Five Questions Archive (21-40)
Every week (ish) New Pulp Heroes sits down with an artist or author creating new heroic fiction works in order to pull back the curtain and give you, our faithful readers, a look into the mind of new pulp fiction’s best and brightest creators.
Here we are, the 20th episode of 5 Questions With… and this installment means we’ve now embarked on adventures with 20 new pulp creators who’ve each recommended at least three universes of New Pulp goodness!
How awesome is that?
This week, NewPulpHeroes dives into the world of criminal justice with author and professional crime solver, Brad Mengel!
Working in the criminal justice field gives Brad unique insight into the seedy underbelly of the shadow world. Coupling that viewpoint with his incredible wordsmithing skills, Brad delivers great new pulp from Pro Se Press and others. You can read more of his thoughts on speculative fiction here: Brad’s Pulpy Blog
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
BM: I’d read about a number of pulp heroes in “Imaginary People”by David Pringle and I was fascinated by these characters. Then I must have been about 13 when I found “The Man of Bronze” at a flea market which had the cover painted to look like Ron Ely. Doc was a amazing guy who trained himself to peak human ability to fight evil and he had a team of guys and they would fly around the world finding lost civilisations it was pretty impressive.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
BM: I don’t think pulp storytelling ever really went away – the success of the Bantam Doc Savage reprints meant that we got very pulp-style characters like The Destroyer and The Executioner. I even wrote a book about them “Serial Vigilantes of Paperback Fiction”
As I was writing that I started to research what were the current series being published and I found the New Pulp movement. For me it wasn’t enough to write about these characters I wanted to create my own pulp characters and create new adventures for some classic characters. I’ve been lucky enough to have a Destroyer short story published.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
BM: Dillon by Derrick Ferguson – I have enjoyed the hell out of this series, Dillon in such a great character.Derrick is familiar with the classic pulps and other pulp style stories and he makes the genre his own.
Jack West Jnr series by Matthew Reilly – I am a hardcore Matthew Reilly fan and his Jack West series is total pulp featuring a retired soldier who has these amazing Indiana Jones style adventures that may change the fate of the world. I’ve started a book on the train and missed my stop. Really you can’t go wrong with anything by Matthew Reilly.
The Deep by Tom Taylor and James Brouwer – This is one of my personal favourites. The Nektons are a family of explorers who live on a submarine named the Aronnax. They sail around the globe exploring the ocean, dealing with sea monsters. It started as a comic book and was adapted as an animated series, which is on Netflix. Taylor and Brouwer work on the animated series as well so it’s very faithful. It’s all ages and so much fun.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
BM: I’d love to spend 24 hours with Ellen Patrick, The Domino Lady. We’d hang out in Hollywood with movie stars and celebrities. I’m sure she needs a getaway car driver.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
BM: I’ve just finished a story for an anthology that allows me to provide a different take on Dracula, I’m actually really excited by what I did with the characters from Dracula taking them in a completely different direction, I’m also keen to see what my fellow writers have been able to cook up.
I think other people will really like where I’ve gone with the concept and be surprised with the fates of classic characters.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Brad for all he’s done to advance the realms of new pulp. Buy Brad’s books here.
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We’re almost 20 episodes in to 5 Questions With… and it’s been one adventure after another! But, before we hit the BIG 2-0, we have to embark on sojourn #19.
This week, NewPulpHeroes brought in former pharmaceutical scientist, Wayne Carey. Better known as the mind behind Airship 27’s Alan Quatermain novels.
Along with new stories of H. Rider Haggard’s pulp adventurer, Wayne has brought us the world of El’aris in his own science fi epic, also from Airship 27.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
WC: At the time I first read A Princess of Mars, in the late sixties, I was unaware of pulps. I was already a big science fiction fan, but Edgar Rice Burroughs captured my imagination like no one else could. I haunted new and used book stores, finding as many of Burroughs’ books as I could, reading many in a single day. Burroughs was my gateway to the pulps, through reprints that abounded in the sixties and early seventies. From Conan and Solomon Kane to Doc Savage, and I’m still discovering more.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
WC: I ran across Pro Se Press through someone on Facebook posting their need for writers for various anthologies. I contributed a couple of stories, then was fortunate enough to be included in Airship 27’s Legends of New Pulp Fiction. That was my introduction to Ron Fortier. When I discovered he published new adventures of my childhood hero, Allan Quatermain, I had to contribute. I wrote two Quatermain novels for Ron, and he later accepted other material from me. It hasn’t stopped yet.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
WC: Teel James Glenn, who could be his own pulp hero, has written a broad range of material, but one particular series, concerning his world of Altiva, is reminiscent of Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser with aspects of Robert E. Howard. Anything by Teel is eminently entertaining.
Nancy Hansen’s series of Jezebel Johnston has every element expected in any pirate story, and much more. Nancy has a knack of creating believable and distinctive, fully developed characters. But more important is her attention to detail. She is a fanatical researcher and not only does it show, but it pays off. When her female protagonist stands on the deck of a pirate vessel, you feel as though you are right there beside her, feeling the breeze, the sway of the ship, hearing the creak of the yard arms and the flutter of the canvas.
John Bruening’s Midnight Guardian series is like watching an old movie from the thirties or forties. His stories could have easily been written eighty years ago but provide the modern audience with thrills and excitement rarely seen. They are nostalgic in a way that pulls you in and drops you into the past, to fight crime along side the protagonist, Jack Hunter.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
WC: Any hero of Edgar Rice Burroughs would do, but it is more a toss-up between John Carter, the Virginia gentleman transported to Mars, or Tarzan, aka John Clayton, Lord Greystoke. Spend the day in Helium, watching the twin moons hurtle across the sky, chatting with the Warlord of Mars or watch the vast savanna of East Africa from the Greystoke bungalow, listening to jungle tales from Tarzan? Hard choice. But considering my love of animals I would probably choose to run through the bush alongside Tarzan (Sorry Woola), although I’d never be able to keep up.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
EC: Airship 27 is about to release Executive Gambit, a political thriller set in the present, involving assassinations and conspiracies. I’m very excited to see what everyone thinks. However, Airship 27 has just released El’aris, my first novel about the exploits of an older space mercenary, Tony Michaels. This begins the next step of his life, and a series revolving around him and his future adventures. This series brings in elements of Andre Norton, E.C. Tubb, and Edmund Hamilton. Just old fashion science fiction. Yes, Michaels is a mercenary, fighting for hire, but he has a heart and a conscience. Sometimes he is on the wrong side, but he eventually finds his way to do what is right. The second novel, Yokai, will be released early next year, with more to come.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Wayne for all he’s done to push the boundaries of imagination. Buy Wayne’s Books Here
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Have we really hit #18 of 5 Questions With… ? Yes we have and what a great ride it’s been so far! If you haven’t caught all 17 prior interrogations, click the “Five Questions Archive” above to get caught up. It’s like binge watching, but reading, and much cooler.
This week, NewPulpHeroes sat down with four time Bram Stoker award winning author, Nancy Holder. With novelizations of Wonder Woman, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel and Smallville as well as helping create the original story for Firefly. In realms more directly tied to New Pulp, Nancy has authored stories spotlighting Domino Lady, Zorro, Kolchak the Night Stalker, The Avenger and Sherlock Holmes.
Not only that, but she’s had a hand in creating a few exciting New Pulp characters making their debut soon. Read on to find out more!
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
NH: I was crazy about Sheena when I was a little girl. We owned a walnut grove; we would use long bamboo poles to knock down the walnuts, which we then peeled and bagged in burlap sacks. I used one of those poles as a spear and trotted around with my blond hair. My next-door neighbor Ricky was Jungle Jim, and we traipsed all over the countryside in Walnut Creek, in northern California, having our jungle adventures. My cousins and I also played Tarzan. My buxom older cousin was Tarzan, I was Jane, and my younger cousin got to be Cheeta. We made outfits out of washcloths and we would run the bathtub faucet to make our waterfall. I can only imagine what my aunt and uncle’s water bill was like
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
NH: Somehow I came into contact with Joe Gentile of Moonstone Books and I started writing Domino Lady in comic book and prose form for and with him. I had wanted to write comics for a long time and was so grateful to him for the chance. Really, my way in was that this was a chance to write comics. But then as more prose pulp gigs came in from Joe, I branched out into Zorro, Kolchak, The Avenger, Sherlock Holmes, and others. What I love about pulp is a sense of un-self-conscious fun and adventure, although I will admit now that I feel cautious about “exotic” elements that were part of that fun growing up–my jungle heroes could be perceived as awfully racist, for example. What I think New Pulp brings to the show is infusing pulp landscapes with somewhat evolved sensibilities. For example, I did a Domino Lady comic book that dealt with the terrible treatment of farmworkers.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
NH: I was poking around the Moonstone site and saw Elizabeth Massie Julie Walker: The Phantom. So awesome! She and I know each other from the world of horror fiction and we are two of the original Necon Whores.
