what are some of your favourite pulp novels ? how should i go about starting to read them !
!!!!!!!!!! I love this! Well, I guess it depends on your definition of pulp and your tolerance for a particular style of prose (it can sometimes feel dated if it was meant to be sens-ATIONAL at the time)--if you’ve never read one, it also helps to ask yourself a few questions, too, like, what genre do you prefer (sci fi, sexi, thriller, mystery, etc.)? What’s the visceral reaction you’re looking to tap into? If you’ve never read anything pulp-y before, I’d vote you start with some short stories by some of the more established classic authors, like the ones below. Red Wind is a bunch of noir-y short stories by Raymond Chandler loosely clustered around the effect the Santa Ana winds have on any of us living in Southern California (only from the ‘40s), the Martian Chronicles are different views on human encounters with martians, the Big Knockover was inspired by Dashiell Hammett working at a detective agency in the ‘30s (I THINK???), the Agatha Christie collection, sigh, what can I say?? I’d rec allllll of hers, forever and ever, the Perry Mason one isn’t a set of short stories, but any of those novels is pure late 1940s/early 1950s LA pulp, the Man from CAMP is a classic example of gay pulp, and my GOD, there’s so much in that genre, I vote you just pick a cover and read read read (I picked this one to highlight based on the cover, and I haven’t read it....yet...but I will!), Valley of the Dolls is probably one of the quintessential examples of pulp AND camp, A Scanner Darkly basically launched a ton of sci-fi, and lastly, I can’t recommend Patricia Highsmith enough, period, but I suppose she’s in this realm, too! You could probably also classify a lot of horror as pulp, but that usually isn’t my personal jam. When you start to dig deeper, the quality can vary, so pick ‘em up as cheaply as you can (or for free). Pulp magazine might have some leads for digging deeper, or this list--enjoy!
