Switchblade – Larque Press | The Digest Enthusiast

News August 28, 2020

News Digest Aug. 28, 2020

New Releases
Ellery Queen Sep/Oct 2020
Contents Page
Doug Crandell “Baby Drop Box” art by Mark Evan Walker
Kristopher Zgorski: Blog Bytes
Steve Steinbock: The Jury Box
Anna Scotti “What the Morning Never Suspected”
Dean Jobb’s Stranger Than Fiction: Arthur Conan Doyle and the Mutineers
Joseph S. Walker “Chasing Diamonds”
Marilyn Todd “Burning Desire”
Jim Allyn “Things That Follow” (Black Mask)
Dale C. Andrews “Four Words”
Violet Welles “Round-Trip Runaways” (Dept. of First Stories)
Dean Jobb’s Stranger Than Fiction Online: Preview
Asibe Taku “The Dashing Joker” (Passport to Crime) Translated from the Japanese by Yuko Shimada; adapted by John Pugmire
Libby Cudmore “All Shook Down”
Michael McGuire “Los Colores”
Jane Jakeman “The Oxford Ghosts”
Gregory Fallis “Terrible Ideas”
Zandra Renwick “Killer Biznez”
L.A. Wilson, Jr. “The Last True Love”
Alexandria Blaelock “The Perfume of Peahes” (Dept. of First Stories)
Barb Goffman “Dear Emily Etiquette” art by Jason C. Eckhardt
Brendan DuBois “The Homecoming”
Indicia

Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine Sep/Oct 2020 Vol. 156 No. 3 & 4, Whole No. 948 & 949
Publisher: Peter Kanter
Editor: Janet Hutchings
Managing Editor: Jackie Sherbow
Senior Director Art & Production: Porter C. McKinnon
Senior AD: Victoria Green
Cover: Brian Stauffer
192 pages
$7.99 on newsstands until October 20, 2020
Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine website
Dean Jobb’s Stranger Than Fiction

EconoClash Review No. 6
Contents Page
J.D. Graves: Welcome Thrill Seekers
Daniel Marcus “Jesus Christ Superstore”
Preston Lang “Party Bus”
Serena Jayne “Chet-Shaped Lure”
John Kojak “The Good Squad”
Donald Jacob Uitvlugt “The Night Jake Addison Saved the World”
Robb T. White “The Curse of the Temple Topaz”
Paul McCabe “Seven Flutes”
J.D. Graves “Don’t Panic”
Chris Fortunato “You WIll be Very Happy Here”
Cheap Thrills Biographies

EconoClash Review No. 6
Editor: J.D. Graves
Cover: ToeKeen
Interior Art: Duane Crockett
5” x 8” 166 pages
Print $10.95 Kindle $4.99

On Tuesday, Down & Out Books released the third episode of Guns + Tacos Season Two: Four Shrimp Tacos and a Walther P38 by Alec Cizak. Series created and edited by Michael Bracken and Trey R. Barker.

Guns + Tacos Season Two Subscriptions:
• Trade Paperback—$32.95 (includes all six digital episodes plus a subscriber-exclusive short story and FREE shipping within the Continental U.S.)
• Digital Formats—$11.95 (includes all six digital episodes plus a subscriber-exclusive short story)

Other authors in Season Two include: Eric Beeter, Michael Bracken and Trey R. Barker, Ann Aptaker, Ryan Sayles, and Mark Troy.

Subscribe at Down & Out Books.

Justin Marriott announced the lockdown special of The Paperback Fanatic will be published soon.

Storytime
Gabriel Hart’s “Bottom’s Up” at Pulp Modern Flash.

The new issue of Close to the Bone is now available to read online or download as a PDF at Close2thebone.co.uk.

Digest Magazine Reviews
Paperback Warrior reviews The Best of Manhunt Vol. 2 at Paperback Warrior.

Gideon Marcus reviews Analog Sept. 1965 at Galactic Journey.