I’m also loving all the pulpy pastiches starring Holmes and Watson, so many I hesitate to name names lest I forget. I’m a Baker Street Irregular and I spend a lot of time working in the world of Holmes these days. To make up for that vaguebooking, let me say that Greg Cox writes great pulp.
My Aussie friend and editor Christopher Sequeira has created The SuperAustralians, which is a comic starring Australian Superheroes, so that’s a bit off New Pulp prose, but still really cool.
You yourself (Mike Bullock) are doing some neat stuff!
And I would be remiss in not mentioning my occasional writing partner, Bobby Nash, who always has some new projects going on.
That’s, like, five people. Sorry.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
NH: Wonder Woman! I novelized the first Gal Godot/Patty Jenkins movie and I love, love, love Wonder Woman. I love that she is kind, and loving, and fully embraces her superhero calling without angsting and brooding over it.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
NH: I think this is the first announcement that Joe Gentile and I co-created a character named “Domino Patrick,” who is the daughter of the Domino Lady. She has adventures in the swinging sixties. After a hiatus due to a death on our team, the excellent David Boop is editing her first anthology. It should be out soon.
I’m writing the comic book series Mary Shelley Presents, which are adaptations of stories written by women from Mary Shelley’s own time period and on up. We just collected the first four issues into a graphic novel of Victorian-ish era ghost stories. Now I’m doing four science fiction stories. The first is a lost-world style novella by Francis Stevens (her pseud.), very pulpy.
I’m doing a team-up of Green Hornet and Kolchak for Moonstone as well as creating a new series with another writer for Moonstone, but we aren’t announcing the deets yet. It’s supernatural noir and I’m totally excited about it.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Nancy for all she’s done to further the world of speculative fiction. Buy Nancy’s books here.
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Installment 17 of 5 Questions With… is ready for your reading pleasure! Besides, it’s Monday, what else have you to do other than read up on great pulp creators?
This week, NewPulpHeroes sat down with Eric Fein, who began his professional career as an editor and writer at Marvel Comics. Among the many series he edited there were The Spectacular Spider-Man, The Web of Spider-Man, and Venom: Carnage Unleashed. During his time at Marvel, he wrote more than a dozen comic book stories that were published in a variety of titles including The Savage Sword of Conan, Marvel Comics Presents, and The Amazing Spider-Man.
Now, a freelance writer, his pulp stories can be found in the pages of several anthologies published by Moonstone Books including: The Avenger: The Justice Inc. Files, The Green Hornet Casefiles, Day of the Destroyers, and The Green Ghost: Declassified.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
EF: As a kid, I loved all sorts of pulp and pulp influenced characters and stories, as well as comic books. I was into the James Bond movies and novels, Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories, and Batman. Plus, a ton more characters that I don’t have the room here to list.
But the pulp story that really hooked me and captured my imagination was the very first Shadow novel, The Living Shadow. I read it when I was about fifteen-years-old. I already knew of The Shadow thanks to his 1970s comic book series that was published by DC Comics.
The Shadow comics made me want to read the original pulp novels. I found a stack of them in a used bookshop. These were the Pyramid/Jove reprint editions that featured those spectacular Jim Steranko covers.
I remember reading The Living Shadow and being enthralled by the characters and the time period. The novel was chock full of mystery, danger, and excitement.
I loved the way The Shadow radiated menace and how he terrified criminals with his laugh that seemed to come at them from every direction.
The other thing that made a lasting impression on me was the novel’s opening scene. In it, Harry Vincent, despondent over the emptiness of his life, is about to kill himself by jumping off of a bridge. However, he’s stopped by the sudden appearance of The Shadow.
After a brief conversation where Vincent explains his reasons for attempting suicide, The Shadow makes him an offer. Vincent can put his life in the hands of The Shadow and become one of his agents in The Shadow’s war on crime. Or, The Shadow can take him back to the bridge and Vincent can end his life. Of course, Vincent chooses to become an agent of The Shadow. That was pretty intense stuff to read as a teenager.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
EF: Somewhere around 2007 or 2008 I became aware of Moonstone Books. I had a friend who had written for Joe Gentile, who runs Moonstone, and he was kind enough to put me in contact with Joe. We traded some emails and Joe ended up offering me the opportunity to write a Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar story for an anthology he was putting together: Sex, Lies, and Private Eyes. Since I love private eye stories, especially those set in the 30s, 40, and 50s, I jumped at the chance to write one.
It was a lot of fun to do. Joe liked it and invited me to contribute to other Moonstone projects including The Green Hornet Casefiles and The Avenger: The Justice Inc. Files.
A few years later, Joe asked me if I was interested in working with Win Scott Eckert to revitalize The Green Ghost. I jumped at the chance to work with Win and to reintroduce The Green Ghost to modern readers. I loved working on that project. We ended up generating enough stories for a book dedicated solely to the character.
Working on the resulting anthology, The Green Ghost: Declassified,was a wonderful experience. I wrote three prose stories and two ten-page comic book stories for the project. The comic book stories were illustrated by David Niehaus.
I also co-wrote another Green Ghost prose story, for the book, with Win. That was a lot of fun, too.
One of the joys of the Green Ghost project, besides working with Win, David, and Joe, was that it gave me the opportunity to create my own pulp hero, The Black Shrike, and feature him in a story with The Green Ghost.
As for why I felt compelled to create new pulp tales, I love to write and more specifically, I love to write about pulp heroes. So when I was presented the opportunity to do so, I took it.
For me, writing pulp stories is not work but a labor of love. I get to travel through time and space and meet fascinating characters by just sitting in front of my computer and letting my imagination run wild.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
EF: I really enjoy the Kolchak: The Night Stalker novels and short story anthologies that Moonstone Books publish. I love the character of Carl Kolchak and his dogged determination to find the truth of whatever mystery he is investigating, even if doing so puts him in danger.
I think Will Murray’s Doc Savage/Shadow crossover novels (Doc Savage: The Sinister Shadow and Doc Savage: Empire of Doom) are great fun. They’re published by Altus Press. Again, I’m a big fan of The Shadow. Anytime he gets featured in a new prose adventure it’s a happy occasion for me. If you like your pulp heroes in the classic tradition, these books are for you.
For fans of private eyes who crack wise, there’s the Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar anthology published by Moonstone Books and edited by Tommy Hancock. It’s a great collection and I’m not just saying that because I have a story in it. Tommy loves the character, knows him inside and out, and put together a stellar team of writers.
Here’s a bonus recommendation: the graphic novels of Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips. Incognito in particular plays with elements of pulp heroes and comic book superheroes and delivers a fresh take on the genre. Their other books are Criminal, Kill or Be Killed, and The Fade Out. All of them are fun reads.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
EF: It would have to be The Shadow. I’m sure it would be quite nerve wracking being around him. I’m pretty sure there wouldn’t be a whole lot of chitchat but it would be cool to see the nuts and bolts of his operation: how he moves around the city so quickly without being seen, how he manages his team of agents, and where he gets his stylish wide-brimmed fedoras.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
EF: I’m working on several projects at the moment. Some of them are unannounced so I can’t say too much about them. However, one of these top-secret projects is a novel featuring a popular licensed character. It should see print in 2021. I’m also contributing stories to a couple of anthology projects that are also under wraps for the moment.
I think as a writer your enthusiasm for what you write comes through in your finished stories. I’m very excited about all of the projects that I am working on. I hope readers sense that passion in my work and get as much enjoyment out of reading my stories as I had writing them.
One project that I can talk about, and is particularly exciting for me, is that I am developing a series of novels featuring my pulp hero, The Black Shrike. The Black Shrike is a hero in the tradition of classic pulp characters such as The Shadow, The Avenger, and The Black Bat, but with a dash of James Bond added into the mix.
I think readers who enjoy pulp stories that balance action and adventure with vivid characters will find a lot to like in adventures of The Black Shrike.
If all goes as planned, The Black Shrike novels will begin to see print in late 2021.
Thanks for the opportunity to be interviewed and share my love of pulp with your readers.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Eric for taking the time from his busy schedule to take us on this trip to his sector of the Pulp-verse. Buy Eric’s books here!
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Installment 16 of 5 Questions With… is here for your reading pleasure! Besides, it’s Monday, what else have you to do other than read up on great pulp creators?
