The Spider, Master of Men! #24: King of the Red Killers (Grant Stockbridge, Norvell W. Page) Review

Rating 4 Stars

In the 1930s nobody told Norvell W. Page that it would be impossible to cram ten 100 million dollar action movies into one 60,000 word hero pulp novel. Of the works I've read by Norvell W. Page (here using the house pseudonym, Grant Stockbirdge), none shows off his weird, frantic, throbbing brain more fully than this adventure, King of the Red Killers, featuring The Spider, probably the most bloodthirsty and emotionally volatile guy ever to be labelled "hero."
Gallons of graphic violence are on display in this story of congregating bad guys, which is a run on sentence of hyper-detailed, moment by moment, breath by breath action where improbable shifts into super impossible all over multiple terrains. Disbelief is not suspended when you read Norvell W. Page, but set on fire, shot in the head, and dropped out of a plane into a volcano that is filled with atomic bombs.

Two things things make this particular book stand out from the other novels of The Spider that I've read:
1. The number of incredible visual ideas on display is uncommonly high. The lovingly detailed torture set-piece that involves a chair and swimming pool will never be forgotten, nor the airport chase sequence, nor the astounding ending. 
2. The conclusion is the highlight of the entire book. This is rarely the case Spider tales, which often have very strong sequences of destruction (like Dragon Lord of the Underworld) and amazing action, but don't have equally creative or memorable bad guy plans or resolutions. In King of the Red Killers, the best sequences are the final sequences, and that helps put this adventure at the top.

Have you ever applauded while reading a book?
I did with this. 

This book has more flaws than my other two favorite adventures of this character (The Spider and His Hobo Army and The City Destroyer, which are much better plotted experiences), but in terms of lunacy, imagery, sadism, and invention, King of the Red Killers is the perfect courtroom evidence of the deranged and furious thing that lived inside of Norvell W. Page's brainpan.

Also highly recommended by this author is the creepy and paranoiac sci-fi/fantasy, But Without Horns, which was written for Unknown Magazine, and has been collected elsewhere.

The Spider, Master of Men! #86: The Spider and His Hobo Army (Grant Stockbridge, Norvell W. Page) Review

Rating 4 Stars

The issue of the hero pulp magazine The Spider entitled 'The Spider and His Hobo Army' is more consistent and fluidly written than the earlier adventures of this character that I've read and fully displays Norvell W. Page's ability to write unbridled, manic action for a novel-length duration.
(Grant Stockbrige is a pseudonym used by Norvell W. Page [and others].)
I am a big fan of Robert E. Howard and Max Brand, but in terms of unrelenting action and overall intensity, I can't recall a work by either author that rivals Norvell W. Page's writing here in this Spider book. The rapidly spinning plot is impressive and the choreography of some of these chases and gunfights--where a paragraph may cover a fraction of a second of action--brings to mind the work of action auteurs like Peckinpah, Leone and Woo...and this was written in 1940.
Although some of the other Spider novels that I've read have more memorably gruesome set-pieces (the attack on the striking factory workers in 'The Emperor from Hell' is horrifying), none is a more continually exciting adventure than this one. Additionally, the lack of a sadistic, albeit incompetent villain--a common staple in this series--makes things feel a bit more menacing, a bit more like Operator #5, which generally excelled in the villainous plots department. (The Operator #5 issue The Red Invader is a frantic fever dream of paranoia, which I also review.)
Something else that lifts this Spider adventure is that instead of just the usual stable of Spider's lackeys and love interest, the author adds some charming and ornery hoboes, whose development throughout the issue exceeds what can be done with the regular characters. There are some really nice and touching moments with the 'boes.
Running, shooting, careening, veering, laughing, employing exclamation points, using improbably excellent powers of deduction, coming up with the least likely solutions for impossible problems, Norvell W. Page & the Spider never let up and exemplify many of the virtues of pulp fiction.
A gasping beeline of invention and passion.