Digest Magazine Writers’ Updates
Stephanie Feldman on “The Staircase” from F&SF Jul/Aug 2020 at Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Wang Yuan on “Casualties of the Quake” from Analog Sep/Oct 2020 at The Astounding Analog Companion.

Brian Trent on “The Monsters of Olympus Mons” from F&SF Jul/Aug 2020 at Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Libby Cudmore, whose “All Shook Down” appears in EQMM Sep/Oct 2020, writes about the birthplace of Philo Vance at Something is Going to Happen.

M. Rickert on “Last Night at the Fair” from F&SF Jul/Aug 2020 at Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Michael Libling on “Robyn in Her Shiny Blue Coffin” from Asimov’s Sep/Oct 2020 at From Earth to the Stars.

Cheryll Jones interviews Fate editor Phyllis Galde at Coast to Coast.

Untold Legend of Batman 3, Batman 327, Brave & Bold 166, Detective 494

TDE Contributors’ Corner
Jack Seabrook and Peter Enfantino review The Untold Legend of Batman No. 3, Batman No. 327, The Brave and the Bold No. 166, and Detective No. 494 at bare•bones e-zine.

Jack Seabrook’s The Hitchcock Project—Harold Swanton Part Six: Museum Place at bare•bones e-zine.

Readin’ and Writin’
Happy to report I finished reading the outstanding Switchblade No. 12 this week. I wrote a full review that will appear in The Digest Enthusiast No. 13 in January 2021. With twelve issues and two special editions Switchblade has become a dependable haven for hard-hitting independent fiction. Its list of authors provides a who’s who of rising stars of dark crime fiction. This edition adds further bloody evidence of its usual five-star killer status.

Also read the Stark House Press imprint Black Gat Books’ editon of Stranger at Home by Leigh Brackett writing as George Sanders. Classic crime fiction that solidly captures the era in which it was written: 1946. Great characters chase an intriguing mystery, bodies mount and suspects dwindle until its suspenseful, satisfying conclusion.

Finally, I completed reading Occult Detective Magazine No. 7, which I had begun last month. In his editorial/introduction to the issue co-editor John Linwood Grant lays out the zine’s original vision: “…to explore this sub-genre with open minds and open hearts. Nothing—as long as it had both a supernatural, strange or weird element and an investigative one—as necessarily out of bounds.”

It helps to review the ground rules and set expectations for a magazine titled “Occult Detective.” There are several tales that fit Grant’s wider definition of the zine’s mission and give its editors a wider net from which to select stories. This edition is another strong entry in the series. My favorite tales were those by D. J. Tyrer, Nancy A. Hansen, and Brandon Barrows. The fiction is supported by articles on Clive Cussler’s Dirk Pitt, Conan and Carnacki, Grimm: Ghost Spotter from Golden Age Comics, and reviews of occult detective novels and comics. If you like this sub-genre, ODM will provide several sessions of great entertainment.

Bob Vojtko sent in six new gag cartoons for the next Digest Enthusiast. Great stuff—can’t wait to see them in print this January.

Our current issue: The Digest Enthusiast No. 12 is available in print at Lulu.com and Amazon, and in digital formats at Kindle Books and Magzter.

Vintage Crime Digest
Pursuit No. 7
Contents Page
Johnston McCulley “Fate Rides the Cyclone”
R. Van Taylor “Revenge is for the Dead”
H.A. DeRosso “May Lady Weeps”
Stephen Marlowe “Flypaper”
August Derleth “The Case of the Lost Dutchman”
Hunt Collins “Joker”
Robert Carlton “One Lethal Evening”
Bram Norton “Rider Wanted”

Pursuit Detective Story Magazine No. 7 January 1955
Publisher: J.A. Kramer
Editor: L.B. Cole
Associate Editor: Phyllis Farren
5.5” x 7.5” 128 pages 35 cents