This week, NewPulpHeroes sat down with Gary Phillips, an incredible author who has brought us new pulp tales featuring the Avenger, Kolchak the Night Stalker, Johnny Dollar and more.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
GP: It was a Doc Savage story. Of course like a lot of folks of my generation, it was seeing that compelling James Bama cover on the spinner rack that like Frazetta’s Conan covers, piqued your interest and you just had to check the paperback out – reading the back cover copy in terse, staccato words what this was about. I believe it must have been Death in Silver or Mystery Under the Sea. Both as I recall start with some hapless guy being chased in the streets of Manhattan by the bad guys. Right there then, you’re dropped into the action, you feel for the man being pursued and you want to know who it is that’s after him and why. Techniques still employed today in genre storytelling across various mediums be they thrillers, action-adventure or neo-superhero like the recent Project Power flick – riffing as it does on Hourman and his Miraclo pills.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
GP: I’d published my first couple of mystery novels then got the chance to do some work in comics – my first love. Crime fiction tales in fact. In that way somehow me and Joe Gentile of Moonstone started communicating and back in the day, he’d come out to the West Coast and have a booth at Comic-Con in San Diego. We’d hang some and that’s how I got introduced to what Joe was doing in terms of utilizing licensed pulp characters like the Spider and the Avenger… and then got to write short stories with those characters.
As to why I was compelled, well we know crime fictioners such as Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and Erle Stanley Gardner started in the pulps. Mystery and crime elements are fundamentals in pulp stories so it was a natural to try my hand at the genre.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
GP: The Black Centipede stories by Chuck Miller are my kind of thing, mash-ups of hero pulp tropes turned sideways and occult who-do with some psychedelia sprinkled in as well. I hope he does more with this character down the line.
Jezebel Johnston by Nancy Hansen thrills like that time when I was a young teen and first read Treasure island by Robert Luis Stevenson. In this case a young lady who initially disguises herself as a boy to sign onto a pirate ship. Sword play, dangerous characters, Not to get all PC and whatnot, but this series shows us what’s different about new pulp from traditional in that there is accuracy in the portrayal of cultures and so-called exotic lands. The origin of a pirate queen. Whew.
Rocket Crockett by Chris Chambers (full disclosure I edited two stories with this character for Black Pulp I & II) also grabs me ‘cause he’s a jet ace during the Korean War in the tradition of WWII era Tuskegee Airmen –and I had an uncle who was one, killed in air combat over Germany in fact. Larger than life quixotic characters and wild goings on, battling bad guys in the streets and in the air, you can’t go wrong.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
GP: Just for kicks, helping out Jericho Druke when he gets an assignment from the Shadow. In that way I’d get to see his world which wasn’t realized in the pulps, plus probably get weirded out when the Shadow shows and lays those blazing eyes on me.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
GP: All my upcoming projects excite me. I suppose in particular, I’m working on a comic with Brazilian illustrator Mani Magalhães who I’ve worked with before. This will run on the UK’s Aces Weekly online site. It’s a private eye slash supernatural story set in 1958 Los Angeles. The PI is Sam Cairo (inspired by the real life, and I kid you not on his name, Sam Marlowe, said to be the first licensed black PI in L.A.) a WWII vet, a Black Panther. These were the all-black tank crews. His old Army buddy comes to him, Sam’s office ins in the supply room of his uncle’s service station. His fiancé has gone missing and Sam takes the case. Readers will not be disappointed in the visuals and hopefully the story too.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Gary for taking the time from his busy schedule to take us on this trip to his corner of the Pulp-verse. Now, head on over to Amazon and pick up some of Gary’s work: Gary Phillips on Amazon.
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We can’t believe this is the 15th installment of 5 Questions With… ! Thank you all so much for reading and encouraging this sort of thing. As long as you continue to enjoy it, we’ll continue to do it (yes, that makes you a pulp fiction enabler! There, we said it).
This week, we go down the wormhole with author, game designer and all around great guy David Boop. With stuff ranging from I.V. Frost and Black Bat and Green Hornet to his own original works like Gridiron, David has some great stuff out there ready to entertain and amaze you.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
DB: First off, thank you for having me here today. I started with pulp detectives before I got into pulp heroes. I also did a lot of Saturday afternoon serials which our local TV stations ran. Nero Wolfe was a big influence on my novel, and anything with Commander Cody and rocket men (Radar Men from the Moon, Zombies of the Stratosphere.)
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
DB: I came into by way of Win Scott Eckert, who invited me to write a story for Moonstone’s Green Hornet series. As for compelled? C’mon! It’s the Green Hornet and Kato. The Bruce Lee Kato to boot. Who wouldn’t be compelled. Since then, I’ve written several other pulp characters, each one just as fascinating. And now I’m editing pulps, which is a unique challenge of its own. I enjoy keeping this torch burning.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
DB: I really enjoy I.V. Frost by Ron Fortier, Green Llama by Adam Lance Garcia, and anything Kolchak!
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
DB: My first thought would be Domino Lady and whatever she wants, but seriously, I think the most fun hero to hang out with would be Kato. His cool-as-ice, and yet, simple, subtle humor always appealed to me. I would love to spend a day seeing what he does to keep himself centered, as we could all use some of that these days.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
DB: I’m finishing a Domino Lady anthology for Moonstone, and working on another no-so secret project (tied into Domino Lady) for them. I’m also writing two new Gridiron (my original pulp hero) stories, one for Airship 27 and one for Moonstone, and a new Black Bat story. Plus…other things I cannot discuss currently, but there’s a lot coming on the horizon. Why should people be excited? Well, it’s new stuff, for one. And new is often good. The other being, in each of these, I plan to take readers to new places with all the action and mystery they’ve come to expect.
Again, thanks for giving me this chance to talk pulp!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank David for taking the time from his busy schedule to take us on this trip to his corner of the Pulp-verse. Now, head on over to Amazon and pick up some of David’s work: David Boop on Amazon
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The 14th installment of 5 Questions With… takes a left turn at Albuquerque and winds it’s way down under to meet up with none other than Frank Dirscherl. Not only is Frank the creator of The Wraith, he’s contributed many works to the new pulp pantheon via Airship 27 and other publishers.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
FD: It was a paperback of the Spider featuring two novels in one–Death
Reign of the Vampire and The Pain Emperor. As soon as I read those, I
was hooked, completely and utterly. The Spider quickly became my
favourite character and has remained thus.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
FD: I was contributing to it long before I heard of the resurgence of
the genre. I started writing/publishing The Wraith in 2002, and quite
some years later found out about Ron Fortier and others pushing the
genre forward to new and greater heights. I was happy doing my own
thing at the start, but was thrilled and gratified to see a new
movement form around me, so to speak.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
FD: I really like the works of Bobby Nash. Anything by him, be it his
Lance Star stories or his contributions to my own universe, are the
best I’ve seen.
Brother Bones, from my guru Ron Fortier, is also
thoroughly recommended. He’s one of the best in the biz.
I like Mike W. Belcher’s Man in the Mask comics, which aren’t pulp novels per se, but are highly reminiscent of the genre.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
FD: Hmm…that’s a tough one. Probably either the Spider or my own
character The Wraith. The former simply because he’s my favourite, and
the latter because he’s my own, and I think he leads a pretty fine
life outside the crime fighting world, and I wouldn’t mind living that
life for a time.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
FD: I have so many on the boil, it’s hard to nail it down to just one.
I have several novels in the works, continuing The Wraith Adventures
series (which already sits at eight), but I’m also working on side
projects featuring that character, such as action figures, Pop vinyls
and the like. But, if I must, I think I’m most excited about the Lady
Wraith novel I have envisaged. That’ll be a lot of fun, and it’ll have
one heck of a painted front cover.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Frank for taking the time from his busy schedule to answer our interro- err, questions. If you have a minute, check out his work via his Amazon Author Page: Frank Dirscherl on Amazon.
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It’s time for lucky #13 in the 5 Questions With… series. This week, New Pulp Heroes exchanged took a ride on the White Rocket with author and publisher Van Allen Plexico.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
VP: As a little kid in the 1970s I remember seeing the Conan and Doc Savage little paperbacks, and visually they made an impression on me and intrigued me, but I never got into them the way I did the comics of that era. Then, years later, I discovered the Del Rey collections of Robert E Howard’s Conan and Solomon Kane—the original versions, 100% Howard, no tampering by later writers— and I was hooked. Those stories totally hold up today; it’s like he just wrote them. The sentence structure, the imagery, the pacing, the vivid characters, the raw fire behind every word; all of those things combine to make Howard’s writing transcend eras and feel as fresh today as they ever did. They truly demonstrate the power words can carry and the majestic beauty and force of a well-told tale.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
VP: Some mutual friends introduced me to the Pulp Factory group of writers, artists and publishers back around 2006. I was excited because by that point I was already well into writing the SENTINELS superhero novels. My co-plotter, Bobby Politte, and I had been calling those stories “pulp” all along. We understood that’s what we were writing, and I was glad to discover others were doing the same thing, in many different genres. It felt from the beginning as if we could all help each other to lift New Pulp to greater heights than any of us could have managed alone.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
VP: The Pulp Heroes series from Wayne Reinagel is an absolutely *massive* set of books that encapsulate everything I love about classic crime-fighter pulps of the 1930s. They are huge and sprawling and truly epic.
