Not only is PulpFest lauded for its excellent programming, it is also known for its very substantial dealers’ room.
Beginning on Thursday, July 26, the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Pittsburgh – Cranberry will be home to thousands of collectible pulp magazines and digests, vintage paperbacks, first edition hardcovers and series books, original art, B-movies and serials, collectible comic books, and more.
Who are we expecting at PulpFest 2018? For the next two days, we’ll be profiling our dealers, telling you a little bit about each of them to help you know them . . .
JOHN McMAHAN sells collectibles on ebay as mybckpages. He comes to us from Oklahoma, where he has long been active as a fan and dealer. At PulpFest 2018, he’ll be selling pulps, books, comics, original art, movie posters, and more. John will also have copies of HARD-BOILED CHRISTMAS STORIES, the anthology he edited with 2006 Lamont Award winner John Wooley.
Although this will be his third PulpFest, it will be the first time that PETER MACUGA has attended as a dealer. He will be bringing many boxes of pulps and books to sell, including very early issues of ASTOUNDING STORIES up through the 1948 numbers. Peter will also have collectible hardcovers from Gnome Press and other publishers. MITCH IRETON will be along to help. Please welcome them both to their first PulpFest as dealers.
From Buffalo, New York, BILL MANN returns as a dealer to PulpFest. One of the founders and a former editor at Age of Aces Books, he will be selling a variety of aviation pulps and books. Bill will also be part of our panel, “Fighting Aces of War Skies: The Pulps Take Flight,” on Friday, July 27.
Collecting since the early days of pulp fandom, legend has it that WALKER MARTIN has owned practically every pulp at least once! A resident of New Jersey, he’ll be selling a variety of pulp magazines, DVD’S, original artwork, and one-of-a-kind canceled checks from the files of Munsey and Popular Publications. Walker contributes a regular column on pulp collecting to Steve Lewis’ Mystery*File blog.
Leading Philip José Farmer publisher METEOR HOUSE will be releasing its newest titles at PulpFest 2018. Pick up your copies of the first hardcover publication of Farmer’s authorized Tarzan novel, TARZAN AND THE DARK HEART OF TIME, and THE PHILIP JOSÉ FARMER CENTENNIAL COLLECTION, a mammoth collection of classic science fiction, poems, articles, tributes, speeches, and more, all from Farmer’s magic pen. We’ll be announcing when the annual Meteor House book-signing party will take place during our regular dealers’ room hours. MICHAEL CROTEAU will also be selling items from Philip José Farmer’s estate and works by attendees of FarmerCon, returning to PulpFest for an eighth consecutive year.
ED HULSE of MURANIA PRESS will have several recent books at PulpFest 2018. THE WILD WEST OF FICTION AND FILM is a 286-page, 146,000-word tome that concentrates on the nexus of American popular fiction (especially pulp) and Western movies. He’ll also have PULPOURRI and the other three volumes of Murania’s Blood ‘n’ Thunder Presents series. Ed will also be premiering a revised and expanded second edition of THE BLOOD ’N’ THUNDER GUIDE TO PULP FICTION. It features more copy, more cover reproductions, updated appendices, and an index, which the 2013 edition lacked.
The author of over sixty novels and assorted books, WILL MURRAY will be selling copies from his various “The All-New Wild Adventures of . . .” series including EMPIRE OF DOOM (featuring Doc Savage and The Shadow), KING KONG VS. TARZAN, and SIX SCARLET SCORPIONS (with that “most dangerous dame,” Pat Savage. Expect to see some of Will’s non-fiction books, as well. Of course, he’ll be glad to sign your purchases. Will publishes his books under the ADVENTURES IN BRONZE banner, in association with Altus Press.
PHIL NELSON is from Waverly, Ohio. He will be bringing an assortment of ADVENTURE, ARGOSY, and Girasol Collectables pulp replicas. This very personable dealer will also have vintage paperbacks, comic books, and other collectibles. He’s a fan of NORTH-WEST STORIES and detective fiction.