News July 31, 2020

News Digest July 31, 2020

New Release
Switchblade No. 12
Russell Highland “The Great Morality” (verse)
Contents Page
Scotch Rutherford: Editor’s Corner

Sharp & Deadly Short Fiction
E.F. Sweetman :Sorry Not Sorry”
C.W. Blackwell “From Dusk to Blonde”
Jon Zelazny “Radio Sutch”
D.K. Latta “Forwarded Mail”
Walter Sandville “Sealing the Deal”
Elliot F. Sweeney “A Dirt Hit”
William R. Soldan “Like a Diamond in the Sky”
Nathan Pettigrew “Aileen of Savanne Road”
Andrew Miller “They Call Me Cuban Pete”

Quick & Dirty Flash Fiction
Patrick Whitehurst “Henrietta’s Calming Way”
Albert Tucher “A Glitch in the Universe”
Preston Lang “The High Notes”
Serena Jayne “Checking Out”

Switchblade Person of Interest: Chris McGinley
Author Bios & Acknowledgements

Switchblade No. 12 July 2020
Managing Editor: Scotch Rutherford
5” x 8” 189 pages
Print $7.99 Kindle $2.99
Switchblade Magazine website

Digest Magazine Writer News
Jay Werkheiser discusses his Science Fact article: Alien Biochemistry for Analog Jul/Aug 2020 at The Astounding Analog Companion.

Joseph S. Walker, whose story “Chasing Diamonds” will appear in EQMM Sep/Oct 2020 muses on “The Page Where It Happens” at Something is Going to Happen.

John Kessel on “Spirit Level” from F&SF Jul/Aug 2020 at Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Ted Kosmatka on “The Beast Adjoins” from Asimov’s Jul/Aug 2020 at From Earth to the Stars.

Storytime
Alec Cizak reads three poems by Robert E. Howard at ACTV.

The Untold Legend of Batman No. 1, Batman No. 325, The Brave and the Bold No. 164, and Detective Comics No. 492

TDE Contributors’ Corner
Jack Seabrook and Peter Enfantino review The Untold Legend of Batman No. 1, Batman No. 325, The Brave and the Bold No. 164, and Detective Comics No. 492 at bare•bones e-zine.

Jack Seabrook’s The Hitchcock Project—Harold Swanton Part Four: An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge at bare•bones e-zine.

Kristin Kisska interviews Josh Pachter about the “dying message” at SleuthSayers.

Zine Scene
The third issue of Jim Main’s What Ever is out. This time, features include The Last Omega Men: Legends Compared by Michael House, Origins of Thundarr the Barbarian by Will Murray, a review of the series Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth, and Fandom Central reviews. The piece on Thundarr includes artwork by TDE contributor Michael Neno. What Ever No. 3 is available for $8.50 (PPD) from Main Enterprises.

Readin’ and Writin’
This week I read Tales From the Magician’s Skull No. 4 with eight all new sword and sorcery yarns. It’s a beautifully designed and illustrated full-size magazine. Included are stories by John C. Hocking, Adrian Cole, James Enge, James Stoddard, C.L. Werner, Ryan Harvey, Tom Doyle, and Milton Davis. Honestly, if you enjoy S&S you cannot go wrong with this issue, it’s terrific. My only complaint is that I wish it were published in an easier-to-handle digest size.

Also read Mourn the Hangman by Harry Whittington this week. The edition shown here is A Graphic Mystery No. 46, a paperback original first published in 1952. A Private Investigator arrives home to find his wife murdered. He immediately puts his worst judgements to work and finds himself suspect number one for the crime. He spends the rest of the novel avoiding arrest and desperately trying to discover who killed his wife. The book is well written, but the PI reviews and reflects on his emotional trauma too many times. Without all the redundancy the pacing and urgency would have made a stronger novel.

Completed the initial layouts on Gary Lovisi’s article on Falcon Books and my review of Sword & Sorcery Annual for The Digest Enthusiast No. 13 this week. Also spent several hours retouching Mystery Book Magazine covers.