Bobby Nash is a very fine crime/action/suspense fiction writer, capable of crafting stories on the order of those starring Jack Reacher and Raylan Givens, and set in any era of time. I recently began his Snow series of contemporary thrillers and love it.
I. A. Watson is a brilliant writer and everything he touches is worth reading—particularly his Robin Hood novels and his Sherlock Holmes stories from Airship 27.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
VP: Honestly, with a lot of them, I don’t think it would be very much fun to hang out with them in their environs! Thinking of the ones I know best and have written, I’ll say Kerry Keen, the Griffon. He was a rich guy with a mansion, in the style of a Bruce Wayne, and a cool airplane. I’d just hang out in his mansion and sample his wine cellar and library while he fought crime.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
VP: There’s no doubt it’s MONACO HEIST. In the past two years my VEGAS HEIST and MIAMI HEIST were published to rave reviews and a Best Novel award for VEGAS (it’s early days yet for MIAMI–we’ll see!). I wasn’t sure where to have my master heisters, Harper and Salsa, go next. Then Alan J. Porter mentioned a certain robbery at the Monaco Grand Prix, back in the same decade my boys were active. Immediately I twisted his arm to come on board as co-author for book three. We’ll be getting underway with it very soon. I think readers should be excited about it because, not only will they be getting more crime-filled action with Harper and Salsa (and their ladies), but Alan will bring his own expertise of Formula 1 racing and Monaco and Europe in general to the mix. I can’t wait!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Mr. Plexico for slowing down from all his amazing work to answer 5 Questions With… Now, check out the amazing offerings of White Rocket, thank us later.
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In this, the 12th installment of 5 Questions With.., New Pulp Heroes exchanged fire with author Andy Fix, one of the rising stars in speculative fiction. Andy’s passionate love of all things action and adventure radiates from everything he does. Check out this post, then grab some of his work and see for yourself.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
AF: I ran across a copy of the first Ace edition Conan book when I was six or seven years old. I was a Conan fan from the Marvel comics, and I was super excited to find a whole book full of Conan stories. The book was a challenge to read at that age, but I devoured it, and then the rest of the series in quick succession. The action, the adventure, and the sense of fright and wonder from the fantastic and the horror elements enthralled me. My brain has been warped ever since…
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
AF: I was living in Columbus, OH in 2013, and My friend Jeff Venture dragged me to PulpFest, which was held in Columbus back then. I had never heard of PulpFest before, much less the New Pulp movement, but I grew up reading the likes of Conan, Doc Savage, Tarzan, and John Carter.
The most impressive table at that show was Airship 27’s display. I was floored at all the colorful books for sale. I dropped a fair amount of cash that day. After chatting with Ron Fortier and Rob Davis for the better part of an hour, Jeff offhandedly mentioned that I was a writer (more of just a dabbler at that time.) Ron asked if I’d be interested in trying my hand at a pulp story. I saw this as a great opportunity to get some writing experience, so I agreed to give it a shot. A year later, I turned in my first pulp story (a Secret Agent X adventure) to Ron. It was a thrill seeing that in print, and I was hooked
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
AF: Ron Fortier’s Brother Bones is, hands down, the grooviest character to come out of the New Pulp movement. In fact, he could stand right up there with the greatest of the classic pulp-era characters. He’s iconic. And his city, Cape Noire, is such an imaginative setting, just filled with dynamic characters and dramatic and exciting story potential. I was honored to be able to contribute to this lore in the most recent Brother Bones anthology.
Van Allen Plexico’s Sentinels series is epic cosmic-scale superhero mythology done right. Clearly inspired by the works of legendary comicbook creator Jim Starlin, Plexico spins an exciting, multi-verse spanning adventure across nine novels. Great stuff!
Charles F. Milhouse has created in Captain Hawklin a classic adventure hero in the same vein as Indiana Jones and Doc Savage. His eight Captain Hawklin novels are all exciting, well-plotted stories filled with non-stop action. I can’t wait for the ninth book to drop later this summer!
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
AF: Man, I can only imagine how much fun it would be to go drinking with Conan, but most of those stories end with bloodshed, so I think I’d pass on that.
I would have to say spending a day spent with John Clayton, Earl of Greystoke would be pretty exciting. I’m a lover of all things to do with nature and animals, and who better to go on a guided tour of the jungles of Africa with than Tarzan, Lord of the Apes
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
AF: The project I’m currently working on has been top secret up til now, but I’ve received special permission from the licensor of this particular property to discuss it publicly here for the first time.
I’m working with the estate of comic book creator Dave Cockrum (most famous for co-creating and illustrating Giant Size X-Men #1, arguably the most impactful comic book of the modern age) to complete a very early and, up until now, unfinished sword & planet tale.
Dave Cockrum’s Thundersaber started as a comic strip series that appeared in the back of a sci-fi fanzine back in the late 60s. The ‘zine folded after just a few issues, so Dave never had a chance to finish the story. He broke into comics soon after, and Thundersaber was set aside for more lucrative work. And now I’ve been given the opportunity to complete the adventure as a prose novel.
What first drew me to the property was the fact that, like me, Cockrum was an unabashed fan of all things Burroughs, particularly the progenitor of the sword & planet genre itself, the tales of John Carter of Mars. Cockrum’s comic book work was obviously influenced by ERB’s tales, and so is my own writing, so Thundersaber is a perfect fit for me.
I think any fan of ERB, Leigh Brackett, Alex Raymond, or any other author of sword & planet tales will enjoy the setting Cockrum created. And I plan on developing the setting and the characters with loving care and respect for Dave’s work. If I do my job well, it’s going to be an exciting, rip-roaring adventure tale! And did I mention it’s going to have a cover painted by Douglas Klauba?
I hope to have Dave Cockrum’s Thundersaber available by early next year.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Mr. Fix for taking time from his crazy schedule to explore the Hyborian Age of 5 Questions With… Now, check out his work, thank us later.
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With the 11th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes sat down with actor, stuntman, fight coordinator, swordsman, author and new pulp creator Teel James Glenn. Not only has he created a wide range of original new pulp characters, worlds and stories, he was also Dr. Strange for 7 years (that was one of the outcomes the good Dr saw leading up to Avengers: Endgame).
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
TJG: I learned to read from comic books so I loved series/heroic characters from the very start. That lead to series books like Tom Swift, Rick Brant and the Three Investigators, but then I stumbled on the Man of Bronze reprint from Bantam and that was it! I still have the first Bama poster they gave out as a premium on my office wall today! I was soon jumping back and forth between Doc Savage and Conan books-often reading two books a day and I was hooked.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
TJG: At a comic book convention I found a copies of fanzines like Rocket’s Blast Comic Collector and through that I discovered the Bronze Gazette and Pulp Vault. Suddenly I realized the books I loved had history before the present day! I fell down that rabbithole to old pulps then the new pulp work of the legendary Tom Johnson with Echoes and Paul Mccall’s Ace of Aces—I wrote for both those publications and was off and running, creating my own versions of pulp inspired characters. That lead me to Pro Se, Airship 27 and a host of the new pulp moment publishers.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
TJG: Anything by Nancy Hansen is gripping, character rich stuff, but particularly her Jezebel Johnson pirate tales from Airship27 are rich and her Vagabond Bard stories from Pro Se are truly beautiful prose.
Derrick Ferguson ’s Dillon is exciting pulp updated to today—never a dull page.
The Doc Atlas stories by Michael Black and Ray Lovato are a wonderful re-imagining of the Doc Savage stories and will please any Doc Savage fan. They may be hard to find these days, but they have been around a while.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
TJG: Why, yes, it is a cheesy question, lol- but no question I’d love to spend an evening with Dr. Pauli- the alter ego of the Green Lama—I imagine he would be a genial and informative person and the Green Lama stories are wonderfully written tales.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
TJG: I have two new projects coming out in the coming months—
A Cowboy in Carpathia is a novel coming out from Pro Se Productions and is the first of a series following the pulp author Bob Howard in a world where he does not take his own life. Instead he travels the world having adventures. In this one the king of the pulps goes up against the Prince of Vampires and faces off against Dracula himself! Pure pulp action Texas style!
