Thu 7 Jan 2021
Reviewed by Ray O’Leary: MAXIM JAKUBOWSKI, Editor – The Mammoth Book of Pulp Action.
Posted by Steve under Pulp Fiction , Reviews[6] Comments
MAXIM JAKUBOWSKI, Editor – The Mammoth Book of Pulp Action. Carroll & Graf, trade paperback, December 2001.
There was only one story, Fredric Brown’s classic “Don’t Look Behind You,” that I’d read before in this solid anthology of what the editor calls Pulp Fiction though not all the stories were published in the pulps. Since there are too many to go through one by one, I will just comment on some of them.
The volume opens with Erle Stanley Gardner’s “The Kid Clips a Coupon,” which features The Patent Leather Kid (a sort of Simon Templar/Raffles type character), who manages to steal $70,000 while clearing an innocent man of murder. Though Gardner wasn’t much of a prose stylist, I find his stories featuring minor series characters like the Kid or Lester Leith compulsively readable.
“Motel†by Evan Hunter seems to be added for the author’s name value since the only action in it is the pounding on the motel room’s walls by the guy in the next room. It’s three chapters depicting the beginning, middle and end of an adulterous relationship, and should be in The Mammoth Book of Adultery if/when that’s published (or maybe Carroll & Graf already has in the five years since this one came out). Judging by the long list of other Mammoth Books listed in the beginning, it’s only a matter of time.
“Burn, Corpse, Burn” by Bruno Fischer, despite its lurid title, is a sad, sentimental supernatural tale about a lonely man who sees the body of a young woman floating in the water while ice fishing. “The Pulp Connection” by Bill Pronzini has his Nameless sleuth solve the murder of a man killed in the locked room containing his pulps. Not only is this a homage to John Dickson Carr but also to Ellery Queen since the victim leaves a “dying message” clue.
“Caravan to Tarim'” by David Goodis is a pretty good Arabian adventure story rather than a crime tale per se. “The First Five in Line” is the opening twenty pages of an unfinished novel by Charles Willeford. Intriguing is the word. “Where There’s a Will, There’s a Slay” by Frederick C. Davis has a man returning to his home town to open a factory, trying to solve the murder of a lawyer friend and. confronting a nest of vipers.
“Dog Life” by Mark Timlin is the only story written for volume. A man avenges the murder of a petty crook/informant though his motive and identity isn’t revealed. Finally, “The Pit” by Joe R. Lansdale is about a small town of redneck types who kidnap any strange men of a certain age who pass through, hold them prisoner while training them and pit them against each other in an unarmed fight to the death.
There are quite a few more stories that are well worth reading in the 630 pages of this fat paperback.
January 7th, 2021 at 7:52 pm
I don’t remember if I bought this one when it came out or not.
This is going to sound strange, but unless there’s a reason for it — a chronological history of the field, for example — I don’t like it when editors of anthologies mix stories from the pulp magazines with newer stories that they (the editors) think are pulp fiction.
January 7th, 2021 at 9:45 pm
I don’t really like the new and old mixed since it makes the anthology almost schizophrenic to read, especially true pulp and more modern digest fiction that is a different approach.
Pulp and Noir are often interpreted too broadly for my tastes when I am buying an anthology expecting one type of stories and get another.
January 7th, 2021 at 11:57 pm
“Pulp” and “Noir” are terms used by publishers far too often to sell products these days that I don’t think are either one, much less confuse one with the other, which happens a lot too.
I think this one, though, has enough old style pulp fiction to make it worth buying. Who reads every story in every anthology any more, anyway?
Answer: I used to, but I don’t any more.
January 8th, 2021 at 12:22 am
PS. It has a very good Bill Pronzini story in it, too!
January 8th, 2021 at 10:28 am
Anthology Contents:
The Kid Clips a Coupon by Erle Stanley Gardner;
Goodbye Hannah by Steve Fisher;
Sinners’ Paradise by Raoul Whitfield;
Motel by Evan Hunter;
Smile, Corpse, Smile! by Bruno Fischer;
Pulp Connection by Bill Pronzini;
Brush Babe’s Poison Pallet by Bruce Cassiday;
Gangsta Wore Red by Michael Guinzburg;
Caravan to Tarim by David Goodis;
Lady Who Left Her Coffin by Hugh B. Cave;
Death at the Main by Frank Gruber;
Red Goose by Norbert Davis;
First Five in Line by Charles Willeford;
Where There’s a Will, There’s a Slay by Frederick C. Davis;
Ride a White Horse by Lawrence Block;
Best Man by Thomas Walsh;
Dog Life by Mark Timlin;
Don’t Look Behind You by Fredric Brown;
College-Cut Kill by John D. MacDonald;
Lost Coast by Marcia Muller;
Pit by Joe R. Lansdale;
Clean Sweep by Roger Torrey;
Eye of the Beholder by Ed Gorman
January 8th, 2021 at 12:14 pm
Thank you, Bill. I saw the contents page on Amazon’s website, but I couldn’t copy it, so this is very helpful. There’s a lot of stories in this book that I know I haven’t read.