Fotocrime from The Digest Enthusiast No. 12

The unique phenomenon of pocket-size (4” x 6”) magazines propagated newsstands in the 1950s. Most filled their pages with pin-ups of models, aspiring actresses, and stars of burlesque. Only a handful were dedicated to true crime stories like Fotocrime.

The brainchild of editor and publisher Jackson Burke, Fotocrime sought the sensational horrors of butchers, mobsters, and serial killers amping up fears of trill-killing juries and a continually degenerating society.

Read the whole sensational report in The Digest Enthusiast No. 12, available in print from Lulu.com and digital formats for Kindle and Magzter.

Vintage Crime Digest
Sure Fire Detective Stories April 1958
Contents Page
Pete McCann “A Challenge for the Killer!”
Art Crockett “Death Couldn’t Reach Me!”
Ray Dunham “The Edge of Terror!”
Jack Oleck “Death with a Stranger!”
Don Unatin “Dead: Do Not Disturb!”
Mitch Clark “Murder is an Accident!”
Bill Ryder “Hell on Wheels!”
Al James “Steel Clad Alibi!”
Hal Crosby “The Face of Death!”
G.G. Revelle “Love Me Hard!”

Sure Fire Detective Stories Vol. 2 No. 2 April 1958
Pontiac Publications
Cover: Carl Pfeufer
5.5” x 7.5” 112 mags 35¢ cover price

News March 6, 2020

News Digest March 6, 2020

Gideon Marcus reviews Analog March 1965 at Galactic Journey.

Essa Hansen answers a few questions about her story “Save, Salve, Shelter” (F&SF J/F 2020) on the Fantasy & Science Fiction blog.

J.M. Landels, Managing Editor of Pulp Literature shares a draft of “The Queen of Swords” via Google Docs.

Hats off to Steve Alcorn of Writing Academy for his 5-Star review of The Digest Enthusiast No. 11 on amazon. He notes the upgrade to full color and the timeline of Leo Margulies’ digests, which I had fun putting together. The visual helps understand when each title appeared in relationship to each other. Turns out Steve was a big fan of The Man From U.N.C.L.E.

Matthew X. Gomez reviews Rusty Barnes’ Kraj the Enforcer. Scotch Rutherford describes it: “Kraj is a human wrecking ball, hiding a tactical mindset, along with his sense of humor.” The collection of fourteen stories is detailed on the EconoClash Review blog.

Fiction Market Window April 15–25
“Submissions for Switchblade reopen on tax day, for a 10 day window. April 15–25. Crime/Noir short Fiction (2k-4.5k), Flash (up to 1k), and Noir poetry (3 pages max). This will be the only submissions call this year for regular issues. We’ll be filling Issues 12 and 13. (issue 12 will be out in June, 13 will arrive in October) Please see our guidelines at switchblademag.com.

“Remember that Switchblade is a no limit gutter noir mag. We publish the stuff no one else will. Not the best of the best. Switchblade is the lowest of the low. (wouldn’t have it any other way) You don’t see “lit” in the title, do you? Right. And you won’t find our authors listing their literary agents in their bios. If you’re working on your Rizzoli&Isles style commercial novel for the NY5, but would like to slum with us, remember this: gutter noir will always get preference. Vulgarity (something other mags despise), words you’re not supposed to use, amoral protagonists–these are tools you can utilize to forge outlaw fiction. Ten days is a big submissions window for us. There will be a lot of competition. Good storytelling about dark corners, bad people, and worse situations to the front.”

C.C. Finlay announces the March/April edition of Fantasy & Science Fiction and hightlights its contents on the F&SF blog.

Likewise, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine announces their March/April lineup on Trace Evidence.

Tony Gleeson will be signing books and artwork at the upcoming Vintage Paperback Collectors’ Show in Glendale, CA on Sunday, March 8, 2020.