Killing Shadows a martial arts-noir thriller is a first in a series coming out from Airship27. It follows Jon Shadows, bi-racial son of a pulp era legend (my Dr. Shadows character) trying to make his own mark on the world in a modern day adventure. In this first novel he tries to save an old flame from a mad tech genius and a bunch of Yakuza killers. I guarantee you will never forget his assassin mother as a character….
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Teel for taking time from his adventurous schedule to swash some buckles with us. If you get a chance, shoot him a line and dive headfirst into a life of excitement, adventure and heroics.
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With the 10th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes sat down with one of the cornerstones of the New Pulp world, Moonstone Books’ own Joe Gentile. Author, editor, publisher and all around great guy, Joe has an unstoppable love for heroic fiction that suits his immovable determination to make things happen. From Airboy to the Avenger, Mr. Keen to Spider and more, Moonstone has a huge back catalog of speculative fiction in both comic and prose forms, including some interesting hybrids. If you’ve not steeped your psyche in Moonstone lore, wondrous worlds await you!
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
JG: The Avenger #1: Justice, Inc. (warner paperback version). Found it at a used bookstore for like 50cents. Picked it up because I liked the cover art and liked what I read on the back cover. What got me about this book, was the character himself. The origin was so original and unusual, for me as a kid then, that the Avenger’s tragic beginnings tugged at my heart. The helplessness of his plight, then the grim development of his character. he wasn’t looking for death per se, but if death came, he would welcome the reunion with his family.
Years later I saw a similar tale in a movie with Jodie Foster. It was powerful, but not as powerful as an Avenger movie could be!
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
JG: For me here at Moonstone, I felt the absence of pulp. I wanted NEW stories of these classic characters. I felt called to spend a decade fighting to get the rights to The Avenger.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
JG: Lazarus Gray by Barry Reese: He is an Avenger type, but the stories are actually better written. No loose ends. Stories are fun, and make logical sense.
The Centipede by Chuck Miller: just superb pulp writing at its finest!
Runemaster by Mike Bullock: an oozing violent mixture of epic Viking storytelling and the ‘always at a cost’ spell-casting. I don’t often do Sword and Sorcery, but when I do, I like some fresh meat. Eat hearty, my friends, on Runemaster.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
JG: Richard Benson, the Avenger. I would want him to teach me. He had done so many things in his life. Perhaps his quiet confidence maybe would rub off on me. Maybe, just maybe, I could help him find that music soothes the soul.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
JG: This is always a tough question, as I don’t want to forget anything or anyone involved.
We have some very exciting “double features” coming up that will have some surprise characters involved!
And we have a long in the works top secret “fun” project that will surprise a lot of folks…
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Joe for taking time from his busy schedule to stalk the shadows with us. We can’t thank him enough for how much time and energy he pours into the advancement of heroic fiction.
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With the 9th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes invites you into the mind of none other than Ed Catto. A man of many talents, interests, dreams and skills, Ed is most famously known as one half of the ownership of Captain Action, quite possibly the coolest action figure line in the history of ever. Along with Joe Ahearn, Ed brought the good Captain back from distant memories, reinvigorated him with new comics, prose, toys and more. Ed was also instrumental in helping Joe Antonacci revive Joe Palooka, the IDW comic series. When now reviving old properties, Ed loves drawing long walks on the beach dreaming up great new ways to promote cool things.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
EC: The first pulp story that grabbed me was the Pyramid reprint of the Shadow story Double Z. The Steranko cover was fantastic and irresistible to me. I was enjoying the DC comics version of the Shadow at about that time, and had read a lot about pulp heroes in Steranko’s History of Comics. As I recall, my mom was a little put off by my request. I was just a kid and while buying comics was one thing, I think she was afraid it was too adult or full of sex scenes. After all it came from the Paperback Section of the store. But that one started a love of pulp prose for me!
By the way – Years later I had Jim Steranko autograph a copy for me.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
EC: I was working with Moonstone on projects and always followed Ron Fortier (from this Green Hornet days) so I had an eye on the pulp resurgence. So the Airship 27 and Moonstone stuff was the first on my radar. I was eager to find ways to get involved from the get-go… it seemed like New Pulp was one big fun club with folks who liked all the stuff I liked!
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
EC:
(1) Will Murray’s stuff is always a thrill ride, and his Shadow + Doc Savage team-ups are just fantastic.
(2) I can’t wait to see what Jim Beard has planned next for his series, Sgt. Janus. He’s a fantastic writer.
(3) Airship’s Jezebel Johnston series from Nancy Hansen is fresh and fun. Its not all about PI’s & dames, you know!
(4) Bonus : Moonstone’s Johnny Dollar because I like the radio version (Bob Bailey episodes are the best) and especially the gorgeous Doug Klauba cover on the latest one!
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
EC: Hm…I’d like to say Domino Lady, but I that she’s the age of my daughters, so I am little old for her. Besides… my wife would kill me! So maybe I’d go with Ravenwood, Stepson of Mystery. We’d just have cocktails on a NYC penthouse balcony the whole time… what fun that would be!
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
EC: I’m hip-deep into illustrating a Three Musketeers book for Airship 27 that’s been a riot to work on. The period illustrations are challenge so I’m really stepping up. I’m also illustrating a story for Jeff Vaughn that will be in Bedtime Stories #3 from American Mythology. It’s very pulpy, now that I think about it. And I’m writing a few cool articles for Back Issue Magazine (Marvel’s War Is Hell and Gold Key’s Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp) and contributing another essay to the Batman 66 series. We’re focusing on season #2 this time!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Ed for taking time from his busy schedule to take a ride with us. We can’t thank him enough for how much time and energy he pours into the advancement of heroic fiction.
For the 8th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes hoped into the Green Hornet’s Black Beauty for a spin around town with none other than Ron Fortier. Creator, writer, publisher and all around great guy, Ron has brought more to the new pulp movement than we can detail in this paragraph. Chances are if you love new pulp, something about it that moves you has Ron’s mark on it somehow, some way.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
RF: I remember reading a Tarzan paperback when I was 12. The concept was outlandish and fun. Tons of great action adventure. Later on I found Doc Savage and the Shadow reprints, along with Conan. At the time I wasn’t aware of the tag “pulps.” All I knew was fiction from this era was special.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
RF: In 1968 I discovered the Pinnacle series, The Executioner and Destroyer
paperbacks. I recognized them immediately as modern day pulps. Then when Moonstone books took it upon themselves to do prose stories of Lee
Falk’s comic hero the Phantom, I realized they were in fact doing pulps.
Seeing a need for such to keep pulps alive, Rob Davis and I began
Airship 27 Productions and along with several other companies launched
the New Pulp era.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
RF: First would have to be DILLON by Derrick Ferguson. Clearly one of the
first black pulp heroes ever created. Wall to wall action in every
single story with immensely likeable characters and dastardly villains.
Pure pulp all the way. Two – Sgt. Janus Spirit Breaker by Jim Beard. One
of the most innovative occult detectives ever imagined. Stories are
always fresh and original. The Peregrine by Barry Reese. A tip of the
fedora to all the classic pulp avengers of the 30s and 40s, Reese built
an amazing universe and populated it with so many wonderful heroes, but
Peregrine was the first and in my humble opinion, the best.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
RF: It would be the beautiful and sexy Ellen Patrick, better known as Los
Angeles’ Domino Lady. And what would I do? I take her out on the town.
Dinner at a fancy restaurant and then dancing at a swank Hollywood
downtown club.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
RF: The new Brother Bones – Tales of Cape Noire now in production. First
time the collection is made up of stories focusing on supporting
characters and written by other writers. In this case Fred Adams Jr,
Andy Fix and Drew Meyer. My Doc Dunniger story for the forthcoming book Endless Mystery from Pro Se. Tommy Hancock assigned me the character born in the old St. Germain publishing house and he’s easily one of the most intriguing heroes I’ve ever written. Finally, the Brother Bones
graphic novel to be illustrated by artist Chris Nye. Fingers crossed it
will be out sometime in 2021.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Ron for taking time from his busy schedule to take a ride with us. We can’t thank Ron enough for his lifetime spent adding mightily to the speculative fiction multiverse.
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For the 7th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes went on an adventure with the multi-talented Gerald Welch. From music to graphic design to pulp novel writing, Gerald is certainly a man of many talents that we’re all blessed to enjoy.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
GW: The first pulp I remember reading was a Sherlock Holmes story and but I was obviously too young for it to grab me, even though at the time (I was eight?) I had no idea what a “genre” was. Even so, our school library was limited to the “classics” so I was limited in my access. I was reading traditional fiction and found pulp stories fast and fun. In fact, I felt guilty that I liked them, because they weren’t “classical” literature, so I was even embarrassed to bring them to school. But that was my projection; people weren’t judging me.
