marvel has ruined the character for me. I’m a diehard Montreal Canadiens fan. And I love classic rock: AC/DC, Dio, CCR, Beatles and a whole host of others.
AP:  Your name graces the covers of several books that are making the rounds amongst pulp fans?  Can you give us a rundown of the work you’ve done in the pulp world, including books, short stories, etc.?
AS: Sure. I’ve had the great good fortune to work with Airship 27/Cornerstone Book Publishers and have been part of a number of their fantastic pulp anthologies. I have tales in Secret Agent X: Volumes One and Three, Jim Anthony Super Detective: Volume One, Dan Fowler G-Man: Volume One, Black Bat Mystery: Volume One and still can’t believe that I’ve been part of both volumes of their Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective series. And how could I forget collaborating with the great Ron Fortier on Ghost Squad: Rise of the Black Legion! I’ve also just had a short story appear in Pro Se’s Masked Gun Mystery #1.
AP:  You have done quite a bit of work on established Pulp characters? What is the appeal of working on characters created sometimes more than a century ago for a modern writer?

AS: They are great characters. That’s pretty much it. They are fun, dynamic and the non-stop action pacing is too good to pass up from both a reading and writing standpoint. Also, unlike the pulp writers of the Golden Age, we have the benefit of hindsight and can explore historical themes the original pulp writers were not aware of or were unable to write about. For instance, my Dan Fowler tale (“The League of Dead Patriots”) deals with the Japanese internment camps of WW2 in a way that the pulps of the day would never have tried. And it doesn’t even have to go as far as the complete plot. Having that period be historical for us modern writers gives us great freedom to include little details here and there for attentive readers to catch. It can be something as simple as a nostalgic touch or historical name dropping. Plus with all these characters in the public domain, we can do the odd team up every now and then and really go to town! And there’s also the opportunity to grow the genre. Read the first Doc Savage and then the last novel from 1949, the characters are not the same. They have changed, evolved. Perhaps not for the better in some cases but that evolution is unmistakeable. I love all the great elements that go into a good pulp story. I wouldn’t write pulp if I didn’t. However with this new era of unprecedented pulp creation going on today, all of the modern day writers and artists are the new vanguard of the genre and it’s up to us to continue to grow the art form. That said, I feel I should stress that the classic elements have to be in place. That’s a must! But just like that subtle evolution from the 30s to the 40s, pulp needs to push the envelope a little. Being a small part of this new pulp revolution is one heck of a lot of fun. The myriad titles published in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s demonstrate that there really are no boundaries when it comes to pulp and I’m curious to see where the genre is going. I think the genre can be experimented with and yet still be authentic to pulp readers young and old. It’s a great time to be a pulp creator and I wouldn’t miss it for the world!