Mystery Weekly Magazine No. 55 March 2020 is now available, with stories by Scott Forbes Crawford, Denise Robbins, E.R. Brown, Andrew Welsh-Huggins, L.A. Wilson, Jr., Andrew McAleer, and a You-Solve-It by Eric B. Ruark. MWM is published by Chuck Carter, and edited by Kerry Carter. Cover by Robin Grenville-Evans. Kindle $2.99 (Print edition coming soon)

“The Big Ticket” by Stefen Styrsky was published online this week at Tough Crime.

Amman Sabet’s “Say You’re Sorry” is a story about the power that apologies hold over us. For more about it, see the Fantasy & Science Fiction blog.

Weirdbook No. 42, the special John Shirley issue is now available. The issue includes a novel, five short stories, and five poems by John Shirley. Editor Doug Draa introduces the issue with resounding praise for the author’s work, “Mr. Shirley has such sights to show you!” Supporting imagery by Allen Koszowski and John Betancourt—plus a wraparound cover by Fotolia. Print $12.00

David Levinson takes the April 1965 issue of Worlds of If on a Galactic Journey.

Brenda Kalt talks about her story “Lemonade Stand” in the March/April issue of Analog on the The Astounding Analog Companion.

Edith Maxwell stars a hyperpolyglot in her story “One Too Many” (EQMM Mar/Apr 2020). Read more on Something is Going to Happen.

Matthew Hughes gives insights into “The Last Legend” in the Mar/Apr 2020 issue of Fantasy & Science Fiction.

Readin’ and Writin’
Best of the Small Magazines: John O’Neill provides a detailed overview of The Digest Enthusiast No. 11, Pulp Modern: Tech Noir, and Weird Fiction Review No. 9 on Black Gate.

Mike Chomko Books and Modern Age Books are both stocked with copies of the full color print edition of The Digest Enthusiast No. 11.

Read The Living End by Frank Kane (Black Gat Books No. 22) this week. One of Kane’s standalone novels. It details the rise and roil of sociopath Eddie Marlon as he corrupts his way to success in the music business of the late 1950s. A roadmap for an insecure egomaniac whose inflated sense of entitlement and grievance grants him license to destroy any challenger or lackey who fails to kowtow. He strikes back tenfold to the few who defy his commands, doing his best worst to destroy their careers and lives. But this is fiction, so comeuppance is more easily dealt on the page than its real life reflection.

Started work on an article about Fotocrime, a pocket-size true crime magazine from 1954/55. The last time I wrote about a true crime book was for the debut issue of TDE, on The Big Story.

From the Vault
I believe this is the final issue of this digest’s remarkable twelve-issue run. Several times I’ve been surprised by the writers who show up in its pages. This final issue is no exception with Fredric C. Wertham, M.D.

True Crime Detective Vol. 3 No. 4 Fall 1953
Contents Page
Kevin Wallace “The Great Screwball Bank Robbery”
Frank Mullady “The Red Circle Murders”
Monster of Monsters:
I The Question: The Kidnapping of Grace Budd by Capt. John Ayers & Carol Bird
II The Answer: The Sanity of Albert Fish by Fredric C. Wertham, M.D.
Stuart Palmer “The Ministering Angel”
Forbes Parkhill “The Strange World of Alex Miller”
Verdict of Two: a book review department by The Editors
Edgar Lustgarten “Small H, Mr. Pigott!”
Irwin Ross “Boom in Counterfeiting”
Robert Tallant “I’m Fit as a Fiddle and Ready to Hang”

Publisher: Lawrence E. Spivak
Editors: Anthony Boucher, J. Francis McComas
General Manager: Joseph W. Ferman
Managing Editor: Robert P. Mills
Advisory Editor: Charles Angoff
Art Director: George Salter
Cover: Uncredited, but likely Dirone Photography from “I’m Fit as a Fiddle and Ready to Hang”
5.5” x 7.75” 128 pages 35¢

News November 19, 2019

The Future is Noir

Scotch Rutherford and Alec Cizak preview the future of criminal takes on technology in special editions of Switchblade and Pulp Modern. Available now in print and digital.