TIM PAXTON of Grand Rapids, Michigan specializes in paperbacks and small-press, first-edition hardcovers, dealing mainly in high-grade science fiction, fantasy, and horror as well as mysteries and pulp-related material. Check out the TIM’S BOOKS website at PulpFestsponsor AbeBooks.com.
Virginia dealer and collector CURT PHILLIPS returns to PulpFest with more material from the Ted White collection, plus even more rare pulps and books harvested from throughout the southern states. His stock is heavy in science fiction, hero, and detective and mystery pulps. This year, he’s bringing a large selection of WEIRD TALES from as far back as 1930. He’ll also be bringing more vintage paperbacks and digests, plus some surprises. He’s currently taking want lists for material to bring to the convention as he has “several thousand books and magazines and can’t possibly bring them all.” Email your want lists to Curt at absarka_prime@comcast.net.
A resident of Virginia, CRAIG POOLE has been attending pulp conventions for years. He will have several pieces of vintage original cover art, representing a mix of genres, but with science fiction the main focus. He will have paperback cover art and, perhaps, a few digest or pulp cover paintings.
LAURIE POWERS — creator of the Laurie’s Wild West blog — will be selling copies of HIDDEN GHOSTS, PULP WRITER: TWENTY YEARS IN THE AMERICAN GRUB STREET, RIDING THE PULP TRAIL, all written by her grandfather, pulp author Paul S. Powers. She’ll also have books and ephemera from her grandfather’s estate. Laurie is currently writing a biography of Daisy Bacon, editor of LOVE STORY MAGAZINE. Also hailing from Virginia, Laurie was honored with our annual Munsey Award in 2016.
GARYN and VIRGINIA ROBERTS from northern Wisconsin will be bringing lots of good, fresh old treasures at bargain prices. They’ll have science fiction, mystery, and western pulps, young adult series books, Big Little Books, Golden and Silver Age comic books, pulp replicas, hardcovers, paperbacks, and more. Garyn is the winner of our 2013 Munsey Award.
If you are a dealer or collector who would like to sell at PulpFest, please click the “Register” button just below the banner at the top of our home page. You can also email convention chairperson Jack Cullers at jack@pulpfest.com for further information about selling at the convention.
If you still need to book a room at the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Pittsburgh – Cranberry — just north of Pennsylvania’s “Steel City,” please call 1-800-222-8733. Be sure to mention PulpFest in order to receive any convention special deals that may still be available.
We’ll be profiling more of our PulpFest 2018 dealers through Friday, July 13. Please visit the site tomorrow.
(In addition to marking the centennial of the armistice that ended the First World War, PulpFest 2018 will celebrate the century mark of Grand Master of Science Fiction Philip José Farmer. PulpFest and its associated convention — FarmerCon — will be saluting the acclaimed author of such works as ESCAPE FROM LOKI, THE DARK HEART OF TIME, the classic Riverworld series, and more. Join us for such panels and presentations as “The Dark Heart of Loki: Philip José Farmer Revisits 1918.” And don’t forget that Mark Wheatley — cover artist for the Meteor House edition of TARZAN AND THE DARK HEART OF TIME — will be offering a rare gallery showing of his original art at this year’s convention.
Year in and year out, PulpFest hosts some of the best practitioners of contemporary pulp fiction. One is Will Murray, the literary agent for the Lester Dent properties, a position he holds to this day. Will is also the authorized author of The All-New Wild Adventures of Doc Savage, including the latest volume, Mr. Calamity, featuring cover art by artist and illustrator Joe DeVito.
During its 2016 convention, PulpFest was honored to have as its Guest of Honor author, editor, musician, and science-fiction and pulp fan Ted White. Beginning with its October 1968 issue, Ted White served as the editor of the first science fiction magazine, AMAZING STORIES. Among his many achievements as editor, White was able to publish some very striking covers by some of the science fiction field’s most exciting artists, including the November 1971 number with cover art by Mike Hinge. Ted White left AMAZING STORIES in late 1978, having reigned over what has been called “The Golden Age of AMAZING.” Curt Phillips will be selling White’s collection at this year’s PulpFest.)