AP:  Sherlock Holmes.  You’ve written a bit about the Master Detective for Airship 27.  Why Holmes?  What does this particular character touch in you as a creator?
AS: No one is more surprised than I am by how much I love to write Holmes and Watson adventures! When the opportunity first presented itself, I passed on it because I felt I was not qualified to play in that particular sandbox. Although I was fully aware of the characters and the rich legacy that has grown around them for more than a century, I had not actually read many of the stories. I think my Holmes exposure was limited to The Sign of Four and A Study In Scarlet, which I had read for a college course in mystery fiction. The 2 novels plus the odd story were pretty much it as far as my exposure to pure Holmes went. So who was I to try my hand at a tale?
Well, after I slapped myself silly and woke up, I realized that I’d been offered the chance to write, arguably, the two most popular characters in the history of pop culture! How could I say no? This lead straight to Doyle and a thorough reading of almost all of the original Holmes tales. And they won me over! I became an instant fan. This plus my love of writers like Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy meant I was already steeped in the Victorian vernacular so to speak. So I sat down and started writing and had so much fun crafting a mystery with that beautiful language and those wonderful characters that I was finished the tale before I knew it. And I’m just getting started with Holmes and Watson! Watch out world! The game’s afoot!
AP:  You’ve left your mark on several other Public Domain characters as well. Any favorites?
AS: First of all, thank you for suggesting I’ve added to the rich history of these already great characters. I take writing these public domain characters very seriously and consider it an honor to be able to do so. Favorites? Well, Holmes and Watson of course. And I love Secret Agent X! Fowler, Jim Anthony and the Black Bat are also great but if pressed for favorites, I’d have to go with the great consulting detective and the man of a thousand faces. 
AP:  What about public domain territory you’ve not yet ventured into. Any characters you want to write about in the future?
AS: Honestly, all of them! As for a list, well, the Green Lama comes to mind. Adam Garcia is having a Lama-fest these days and I can’t resist the urge to get in on the fun. Domino Lady guest-starred in my Fowler tale and she also great. Let’s see, Moon Man would be a lot of fun, Captain Hazzard (though my intrepid editor Ron Fortier will see that anyone who undertakes a Hazzard tale will meet with an unfortunate accident, cue organ music), the Scarlet Pimpernel, Allan Quartermain, Ebenezer Scrooge, the Masked Rider and a bunch more. The more the merrier! Writing pulp is just too much fun! 
AP:  A work that you co-wrote that has gotten a bit of buzz is THE GHOST SQUAD: RISE OF THE BLACK LEGION, co written with Ron Fortier for Airship 27. Can you give us a brief outline of this book?
AS: Working with Ron was one of the highlights of my writing career to date. Actually I should back that up. Just being ASKED to work with Ron was the true highlight. At the time, I’d only written 2 or 3 pulp tales and, out of the blue, the King of Modern Day Pulp asks me if I want to collaborate with him. Yeah, I had to think about that one for a nanosecond. The Ghost Squad consist of Lazarus (yes, that Lazarus from the bible), Lady Arcane, the mistress of the mystic arts, Alan Hale, pilot and brawler extraordinaire and Professor Andreas Vantassel who has more medical and scientific degrees than you can shake a stick at. The immortal Lazarus has become aware of a terrible threat to world peace, the Black Legion, and has put the Ghost Squad together as a top secret fighting team with government backing to combat this threat. The first novel introduced the characters and the menace of the Black Legion and had as much action as Ron and I could jam into it. The buzz you mentioned has been most welcome and truly appreciated by everyone involved with the book. With an amazing cover by comic artist Chad Hardin and interior illustrations by the incomparable Rob Davis, the first book kicked off the Squad in style and it’s immensely gratifying to hear that folks have enjoyed the book. And Book Two is in the works!
AP: How about co-writing?  Some writers absolutely love to work on books with other authors, other writers absolutely detest it.  How do you feel about it and what is the process you prefer to use when co-writing?
AS: I suppose it depends on who you are collaborating with. When Ron contacted me, I had never collaborated before so it was all new to me. And I had a blast! Ron implemented a method where one of us would do a chapter or two, then pass the book on to the other to whip up a chapter or two and this back and forth was a lot of fun. Watching the pages grow, finding emails with attached chapters of the novel already done so you don’t have to… it was great! I have nothing but good memories of working with Ron and can’t wait to do it again!
AP: You have your own creations as well.  Can you list a few of those for our audience?
AS: Okay. Well, I self-published a long short story of mine called The Forty Club as a gift book since it dealt with the trials and tribulations of reaching that milestone. And my first full-length novel, The Dark Land, was also as self-published effort though a new, revised edition is coming from Airship 27/Cornerstone hopefully next year. The Dark Land is a near-future science-fiction mystery where a terrible pandemic has wiped out most of the world’s population, plunging the survivors into chaos. With the death of billions, the governments have resorted to cloned policemen grown from samples stored for just such a global emergency. The hero of the tale, C-Peter Reilly, is a clone but he remembers the life of his source material and that is a big no-no so while he’s on the case, he’s plagued by memories of loved ones he never really had but who are more dear to him than anyone. I have a superhero serial running in A Thousand Faces magazine featuring Fred Brand and Project X – as an unlikely a duo as you’re liable to find anywhere. I’ve sprinkled a few other stories around here and there in Storyteller, TBT, Thirteen Stories magazines and others. And I just had my very first pulp short story appear in Masked Gun Mystery #1 from Pro Se Productions. The story is called “Run” and it is very dear to my heart because it was the story I sent to Ron as my audition for joining the ranks of Airship 27. And it got me the gig! My biggest non-pulp work is The Light Of Men, the response to which has been nothing short of staggering and humbling. 
AP:  Talk a little about THE LIGHT OF MEN, about the story itself and whether or not you feel it is pulp.
AS: The novel took me a little more than 12 years to research and write as it is set in a Nazi concentration camp and I wanted to get all the details right. The tale is set in the dying days of the war and a strange prisoner is admitted who appears to have his own agenda, his own reason for being there aside from being arrested. I can’t really say more without giving away too much of the tale but I will say that there is a science-fiction element in the novel and we’ll leave it at that. The book has been added to the Holocaust Memorial Museum Library in the US, has received very good reviews, and was even a book club read for a group of bloggers – all of which has been simply amazing. As you might imagine from the subject matter, it is not a light-hearted tale. My goal was to give modern readers the genuine experience of what it was like to be in one of those horrible camps and I pulled no punches. I’ve heard from readers that this was the experience they had reading the book which has been immensely gratifying because it means all those endless hours of research paid off. Although there is action in the novel, I would not classify it as pulp. It’s more of a literary work though there is a good dose of action along with that science-fiction element I mentioned. Unlike writing pulp, writing this novel was not a lot of fun, but it is the work I’m most proud of to date.
AP:  Can you share anything about the super hero serial you’re creating for A Thousand Faces Magazine?
AS: Sure, I’d be happy to. The Brand/X serial took on a life of its own with me. The first tale, “Soar”, was supposed to be the only tale. It dealt with the general fascination we all have, as comic and pulp fans, with flying. Wizard used to have a monthly poll where fans could vote on the super power they most wanted to have and flying won month in and month out. So I came up with the idea of a two-bit crook whose greatest high is to be carried by a superhero in full flight. Flying, or soaring, becomes a full-blown addiction with him. Thing is, the only way to fly with a hero is to commit a crime and get carted off to jail. Thus poor Fred’s life becomes reduced to doing time until being released from jail so he can commit a crime and get that high when a hero scoops him up to send him back to prison. The pay off for this was that, like most junkies, more is always needed to fix and the short flights no longer do it for him. So he comes up with an idea for the longest and best flight of his life, which is also supposed to be his last. Fred Brand was supposed to commit suicide in achieving this ultimate high, going out in one final blaze of glory. However when it came time to write that scene, something just clicked in my head and Fred survived that first tale. I sent it off to the magazine, crossed my fingers, and moved on. To my delight the story was accepted and was published in issue #0. Well, a few readers wrote in expressing their fondness for Brand and speculating on what would happen next with him. This blew me away, because I certainly hadn’t thought that. But their discussions got me thinking and I found myself asking, “Yeah, what does happen to him?” and now I’m on a journey with Fred and Project X to find out. Six tales have appeared to date, the last just a few months ago. And they are all still available in issues #0, 2, 3, 5, 7 and 12. With more to come…
AP: You’ve been nominated for at least two awards and won one of those.  What awards were those and how does that sort of attention affect you as a writer?
AS: My second published tale, “A Turn of the Scrooge” was nominated for an Arthur Ellis Award, which is the Canadian equivalent of the Edgar. It didn’t win, but coming so early in my career I really could say that it was truly and honor and thrill just to be nominated for so prestigious an award. Last year my novelette, “The Adventure of the Locked Room”, won the Pulp Factory Award for Best Pulp Short Story of the Year. The story was part of Airship 27’s first Holmes anthology (Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: Volume One) and the book also took home awards for Best Pulp Cover (Mark Maddox) and Best Pulp Interior Art (Rob Davis).
The awards were presented at the Windy City pulp show in April and to say I’m still on Cloud 9 would be the understatement of the year! I was, and still am, completely bowled over by winning the award. As I’ve only been reading pulp for about 10 years and writing it for only 3 or 4, I still consider myself the new kid on the block with a lot still to learn so to win one of these beautiful awards so early in my pulp career, well, there are simply no words to truly express the feeling. What affect did it have on me? Well, it showed me that I’m on the right track with my pulp work. The awards are voted on by pulp writers, artists and fans. Getting the nod from a group like this covers all the bases, doesn’t it? Also, as a writer, you never know if your work is good or not until someone reads it. You can think it is, convince yourself it is, but the only way to truly know is to hear from people who know the genre, have read your story and enjoyed it. Hearing positive feedback from readers through reviews or emails is a precious reward in itself. Being voted an award by your peers is just the icing on the cake. And it is a humbling experience. You think: “Wow! Folks actually read my story and liked it! It affected them!” It’s what every writer works towards.  For those of you who don’t know, the awards are presented annually by the Pulp Factory to recognize outstanding achievement in pulp writing and art and any new published work set in 1940 or earlier is eligible for nomination in a given year. So get scribbling pulp creators, you could be the next winner!
AP:  Anything coming in the near future from the mind and pen of Andrew Salmon you want to talk about?
AS: Well, I’ve just learned that my third Sherlock Holmes tale has been accepted by Airship 27 and will appear in Volume Three of that bestselling series. Look for that in January. Mars McCoy Space Ranger is also about set to blast off from Airship 27 and I’ve got a tale in that along with a bunch of other great pulpsmiths. There’s that revised edition of The Dark Land looming. And I’ve just finished a collaboration on a novelette with pulp fan Mark Halegua who created a hero called the Red Badge. Readers can look for that in an upcoming Airship 27 release. As for works in progress, well, I’ve got some novel ideas… literally. I’m currently working on a novel featuring German pulp heroes which I think is going to knock a few folks for a loop. I’ve also been given the nod by Air Chief Ron to write a full-length Sherlock Holmes novel and was press-ganged by Ron and artist Rob Davis at the Windy City show a couple of years back to write a Secret Agent X novel. Believe me, no arm twisted was involved. Ha! I kicked ideas around for an epic X tale and I think I’ve hit on one that will work. Along with all that, I’d like to do more Fred Brand tales, and maybe throw in a pulp novelette along the way. Also, I sit daily with fingers crossed as I await word on the Green Hornet tale I submitted to Moonstone for the upcoming Green Hornet Casefiles anthology. Working with Joe Gentile and Moonstone was a lot of fun and I’ll gladly do it again if they want me. As I’m a huge Operator 5 fan, and, I believe, they are now doing 5 stories, I’ll say a prayer every night that Joe gives me the go ahead to do one. I guess to sum up my plans I can just say: pulp and more pulp! I’m having the time of my life here!
AP:  Andrew, thanks again and come back to visit ALL PULP anytime.
AS: It’s been my sincere pleasure! Thanks for having me. I’d love to do it again sometime. Hey! I check All Pulp every day and so should every pulp fan. Pulp fiction is back, big time! There’s a lot of truly great stuff being created today to stand shoulder to shoulder with the great work of the past giants. All Pulp celebrates that. If you’re a pulp fan, what more could you ask for?
Links:
http://www.amazon.com/Andrew-Salmon/e/B002NS5KR0/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_2.
http://stores.lulu.com/airship27
www.lulu.com/AndrewSalmon
www.lulu.com/thousand-faces

