Details supplied by Steve Scott. Bluebook would become a shadow of itself by the time its '60s revival as Blue Book for Men staggered into the '80s, but in 1952, it was still riding reasonably high as the sibling magazine of Redbook, though it had just lost its most legendary editor, the late Donald Kennicott, and new editor Maxwell Hamilton was making some changes, including more nonfiction in the mix and moving away from some of the devotion to historical fiction and, to a lesser extent, sf and fantasy. This issue includes such old hands at the magazine and in other pulps and digests of the era as Nelson Bond, Robert Bloch, John D. MacDonald, Tom Roan and a relative newcomer as the only female contributor to this issue, Elsie Lee. Another notable byline is that of Ib Melchior, who would gain his greatest infamy in his scripting and other contributions to some of the worst skiffy films at midcentury, certainly least the Danish production Reptilicus, which was notable in several ways, including having its giant monster portrayed by a poorly-designed and -controlled marionette, and causing havoc by spewing acidic mucus, which the monster belches up by having the yellow/green goop drawn on the negative of the film with what looks like ink. The Bloch novella, "Once a Sucker", is a slightly shorter form of Spiderweb, first published in an Ace Double two years later, in 1954, and reprinted in 2006 with another 1950s Bloch short novel, Shooting Star, in a double-volume by Hard Case Crime. An out of work radio announcer/actor in L. A. is sucked into assisting with an elaborate series of cons by a Very Careful megalomaniac and his collaborators, who begin by setting up fake spiritualism rackets and sexual blackmail stings, while the ringleader is beginning to take his potential leadership in a satanic cult very seriously indeed. The reverberations from, among others, the Jack Parsons, et al., involvement in the Aleister Crowley Thelema cult, and Scientology, and anticipation of the likes of "est", are rather deftly employed here, along with laying out some of the various tricks of the "psychic" trade and means of encouraging potential cult members to Get and Stay In Line. Bloch lays the jokey patter on a bit heavily at first, and then gets down to business. It's not quite noirish nor hardboiled, but it's in the neighborhood. The John D. Macdonald vignette "Delivery Boy War" involves the trade-offs military life requires of married couples, in this case the relatively dangerous duty faced by US pilots and crew even in transporting fighter planes from the U.S. to South Korea, during our Police Action of the '50s. Morale and how it can be (barely) maintained is the subject, and it's treated sensibly in the narrative, as was JDM's wont. Elsie Lee's vignette "Ever Since Eve" is a bit of folktale/joke satire of the vicious pomposity of foolish judges, albeit set perhaps unfortunately in historical Arabia. It makes its point. I shall be reading at least the Roan and Bond stories soon. FFB reviews of Spiderweb by Robert Bloch: James Reasoner (and again for the Bloch Centennial) Ed Gorman (and hosted by Patti Abbott) .jpeg)  For more of today's stories, please see Patti Abbott's blog. .jpg) |
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Cover artist John Cullen Murphy was perhaps best known of this work on the PRINCE VALIANT comic strip, first working with creator Hal Foster from 1970 to 1980, then with his son Cullen Murphy doing the scripting until John Cullen Murphy's retirement in 2004. Ha also drew the boxing comic strip BIG BEN BOLT.
Elsie Lee wrote some 35 books. including tie-in novels for two AIP Edgar Allan Poe films and one for the SAM BENEDICT televisions series, based on the program's sixth episode "Twenty Aching Years." As "Elsie Cornwell," she wrote the Edgar-nominated novel THE GOVERNESS (1972).
Jon Cleary was the popular Australian author of the Scobie Malone detective series (20 novels). Among his thirty-five other novels was the Edgar Award-wining PETER'S PENCE and Ned Kelly Award-wining DEGREES OF CONNECTION, as well as the popular HURRAY SUNDOWN and HIGH ROAD TO CHINA. He was one of the popular Australian authors of all time.
Richard (Martin) Stern won the Edgar for Best First Novel in 1959 for THE BRIGHT ROAD TO FEAR. Among his other works were six books about Johnny Ortiz. He is probably best known for THE TOWER which was used as the basis -- along with Thomas N. Scotia and Frank M. Robinson's THE GASS TOWER -- as the basis for the Irwin Allen blockbuster film THE TOWERING INFERNO.
William Heuman wrote about 70 books and a long list of short stories -- mainly westerns, sports, and juveniles -- for over thirty years. Several of his books were Gold Medal original paperbacks.
Tom Roan was a very popular western pulps author from the 1920s until his death 1958. He published a few novels but was far more successful in his shorter works. In reviewing his OUTLAW IN THE SADDLE, James Reasoner said that "he writes great action scenes" but "is no prose stylist. His writing is full of awkward phrases and oddly constructed sentences. Hr doesn't handle the romance angle well, either." James found the shorter works by Roan that he read to be enjoyable.
William Holder wrote over a hundred stories for the pulps and the slicks in the 40s and 50s; as "Lee Wells" he was a frequent contributor to the sports pulps.
Thanks! I knew some of this, though of Elsie Lee I knew little enough to think it worth adding the WIKI link, after discovering the extent of her career. Roan, particularly, is someone anyone who has read westerns even casually (maybe perhaps particularly if they read them in the anthologies Bill Pronzini and others put together over the last several decades) might well recognize...and I did cast my eye over Holder's FMI entries...I knew Murphy's name, but didn' know why...
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