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- Sticking it to the Man: Revolution and Counterculture in Pulp and Popular Fiction, 1950-1980, now available for pre-order
- 2019 mid-summer reading report back
- Playing dirty: war as a criminal enterprise
- My top 10 reads of 2018
- Interview with Iain McIntyre, author of On the Fly! Hobo Literature & Songs, 1879-1941
- ‘Broadsword calling Danny Boy’: In praise of Where Eagles Dare
- Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria
- Pulp Friday: a celebration of Tandem Books covers
- Joint launch of new cinema books on Rollerball and The Fly, Sunday, November 4
- The pulp magazines under the floorboards
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The lurid world of pulp
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Category Archives: Crime fiction
2019 mid-summer reading report back
Summer is the one time of the year I am able find a decent amount of time to read. And, despite going full bore on my PhD at present, this year has, thankfully, been no different. Here is a very brief mid-summer reading report back.
The Real Lolita, Sarah Weinman
I have to fess up to not having read Vladimir Nabokov’s novel, Lolita, or seen either of the films based on it (I have Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 version and, having read The Real Lolita, want to see it). This didn’t stop me from devouring Weinman’s book. The Real Lolita has two threads. The first deals with the 1948 abduction of an eleven-year-old New Jersey girl, Sally Horner. The second looks at the torturous process by which Nabokov created what is his best-known work, the story of a middle-aged literature professor and his obsession and, eventually, sexual relationship with a 12-year-old girl, a story which Weinman contends Nabokov partly based on the Horner case.
Weinman painstakingly recreates the circumstances of Horner’s abduction and sexual grooming by a much older man, and the lengthy police investigation into her disappearance. It is fascinating, at times, horrific stuff and she puts it together brilliantly. I found the second strand concerning Nabokov less satisfying. … Read more
Posted in Australian crime fiction, Australian noir, Crime fiction, Neo Noir, Noir fiction, Science fiction and fantasy, True crime
Tagged Anna Kavan, Dancing Home, David Whish-Wilson, he Coves, Ice, Ira Levin, Lolita, Lou Berney, November Road, Paul Collis, Sarah Weinman, The Boys From Brazil, The Coves, The Real Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
My top 10 reads of 2018
I reconciled myself long ago to the fact I will never get to the end of a year without thinking I have not read as much as I should have. That said, I have read some great books this year. Fiction and non-fiction, old books and new, in no particular order, here are my top ten reads for 2018.
Red Dragon, Thomas Harris
This year, I read a few bestsellers from the past to see if I can figure out what made them so successful, and this was my favourite. The book that introduced Hannibal Lector, it is a riveting rollercoaster ride into the serial killer mind. Beautifully written and acutely observed. Harris includes some incredible detail on forensics and police procedure without overdoing it. Red Dragon is the perfect mix of elevated airport novel and hardboiled crime story.
Twisted Clay, Frank Walford
Australian writer, Frank Walford’s 1933 account of a murderous young woman, a pathological liar and sociopath, was banned in Australia until the late 1950s. The story, which contains patricide, sex work, suicide and the young female main character’s burgeoning awareness and enjoyment of her lesbian sexuality, is a wonderfully lurid read. One can only wonder what readers must have made of it in the 1930s. Not surprisingly, they seemed to like it as it was a bestseller in the UK and US, where it was published.… Read more
Posted in 70s American crime films, Book Reviews, Crime fiction, Noir fiction, Non-crime reviews, Science fiction and fantasy, True crime
Tagged 1966: The Year the Decade Exploded, Beautiful Revolutionary, Bran Mak Morn: Legion From the Shadows, Charles Taylor, Elka Ray, Frank Walford, Hard Boiled Hollywood: Crime and Punishment in Post-War Los Angeles, Jack Waters, Jon Lewis, Jon Savage, Karl Edward Wagner, Laura Elizabeth Woollett, Opening Wednesday at a Theater Or Drive-In Near You: The Shadow Cinema of the American 1970s, Patricia Highsmith, Red Dragon, Ripley's Game, Saigon Dark, Scott Adleberg, Scott Adlerberg, Thomas Harris, Twisted Clay
Interview with Iain McIntyre, author of On the Fly! Hobo Literature & Songs, 1879-1941
Regular readers of Pulp Curry may be familiar with the name Iain McIntyre, my co-editor on Girl Gangs, Biker Boys and Real Cool Cats: Pulp Fiction and Youth Culture, 1950-1980, and its follow up, Sticking It to the Man: Revolution and Counterculture in Pulp and Popular Fiction, 1950-1980, out sometime in 2019. Iain is also the editor of a number of his own books, the most recent of which, On the Fly! Hobo Literature & Songs, 1879-1941, has just come out through PM Press. On the Fly! is an anthology which brings together dozens of stories, poems, songs, stories, and articles produced by hoboes to create an insider history of the subculture’s rise and fall. Iain was good enough to answer a few questions about his latest book, researching hobohemia, and the links between hobo culture and crime writing.
One of the points you make in the introduction to On the Fly! is that while there have been a lot of historical and academic studies about American hobo culture, there is very little currently available in the words of the members of the culture themselves. Where did you get the inspiration for this book?
I’d long been aware of hobohemia’s influence on American popular culture via country and folk music songs, Charlie Chaplin’s Tramp character, etc but it wasn’t until I met some modern train hoppers in the 1990s that my interest was really piqued.… Read more
Pulp Friday: a celebration of Tandem Books covers
Regular readers of this site will be familiar with my particular jones for late 1960s and 1970s pulp covers, particularly the photographic ones. For me, they represent a very creative but little celebrated body of book cover art and, as far as I am concerned, the Brits were the masters of it.
A week or so ago, during one of my frequent second hand bookshop jaunts, I stumbled across a 1967 copy of novelist and beat poet, Royston Ellis’s coming of age tell all, The Rush at the End. The wonderful cover is an example of what I am talking about when I go on about my love for photographic book covers – a cheap but imaginative shot that dives deep into the book’s themes of sex, drugs and the emerging counter culture.
Pulp enthusiasts have rightly devoted considerable time and energy in celebrating the covers of UK publishers such as Pan, Panther and New English Library. But there were a host of other lesser known outfits active on the British publishing scene in the 1960s and 1970s, who contributed some terrific covers. One of these was the little known Tandem Books, publisher of The Rush at the End. Indeed, along with Mayflower Books, Tandem contributed some of the strangest and best covers of that period.… Read more
Posted in British pulp fiction, Crime fiction, Horror, Pulp fiction, Pulp fiction in the 70s and 80s, Pulp fiction set in Asia, Pulp Friday, Pulp paperback cover art, Science fiction and fantasy
Tagged 1970s pulp, British pulp fiction, Charles Birkin, Death Sport (1978), Doctor Who, Idries Shah, John W Campbell, Lust For a Vampire (1971), Nick Carter-Killmaster, Nicolas Roeg, Performance (1970), Photographic book cover art, Roger Corman, Royston Ellis, Sergio Leone, Tandem Books, The Thing From Outer Space