Yearbook 23 features all the serial pulp novels from Dime Pulp in 2023 (Carriers, Better Than Dead, Cheése Stands Alone, and Just Coincidence), presented here in uninterrupted (deserialized?) versions as easily accessible pdf files. For those who might have lost track of a story thread or were just too impatient with the serial format or would like to revisit some terrific storytelling in the pulp mode, check out a year of Dime Pulp below.
Also available from the menu bar above are Dime Pulp Yearbook 21 & 22 featuring Crime Fiction, Western, Crimefighter, & Steampunk pulp fiction.
“Lackland Ask is the name. ‘Lack’ to my friends, ‘Don’t’ to those who think they’re funny. You might have seen my portrait on the cover of Black Mask, the crime fiction magazine. This is my story. It starts with a blonde. This kind of story always starts with a blonde.” Colin Deerwood’s anti-hero PI, Lackland Ask, was named “Dick Of The Day” by the prestigious Thrilling Detective blog last year. The pulp fiction serial came about from dashed off word sketches no more than a page or so in length of the action depicted on the covers of pulp magazines from the 30s. Soon the fragments took on a life of their own, growing from the accumulated potential of the occasional improvisations to a crime story set in 1940. The author credits his style to evenings spent listening to The Damon Runyan Theater on the radio as a child and, when he was mature enough, the hyperbolic wit of Dorothy Parker. The inspiration for his private detective can be found on the cover of a March 1930 issue of Black Mask that featured Hammett’s The Glass Key. Better Than Dead has been Dime Pulp’s longest running serial, appearing in 30 issues since January of 2020. Better Than Dead is truly better than dead. Read the final 36 episodes of Better Than Dead here: BETTER THAN DEAD23yb .
In March of 1892, a Scotsman by the name of Arthur C. “Artie” Doyle was hanged by the neck until dead after being found guilty of a string of grisly murders of prostitutes in Whitechapel. At that moment, history veered off its presumed course and headed in a direction all its own in which the Great War never happened because the Kaiser was afraid of offending his grandmother, Queen Victoria, whose life has been prolonged by the wonders of biology. Her reign, known as the Pax Victoriana, has lasted 180 years maintaining as many Victorian airs as possible while making accommodations to rapid advances in bio technology. Cheése Stands Alone poses a steampunk question, can Captain Lydia Cheése (pronounced “Chase”) find her father, the antigovernment turncoat and radical, Commodore Jack “Wild Goose” Cheése. And furthermore, will her quest take her around the globe and through alternate world histories in the requisite 80 days or is it the beginning of a lifelong journey? Catch up on the Chapters XIII-XXVI of Lydia’s adventures here: Cheese 23yb.
In Just Coincidence, a privileged young man with the unremarkable name of Wayne Bruce returns to the site where his father once had his business, a battery manufacturing plant, and where he often spent his childhood days hanging around the factory and the neighborhood. His return is haunted by the mysterious circumstances surrounding his father’s death and the vague feeling that his uncle is somehow involved. Appalled by the poverty and crime of the place he remembers fondly, he is moved to resolve the injustice of the socially marginalized and to wreak vengeance on those he believes are responsible for the death of his father. A personal coincidence brings together a brooding prince and a dark knight in a fateful and tragic quest for justice. Read all of Act II here: Just Coincidence23yb.
Carriers is a vampire novella with touches of black comedy and satirical bite, and is told from the perspective of its unreliable narrator and protagonist, Johnny. It takes place during a “plague” that has been going on for two years in an unnamed city. Dead bodies litter the streets, hallways, and homes. A corpse disposal company hires people like Johnny to transport them to a facility at the edge of town with the very important stipulation that the bodies be delivered there before sundown. No one ever says why. Read 7 Chapter’s of Mark DuCharme’s Carriers here: Carriers23
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