                                                _______________________

INTERVIEW-ELIZABETH BISSETTE, RELATIVE TO THE MAN WHO CREATED THE SPIDER!

  • News
  • October 12, 2010

ELIZABETH BISSETTE, Writer/Performer/Relative of Pulp Icon

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Elizabeth Bissette, wearing Norvell Page’s fedora and holding his .22

AP:  Elizabeth, ALL PULP is really excited that you have time to sit down with us.  Before we talk about your very special connection to Pulp, can you give us some background on yourself?

EB: I guess Southern Gothic Renaissance woman might sum it up best. I’m a music, art and culture writer and one day had the privilege of talking with Mike Seeger (http://mikeseeger.info/), a folk archivist and musician Bob Dylan credits with being the reason he wrote his own songs. It changed my life. I spent the past five years or so since then doing a Lonesome Liz (http://www.myspace.com/lonesomeliz) version of what he did; traveling and learning as much as I could from other artists and musicians I ran into; writing about them along the way.

Through the course of all this I’ve become an Outlaw Americana singer-songwriter and visual artist, with the official Outlaw nick-name Lonesome Liz. (Hellbilly Outlaw authority and filmmaker Cuzn Wildweed (http://www.myspace.com/cousinwildweed)  told me Outlaws had nicknames and that was bound to be mine; I figured he knew more about it than I did and have kept it ever since.) I also play a little banjo; had the good fortune of learning a little from a man in Appalachia named Bill Garvin, who played with Bill Monroe early on.

There’s more to it than that, but that’s the backbone of it. Mr. Seeger died last year and my interview was the last he did. I can’t thank him in person anymore for how our talks were so pivotal for me and how other artists have told me since they’ve in a way been important for them to0. He centered a lot of his work academically so I’m putting together a Masters Thesis of Thank You –  I’m going to put all the research, some done with his feedback, into a Public Folk Studies thesis. I majored in Religious studies so there’s going to be a Folk Belief track too. I’m the only person I’ve heard of who’s getting an MA in Hoodoo.

AP:  Now, let’s get to that special connection to the Pulp field.  You are related to a key figure in Pulp fiction.  Would you elaborate on that, please?

