Issue Review - Blue Book magazine, January 1936

Thought I’d begin this year with a review of Blue Book, another of my favorite magazines. It’s easy to overlook it, most of the covers are not spectacular. However, in the 1930s Blue Book was definitely better illustrated than Adventure magazine, and generally had high quality fiction spanning many genres – science fiction and humor included.

This issue is representative of the quality of the issues in 1930s overall. In the 1940s, Blue Book changed to a bigger size, and I hope to have a review of one of those issues later this year.

Blue Book - January 1936 - cover by Herbert Morton Stoops

The Blue Book Magazine [v62 #3, January 1936] ed. Donald Kennicott (The McCall Company, 15¢, 144pp, pulp, cover by Herbert Morton Stoops)

Review of Adventure – March, 1940

Inspired by a post on James Reasoner’s Rough Edges blog. Cover by Wesley Neff, interior illustrations by multiple illustrators.

Adventure, March 1940 - cover illustration by Wesley Neff

The Seal of Jenghis Khan - short story by H. Bedford-Jones

H. Bedford-Jones was the King of the Pulps before Erle Stanley Gardner took over, writing more than a million words of fiction a year. The Seal of Jenghis Khan is fairly typical of his writing style, building a story on historical fact and lore around the legendary Genghis Khan.




The Seal of Jenghis Khan by H. Bedford-Jones (Originally appeared in Adventure, 10 June, 1923]

 

Download the story here.

H. Bedford-Jones, King of the Pulps, speaks about his typewriter's keyboard layout

From the letters column of the Author’s League Bulletin, Vol. 6, No. 7, October 1918, a letter from H. Bedford-Jones about some typewriter modifications he made to increase his speed. Bedford-Jones was the "King of the Pulps", writing more than a million words a year.