THIS’N’THAT Plans. We all have them. God knows I do. However, mine seem to work out about as frequently as Soviet Union Five Year Industrial Plans. IE, never. Fortunately, I have defeated the flu that kept me under its hideous thumb for most of last week, so now I’ve just got to catch up on all the stuff I’ve gotten …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: Another Ride on the Mystery Train Your humble Cheese corrrespondent has been sick as a dog almost all week. A flu-y type thing came out of nowhere and barreled me over like a runaway freight train. However, it seems to have left almost as quickly as it hit. I staggered off to bed at 9:30 last …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
FUN WITH YOU TUBE So, over dinner last night I mentioned to the Czarina of All Knowledge that I’d caught part of a song that afternoon on the oldies station that I had never heard before (which is unusual) but thought was pretty good. It was a male/female duet and I hadn’t caught the name but the lyrics “summer wine” …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: DIME MYSTERY, THE LATE ’30S Suddenly, things get funky. Everyone has heard of the Yellow Peril, but Egyptian Peril, not so much. Somebody in the editorial office must have had a massive fear of ancient Egyptians rising from their graves to snatch our women for whatever nefarious reason. (I couldn’t even use all of them, …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: DIME MYSTERY DEUX Welcome to our second installment of covers from the seminal shudder pulp DIME MYSTERY. What have we learned so far about this pulp? 1. Their covers are a little less zany than DIME DETECTIVE — but there are some to come that are pretty out there, so stay tuned. 2. The like coffins. …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Well of the Worlds by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore I haven’t posted anything lately on my 1950’s SF novels review project, so after taking yesterday off for getting shot sixty-seven times in the left eye by a laser (by actual count, though I may have missed one or two blasts because the doctor was pretty quick on the trigger), …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: DIME MYSTERY! So, it’s been rather an unusual week around here. Bought a car. Got my right eye lasered (almost). Gail’s 1981 Corolla finally succumbed to old age. I’m not a car guy. There’s probably nothing I dislike more than spending money on cars, but I guess every thirty or so years you’ve got to suck …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: DWELLERS IN THE MIRAGE As long-time readers of this blog know, I’m engaged in a couple of long-term research projects on American science fiction of the 1950’s. They’re progressing steadily, like glaciers, but recently I came across something that I thought I’d share with you-all this week. There were three magazines in the 1950’s (some dating …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Writers You Should Read: Roger Zelazny In the first of a series of posts concerning science fiction and fantasy writers whom, for various reasons, you might not know about whom you really should be reading we’re going to talk about Roger Zelazny. So you know where I’m coming from, here’s my biases in re Roger. This is nothing I haven’t …
Free Tales of Misery (and Career Guide)
From now through Wednesday, January 11, you can get my collection of short stories, Tales of Misery and Imagination, FREE for your Kindle (or Kindle app). Just head on over to the book’s Amazon page and download it at no charge! Also, through Monday, January 9, you can get a free Kindle copy of A Career Guide to Your Job …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday: Still Riding the Dime Train As we get well into the 1940’s, I’m not sure how much more we’ll be able to get out of DIME DETECTIVE, but at least here’s one more installment. I noticed three things about these early ’40’s issues: 1) DIME DETECTIVE now costs .15. 2) The dames are getting tougher. Many are …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURES
My Year In Movies: The Best It’s that time of year again. No, not the Academy Awards, but my own shout-out to the best films I’ve seen this year. Again, a lot of text, so not so much in the way of pictures. I saw 172 movies in 2011. Here’s the ones I would unreservedly (or at least with teeny, …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
Pulp Cover Friday Presents: Pulp Covers on Friday, Twice In A Row! Third time lucky? Let’s see. 1937 saw some new names on DIME DETECTIVE covers, mostly importantly that of Raymond Chandler. He wrote a a number of stories for DD from 1937-1939 (and one in 1941), many of which were cannibalized for his Phillip Marlowe novels, which made him …
John Jos. Miller’s CREATURE FEATURE
PULP COVER FRIDAY PRESENTS: PULP COVER FRIDAY, ON FRIDAY! Made it! I hope everyone is having a happy holiday season on the run up to Christmas, and that your good fortune continues through-out the upcoming New Year. More detective fun as we continue our look at DIME DETECTIVE. Since I only made it through mid 1937 this time around, I’m …
Short Ends
Possibly for the first time ever, Jean-Luc Godard and Ron Bonk are reviewed in the same column.