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One of only two existing photos of Norvell Page


EB: Norvell Page was my Great-Uncle and the funny thing is my family never talked about him. I grew up hearing stories about this mysterious and intriguing figure who “wrote something to do with Spider-man” ,but that’s about it. Well, one day I was sitting at home; I was about 22 I guess, and I turned to my room-mate and said, “You know, my family always said my Great-Uncle wrote something to do with Spiderman and I really don’t think they would have made that up, but I’ve not heard anything else about it, I wonder what that was?” The response to that was, “Well, if it’s really true then you could just write Stan Lee and ask him.”  I said, “Well, I guess you’re right.”

At the time, Mr. Lee was still with Marvel so I just looked at the website, found what appeared to be the right e-mail for him and wrote, “Dear Mr. Lee, I’m the Great-Niece of Norvell Page and I have heard that my Great-Uncle wrote something about Spiderman, but have no idea if it’s true or even what it was.”

Well, it may not surprise you but it sure surprised me to receive an e-mail back from Mr. Lee in I think maybe 10 minutes, saying “Great Gotham! We’ve been wondering what happened to Norvell Page since 1943!” Not in those exact words of course but it was rather overwhelming to discover that, not only had I been looking for the truth behind Norvell’s Spider but Spidey apparently had been looking for the truth behind Norvell. It was every bit as life changing as that phone call to Mike Seeger.
 

AP:  Can you share a brief biography of Norvell Page with us?

 EB: Norvell was a remarkable man. He seems to have really been like his characters in more ways than one. While writing Pulps he dressed like the Spider sometimes, drove a Dailmer, lived for a time on Riverside Drive, he was very Wentworth in day to day life. In 1943 he left Pulp writing for a government career that was pretty heavy, to say the least. He seemed, for example, to truly want to save the world and I think tried to. In some ways maybe he came close, hard to tell. Sounds incredible, but we are talking about the Spider.

He grew up in an old Southern family, the Pages arrived in Virginia very early on, 1652. Their first land grant became Williamsburg eventually and they had a lot to do with the founding of some of the major sites there, William and Mary, (which he briefly attended) and Bruton Parish Church are the main ones. A long line of revolutionaries, statesmen and writers as well. The popular Ante-Bellum novelist Thomas Nelson Page, for example, was a close relative.

Norvell started out as a journalist and wound up in New York after his writing had started taking off enough to make a move there make sense. He wrote for the Times and also the World Telegram, where Varian Fry, who spearheaded the International Rescue Committee, an operation that got a number of major artists and thinkers out of occupied Europe, was an editor at the time. Family rumor has it and considering his later government career it’s certainly plausible, that he got his start in intelligence work helping Mr. Fry. I’ve not yet been able to fully substantiate it but he was right there with Varian, was later an official intelligence worker as fellow writer Ian Fleming was and maintained a lifelong friendship with Max Ernst, the husband of Peggy Guggenheim, who funded the committee.

As you and your readers know, he became a tremendously influential and prolific Pulp writer; ‘the Batman’ first appeared in a Spider story (editor’s note-A character, different from the later, more famous one, named ‘Bat-Man’ appeared in the Spider Novel DEATH REIGN OF THE VAMPIRE KING, published approximately six years prior to the debut of DC Comics’ Batman) and he later also wrote two ‘Black Bat’ tales. He also wrote what’s considered a classic, ‘But Without Horns’, a story that explores the concept of a ‘superman’ but this time as a villain, and, of course, he created the Spider. It’s hard to imagine what comics would be like today without the vast imagination of Norvell Page playing such a heavy role in Pulp Fiction.

His career with the Government would probably be boring to read in an outline but he moved from Committee to Committee, clearly trying to make the world a better place as best he could; you can find an outline of that in his obituaries at my Norvell Page blog. He was one of the only members of these committee who remained in the Executive Offices of the President which I guess translates to real close to where all the action was. At the time of his death he was the Editor in Chief for the Atomic Energy Commission, and he was also one of the first six people appointed to that Commission. He died, unquestionably suspiciously, around the time of the Bay of Pigs invasion.

AP:  What sort of family stories are there about Norvell Page?  Can you share some insight into how he was as a man, a writer, a relative?
EB: Oh yes and the tales are as wonderful as his stories! The best one is that his parents had tickets for the Titanic and didn’t go at the last minute because, according to my Grandmother, Norvell, who I guess was 11 or so at the time, begged and insisted that they not. Good call.

Another tells of him rescuing all of them again from certain destruction. He was home for Christmas from college and it was back in the days when candles were still used for the trees. Well, I guess everyone had too much eggnog and someone forgot to put the candles out. The house caught on fire and Norvell somehow woke up. He didn’t panic but instead threw his mattress out his window, ran and grabbed my grandmother and my Great-Uncle Roger, then infants, shouted through the halls to wake everyone up and jumped with one of them under each arm out the window.

Last but not least, by the next Christmas he couldn’t bear to be away from Audrey, his high school sweetheart who the family didn’t approve of. He left William and Mary to elope with her. To keep his parents in the dark about what they’d done, he left letters with his room-mate describing how he was doing in college to be mailed, one a week, over the remainder of the semester. He then went to nearby Norfolk and told the editor of the paper there that he was 18 and had already been writing for the Times Dispatch in Richmond. They gave him, I believe, an editing job. And so his writing career began.

AP:  Just how much was THE SPIDER a part of Page’s life?

EB: As far as I can tell he WAS the Spider. 

AP:  Was Page’s connection to THE SPIDER and to pulp in general an overall positive or were there any negative things as well?

EB: Positively positive! He seems to have made such wonderful friends and had such a fantastic time. It was probably also a huge outlet for all of the stress he must have been under, considering his probable role in the IRC and who knows what else; (he was, for example, on a German liner on its way to Austria when WWII broke out.)