Switchblade: Tech Noir
Contents Page
Scotch Rutherford: Editor’s Corner
Eric Beetner “Killer App”
Callum McSorley “Baby on Board”
John Moralee “Bad Score”
Mandi Jourdan “Folie à Deux”
Hugh Lessig “Muscle Memory”
Nick Kolakowski “Night Mayor”
Alec Cizak “Post-Biological-Stress-Disorder”
Matthew X. Gomez “Galatea in the Garden of Eden”
James Edward O’Brien “Torna Nails, Mindbender”
Rob D. Smith “Sundown”
Author Bios & Acknowledgements

Switchblade: Tech Noir October 2019
Editor: Scotch Rutherford
Cover Photos: Scotch Rutherford
Cover Model: Kiana Gonzalez
5” x 8” 222 pages
Print $8.99 Kindle $2.99
Switchblade Magazine website
Switchblade Merchandise

Pulp Modern: Tech Noir
Contents Page
Alex Cizak: From the Editor
C.W. Blackwell “A Deviant Skin”
Nils Gilbertson “The Moderator”
Tom Barlow “Love in the Time of Silicone”
Deborah L. Davitt “Leaving Red Footprints”
Angelique Fawns “A Time to Forget”
J.D. Graves “Three, Two, One Zebra-Stripe Shake-Off”
Don Stoll “15 Minutes”
Jo Perry “Lights Out”
Zakariah Johnson “Walking Out”
Contact and Links

Pulp Modern: Tech Noir Fall 2019
Chief Editor: Alec Cizak
Guest Editor: Scotch Rutherford
Design: Richard Krauss
Cover and Interior Art: Ran Scott
Cartoons: Bob Vojtko
5.5” x 8.5” 132 pages
Print $6.99 Kindle $2.99
Pulp Modern website

Opening Lines July 20, 2019

Opening Lines

“Nothing ruins a midnight stroll through Deep Ellum like being kidnapped.”
“A Death in Deep Ellum” by William Dylan Powell Switchblade #2 July 2017

TDE Update January 3, 2019

Ray Palmer’s Digest Dynasty

The Digest Enthusiast No. 9 pages 58 and 59

Inside The Digest Enthusiast No. 9 January 2019:

Vince Nowell, Sr. charts Ray Palmer’s digest dynasty from 1948 to 1958, followed by the bibliography of S.J. Byrne, one of Palmer’s go-to SF storytellers.

Special thanks to this issue’s advertisers:
Bud’s Art Books
Fantasy Illustrated
Mike Chomko Books
Modern Age Books
Pulp Modern
PulpFest 2019
Stark House Press
Switchblade

Ads in The Digest Enthusiast and very reasonably priced. Check out our rates and specs here.

Interviews February 3, 2018

Ellery Queen March/April 2014

An excerpt from the interview with Bill Crider, from The Digest Enthusiast book five:

Bill Crider: “At an Armadillocon some years ago, I was on the “Apes” panel, along with Joe Lansdale, Rick Klaw, Mark Finn, Chris Nakashima Brown, and probably some others I’m forgetting. The talk turned to a legendary pulp cover for a story called “Gorilla of the Gas Bags” in a pulp called Zeppelin Stories. As anyone knows, there are only a couple of copies of the magazine still around, so nobody had read the story. Joe Lansdale challenged the panelists to write a story based on the cover. He sold his, and I sold mine. I don’t know if anyone else wrote a story.”

Ellery Queen April/March 2014 cover — Ellery Queen March/April 2014 with Bill Crider’s “Gorilla of the Gasbags” with Hollywood detective Bill Ferrell

Attn. Writers: Sandra Seamans reminds us Switchblade magazine is open for submissions.