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Lucynka

@lucynka.bsky.social

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Of the blog “Lucynka Reviews Obscure Bullshit.” Girls don’t want boys, girls want feminist analyses of Cornell Woolrich stories. Currently also reviewing stories from the romance pulps. lucynka.wordpress.com Books: lucynka.wordpress.com/en-prise-press/

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · Nov 25

Plugging this once again: An introduction to the romance pulp magazines of the 1920s-1950s, an important-but-forgotten part of #romancehistory. ❤️ Many (specifically American) romance novels of the time exist SOLELY in these magazines! #romancelandia

An Introduction To the Romance Pulps

Welcome! As there is precious little information out there on the romance pulps, and as I’ve accidentally become the closest thing to an expert on them that there probably is at the moment, I’ve s…

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2h

ALL-STORY LOVE anthology update: Ebook text all laid out; now I get to figure out how to add images (and consequently what format/resolution to add them in so that I don't totally bloat the file 🙃).

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 7h

Oh, thank goodness it was just my system needing a (long-overdue 😅) reboot, and not…yanno…my Scribus document getting corrupted. #whew

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 9h

Nooooo! 😭—(nevermind that yes, I'd actually love to turn this into a series, ahahahaha! 😅)—noooooooo! 😭😭😭

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 23h

I wouldn't go so far as to say the illustrations are HALF the fun of pulp stories, but they're definitely a PART of the fun!

And yes, all from 1929.

Reposted by Lucynka

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 1d

MY PROOF COPY HAS ARRIVED! A few tiny tweaks to make, but on the whole I'm so happy!!! 😍 Fourteen stories (two of which are novellas), 140K words, and 400 pages. Now just to get the ebook together!

See below for some images of the (illustrated!) interior! #pulp #romance #romancelandia #booksky 📚💙

The front cover of THE BEST OF ALL-STORY LOVE: 1929, tilted at an angle so you can also see the spine. The front features a classic (VERY classic!) clinch painting by Paul Stahr.

The table of contents. It reads:

Introduction . . . 3
Editor's Disclaimer . . . 11

Saturday Night and No Date (Dorothy Dayton) . . . 13
The Timid Vamp (Chet Johnson) . . . 27
Fate! (Doris Knight (as Myra Gay)) . . . 51
New Year and New Love (Jane Littell) . . . 70
In the Eyes of the World (Rosalee Tree) . . . 88
The Love Master (Ethel M. Dell) . . . 111
Bitter-Sweet (Hagar Wilde) . . . 144
The Road Back Home (Du Vernet Rabell) . . . 167
The Palace of Love (Doris Knight) . . . 188
Twenty-Minute Princess (Walter Marquiss) . . . 201
The Paper Doll Bride (Marjorie Gleyre) . . . 215
The Tag-Along Girl (Helen Ahern) . . . 234
Remembered Rapture (Beulah Poynter) . . . 269
Wooing Wings (Clelia S. Mount) . . . 331

Author & Artist Information . . . 394

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 1d

IT LOOKS SO GOOD!!! 😍😍😍

The beginning of Chet Johnson's "The Timid Vamp" (illustrated by Ed Leonard).

An illustration (by Benjamin Goodwin Seielstad) for Helen Ahern's "The Tag-Along Girl."

A two page illustration (by John V. Ranck) for Beulah Poynter's "Remembered Rapture."

An illustration (artist unknown) for Clelia S. Mount's "Wooing Wings." (Mount is suspected to be a pseudonym of C. S. Montanye.)

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 1d

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Reposted by Lucynka

collectingromance.bsky.social @collectingromance.bsky.social · 1d

A Gothtober montage of covers by my favorite illustrator of gothics, George Ziel 🦇🖤 He was born in Poland in 1914, survived the Warsaw Ghetto & Dachau concentration camp, then came to the US where he had a highly successful mid-century career as a pulp illustrator

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2d

5/ Out of the spicies and into the Weird Woolrich™ with Cornell Woolrich's Voodoo thriller "Dark Melody of Madness" (DIME MYSTERY MAGAZINE, July 1935). A commentary on cultural appropriation that is at once wildly racist AND critical of racism. It's…complicated. #pulp #horror #EarlHadToDie

“Dark Melody of Madness”: A commentary on cultural appropriation that is at once wildly racist and critical of racism. It’s…complicated.

Staats only murmurs: “So you’re crossing them? I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes for all the fame and money in this world, guy!” “If you mean that bad dream the other night,” says Eddie, “I hav…

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3d

Thank you, hah. I do intend to get around to the one you already sent when I have a free minute (which will maybe even be sometime soon?), and will def let you know what I think!

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3d

I'll keep it in mind. For now, I still have that Novalyne Price piece I need to read (and haven't forgotten about, believe it or not! 😅).

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3d

Yeah, I mean, these were clearly written for a (white cishet) male audience, and "weird" doesn't do much for me in and of itself, so…probably not. 😂

They were interesting to dip into at the time, but not something I'd really seek out, at this point.

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3d

4/ The 3rd and last "spicy": "The Third Man" by Colby Quinn (SPICY MYSTERY STORIES, Nov. 1937).

