Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Fantastic Adventures, May 1942

I hate snakes in real life, but for some reason, put one on the cover of a pulp or a book and it always catches my attention. Throw in a scantily clad young woman with a spear, and I'm definitely going to notice a cover like this one by Malcolm Smith. Several of the Ziff-Davis regulars show up in this issue of FANTASTIC ADVENTURES, including David Wright O'Brien (once as himself and once as John York Cabot in a collaboration with another Z-D stalwart, William P. McGivern), Don Wilcox, Robert Moore Williams, and David V. Reed. Also on hand some pretty famous names: Robert Bloch, August Derleth, Nelson S. Bond, Stanton Coblentz, Ralph Milne Farley, and future comic book scripting legend John Broome. FANTASTIC ADVENTURES always had good covers and pretty good writers. I'm not sure why I haven't read more of them. 

Classic Horror Fiction: No Light for Uncle Henry - August Derleth

August Derleth’s short story “No Light for Uncle Henry” appeared in the March 1943 issue of WEIRD TALES. It was reprinted in a couple of Derleth collections, one from Arkham House and one from Battered Silicon Dispatch Box. It’s the first thing I’ve read by Derleth in quite a while, but I enjoyed it. It’s the story of a young man who goes to live with a bachelor uncle in a small Midwestern town. Another uncle had lived in the same house until recently, when he died. The surviving uncle gives the young protagonist strict instructions that no light is to be taken into the dead uncle’s former bedroom . . . but we wouldn’t have a story if the guy didn’t do exactly that, would we? What does he find when he steps into that deserted room and lights a match?

A sinister shadow cast on the wall, even though there’s nothing there.

I’m about as far from a scholar of Derleth’s work as you could find, but even without being that familiar with it, I get the feeling this is a pretty minor tale. The plot is fairly predictable, with the “twist” at the end not coming as much of a surprise. And yet, it’s a pretty entertaining yarn, a nice little slice of mild, rustic, Americana horror. I enjoyed it enough that I wouldn’t mind reading more by Derleth.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Strange Stories, June 1940

From very late in the Weird Menace boom, this issue from the Thrilling Group's entry in that genre has an eye-catching cover and some good authors mixed with several I've never heard of. On hand are Henry Kuttner (twice, once as himself and once as Keith Hammond), August Derleth (also twice, once as himself and once as Tally Mason), Robert Bloch, Hamilton Craigie (who I think of as more of a Western writer, even though he turned out stories in just about every genre for the pulps), and Don Alviso (likewise). The ones I'm not familiar with include Jack B. Creamer, Earle Dow, John Clemons, O.M. Cabral, and Maria Moravsky. It looks like a pretty entertaining issue, even if the Weird Menace pulps were running out of steam by then.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Weird Tales, November 1934

That's a Margaret Brundage cover, of course. What else could it be? And this issue is so packed with stories that Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, and August Derleth don't even make the cover. E. Hoffmann Price, Paul Ernst, and Kirk Mashburn are still remembered today, but I doubt if S. Gordon Gurwit is exactly a household name. I don't know that I've ever read anything by him. Still, his work was popular during that era, because I've seen his name on numerous pulp covers. Anyway, with issues like this, it's easy to see why WEIRD TALES is such an iconic pulp magazine.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Weird Tales, November 1941

This cover by Hannes Bok seems appropriate for a few days before Halloween. I like the 1940s issues of WEIRD TALES. Great lineup of authors in this one: Edmond Hamilton, Manly Wade Wellman, Henry Kuttner, August Derleth, Frank Gruber, Clifford Ball, Robert H. Leitfred . . . These guys wrote some fine weird fiction.

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: Strange Stories, August 1939

This cover is by Earle Bergey, although you might not guess that to look at it. Not a space babe in sight. But plenty of good authors, including Robert Bloch, Henry Kuttner, E. Hoffmann Price, Carl Jacobi, August Derleth, and Norman Daniels.

Zombies From the Pulps!: The House in the Magnolias - August Derleth and Mark Schorer

"The House in the Magnolias" by August Derleth and Mark Schorer is another tale that first appeared in the pulp STRANGE STORIES, in the July 1932 issue. In this one, the narrator is a landscape painter, John Stuard, who comes across a picturesque old mansion just outside New Orleans surrounded by magnolias. Stuard wants to paint a picture of it, so he asks permission of a woman who lives there, the beautiful and mysterious Rosamunda Marsina, who reluctantly gives him permission to stay there while he's working. Stuard is attracted immediately to Rosamunda, but he's baffled by sinister noises he hears at night, and it won't come as a surprise to know that he decides to investigate and discovers more than he bargained for.

This is another story that seems to have been directly inspired by W.S. Seabrook's THE MAGIC ISLAND. There's even a line of dialogue referring to Haiti with that phrase. It's a good yarn, too, well written and no less compelling because we know where it's going. Derleth is more remembered as the founder of the publisher Arkham House than he is for his writing, but I've read a number of his stories and always enjoyed them. According to Jeffrey Shanks' introduction, Schorer was a long-time friend and occasional collaborator of Derleth's. Together they've written a very entertaining story in "The House in the Magnolias".

ZOMBIES FROM THE PULPS! e-book and trade paperback on Amazon.