The family, however, did not approve of Pulp Fiction or consider it a worthwhile use of his writing ability; that’s part of the reason no one ever talked about it. His father had wanted him to be the next Poe (who was also from Richmond and who had worked with my Great-Great Uncle, Lawrence Page on the Southern Literary Messenger), and seems to have been disappointed. He was too close to it to realize he actually sort of was the next Poe I suppose. So, in a way, that was probably a negative.

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AP:  How are you involved with THE SPIDER?   How are you working to further the legacy of this character that you have a family tie to?
EB: I have a theater background as well as the aforementioned music and art and recently merged the three in a multi-media event I produced called Lonesome Liz’s Mojo Sideshow. The show was a tribute to and celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the death of Norvell Page and the 75th Anniversary of his ‘Spider’ Series.

Norvell’s Ken Carter stories were released at that time and they included my favorite tale of his, ‘Satan’s Sideshow’ and also one called ‘Hell’s Music’, which I thought touched in an odd way my connection with the Hellbillies, (and I had the good fortune of having Hellbilly artists Cuzn Wildweed and J.B. Beverley (http://www.myspace.com/waywarddrifters) as performers). It wasn’t a play of his stories but inspired by the way both of our imaginations unwittingly went in the same direction. The play was a Southern folklore interpretation of ‘Faust’ at its core, with the ghosts of Sideshow workers and historic figures, including Norvell, playing a part in my (the ‘Faust’) damnation.

There was an accompanying visual art exhibit to the Sideshow, which featured artists from all over the world, everywhere from Hazard, Kentucky to London! I was fortunate to have some amazing people participate – including Molly Crabapple (http://www.mollycrabapple.com), a visual artist and entrepreneur who founded Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School, (she’s also done some work with ‘Weird Tales’ and Marvel, the earth shattering ‘Scarlet Takes Manhattan’, for example), Katelan Foisy (http://www.katelanfoisy.com), another New York artist, painted me as ‘Faust’ for the exhibit, Wes Freed (http://www.wesfreed.com), who’s best known for his Drive by Truckers album and poster art  was part of it; and many others.  It was fantastic. A local sculptor contributed a giant black widow spider they hung from the ceiling with a banjo instead of a violin.

All of those remarkable creative minds, and many others, joined together in what was, I think a remarkable tribute to him. What’s so lasting about Norvell isn’t just his work but his influence on other artists and what I love most about the show is that it reflected that, albeit in perhaps an unexpected way.
 
I’d love to write Pulp stories or comics myself, maybe something that included 5 stories in 5 genres as a tribute to him. I’ve been turning ideas over for a while. The characters are there though. There’s a Lonesome Liz Hoodoo Detective, Katelan Foisy inspired a character named Penny Dreadful, a Western based on the Dodge City Gang; I’m sure it will happen in time.
 

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AP: You are a writer yourself as well as a multimedia performer.  Has The Spider influenced your own creative process at all, shown up in any of your work, etc.?
EB: He’s always there. I don’t quite know how to explain how he’s always there except we were raised with the same stories I suppose; have the same sort of brain. I think he probably shows up to some extent in all of the characters I’ve made up but some are more like him than others. The Goblin King, a central character in a fantasy series I’ve written, has elements of the Spider and the Batman that were deliberate, choosing Faust as the center of the Sideshow play was definitely because of his life and writing, he was very Faust in a way and making that production a Vaudeville style one was definitely due to Ken Carter, the idea of making Lonesome Liz a detective came from his detective stories, he’s all of it I think.
AP: Now, part of your background is in the paranormal field.  Ever encountered anything that makes you think Page is looking in on things?  Anything SPIDER related in your life or family you can’t really explain?
EB:  Well, he was doing séances with a woman from the Dominican Republic, L. Ron Hubbard and Arthur Burks for years so I’m not surprised that there are odd things that occur from time to time. Family members and a few other people have seen a man in black standing by me a time or two, and they’re not family members who usually talk about or even believe in ghosts. One even described him as wearing a cape and I have to admit it did sound like the Spider. Funny thing was that was a relative who hadn’t read any of the stories and didn’t know what he looked like.
AP:  Why do you think THE SPIDER has such appeal to the reading public?
EB: Because it was great writing. You care about the characters, they have depth, conflict, and they’re very alive. And it was so extreme! It was the bloodiest, most dire, most deadly Pulp fiction of all Pulp fiction! It was also the most bizzarre at times. Pulps were an escape, something to empower the powerless and what did that more, who did that more than the Spider?
 
AP:  What about the rest of Page’s work?  Can you discuss some of his other pulp work beyond THE SPIDER?
EB: It’s a wonderful tapestry of imagination. Whatever you’re into you’ll find it in Norvell’s stories. G-men, detectives, weird menaces, magicians, westerns, swords and sorcery, I have a hard time thinking of what sort of story he didn’t write! The Spider just happens to be what someone kept in print. There are other characters, other stories I think are a lot better or at least a lot more intriguing.
 
AP:  Do you have anything past, current, or in the works, our audience might be interested in checking out?  Any music, writing, work on Page’s life, anything at all?
EB: There’s a new blog in progress! The Norvell Page Page http://www.norvellpagepage.blogspot.com and the Mojo Sideshow can be seen in part here: http://mojosideshow.blogspot.com
 
AP:  Elizabeth, it’s truly been a pleasure!

National Graphic Novel Writing Month, Day 10: Can conventions get your graphic novel written, part three

  • News
  • October 11, 2010

nagranowrimo-8349597Day ten, and also day three or four or ninety-seven of the New York Comic Con… and the sad truth of how they can wreck your schedules. So let’s pick up a few quickies:

For those who find they are having a little trouble there are a number of tips online that can be helpful. Below are a few tips that professionals in the industry have posted on blogs and news sites over the last couple of years.

Online at the Clockwork Storybook blog site is a nice in depth look at the writing process by Bill Willingham (writer of Fables). This takes a whole look at scripting keeping in mind that this must also be interpreted by the artist.

On his personal website Warren Ellis (writer of Transmetropolitan) posts an helpful answer to character motivation and action concerning “Want/Get/Do“.

