Sun 11 Nov 2018
Pulp Stories I’m Reading: LARS ANDERSON “The Domino Lady Collects.”
Posted by Steve under Pulp Fiction , Stories I'm Reading[9] Comments
LARS ANDERSON “The Domino Lady Collects.” Short story. Domino Lady #1. Originally published in Saucy Romantic Adventures, May 1936. Collected in Compliments of the Domino Lady (Bold Venture Press, 2004). Reprinted in The Big Book of Female Detectives, edited by Otto Penzler (Black Lizard, 2018).
Not the first paragraph of the story, but close to the beginning, and introducing the first recorded adventure of The Domino Lady!
Fairly tame stuff, by today’s standards, but while I don’t know for sure, I suspect that at a lot of newsstands in 1936, you had to ask if they carried copies of Saucy Romantic Adventures, and if you didn’t look like some kind of close-minded law enforcement officer, they might have been able to sell you one from under the counter.
Copies of the magazine that have survived until today go for large amounts of money. Scarcity and high demand. Simple economics. It certainly can’t be great literature that buyers are looking for.
In the Penzler edition, the story is only eight pages long, barely enough to introduce the character, describe what it is that motivate her to dress up in style but adding a domino mask to keep her real identity a secret. She also has a job she has been asked to do, which she does most efficiently (some indiscreet letters must be retrieved). She has vengeance on her mind, to avenge the killing of her father at the hands of the “state machine.” That the villain in this piece is not jailed or otherwise inconvenienced by her intrusion into his home may mean the story continues right on into the next one.
It’s a mere trifle, nothing more, and when it comes down to it, the writing is nothing to get excited about, D-level at best. Lars Anderson may have been a house name. If he was a real person, nothing solid seems to be known about him, but that his semi-sexy tales are being reprinted — and that stories of the character he created continue to be written by other hands — does say something about his ability to capture the minds of readers still young at heart. A little nostalgia for days past doesn’t hurt either.
The original Domino Lady series —
The Domino Lady Collects. Saucy Romantic Adventures, May 1936
The Domino Lady Doubles Back. Saucy Romantic Adventures, June 1936
The Domino Lady’s Handicap. Saucy Romantic Adventures, July 1936
Emeralds Aboard. Saucy Romantic Adventures, August 1936
Black Legion. Saucy Romantic Adventures, October 1936
The Domino Lady’s Double. Mystery Adventure Magazine, November 1936
November 11th, 2018 at 7:21 am
Well I’ve always been a sucker for women in masks, but thatthehell is a “chastely-rounded body”?
November 11th, 2018 at 10:44 am
That caught my eye, too, and it brought at least two possible interpretations to mind. But I’d only be guessing. It is a puzzlement.
November 11th, 2018 at 12:03 pm
Old British TV line:
“She’s so beautifully chaste …”
” … and so easily caught up with …”
Sorry – couldn’t resist …
November 11th, 2018 at 12:36 pm
… at least three possible interpretations.
November 11th, 2018 at 7:55 pm
I’m pretty sure chastely rounded means she is more Harlow or Lombard than say Jane Russell or MM, in short the svelte type favored by Hollywood in the thirties, at leas that is the impression you get from covers and interior illos. In fact that is the type most often portrayed in thirties spicy pulps and not the va va vavoom types of the forties and fifties.
I’ve read some of these and there is a more or less continuing story among the run. None of them are great literature but they are harmless fun, and certainly she is the only one of her type in the pulps other than adventuress Vivian Legrand, a near villain.
November 11th, 2018 at 10:27 pm
You forgot to mention one additional story, “Emeralds Aboard,” wherein the Domino Lady gets wrapped up in a jewel heist during a transcontinental journey.
I’m glad to see someone is reading the original DOMINO LADY stories, after all the work we put into the reprint edition. I suspect, these days, many people are discovering “our old friend” Ellen Patrick through contemporary Moonstone comics, or other less accurate interpretations.
Most of the contemporary writers and illustrators depict her as sexy and sleazy, rather than beautiful and sophisticated. I described her in those latter terms — Steranko got it, but even his formidable influence can’t seem to keep people on course.
November 11th, 2018 at 10:48 pm
Hi Rich
Thanks for catching that missing story. I messed up big time, but I’ve made the correction.
I’ll go along with your description of Ellen Patrick as being beautiful and sophisticated, sexy perhaps, but never sleazy.
I think David’s image of her along the lines of either Harlow or Lombard is just about perfect.
Congratulations again on a fine collection Getting Jim Steranko to do the cover quite a coup at the time, and it still is.
December 5th, 2018 at 11:59 pm
It appears Will Murray has ID’d Lars Anderson as Thelma B. Ellis.
December 6th, 2018 at 12:17 am
Yes, I saw that too, Darci. I just haven’t had a chance to get to my blog today, so you were able to break the news here before I could. Thanks!!