If you think about it, comic books are an illustrated form of pulp, and I was reading a lot of comics until my Mom burned them, because I was “reading too much.” She let me keep a few paperbacks, but even they were lost in one of our many moves.
If I had to choose an early pulp story that really grabbed me, I’d have to choose one of Tarzan’s stories. It was in our world, and obviously fiction, but the way it was written, it made it seem totally plausible to me. If the internet would have been around at that time, my eight-year-old self would probably have searched to see if it was based on a true story.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
GW: I became aware of the resurgence of pulp storytelling after reading a few Destroyers. It’s one of those things where you have been doing something and don’t realize it until later. I personally think the resurgence began with Mack Bolan and Remo Williams and the dozen other titles that didn’t survive.
Why did I feel compelled to contribute? One book: Destroyer #70. I was in the Army at the time and as a broadcast journalist (Goooood Morning Vietnam! but on the TV side of things) I worked odd hours. I had been a long-time fan of the Destroyer by that time, in fact I chose Korea as my post because of the series. I had to be onsite at 2am for some kind of remote shoot, so when I picked up Destroyer #70 around 4pm, I thought I would just read the first couple of chapters (Chapter Two always starts “His name was Remo…”) and I would just finish it later, because I needed to sleep a few hours before work.
Yeah, that never happened. I couldn’t put the book down, because it was wrapping up every loose end in the series and when I finished the book, I literally thought the series had just ended. So, even though I was not a writer, I thought that if there were not going to be any more Destroyers, I would write some of my own, so people could feel what I feel when reading a good story. I worked on that awhile (it was horrible) and realized that I just wasn’t a good enough writer. Then, on my 38th birthday, it just hit me: no one starts out “good enough,” so I gave myself ten years to get published.
I put some serious time and effort in writing and wasted hundreds of dollars on books and programs that barely helped, if at all. But I kept working on it and in ten years, I was writing with my favorite author, Warren Murphy.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
GW: I’m going to name Jim Mullaney TWICE because he is just that good. In fact, I believe that he is one of the most underrated authors of our time. The man was cranking out FOUR 90,000-word Destroyers each year. And not garbage, either. These were some of the best Destroyers by any ghost!
1) If you liked his work on The Destroyer (if you don’t, I’m going to just assume that you can’t read), then you will absolutely love The Red Menace. This isn’t the Destroyer, but Jim’s mutant ability to not only make memorable characters but then make the relationship work is amazing.
2) Jim also writes the Craig Banyon series which is the very essence of pulp fiction, but taken to the next level. I feel guilty that I haven’t caught up on the last few Banyons, but I’ll get to them later this year.
3) This will sound weird, but I’m going to go back a bit in time and push the envelope by choosing the BBC’s version of Sherlock. Yes, that’s a television show, but it’s so well written that it transcends media. There are other modern takes on the detective, but none so cleverly written.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
GW: Does Ron Swanson count?
Chiun is going to kill me, but it would probably be The Shadow. I have a billion questions for him, even though I’d probably be afraid to talk to him.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
GW: While Legacy 8 is almost finished and will be available soon, the second Legacy Omnibus is what I’m most excited about. There’s just something about having an oversized hardback that contains three books and has an encyclopedia in the back. It’s like fiction and a reference book all in one, the best of all worlds!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Gerald for taking time from his busy schedule to chat with us. Not to mention the spiffy NewPulpHeroes logo that adorns the front of this site, created by Gerald just for all of us to enjoy.
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For the 6th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes sets sail with the flotilla of pirate ships captained by none other then Nancy Hansen.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
NH: I didn’t have a huge background in the pulps, at least not knowingly. But I had read an omnibus of Robert E. Howard’s ‘Conan’ and on of ‘Jirel of Joiry’ stories by C.L. Moore and really admired the pacing—especially with Howard. The more I learned about the old pulps, the more famous authors I began to recognize who had cut their teeth back in that era. Back in March of 2010, I took fellow writing pal and transplanted Texan Lee Houston Jr.—who is a big fan of comics—to a pulp cover art show at a local college gallery for his birthday. That was about a month before he was recommended as a writer to Pro Se Press, and it was Lee who brought me in. So I guess it was serendipity or maybe fate that I’d wind up writing it as well as reading it. I still hearken back to Howard’s larger than life Conan when I think of the ultimate pulp tale that caught my interest, because I am an avid fantasy fan and writer, and REH could leave you breathlessly turning pages deep into the night.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
NH: Well, as I said in the answer above, it was 2010, and Lee was dealing with some major health issues which had kept him from working. So he had gotten involved in a couple of comic startups that really didn’t get off the ground, and one of the writers he’d been working with got picked up by Pro Se Productions. That person recommended Lee to Pro Se head honcho Tommy Hancock. When Tommy put the word out he was looking for other interested writers, Lee threw my name out there. There was a learning curve involved for me in getting the action and pacing right because I had been submitting mainstream fiction for years, but I picked up on how this was done by reading and volunteer editing of other writer’s work. More importantly though, I found out there was an entire community of readers and writers who loved the pulps and longed for more work in that style of writing. I’d been turning out mainstream fiction for almost 20 years at the time with little success in getting published, and so that initial acceptance into the fold did wonders for my well-bruised ego. Through the magic of the internet, we were able to put together magazines of short stories as well as entire novels, and I finally got some of my stuff in print. Holding that first book with my name on the cover and my work inside (FORTUNE’S PAWN back in 2011) I had the stupidest grin on my face and big tears in my eyes. That story was cut out and revamped to be pulpy from an 850-some odd page lumbering behemoth of a manuscript that I had been shopping around for years. After that, the books just kept coming out of me, because now I had an audience and a willing publisher, and that’s what I had been laboring away all those years to find.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
NH: First one that comes to mind is Chuck Miller, either his BAY PHANTOM series or the BLACK CENTIPEDE. Chuck puts a ton of work into his stories with all sorts of oddball regular characters as well as famous real world guest stars who don’t usually wind up being quite the people you thought you knew about. Chuck’s stuff is always a great read, no matter what he’s writing. Bay Phantom is through Airship 27, the Black Centipede with Pro Se.
Teel James Glenn has a plethora of stories and novels in many different pulp genres. I especially love his ‘Ada’ stories from the ARICA series and his ‘John Shadows’ tales. Ada is a barbarian warrior woman who travels with a bard through a well-defined fantasy world, and they get into all sorts of interesting situations. John Shadows is a modern day ninja/investgator of sorts with an interesting background and an aged and diminutive Oriental mother who can kick ass and take names well into her 80s. Fun reads both of them. Oh and TJ has a simian cop from another world where apes are the top sentient species. He has a human sidekick, and the stories have plenty of action as well as humor, with situations and dialogue that often cracks me up. All well worth reading. TJ says some of these stories I’ve mentioned are not out yet, but you can’t go wrong with any of his writing and he has plenty of it out there with more on the way.
Elizabeth K. Wadsworth I met through a friend of my other half. Writers tend to want to share their stuff with others, and she is definitely 100% pulp in the classic style. She has only three books out, but they are well worth reading. CROOKS BEHAVING BADLY is a standalone with a true crime writer getting involved with a seductive cat burglar. The Malloy & Russell series has two books so far. (MURDER BALLAD & MANHATTAN CONFIDENTIAL) They take place in late 1940s New York with Private Investigator Danny Russell and his red-haired secretary-cum-partner Allison Malloy. I’m not a big PI reader and yet I devoured these, because Liz has a way with a story that just can’t be beat. They’re on Amazon in both paperback and Kindle formats.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
NH: My cheesy answer is gee whiz, do I have to pick just one? Any well written story is a great escape, so today I might be fighting the good fight with Solomon Kane, tomorrow running down those bad dudes with Derrick Ferguson’s Dillon, or sailing the seven seas fighting monsters and collecting treasure with Sinbad in all his new voyages. I’d thrill to the adventures of Zorro, cheer for Bass Reeves, and follow Allen Quartermain deep into what was a dark and unknown continent. Or maybe fly some Martian flivver and race after those multi-armed baddies with John Carter. I wonder if that’s anywhere near Hugh Monn’s city of Galveston 2 on his current homeworld on Frontera? Would Lazarus Gray find work for me in Assistance Unlimited? Heck, I’ve got plenty of my own characters I could hang out with regularly if I was the fast moving and heroic sort. The point is, there’s a lot of really good old as well as new pulp fiction out there and it would be fun to be able to drop into those worlds as well, so keep the stories coming folks. I’ve barely scratched the surface here too, there’s so much to choose from.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
NH: I’ve got a lot of irons in the fire this year, so it’s hard to pick just one. It’s like being asked to choose your favorite child. I am writing my first Western novel, a book I got invited in on. That’s pretty exciting and it was a bit scary at first because I have only written one western short story previously, though I find myself reading more of them off and on. I’m also working on my 7th Jezebel Johnston pirate novel, which is pretty amazing in itself. I knew nothing about seafaring when I got involved in writing it, I just loved pirate movies, and decided to write about pirates but include a historical backdrop. I still have some fantasy stuff awaiting print too, I’ll never stop writing my first love genre. I’ve had my first paranormal investigator story accepted for a UK magazine (OCCULT DETECTIVE MAGAZINE) which is another first for me, placing something with a publisher who is not a US-based. Again I was invited in and was informed that further submissions would be welcomed.