It could have been a neat story about two people exploring their (respective) polyamory and cuckolding kinks together, but instead we get misogyny and a tacked-on out-of-body experience. 🫠 #pulp #horror

“The Third Man”: Sorry if you were expecting Orson Welles and post-war Vienna; will out-of-body experiences and cuckolding kinks do instead?

“Suppose you stayed with me,” Jimmy said deliberately, “and you could see him, too… Then what?” What agony it was to say that! Remembrance of Julius holding Dolly close…visions of the way she’d h…

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

3/ Next up is Robert Leslie Bellem's "Death's Nocturne" (SPICY MYSTERY STORIES, July 1936). A kinky, Gothic horror with musicians, ghosts, and some surprisingly good relationship dynamics between the hero and heroine. Just don't try to apply logic to any of it, pfft. #pulp #ScoobyDooVibes

“Death’s Nocturne”: The music has come to life, and it’s both horny and pissed off.

Suppurating fear festered within Nelia Freeman’s cringing soul; grew like a sarcoma on her pounding heart. Desperately she tried to fight away the invisible hands which fondled and pawed at her na…

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

PROOF COPY ORDERED, AHHHHHH!!! 😱

I'm just a little too burnt out to work on the ebook layout just yet, so I'm going to instead start on updating my existing books with my imprint logo, and hopefully take it a bit easy this weekend.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

Thanks! (*screams internally* 😂)

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

I…I think I have the final cover design? #pulp #romance #romancelandia #booksky 📚💙 #comingsoon

The full wrap-around cover of THE BEST OF ALL-STORY LOVE: 1929, my upcoming pulp romance anthology. The front cover is a classic clinch painting by Paul Stahr (from the original magazine), and the back is light blue (fading to medium blue at the bottom), with red, yellow, and pink accents. The cover copy reads:

In the first half of the 20th century, before paperbacks, there were the pulps: magazines printed on cheap wood-pulp paper, specializing in mass-produced genre fiction. While now mostly remembered for sci-fi, fantasy, and detective stories—for quick action and an emphasis on two-fisted adventure—the pulps, in actuality, had something for everyone. Including a vast array of romance titles.

The pulps were, in fact, the primary way American readers consumed romance in those pre-paperback days, and ALL-STORY LOVE was one of the giants of the genre, running from 1929 to 1955. In the first anthology of its kind, editor and romance pulp researcher Lucynka Staron has assembled the very best short fiction from that magazine's first year, complete with their original illustrations, and invites you to take a trip back in time to this forgotten part of romance history. Inside you'll find secretaries and reporters, actresses and debutantes, matched with heroes who range from aristocrat to aviator, from vaudeville dancer to private investigator—and each of their stories a fascinating slice of then-contemporary American culture and concerns.

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

2/ First up, this oldie from 2021: "Her Demon Lover" by "Morgan Lafay," AKA: Arthur Leo Zagat (SPICY MYSTERY STORIES, July 1936).

I went in expecting monster-fucking, and instead got women supporting other women and an abusive husband getting murdered, so…that's cool. ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ #pulp

“Her Demon Lover”: I went in expecting monster-fucking, and instead got women supporting other women and an abusive husband getting murdered, so…that’s cool.

She was a simple mountain girl, starved for love, slave to a brutal master. Then she meets the man from the city, and an old hag’s curse comes to answer her dreams. In my continued search for a fe…

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d

1/ It's October, which means it's time to share the ~spooky~ (or otherwise seasonally-appropriate) pulp reviews I've written over the years! A thread, which I will be progressively adding to throughout the month 🧵:

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 5d

Of all the things about this anthology project, I would not have expected the *spine design* to be the thing to trip me up, and yet here we are. (Maybe sleeping on it will help?) 🫠

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 5d

Apropos of nothing, working with illustrations has really upped my layout game, to the point that I kind of dread the idea of looking back at my first couple pulp collections, lest I be disgusted. 😂

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d

ALL-STORY LOVE anthology update: Short author and artist bios done! Can I put the finishing touches on the paperback layout and get the rest of the cover created by Friday, so that I can get my proof copy ordered this week??? 🤞 #pulp #romance

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Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d

Ah, so maybe it's my ignorance of tennis at play.

Still, there's a LOT of wild stuff going on in this story, and it would be equally hilarious (potentially even more hilarious?) if the tennis/secret agent thing was actually the most believable part of it.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d

I guess??? But the story has basically been treating him like he's Rafael Nadal or something up until this point, not just an amateur.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d

Omg, this is fucking amazing. An amateur tennis champ who's also a secret agent. Which one came first??? How does that make any kind of sense, either way??? It's so stupid, I love it.

("Exiled!" by Eric Powers. LOVE STORY MAGAZINE, Feb. 28, 1931.) #pulp #romance #romancelandia #hordesofanarchists

"I think it is time we were properly introduced," he told her ironically, "or rather that I explained that, apart from my activities as an amateur tennis champion, I have been for many years a member of the king's secret service. Among all the hordes of anarchists which threaten this country, we of the secret service know that the one most to be feared is The Society of the Crimson Cross. We know that the avowed intention of that anarchist who is its head is to destroy the royalist government, and become the first president of the Spanish republic. There is no need for me to explain to you that this man is Juan Barata—José Fernandez."

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