And from our own site archives: two years ago John Ostrander (writer of Suicide Squad) posted an article with writing tips all writers can benefit from, covering the creative process and what being a writer means and does to you as a person.

Also: Dennis O’Neil did a more detailed write up on the differences between the full script method and the Marvel method which is much better than mine, and I should have lifted it directly. Here’s part one, and here’s part two.

Instead, I’ll lift his RECOMMENDED READING and suggest his book, The DC Comics Guide to Writing Comics, which somehow wasn’t included on our first list of writing books to look at. It’s truly excellent, and the only reason I can think of that it slipped my mind is that it’s constantly out on loan to other people who are using it to become better writers themselves.

Hat tip to Kyle Gnepper for the assist on tracking down articles. Remember: you can follow all the NaGraNoWriMo posts here!

DC Drops Page Count, Prices

  • News
  • October 7, 2010

DC Comics announced today that they will be cutting almost 10% of their editorial content from their ongoing books while at the same time standardizing the cover price at $2.99.

Their innovative 40 page format, where the reader received a second feature in addition to the lead, is being abandoned.

This is your classic “good news / bad news” situation. DC decided $3.99 was too expensive for a pamphlet containing 22 pages of story. Seeing as how their line had been split between $2.99 titles and $3.99, they’re moving to $2.99 across the board but, in the process, dropping two pages of story. This might come as a relief to artists who have a difficult time producing 22 pages each month and it certainly will be a boon to readers and retailers – with one dramatic exception.

For quite a while, comic book stories were 20 pages. They simply weren’t as interesting as the 22, 24 and 27/28 pagers that followed. Since comic book stories are far less dense today then they were back then, even less will be going on in each individual issue. Historians will note that the 20 page story was only a stopping point on the way down to 17 page stories.

Writers are particularly screwed. Plotting a 20 page story takes just as much time and energy as plotting a 22 pager, and writing two fewer pages of dialog saves every little time indeed. Since they can’t sell two page stories, their monthly income will go down noticeably.

In a press release, co-publisher Dan DiDeo said “We needed a progressive pricing strategy that supports our existing business model and, more importantly, allows this creative industry to thrive for years to come. With the exceptions of oversized comic books, like annuals and specials, we are committed to a $2.99 price point.”

About that “allows this creative industry to thrive for years to come” part? We sure hope he’s right about that, and sincerely wish DC the best with this new strategy.

As long as the page count doesn’t become the proverbial slippery slope.

INTERVIEW-Russ Anderson, Writer/Editor with Pulpwork Press!!!

  • News
  • October 5, 2010

RUSS ANDERSON, Editor of HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD, Pulpwork Press/Writer
AP: Who’s Russ Anderson?
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RA: A writer/editor/father/husband/bicyclist/amateur bear-fighter living in the Baltimore-DC area of these United States. In regards to what the readers of All Pulp might care about, he’s also one of the dudes behind the late Frontier Publishing and the editor of HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD from Pulpwork Press. Furthermore, he enjoys talking about himself in the third person.
AP: What have you written and where can we find it?
RA: (Russ is disappointed to be abandoning third person already.)
I wrote “Mythworld”, a novel about Greek gods pressing for a comeback in the modern age, and the hijinks that ensue because of it. Mythworld appeared on the late Frontier Publishing website, but isn’t currently available. Maybe I should do something about that. Also, I wrote a short story called “The Origin of Flight” that appeared in a print superhero anthology that is no longer available called “Truth, Justice, And…”
So basically, you have to just take my word for it that I write. Oh! Except for my flash non-fiction story, Little Beagle Puppy, which is still available on Flashquake at http://www.flashquake.org/archive/vol2iss3/.
AP: How did you get hooked up with Pulpwork Press?
RA: I’ve known everybody at Pulpwork for about ten years, so the real question is why it took me so long to get involved over there. Fortunately, when I had a project I wanted to put together for them, our prior friendship greased the wheels of progress a bit.
AP: What’s the story behind HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD?
RA: I wanted to be part of the club over at Pulpwork Press for a while, but hadn’t been successful in carving out the time to write a long-form project in a long time. So I pitched How the West Was Weird as an anthology mainly as a way (a) to get a project going with those guys without having to spend a year writing a book, and (b) to reconnect with some of the writing buddies that I’d started to fall out of touch with since Frontier went under. To that end, the story submissions were invitation-only, and I only invited writers I’d worked with whose stuff I enjoyed.
I sometimes feel like I didn’t edit HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD so much as hosted it, since it really was just an excuse to get a bunch of my pals together. Fortunately, the book has transcended my selfish reasons for creating it and become something I’m really proud of.
As for why I went with a weird western, there’s no story to that. I enjoy the mash-up of those two genres quite a bit, and it was different from anything Pulpwork was doing. So here we are.
AP: What’s your definition of a weird western?
RA: The western isn’t defined by its location so much as it is by its tropes. There are certain plot elements (life on a frontier, the cycle of revenge) and certain character archetypes (the mysterious drifter, the lawman) that make a story a western, regardless of where it’s located. I don’t think anybody would argue that “Seven Samurai” and “Outland” aren’t westerns, even though one’s set in feudal Japan and one’s set on a moon of Jupiter.
The weird western basically takes those tropes and either presents them in an unusual setting, or adds elements from other genres into the western framework. The most popular seems to be the horror-western – those two just seem to go together like peanut butter and jelly – but I’m a big fan of the steampunk-western and the space-western myself.
AP: There are other weird western anthologies out there.  What makes HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD special?
RA: Can I say “because it’s good”? Is that snarky?
Well, how about the fact that it’s wrapped in an extremely pretty cover by Jim Rugg, artist/creator of “Street Angel” and “Afrodisiac”?
Also, it’s awesome.
Next question.
AP: Do you think that the weird western is a legitimate genre that will be around for awhile or is it just a phase that’s going to fade out as soon as the next bright & shiny thing comes along?
RA: Genres don’t really go away, do they? They may get put back on the shelf as they fall out of favor, but they always come back. I don’t think the weird western is ever going to fully disappear now that it’s out of the box.
I think the question is misleading, since it’s not like the genre is setting the world on fire right now. There’s a biiiiiiigg gap between it and, say, the vampire teen drama, and I think that’s primarily based on Hollywood’s inability to get the weird western right. Whenever they try, we get stuff like the Will Smith “Wild, Wild West”, or “Jonah Hex” starring Brandon from The Goonies. And that’s fine, I think. In a few years, everybody’s going to be sick of vampires stalking high school girls and the weird western will still be chugging along just fine.
All that said… you have to remember that the weird western is really only about 20 years old, so eventually the unique aspects of it will start to seem less and less unique. I think as time passes, the “weird” elements will begin to define the genre that the story falls into, and you’ll start seeing weird westerns in sci-fi, horror, and fantasy anthologies. It will be treated as a subset of other larger genres rather than being its own thing.
AP: There have been rumors of a HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD 2.  Any truth to those rumors?
RA: Absolutely. A bunch of the guys who contributed to the first one have already promised me stories for volume two, along with some new faces. What’s more, I had a chance to talk to Jim Rugg at this year’s Baltimore Comic Con, and he’s on board for the cover too. I’m shooting for it to be twice as awesome as the first one, though I’m concerned about whether the binder can possibly contain all that.
I have no idea when it will hit the streets. I expect to be done with it by next spring, so we’ll have to wait and see when we can fit it in to Pulpwork’s publishing schedule at that point. Also, keep in mind that the last time we did this, my wife got pregnant halfway through, which added – no kidding – exactly nine months to the process. It should be out sometime during 2011, though.
AP: What other projects have you got in mind?
RA: I’ve got a 10 month old daughter, who’s enough of a project all by herself, thanks.
AP: Here’s your chance for a shoutout or to plug/pimp something.  Go.
RA: Buy HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD. If you haven’t gathered as much from the rest of this article… it’s awesome.
AP: Any final words of wisdom?
RA: Like Linda Hunt said in Silverado: “The world is what you make of it, friend. If it doesn’t fit, you make alterations.”

