New Pulp Fiction Clarified

Moonstone Books recently announced the upcoming release of a book called New Pulp Fiction, but its contents weren't particularly clear to me. Ron Fortier's explanation on various Facebook groups clears everything up.

Last year Moonstone published a limited edition novella, Faces of Fear by Ron Fortier with illustrations by Rob Davis. That book was available exclusively on their website. At the same time Fortier & Davis published the first ever Secret Agent X comic book from Davis’ Redbud Studio. Now both the novella and the comic will be offered in a new package called, New Pulp Fiction, being solicited via Diamond to be released in comic shops this September.

So it's a Fortier/Davis double bill.

While I have no particular fondness for Secret Agent X, I've only read the Kindle version of Faces Of Fear so getting a print one for the collection will be swell. I thought I had seen illustrations (by Davis, naturally) for that book that were not included in the digital copy so there'll be new material to take in along with the Secret Agent X story. Looking forward to this.

Moonstone's New Pulp Fiction Scheduled for September

Upon laying eyes on the cover below, I had to assume that this was the solicitation for the new edition of the Faces Of Fear book that was released by Moonstone last fall. It is a vertically flipped version of that cover with a purple colour scheme rather than orange.

Writer: Ron Fortier
Artist: Rob Davis
Cover: Dennis Calero 

7”x10”, squarebound, grayscale, 146 pgs, $12.99
ISBN: 978-1-936814-53-451299
COMICS & ILLUSTRATED PROSE! 

From Blood and Thunder Alley…dealing out Maximum Justice:
New complete action thrillers starring the Black Bat (can-see-in-the dark two-gun crimefighter), Secret Agent X (man of a thousand faces), and the Purple Scar (who wears a mask of his murdered brother)!

The text above confuses matters a bit though. If it is a "deluxe" edition of Faces Of Fear from last October, can it be called a new action thriller? It actually sounds like three new stories but I can't see applying a re-coloured cover to such a book. Unless that cover is not final.

Also, I don't recall much involvement from Secret Agent X in FOF so does he get a story all his own in this edition, or has he been worked into FOF?

I'll be eager to get a look at a table of contents but since I could only read the Kindle version of Face Of Fear, this will be making its way into the collection even if it is "just" a reprint with a few extras.

Update on Sanctum's Black Bat Reprints

A week ago, Sanctum Books' Anthony Tollin commented on a discussion about tardiness with the publisher's Spider reprints. He included The Black Bat in his response. I've copied most of it below, adding only paragraph breaks and removing a portion about recent health issues.

BLACK BAT #10 is completed and WILL soon be resolicited. Sales and income are down, and THE SPIDER and THE BLACK BAT simply were not selling well enough to justify their continuation (at least not with the added cost of the bonus Sanctum Books extras). It costs a lot of $$$ to include all the extra features and articles that are part of the Sanctum Book format, but those extras don't appear to pump up sales at all, at least not on SPIDER and BLACK BAT.  

Altus, like most other pulp reprint companies, relies on print-on-demand printing, while Sanctum has always gone exclusively with actual print runs and real warehoused first printing inventories. Hopefully, Altus will be able to make a go of THE SPIDER and BLACK BAT with the lessor print-on-demand advance overhead.  

Also, THE SPIDER and THE BLACK BAT took much more time editorially and production-wise to produce than THE SHADOW and DOC SAVAGE, and I recently had to concede that I was sabotaging/delaying several important upcoming book projects (including THE SHADOW newspaper strip collection and the revised, expanded color edition of THE SHADOW SCRAPBOOK) by devoting so much time to two time-consuming ongoing series that were not producing an actual profit. Things would have been different if THE SPIDER and BLACK BAT could have sold just a couple hundred more copies per issue, but they simply didn't.

Probably nothing that shocks anyone but it's still good to hear it from the dachshund's mouth, if I may alter the expression to refer to another interest Mr. Tollin and I share.

Last we'd heard, the books were going to come out annually. Now we're not sure if there will be an 11th issue. Too bad, but business is business.