Pulp magazines had a profound effect on popular culture across the globe. Their stories and art have reverberated through a wide variety of media — comic books, movies, paperbacks, genre fiction, television, men’s adventure magazines, radio drama, video, anime, manga, and role-playing games. And their influence continues today.
We hope you’ll join PulpFest 50 as we not only celebrate “A Half-Century of Pulp Cons,” the centennial of pulp magazine and comic book publisher Fiction House, and the ninetieth anniversary of Popular Publications’ “Dime” line of pulp magazines but also the writers, artists, and publishers of contemporary genre fiction.
Our salute to 2022’s “Children of the Pulps” continues on Friday afternoon, August 5, at 3:30 PM as PulpFest 50 welcomes Flinch! Books to the convention’s stage.
Flinch! Books was founded in 2015 by two Ohio-based writers living on the shores of Lake Erie. Since their initial foray into the world of independent publishing — Something Strange is Going On!: New Tales From the Fletcher Hanks Universe — co-publishers Jim Beard and John C. Bruening have followed with five other wide-ranging anthologies, as well as editions of their own work. Their latest book is an anthology of sword-and-sorcery tales, Blood on the Blade: Ten Tales of Slashing Swords and Sinister Sorcery.
John Bruening drew his literary inspiration from the stories of his father’s generation, defined by the Great Depression and World War II. “I was enamored with the adventure stories and pulps of my dad’s era. We were at rock bottom in the 1930s and facing a global threat in the 1940s. That landscape of adversity was the place where great heroes emerged.”
John has been writing professionally for more than 35 years, first as a newspaper reporter and magazine editor and later as an advertising copywriter and marketing specialist. As far back as he can remember, he’s been a fan of comics, pulps, adventure fiction, classic movies and serials, old-time radio, and any other form of heroic storytelling. His debut novel, The Midnight Guardian: Hour of Darkness, was called “the creative construct of a first-rate storyteller” (William Patrick Maynard, writing for blackgate.com). John followed with the 2019 sequel, The Midnight Guardian: Annihilation Machine. The third volume in the series is scheduled for release in the fall of 2022.
Jim Beard became a published author when he sold a story to DC Comics in 2002. Since that time he’s written official Star Wars and Ghostbusters comic book stories and contributed articles and essays to several volumes of comic book history. His prose work includes the novellas Green Hornet: How Sweet the Sting and Kolchak: The Last Temptation; co-editing and contributing to Planet of the Apes: Tales from the Forbidden Zone; a story for X-Files: Secret Agendas; three books of essays on the 1966 Batman TV series; the Sgt. Janus occult detective series of novels; Monster Earth, a shared-world giant monster anthology series; and Captain Action: Riddle of the Glowing Men, the first pulp prose novel based on the classic 1960s action figure. Jim also provided regular content for Marvel.com, the official Marvel Comics website, for over seventeen years. In addition to co-publishing Flinch! Books, Jim is the publisher at Becky Books, named after his late wife.
Please join PulpFest 50 as we welcome Jim and John to the DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Pittsburgh – Cranberry in Mars, Pennsylvania for “In-Your-Face Pulp-Style Adventure Fiction!” from Flinch! Books. They’ll be joined by William Patrick Maynard, the director of PulpFest’s afternoon programming. Their talk is part of our fine line-up of programming at this year’s PulpFest.
The general public is welcome to attend our programming events. To learn more about our schedule, please click the Programming button at the top of this page.
If you would like to register as a dealer at this year’s PulpFest, we’ve run out of tables. Please contact Jack Cullers ASAP to be added to our waiting list. You can reach him at jassways@woh.rr.com or jack@pulpfest.com.
To enjoy our dealers’ room, click the Registration button at the top of this page to join PulpFest. And don’t forget to book a room at the DoubleTree by Hilton Pittsburgh — Cranberry in Mars, Pennsylvania. They’re going fast! So don’t wait! Remember, you must book your room by 11:59 PM on Tuesday, July 12, to get the special convention rate.
The pulps gave us Buck Rogers, Conan the Barbarian, Cthulhu, Doc Savage, Hopalong Cassidy, John Carter of Mars, Sam Spade, The Shadow, Solomon Kane, Tarzan, Zorro, and many other pop culture icons. As early as 1938, characters such as Tarzan were inspiring creators. That’s when Fiction House debuted Jungle Stories, with its first issue dated Winter 1938.
Galvanized by the popularity of the Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan Tarzan film series of the 1930s and 40s, Fiction House’s Ki-Gor and Helene would go on to tackle one jungle menace after another for 59 issues. Pictured above is the February 1942 issue, with cover by George Gross.
John Bruening’s first Midnight Guardian novel was published by Flinch! Books in 2016. Featuring cover art by the late Tom Gianni, it was entitled The Midnight Guardian: Hour of Darkness.
The latest title from Flinch! Books is an anthology of ten sword and sorcery stories, edited by Jim Beard and John C. Bruening. Published in 2022, it features cover art by Mark Wheatley. Their previous book was Occupied Pulp — also edited by Beard and Bruening — featured cover art by Adam Benet Shaw.
Leslie Silberberg is a writer and popular culture enthusiast who has volunteered to help the PulpFest organizing committee. She is looking forward to writing more for our website and The Pulpster.