Crazy Sexy Geeks: Superhero Psychology 2 – Robin!

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Comic book historian Alan Kistler and the forensic psychiatrists of Broadcast Thought discuss the teenage heroes called "Robin." And how does Batman benefit from having an apprentice? With guest host Jen Jamula. All images are from DC Comics. Music is royalty free. Please support us.
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INTERVIEW-MATT MORING, PUBLISHER, ALTUS PRESS!!!

  • News
  • October 1, 2010

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AP: Matt, thanks for taking the time out to visit with ALL PULP. To kick this off, can you share some personal/professional background about yourself?

MM: Sure, I’m a web/graphic designer who’s worked in publishing for a number of years. In the past, I’ve put this art background to use doing artwork reconstruction work for Marvel, DC, AC, Disney, etc., for their various golden- and silver-age reprints.

But I’ve always loved pulps and I thought I could do at least a serviceable job in making attractive pulp reprints that matched their “cousin” hardcover comic reprints that Marvel and DC are doing.

AP: You are the head man behind Altus Press. What is Altus Press in terms of what it produces and its mission and purpose?

MM: Honestly, it’s to produce the books that I’d like to personally have on my bookshelf. That doesn’t just mean producing a collection of, say all the Secret Agent X stories just because I want them, but making them the de facto place to get these classic stories. In this case, all the Secret Agent X stories have been reprinted in one place or another, in one format or another, over the course of nearly 50 years. So my hope is that my Secret Agent X volumes will allow fans to toss out all those mis-matched reprints they already have–whether they’re the 60s Corinth paperbacks, Hanos digests, Bill Blackbeard photocopies, PDFs, etc.
In addition, I want to share with as many people as are interested all the interesting pulp stories that I’ve encountered, and there seems to be an endless supply of such material. The more I learn, the less I know, as the saying goes.

AP: Altus Press is well known for its collections of reprinted material, a lot of it thought long lost to the public at large. Can you give us a list of what characters you’ve got in your stable of reprints?

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MM: Certainly. I try to do a healthy mix of “done in one”-type collections as well as multi-volume series. Some of the characters include Ravenwood, Mr. Death, Diamondstone, Doctor Death, Johnny Saxon, Ka-Zar, Ki-Gor, Jim Anthony, Polaris, Secret Agent X, Armless O’Neil, Seekay, The Bat, The Black Bat, The Cobra, Sheena, Senorita Scorpion, The Griffon, The Crimson Mask, Red Finger, The Man in Purple, The Black Hood, The Secret 6, The Purple Scar, The Blond Adder, Thunder Jim Wade, and many, many more that are on their way.

AP: What is the process you went through to gather these stories? Is everything you’re reprinting public domain?

MM: No. I generally tried to focus on PD material when I started, but in recent years, I’d say it’s about 50% PD, 50% licenced.
The process on each title is different. Sometimes a final product is quite clear to me, such as my recent Diamondstone: Magician – Sleuth book. In that case, it was very straightforward: there were only six stories and together, they filled out a nice 250-page book. There weren’t any other related stories from the author, G.T. Felming-Roberts, that made sense to include. So that book only took a matter of weeks to finish.

Other books take much longer to complete. My recent Norvell Page detective anthology, When the Death-Bat Flies: The Detective Stories of Norvell Page, has taken over a year to finish. It collects over 30 stories, and I only owned two of them. So it took quite a while to track all those down at finish that 800-page book. And there are other books that I’ve started but am looking for additional pieces to add to flesh them out. Some of these have been in this state for several years.

AP: What about new stories based on existing characters? Is this an area Altus Press works in? What titles?

