PulpFest is a top venue for writers and publishers to roll out their newest titles. Following are some of the new books that will be featured at this summer’s pulp con.
In addition to being one of the world’s largest pulp dealers, Adventure House is a very active publisher of pulp reprints and pulp replicas. In addition to having a wide selection of vintage pulp magazines, John and Maureen Gunnison will have recent issues of High Adventure and various titles in their pulp replica line, including Spicy Adventure, Spicy Detective, Spicy Mystery, and others.
Age of Aces Books is a publisher of pulp fiction treasures with a keen eye for design. At this year’s PulpFest, Chris and David Kalb will be releasing two thrilling collections from the tattered pages of the air war pulps:
Lieutenant Graham Townsend, the mad Englishman led the craziest bomber squadron on the Western Front — The Casket Crew. The extraordinarily prolific Arch Whitehouse drew upon his own experiences as a tail gunner in the Royal Air Force to bring to life the colorful aces that flew through these stories, written for Fiction House’s air- war pulps, Aces and Wings. The Casket Crew collects five 1931 – 32 stories from Aces.
Thirty cursing, rebelious undesirables find themselves thrown together in the doomed, scorched region known by all as Hell’s Half Acre. There, under the command of “Iron” Mike Hilton — himself ostrasized for questioning his superiors — they become the Hell-Cats! The Hell-Cat Squadron: Cyclops of the Skies collects six 1931 – 32 thrilling adventures from the pages of Flying Aces, written by Siberian-born, Russian war veteran Alexis Rossoff.
A familiar face at PulpFest, Jim Beard of Becky Books will have several new books at this year’s PulpFest. His latest is Knocks and Howls, collecting twelve tales of action and adventure, mystery and mayhem, and humor and horror with a singular central character that drives each narrative — the towering conundrum known as Bigfoot. Featuring work by Beard, John C. Bruening, George Ebey, Eric M. Esquivel, Forrest C. Helvie, Matthew Kresal, Bobby Nash, Josh Pritchett, Josh Reynolds, Christopher Ryan, John Small, and Mary Fan. Two other books new to PulpFest will be essay collections on Star Trek and DC Comics’ The Brave and the Bold, likewise published by Becky Books.
Author Brian Bohnett of Mad Kings Publishing will be exhibiting at PulpFest for the first time. So everything he has will be new to the convention. Be sure to check out Them Was the Days: Edgar Rice Burroughs and the History of the Michigan Military Academy, Tarzan Big Little Books, and The Remarkable Enid Markey: First Lady of the Tarzan Films. Brian is an active member of the Greater West Bloomfield Historical Society and The Burroughs Bibliophiles.
Maryland author Ron Chandler writes adventure and nature fiction. He’ll have his latest book at PulpFest 2024, Madcap Dogs: Revealing Their True Glory. Inspired by the world of Frederick Faust — who wrote as Max Brand — it’s a collection of stories that explores the relationship that dogs have with their families and shows how their behavior can change lives.
Mike Chomko Books will be representing Stark House Press at this year’s PulpFest. He’ll have books by Gil Brewer, W.R. Burnett, Arnold Drake, Day Keene, Ed Lacy, and other great noir writers. He’ll also have rare works by Robert W. Chambers and Sax Rohmer and some of Stark’s backlist, including their excellent Manhunt anthologies and non-fiction titles such as Paperback Confidential and The Manhunt Companion. Mike will also the latest offerings from Steeger Books, including new volumes in their Black Mask Library and the omnibus edition of Don Hutchison’s It’s Always Raining Corpses in Chinatown.
Christopher Paul Carey and Cathy Mann Wilbanks of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. are hoping to have copies of Ann Tonsor Zeddies’ novel A Princess of Mars: Shadow of the Assassins. With cover art by Douglas C. Klauba, it tells the story of a young Dejah Thoris as she sets plunging headlong into an adventure filled with treachery and deadly peril. Also included is a bonus John Carter novella by Geary Gravel. They will also be debuting the anthology Victory Harben: Tales from the Void, edited by Christopher Paul Carey, and will have on hand copies of Win Scott Eckert’s Korak at the Earth’s Core, an epic saga set in the savage inner world of Pellucidar, and other exciting works.