I guess the most exciting thing I did this year was to enter Baen Book’s fantasy adventure contest with a short story. I’m sure there’s a huge field of writers invoolved, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed that somebody sees something worthwhile in what I’ve sent. It’s not the idea of winning the award that appeals to me so much, but knowing that I had something I felt good enough about to send in that mattered. It just adds a bit of frosting on a year that has had its share of cake moments as well as some scary scenarios out there in the real world. Besides the virus pandemic we are all dealing with, I’ve had my own personal ongoing battles with mobility lost to advanced arthritis and the fight to save my vision from stubborn and persistent glaucoma. Writing gives me something I can do from home and not feel like a shut-in.
So I suppose the takeaway message here is that if you make the time to hone your skills, and you labor away at your craft until you feel confident in what you can do, you have something you can fall back on to get you through some rough spots in life. I’ll never claim to have made a lot of money writing, but the satisfaction it gives me can’t be purchased. To be honored with invitations to write for others tells me somebody is reading my stuff and enjoying it. If you’re going to leave a personal legacy and help keep a style of writing like pulp alive at the same time, that’s not too shabby. Hold up your head and be proud!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Nancy for taking time from her busy schedule to chat with us, and for brining her passion, skill and dynamic storytelling zeal to the frontier of modern speculative fiction.
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For the 5th installment of this column, New Pulp Heroes takes a ride through the imagination of Derrick Ferguson, one of the most prolific founders of new pulp fiction.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
DF: Although I’m pretty sure I had read other pulp stories before that one I’m going to go with THE MAN OF BRONZE because it caused such a shift in my consciousness. Up until I read that book, I had no idea that prose like this could exist. It was at the same time extraordinarily simple and deliriously complex. It combined action and emotion. It was high adventure that wasn’t just a story, it was an entire world. It had comedy and tragedy. It was the sunrise and sunset. It was everything I aspired to be as a writer. I had no idea what this style of writing was called but whatever it was, I wanted to do it.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
DF: Tommy Hancock had been talking to me for years about starting a publishing company featuring Public Domain Classic Pulp characters. It was a dream of his for years that we used to have long IM discussions about until 2 or 3AM. And I told him that when he got it started up, let me know. I would say that 75% of the writers in New Pulp now I became associated with back when we were all doing Marvel and DC fan fiction and when most of them migrated to New Pulp I went along. We all were hungry to do something new and different and New Pulp looked to be it.
For a good many years I was associated with an original fiction site called Frontier which is where I think I came to be noticed by editors, writers and publishers who now are in New Pulp. Those years with Frontier was the transition period for me, I think.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
DF: I wish I could buy everybody I know copies of Nancy Hansen’s Jezebel Johnston series. It’s a fabulous swashbuckling pirate saga with a female POC as the lead and it’s astoundingly good stuff.
If you like Weird Westerns, I highly recommend Mark Bousquet’s Gunfighter Gothic series.
Read anything and everything you can get your hands on written by Chuck Miller. He’s a wonderfully deranged writer whose prose is absolutely fearless.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
DF: Pat Savage. I’ve never gotten a pedicure or manicure in my life but I’d sure as hell get one at her salon if she would be good enough to do the honors. Throw in a facial and scalp massage, why not?
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
DF: I’ve got my collection of Sebastian Red stories ready to submit for publication at last. Sebastian Red is a mystical gunslinger/bounty hunter roaming and adventuring in the Weird West of an alternate Earth that I describe as a what might have happened if Sergio Leone and Michael Moorcock had ever collaborated on a Western.
It’s been a long time coming and I’m glad to have all these stories in one volume at last so that readers who are interested don’t have to hunt all over the place to find them in the various anthologies they were first published in.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Derrick not only for taking the time to answer our questions, but for his unending drive to push the envelope and expand the horizons of speculative fiction. Open document settingsOpen publish panel
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For the 4th edition of this column, New Pulp Heroes sits down to explore the worlds of Bobby Nash, one of the most prolific and dynamic authors of modern speculative fiction.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
BN: Growing up, I really didn’t know what a pulp story was, though I realized later in life I enjoyed that kind of story. I read Conan, Tarzan, Lone Ranger, Han Solo, etc. They were pulpy kinds of stories. It wasn’t until I was reading Domino Lady as research for my first time writing her adventures that I truly fell in love with a pulp story. The character was great, fully formed (both literally and figuratively), and intelligent. I was hooked from her first adventure.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
BN: I was talking with Ron Fortier at a convention after my first novel, Evil Ways, came out. He mentioned that he and a few other creators were about to put together anthologies with pulp characters and that he thought my writing style was a good fit for pulp. That was the first time I asked the question, “What exactly is pulp?” Eventually, these anthologies, along with other titles, grew into this thing we call New Pulp.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
BN: Derrick Ferguson’s Dillon series is an incredible journey. Derrick writes great characters and action and Dillon exemplifies the best of both.
Van Allen Plexico’s Vegas Heist is a wonderful heist thriller. Imagine if the Ocean’s movies had that pulp flare. Van also writes great sci-fi pulp too.
The Fight Card series spearheaded by Paul Bishop and Mel Odem is a great series of 1950’s boxing fiction. Each novel is written by a different author, but the entire series is worth the read. (full disclosure, I wrote one of the Fightcard books). The series kicks off with Paul Bishop’s excellent Felony Fists.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
BN: Domino Lady, of course. We might get shot at or chased by bad guys, but I guarantee it would be 24 hours I would never forget.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
BN: My SNOW series is some of my favorite stories and characters. I love writing them and I hope to keep telling Snow stories for many years to come. Snow is a nice mix of 70s/80s p.i. and cop tropes mixed with a dash of pulp style and loud rock ‘n roll. It’s a helluva fun ride
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Bobby, not only for taking the time to answer our questions, but for his undying motivation to expand the imaginative worlds of new pulp fiction.
For the 3rd edition of this column, New Pulp Heroes sits down to investigate the worlds of Jim Beard, author, writer and all-around contributor of the fantastic.
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Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
JB: Though I grew up with my dad’s love of pulp stories and characters, I myself didn’t start in on them until a 1990’s COMIC BUYER’S GUIDE story on Will Murray reviving Doc Savage intrigued me so much I picked up his novel WHITE EYES. From there I started right in on the original Doc corpus with MAN OF BRONZE and then started hunting down other pulp reprints – which in those days were not plentiful and easy to find like today. What I enjoyed was the raw adventure of the Doc Savage stories, the sense of time and place they put across, and the building blocks of later media like comic books, etc.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
JB: When I was first on Facebook I saw writer Ron Fortier’s name and recognized him as the guy who wrote Green Hornet for NOW Comics. I loved his Hornet work and sent him a Friend Request and also noticed he had started his own prose publishing house called Airship 27. He was doing pulp and since I was already a pulp fan and wanted to try my hand at that style of writing, I asked him what opportunities were available. He asked me to write a few pages of pulp as a sample so of course I did a Doc Savage. From that moment on I have never looked back. Pulp is what I do.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
JB: Whew, you don’t ask easy ones, do you? There is SO much good stuff out there now… how about Frank Schildiner’s Frankenstein stories, Van Plexico’s space opera sagas, Nancy Hansen’s pirate works, and — a biased favorite — my own pulp publishing partner John Bruening’s Midnight Guardian series. Yeah, that’s four, but you’re lucky I narrowed it down to even that!
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
JB: Probably Monk Mayfair from the Doc Savage crew. Never a dull moment with him, and he knows how to have fun.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
JB: I am currently republishing my occult detective Sgt. Janus books under my own Flinch Books line. I’ve commissioned gorgeous new covers by Jeff Hayes, added new material to ’em, and cleaned up the editing. To sweeten the pot I’ve also finally finished the long-awaited third Janus novel and together with the other two they’re going to be a fantastic-looking set of supernatural sagas.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Jim, not only for taking the time to answer our questions, but for all he’s done to bolster the world of speculative fiction whether it be through prose, comics, web site copy or non-fiction books delving into the scenes behind the curtains.
