Any pulp fiction collectors out there?

I've just started collecting lesbian pulp fiction! I began my collection by buying a first printing of Spring Fire by Vin Packer. Curious to see who else collects pulps, and what kind of pulps! Where do you find yours, and what's your search strategy?

I began my collection by buying a first printing of Spring Fire by Vin Packer.

Nice!

I'm not sure I can really call myself a collector as I don't make a special effort to seek them out, but I will buy old pulp titles in various genres if I run into it, and not always with the intention to read. I'm interested in graphic art and the covers are often irresistible. I suppose that's rather collector-y of me.

No strategy to speak of beyond checking out used bookshops and sales.

Hi Jessica,

A book that you might find both interesting and of use in your collecting endeavors is "Strange sisters : the art of lesbian pulp fiction 1949-1969, by Jaye Zimet, Viking Studio, 1999. It also has an introduction by Ann Bannon. The isbn is 0140284028.

I have collected vintage paperbacks, digests and pulps off and on for several years. I tend toward sci fi and mystery, but will pick up most anything depending on cover artist, imprint, condition and cost.

Goodwill stores, local thrift shops, Salvation Army stores and flea markets are all great places to explore in your quest. I mentioned imprints earlier. Among those you should be on the lookout for are Midwood, Beacon, and Gold Medal from the 50s and 60s. Mainstream publishers like Bantam, Dell, Pyramid and so on, were not averse to publishing lesbian or gay fiction, but were not especially flashy in their promotion of the books or in their cover art.

Happy hunting.

>3 bientrey:

Oh, yes, good reference. Here's the touchstone:

Strange sisters : the art of lesbian pulp fiction 1949-1969

> 4 LolaWalser:

All these years, and I don't think I have ever made use of touchstones. Thank you.

>5 bientrey:

Ha, you can't have posted a whole lot in Talk! :) (The instructions for touchstones are on the right of every "add a message" box.)

That's a very impressive collection--or dozens--of vintage paperbacks you have there, btw!

I began collecting "antebellum romances" like The Mahound and Eulalie, among others. Tasteless cultural knickknacks, at least in the age of Django Unchained and Paula Deen saying incredibly racist things.

I inherited a few doozies from my late husband which are cataloged in his account ibonewits, including several faux-Ian Fleming books by Ted Mark which by current standards are more like soft porn. He (my husband) was friends with Randall Garrett back in the day, so I've to a couple of those, too. My favorite cover is Pagan Passions.

In my own catalog I have a 1947 edition of Gypsy Rose Lee's G-string Murders, again with a wonderful cover, and a 1957 paperback of Peyton Place.

Now I'm inspired to go tag them Pulp Fiction.

I don't make a super-strong effort to "collect" pulps, but I do enjoy having a fairly robust selection of them. I like pulp science fiction books and spy novels, but what I especially like are the "pulp" publication versions of classics.

I collect pulp mysteries and sometimes find other pulps in that area. Like Lola, I find the covers irresistible and consider them works of art.

I travel for my work so am able to cast a wide net at thrift stores, antique stores, and used book shops. The key is to find good deals as a book that is falling apart and unreadable is rarely worth $20.

I wrote what I thought was 50s-style pulp fiction back in the 90s during my first attempt at college. I wrote 5 novels before I turned 30, never had any published (due to lack of self-interest and funding), and haven't written a book since. Got too busy with life. Have started books, including a book about a bisexual male shaman in Siberia who lived to be 108 and somehow survived Russification and Stalinism and lived to tell about it. Of course it's all fictional. I had to abandon the novel because most of the research needed for the book was in Russian which I can't really read very well at all. It would've been an amazing story though.

Looking back on this idea, it sounds as if it were a combination of Miss Jane Pitman and Black Elk, influenced by Ann Reid, who wrote a wonderful book about Siberian Shamanism. Ann Reid's book inspired me to write the novel in the first place.

Being a fan of the life of Gypsy Rose Lee (not necessarily her career although I do admire her as a skilled showgirl), I've heard of her G-String Murders. I'm pretty sure she wrote it to make money. Her son would've been 4 at the time.

>12 HilariaDiana: I have a copy of G-String Murders with a wonderful pulp cover, and have seen the movie starring Barbara Stanwyck (also known as Lady of Burlesque). It's great fun with lines like, "Strangled with her own g-string!"

Some say that it was ghost written by a friend of hers, Craig Rice, but others say his contribution was minimal. I suspect at least some of the Rice advocates are indulging in bias; a stripper couldn't possibly be a competent writer.

She may have written it "for the money," but her career was doing great at the time. Murder mysteries were very fashionable for a few decades, so it might also be she just wanted to take a shot at it.

I remember when I was a kid watching her daytime TV show. She was a pistol.

>13 PhaedraB:
"Craig Rice... but others say his contribution was minimal."

Craig Rice was a woman.
https://www.librarything.com/author/ricecraig

>14 Crypto-Willobie: Thanks.