MM: We do some new material here and there, but since other publishers like Airship 27 do a lot of that, I’ve focused on mainly reprint material. But I will recommend everything that Tom Johnson has written for Altus Press… he’s a pro and everything is a solid read. He’d done full collections such as the book Pulp Detectives, and he’s filled the lion’s share of our semi-regular anthology, Triple Detective. He’s also done new stories to augment reprint material such as in The Hand of Red Finger and The Man in Purple. And he’s got more on the way!

I hope that we’ll also do new material by other authors in the future.

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AP: In dealing with new stories based on old characters, what is your opinion on modernizing/changing them to possibly appeal to a broader readership?
MM:  Well, since I don’t do a lot of new material, I don’t have much to say on it. But a lot of these long-running characters, such as Doc Savage, The Black Bat, The Phantom Detective, etc., all changed and grew within their original pulp runs. If they were published non-stop from the 1930s to now, something tells me editorial & buying tastes would have changed these characters anyway. So as long as the changes don’t make the characters unrecognizable, I have no beef with updating things.

AP: How about all new original characters in the pulp vein? What original characters has Altus Press published?

MM: I’ll just say this: look for news on this in the future.

AP: Yet another line that Altus Press has is its pulp companions/histories. What is the importance of providing these published histories to the modern reader and overall, why is pulp history relevant?

MM: There’s a lot of pulp scholarship that was written in the 1970s-80s in fanzines such as Echoes, Pulp Vault, etc., which deserves to be made more available to the public. These are great fun to assemble, as they’re like a puzzle to put together… what articles & content could/should be collected under one cover on a certain topic? These are the books I’ll frequently pull out to browse through for enjoyment.

Pulp-reading is, by its nature, an insulated group. By that, I mean it’s tough for a person to learn about a character/topic/theme without having to refer to multiple sources to get a thorough history. We shouldn’t force people to do homework. So I think making my Companion books available is a solution for those fans who wish to learn more about a topic… after all, there’s not a top of information on most of these characters online.

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Additionally, many of these books revolve around series which were written by multiple authors under a house name. A lot of time has been spent on attempting to identify writers, and I felt it was important to make that research available. The next generation that wants to dig deeper on IDing authors will appreciate having this information in easy-to-reference editions, I’d reckon.

AP: You’re a publisher and a lot of pulp publishers are also writers? What about you? Are you a writer and if so, what is your general interest as an author?

MM: No, I wish. I’m not a good writer, so I’ll leave that to the people who are.

AP: Altus Press obviously deals with multiple pulp characters. Are there any you haven’t worked with/researched enough/been involved with in some way that are on your to-do list?

MM: Not really. I’ve published Lester Dent which was a dream come true. If anything, it would be great to have a hand at publishing an authentic Doc Savage or Shadow original story and have it considered part of cannon.

AP: It obviously doesn’t seem like you or Altus Press have anytime soon to slow down. Any further projects you can discuss?

MM: There’s plenty in various stages of completion now. The Page Death-Bat book I mentioned earlier is almost done. That’ll make 1200 pages of Norvell Page that I’ve done in just a couple of months.

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I’m just about finished with another companion book, this being The Dime Detective Companion, which reprints a pretty cool story: the fifth anniversary story (from 1936) “The Tongueless Men”. What makes it cool is that it’s written in round robin style, with five of Dime Detective’s most popular writers at the time–William E. Barrett, Carroll John Daly, Frederick C.Davis, T. T. Flynn and John Lawrence–writing a chapter apiece. And it’s up to the reader to figure out who wrote which chapter! It’s pretty fun and it’s never been reprinted before.
I’ve also got my reprinting of the complete series of The Green Lama coming out soon. While I’ve spaced out my previous multi-book series reprints, I’m going to be putting these out in succession, across three volumes. So Green Lama fans won’t have to wait too long for the next books.

I also have a pair of books collecting the adventures of The Suicide Squad coming… two books containing six stories each.

Several more Companion books from Tom Johnson, such as The Black Bat Companion and The Dan Fowler Companion, as well as another collection of Tom’s new stories.

Another multi-book reprint series starring Richard Knight by Donald Keyhoe.

A special Phantom Detective anthology… Doc Savage fans will really enjoy this one!

And last (but certainly not least) is a collection of Paul S. Powers western material, about half of which is comprised of unpublished manuscripts. It’s going to be a great book.

And that’s just the next few months! There’s plenty more down the road. And I’d like to add that these would be impossible to do without the help of so many kind people in the pulp community, among them Tom Johnson, Will Murray and Ray Riethmeier… without their help, our books would be much weaker products.

AP: We can’t thank you enough for being with ALL PULP today, Matt!

MM: Thanks for having me. I’m pleased to see so many regular updates on All Pulp; it makes for frequent visits!

  • News
  • September 30, 2010

REVIEWS FROM THE 86TH FLOOR- Reviews by Barry Reese

FIRST WAVE #4firstwave4-8386797
DC Comics
Brian Azzarello & Rags Morales

The fourth issue in the First Wave “kick-off” limited series is finally here, despite the fact that the line has progressed far beyond it at this point. As with the first three issues, the art is stellar — Rags Morales is one of the best working in comics today and I enjoyed his interpretations of Doc Savage, The Spirit, Rima and The Bat Man quite a bit.

Unfortunately, the story is still a bit of a mess, with an unclear plot-line and some unlikeable characterization along the way. How does Doc Savage know the Golden Tree is evil? Because they claim to be interested in promoting peace but they haven’t invited him to be a member, and he’s practically the face of fighting for peace! I’ve seen some reviewers online who seem to like that reasoning but it stopped me in my tracks and made me wonder just how big Doc’s ego is supposed to be. They must be evil because they didn’t invite me to join? What?

I did enjoy The Bat Man’s internal narration at the end and there is an undeniable thrill to seeing Doc alongside The Spirit and Bat Man but if this is the best DC can do with these characters, I think the First Wave isn’t going to be around much longer.

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