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For the second edition of this column, we ‘re thrilled to chat up the incomparable Doug Klauba, artist extraordinaire.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
DK: To be honest, I don’t know if it was one that hooked me immediately, but there were a few that prepared me for the one that gripped me and hasn’t let go since. Growing up in the 1970’s and being an avid comic book reader, monster movie fan, and into rummaging through antique stores and old book stores to discover new treasures, I often discovered visuals that I saw in the magazines and fanzines. So when I would come across a book on the pulps, or an old Grosset & Dunlap Tarzan hard cover – I would snatch them up. But, it was the DC comics versions of Tarzan, The Shadow, Justice, Inc. and Marvel comics publishing Doc Savage and John Carter – that’s when I found those characters excited me more than everything else I was picking up. I was also a huge Buster Crabbe – Flash Gordon fan because of watching the serials on Sunday with my dad. The exposure to all of the heroes of the past led up to my interest of stories set in the “old days” like the 1930’s and 1940’s. But, the one vivid memory that I have is when my friend saw how much of a John Carter of Mars fan I was with the Marvel comics series, and Mark handed me a copy of A Princess Of Mars and said, “you should check this out.” That was the moment! And soon after that The Shadow re-issues with the Steranko covers were released, and I started reading those. It felt so comfortable in the far off world of Barsoom, and mingling with characters in the “olden days” of the 20’s, 30’s, and 40’s. I was always one to walk around the city of Chicago and marvel at the tall shadows in the alleys, and old fire escapes.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
DK: It was just happening around me, and I got rushed right along in with it! So… I was working in editorial illustration for magazines and commercial illustration, mostly in advertising and design and painting for products, and corporations with a book cover coming my way ever so often. But, I never gave up my interests of comics, adventure art, and the pulp heroes. I started to incorporate those interests with my assignments, much to my agents confusion. But at the time that there were more painted comic covers happening in publishing. There was one fateful conversation and showing of my artwork to Lori Gentile at her comic shop, Amazing Fantasy. Lori called her brother Joe Gentile who had just started Moonstone Books and showed him some of my artwork. Then, Joe and I talked and we hit it off. I was a pulp fan, he was a pulp fan. Moonstone was the only independent publisher doing pulp and crime books at that time, and I was thrilled to be a part of what would eventually be called a resurgence. Pulp characters, mystery, crime, and hard boiled tales was my interest and I was looking for more new stuff like Vertigo’s Sandman Mystery Theater comics series, which I was a huge fan of at that time and still am. Listening to Joe about his plans with Moonstone thrilled me, and I asked him for as much of the cover work as possible. Even some interior work, as well. I soon found out about the Windy City Pulp and Paperback Convention in the Chicago area and I became a part of that community as well.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
DK: Just 3?! Well, I haven’t had a chance to really seek out much of the new pulp works, but the stuff that has found it’s way to me that I can recommend highly is Van Allen Plexico’s Harper and Salsa caper: Vegas Heist. Then I can recommend, The Midnight Guardian by John Bruening, and some of the new Wild Adventures of Edgar Rice Burroughs series have been great. Still on my must read pile is Ron Fortier’s Challenger Storm with illustrations by Michael Kaluta! These are all great examples of strong original creator pulp that gets me excited.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
DK: As long as it’s the cheesy question, the obvious answer would be: John Carter – so he could safely show me how I can jump across Barsoom, safely. I would want to watch the Warlord of Wars in action, teach me to use the blade, and give me the whole tour! I want to see Tharks, Warhoons, the white apes, and then I would want to book a few modelling sessions with Dejah Thoris. I’d love to get a few new paintings under way from the original source.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
DK:. Just released is the Limited Boxed, Deluxe Manuscript Edition of A Princess Of Mars from ERB Books. It’s a dream come true from this ERB fan. Especially, since A Princess Of Mars was THE story that grabbed me in the beginning. I was commissioned to do a new full color painting for this edition that features a remarkable amount of top of the line paintings and illustrations. Many included are my favorite pieces of art from Frazetta, J. Allen St. John, Abbett, Whelan, and Manchess. Along with my new color painting and a new black and white illustration, I have a couple of other pieces of mine that were included. The price is for the die hard ERB / John Carter collector or historian but, well worth the price because the packaging is out of this world and filled with so many extras. I was art directed to compose a painting more in line with the classic J. Allen St. John or Roy Krenkel golden age of illustration style. This was the second time I was asked to paint like that era. The first was for the cover of John Carter of Mars from ERB Books, as well. So, yeah – painting. I’ve been in the studio doing some long overview “me” time, after the long days and weeks of teaching, I’m in my studio a lot more. Doing some studying of my own, and experimenting with my paintings. I’m sketching and drawing a lot. Planning out some new works. I’m back working over my own pulp inspired characters, so we will see what comes out of that. And the big exciting project is something that has been in the works for the past 2 years. Designer, book packager, author, and publisher, Robert Garcia has been putting together a collection of my artwork into a book. I have published sketchbooks and a couple of calendars in the past but never a full color art book of my paintings. This will focus on the adventure illustrations and pulp paintings from the last 15 years or so from a variety of characters. Watch for the announcement soon!
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Doug, not only for taking the time to answer our questions, but for the incredible contributions he’s made to the world of pulp fiction. You can check out Doug’s extensive catalog of amazing artwork in his online gallery here.
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For the inaugural edition of this column, we thought it only right to interrogate – err – interview Barry Reese, an author dynamically involved in the birth of new pulp fiction. For those who came in late, Barry is the creator of The Rook, Lazarus Gray, Grave Digger and more. He’s also brought his talent to bear by forging adventures with the likes of The Avenger, Captain Action, KI-Gor, Liberty Girl and a host of others.
Every week (ish) New Pulp Heroes sits down with an artist or author creating new heroic fiction works in order to pull back the curtain and give you, our faithful readers, a look into the mind of new pulp fiction’s best and brightest creators.
Question One: Thinking of the first pulp story that grabbed you, what was it and what about it hooked you?
BR: That’s going waaaaay back. My father had been a pulp collector so I always remember seeing Doc Savage covers, Conan reprints, and The Avenger novels lying around his home. I remember being captivated by the covers and the plot descriptions on the back of the book… and I think it was the Robert E. Howard biographies in the Ace reprints that first put the idea in my head that I could be a writer. My first pulp loves would have been Conan and Doc Savage but it wasn’t long before I moved to The Avenger, The Shadow, Tarzan, and John Carter.
Question Two: When did you first hear about the resurgence of pulp storytelling and why did you feel compelled to contribute to it?
BR: During my time working for Marvel I got the itch to write a pulp-style book. I just wanted to write the kind of things that I had always liked to read. I produced a book called The Conquerors of Shadow and looked around but didn’t come across anyone that seemed to publish those kinds of things. I eventually self-published it through Lulu.com… and one day I saw another book produced through the same site: The Hounds of Hell by Ron Fortier and Gordon Linzner. I ordered it on a whim, absolutely loved it, and immediately sought out the publisher of said volume – Wild Cat Books. I eventually started selling my Peregrine stories to them and the rest is history. I was so thrilled to see that I wasn’t the only one hungry for this kind of material — I was immediately driven to write for them.
Question Three: Recommend three new pulp properties you really dig and why you think other people would enjoy them also.
BR: Derrick Ferguson’s Dillon, Ron Fortier’s Brother Bones, and Mike Bullock’s Death Angel are just three of the first ones that come to mind. All three take classic pulp concepts but infuse them with modern sensibilities. I could see any of those three breaking out into different mediums, too.
Dillon is like a Doc Savage on high testosterone while Brother Bones takes some of the Shadow tropes and goes full-on supernatural with them, and Death Angel is, on the surface, your vengeful vigilante but there are some unique aspects of identity on display that make it stand apart.
Question Four: Here’s the cheesy ask: If you could spend 24 hours with any old or new pulp character, who would it be and what would you do?
BR: If I were 14 years old again, it would be Pat Savage… but at this point in my life, I think I’d like to hang out with Harry Vincent, my favorite of the Shadow’s gang of agents. I’ve always liked Harry and think he’d have some interesting stories to share.
Question Five: Which of your upcoming projects excites you the most and why should people get excited about it with you?
BR:. That’s rough because I write so far ahead – I mean, I’m working on Lazarus Gray Volume 13 right now… and the last one published was 7! So I can tell you that some of the Lazarus books still to come are amongst my favorites – especially books 9, 11, and 13. I also wrote a book featuring Lilith that I think was one of the best things I’ve ever written. Hopefully someday you’ll be able to read them! It’s hard to be patient.
NewPulpHeroes.com would like to thank Barry, not only for taking the time to answer our questions, but for the incredible investment he’s made into the world of pulp fiction. You can check out Barry’s extensive catalog of new pulp fiction on his Amazon Author page here.
New Pulp Heroes 