Terror Tales January 1936 (Hugh B. Cave, Wyatt Blassingame, Emerson Graves, Paul Ernst, Novel Page, G.T. Fleming Roberts) Review

Rating 4 Stars

Although Terror Tales is typically classified as a Weird Menace pulp magazine, only two or three of the seven stories in this issue adhere to stipulations of that subgenre-- lustful foes, implied supernatural happenings, and a mundane resolution that is the pin of exposition, popping the balloon of atmosphere by explaining away all of the mystery. For me, a horror magazine like this one, which mixes Weird Menace and committed supernatural horror, is a superior experience since the outcomes are not uniform and do not undo all of the supernatural goings-on. Additionally, the prose and psychological complexity of some of these tales are far richer than I expected, comparing more to Weird Tales than Uncanny Tales or Dime Mystery (even though many of the same authors appear).
I've read that the steeper cover price for Terror Tales (a whopping 15 cents as opposed to a mere 10 pennies) was supposed to indicate a higher quality of fiction, and actually, the number of standout stories in this issue proves that to be the case. Although there are not any stories as compelling as my favorite HP Lovecraft, CA Smith, and Donald Wandrei stories, this January 1936 issue of Terror Tales has four stories worthy of anthology, and two other enjoyable yarns, and just one lone dud, by Francis James (who consistently writes tedious tales with clunky prose).
Hugh B. Cave provides the solid, though standard feature tale (Daughters of the Plague) that I would expect from such a workhorse, and G.T. Fleming-Roberts's Father of the Monsters is not very well written, but certainly ugly enough to elicit a chill. But things get noticeably better elsewhere: Wyatt Blassingame and Paul Ernst's well told tales (Satan Sends a Woman & The Devils Cistern) are both highly atmospheric and satisfying---both of these could have been highlights in an issue of Weird Tales and display the art of two strong craftsman; Norvell Page's lunar story is an unlikely, but volatile fable that moves far too quickly to leave room for logic; and Emerson Graves provides a genuinely haunting look at dementia with a bigger temporal scope than is usually achieved in most novelettes.
Four really good, well-crafted stories and two solid yarns comprise this remarkably artful and consistent issue of weird pulp fiction, the January 1936 issue of Terror Tales.

The Red Invader (Operator #5) (Frederick C. Davis)

Rating 4 Stars

After reading seven Operator #5 novels, The Red Invader stands out as the best, slighting beating out the nastiest, which is Master of Broken Men. Frederick C. Davis is very well liked in pulp circles, and I definitely like a ton of what he does here (and in the Op #5 books Green Death Mists and Blood Reign of the Dictator, which are almost as good).
My one complaint with his writing (here and elsewhere) is that his action sequences are written like sloppy book reports--there is information, but no flow, and he regularly substitutes the word "as" for the word "and" as if they are wholly interchangeable. His action lacks the sense of timing and spatial orientation that exists in the works of Max Brand, Robert E. Howard, and the #1 master of action, Norvell W. Page, and even second tier guys like Paul Chadwick (Secret Agent X) and Emile C. Tepperman (the second Op #5 writer) provide clearer action.

Regardless of that criticism, I am a big fan of Frederick C. Davis, who in this adventure (and others) exceeds most if not all of his hero pulp contemporaries in three big ways:
1. Intelligent tactics. The bad guys have good plans, not just "consolidate the bad guys" or "poison gas guns." And thus, the plans of the good guys must be similarly smart.
2. Expert escalation of tension. The Red Invader should be taught in a course entitled, "How to Gradually Build Tension from Page 1 until The End." The plotting is sharp, purposeful, and suffocating in this tale.
3. An abundance of believable details. The weaponry and foes described in this adventure feel authentic, and the main weapon is a truly harrowing threat.
I can honestly say that I am not sure which of the historical footnotes about weapons and politics are fact and which are fiction. This blurry line also helps sell the story's big ideas.

Do you want to read a tense, paranoia-inducing, grandly explosive, xenophobic, expertly-plotted war fever dream? Read this.

Satan Paints the Sky (G-8 and His Battle Aces #52) (Robert J. Hogan) Review

Rating 4 Stars

The bad guy has a dagger stuck in his head. The point is in his brain and the hilt is just sticking out there. He's not very happy about this ... but I am.
Although there is far more to this book than this particularly strong visual idea, this idea is really something. (This is shown on both the cover and the very first page of the story, so I'm not spoiling anything.)
Recommended in Ed Hulse's indispensable The Blood 'N' Thunder Guide To Collecting Pulps, the aeronautical adventure of G-8 entitled Satan Paints the Sky is a nearly perfect example of how a few strong visual ideas (there are others besides the villain, especially one involving picnic baskets), some especially fluid/invisible prose, and a particularly well turned plot can be all that is required for an engaging reading experience. The various plot inversions are logical but rarely foreseeable, especially at the speed that Robert J. Hogan moves this WWI flying spy tale.
I've enjoyed the other G-8 adventures that I've read, but this one compares to my hero pulp favorites, The Spider and Operator #5.