Although ERB Books won’t physically be at PulpFest 2024, the publisher will be with us in spirit. By special arrangement with the publisher, PulpFest fans and attendees can get $50 off either Edgar Rice Burroughs’ At the Earth’s Core or the Centennial Edition of The Moon Maid. Simply add the discount code PF50 when you’re checking out online. Authorized by and published under the imprint of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. of Tarzana, California, these heavily illustrated, collector editions are stunning additions to anyone’s library.
And thanks to the generosity of publisher Jim Gerlach, we’ll be raffling off copies of both The Centennial Edition of The Moon Maid and The Standard First Edition of Robert B. Zeuschner’s Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Bibliography at this year’s convention. Tickets will be available at the PulpFest 2024 registration desk for $5. You don’t need to be present at the drawing to win.
Ohio-based Flinch! Books will have copies of their recent release by author Brian K. Morris. Quest for the Delphi Oculus is the second book in The Chronicles of Conrad von Honig, a fun series about ancient aliens. Publishers John Bruening and Jim Beard will also have copies of their own books, as well as their wide-ranging and popular anthologies.
Award-winning novelist, journalist, and editor Craig McDonald will have the latest volume in his terrific new series, The Adventures of Zana O’Savin. A pastiche of classic pulp characters such as Pat & Doc Savage, The Shadow, The Avenger, and the Domino Lady, the O’Savin stories debuted in 2022.
In The Death Killers, the O’Savins and their crime-fighting colleagues are the quarry of a homicidal clique of tech moguls and social media barons. These would-be eternals are hellbent on employing an unholy melding of AI and quantum computing in a reckless, bloody quest for personal immortality.
And don’t forget about the first two O’Savin adventures — The Blood Ogre and The Mothman Menace — and Craig’s Hector Lassiter books.
William Patrick Maynard — the author of the first authorized Fu Manchu thrillers in nearly forty years — will be joined by his daughter and co-author, Anna Victoria Maynard, to autograph copies of the Black Coat Press anthology, The Last Tales of the Shadowmen, at this year’s PulpFest. The book features their Fantomas story, “Malice and Snares.”
So what are you waiting for? Book a room for three nights and register now for PulpFest 2024. And don’t forget about FarmerCon XIX and ERBFest 2024. They’re also taking place at the same location. That’s three great conventions for the price of one, only at the DoubleTree by Hilton Pittsburgh — Cranberry in Mars, Pennsylvania.
If you can’t find a room at the DoubleTree — it’s already packed with PulpFest attendees — our hotel recommends the Hampton Inn, Hilton Garden Inn, or Home2 Suites. They’re all just a few miles away from our host hotel. Click here to learn more.
Our featured image is Jerome Rozen’s cover art for Don Hutchison’s anthology, It’s Always Raining Corpses in Chinatown (Steeger Books, 2024). The art was originally used for the seventh and final issue of The Mysterious Wu Fang, dated March 1936 and published by Popular Publications.
Chris Kalb designed the cover for Age of Aces first collection of Alexis Rossoff’s Hell-Cat Squadron. Entitled Cyclops of the Skies, it collects six 1931 – 32 World War I stories from the pages of Ace Magazines’ Flying Aces.
Brian Bohnett’s Tarzan Big Little Books, part of the Edgar Rice Burroughs Collectors’ Treasury, was published in 2003. The author and compiler will be exhibiting at his first PulpFest/ERBFest. The cover art is by Hugh Hutton. It originally served as the back cover art for Whitman Publishing’s The Return of Tarzan, Big Little Book #1102, published in 1936. The book featured 209 Rex Maxon interiors from the 1929 comic strip.
Craig McDonald’s third novel in The Adventures of Zana O’Savin features cover art by Douglas C. Klauba. Craig — who writes regularly for pulpfest.com and The Pulpster — will be interviewing artist Douglas C. Klauba at this year’s PulpFest.
And don’t forget to visit the PulpFest YouTube Channel for Craig McDonald’s great videos on Doug Klauba and the Great Pulp Heroes such as The Avenger. Craig has a new one on the latter, that premiered just a few days ago.
Of course, while you’re at the PulpFest Channel, please remember to join hundreds of others and subscribe to our channel.
Derek Starr is a writer and popular culture enthusiast who began contributing to our website in 2022. He particularly enjoys the Fiction House pulps. One of his favorites is Planet Stories, the publisher’s legendary science fiction pulp. He’s also a fan of their air pulps. His most recent contributions to our website discussed Flinch! Fest, one of our afternoon programming presentations at this year’s PulpFest and one of our annual dealers’ posts.
