Pulp International

vintage and modern pulp fiction; noir, schlock and exploitation films; scandals, swindles and news

LOSING WAIT

Too old to waste the time.

Fred Fixler cover art comes at a heavy price on the auction sites. It’s very nice. That’s why we put together a collection of his work a while back, but we’re the silly types that don’t think any paperback is $295.00, which is a common price for Fixler. Hell, we don’t think any are worth $29.50, especially when they’re wrapped around bad fiction, which happens a lot. If you’re patient, affordable Fixler may appear. Peter Kanto’s 1966 sleaze novel Too Young To Wait, which we’ve had our eye on in appreciation for its phallic/sapphic-bottle/glass innuendo, was available electronically, so we grabbed it.

It’s about a group of college students on vacation at the beach over Labor Day, and how everything that can possibly go wrong does. There’s one girl who can’t achieve orgasms but will do anything (promiscuously) to succeed, another who’s terrified she may be a lesbian and crosses the line (orgasmically) but thinks she’d rather die than be gay, a guy who has the makings (definitively) of a rapist, and so forth. Kanto handles all of this as manipulatively as he can and delivers sex aplenty, but we weren’t happy with some of his more retrograde stylings. Life is short, so we won’t venture his way again. Well—maybe we’ll read Cocksure on Campus. That sounds fun.

Brandon House, Peter Kanto, Fred Fixler, cover art, literature, lgbt

CLASS SIN SESSION

And the first lesson of tutoring is what, girls? That's right. We never talk about what we do in tutoring.

Above: Peter Bronson’s The Sin Tutor from Brandon Books, aka Brandon House, which specialized in sleaze, often lesbian sleaze. This novel looks reasonably high grade, but there are excerpts from it online, and it’s actually quite raunchy. Are we tempted? Of course. See more from Brandon House here and here.

Brandon House, Peter Bronson, cover art, literature

THE PRICE OF CIGARETTES

I promised my husband I wouldn't smoke anymore, but since I already broke one promise I might as well break them all.


Above, a cover for Two Sided Triangle by Gus Stevens for Brandon House Books, 1965. The company’s most beautiful covers were painted by Fred Fixler. Is this a Fixler cover? We don’t think so. Brandon House, through its art direction, seemed to make all its illustrators paint like Fixler, but while similar, this doesn’t look like him to us. We could be wrong. We could always be wrong. It’s happened. More than once. But we like this cover quite a bit, and it amuses us that the male figure seems to be staring directly where the sun don’t shine on his female companion, which is probably what we’d be doing under the circumstances too. If you have an idea who painted this, Fixler or otherwise, feel free to drop us a line. 

Brandon House, Gus Stevens, Clarence A. Stevens, cover art, literature

FULL COVERAGE

Are you ready to see my unbelievably sexy new panties? These will blow your mind.


There was a time when her panties probably were considered unbelievably sexy. We’re glad that time passed, though with the waistlines in women’s fashion creeping back up—harkening to the era when it was illegal to show a navel on television or in movies—will it be long before panties turn into parachutes again? We’re on record as hating high waistlines on undergarments. Let’s pray to the Roman goddess Clotho that sense prevails before that happens. She isn’t technically responsible for clothing, but she does spin the threads that determine the course of people’s lives. Presumably that includes fashion designers. 1964’s Suzy and Vera comes from author Peggy Swenson, aka Richard Geis, last seen around these parts writing the sleaze classic Lesbian Gym. The same artist painted the covers for both books, looks to us. Some say it’s Fred Fixler, but we think it’s someone charged by Brandon House with producing work in a similar style. And a nice style it is. But Fixler? We think not. We’ll keep researching this. 

Brandon House, Peggy Swenson, Richard E. Geis, cover art, literature, lgbt

EXERCISING CAUTION

I want to be prepared to fight back in case a man attacks something other than my basic rights as an individual.

Above, a cover for Lesbian Gym from Brandon House, by Peggy Swenson, aka Richard Geis, copyright 1964. This one caught our eye because the Pulp Intl. girlfriends are always mocking the guys in their gym, whose apelike nature—so they tell us—emerges rather strongly there. We can’t comment because we don’t go to the gym. We do a bit of heavy lifting at the local bar, though. Good thing we’re naturally skinny. A couple of sources attribute this cover to Fred Fixler, but we think they’re wrong. Keep this in the uncredited bin.

Brandon House, Richard E. Geis, Peggy Swenson, cover art, literature, lgbt

THE FLESH’S WEEK

I’m glad we stopped calling it spring break. I just feel better being honest about how we behave.


Sex Week is classic lesbian sleaze from publisher Brandon House and author Rex Weldon, aka Duane Weldon Rimel, and it appeared in 1965. Weldon also wrote Party Wife, Bedroom Bingo, Bed Slave, Sweet Sapphic Scene, and other gems of the genre. He may have gotten some of his ideas from his many interesting jobs, including as a liquor store clerk, jazz pianist, hotel worker, and bartender. Thankfully, he found his true calling in sleaze. The artist here is the indispensable Fred Fixler, and you can see much more from him by starting with this link, and you can see our recent large collection of lesbian sleaze here. 

Brandon House, Rex Weldon, Duane Weldon Rimel, Fred Fixler, cover art, literature

QUICK FIXLER

Fred Fixler once again elevates Brandon House sleaze with virtuosic art.

A few years ago we shared eight Fred Fixler covers he had painted for Brandon House. Today we thought we’d fill out the collection a bit with another group of Fixlers, above. Some of these you can see elsewhere online, whereas others you can’t, but they all fall into that our-website-is-not-complete-without-them category we’ve mentioned before. Problem solved. Over time Fixler has become one of our favorite paperback illustrators, and these pieces show why. In fact, they’re probably way too good for an imprint like Brandon House, which published books like The Rape Machine and Sex on Welfare. It’s proof that even excellent artists often barely manage to make a living in this crazy world of totally upside down values. You can see the other Fixler collection at this link.

Brandon House, Fred Fixler, Guy F. Brown, Norma Gilbert, Richard E. Geis, Gus Stevens, Peter Kanto, Robert N. Owen, Peggy Swenson, Wayne Wallace, Marcia Marcoux, Stanley Curson, Rod Strong, Pamela Kaye, Tony Trelos, cover art, literature, cover collection

READY FOR FREDDY

Fred Fixler’s talent transformed sleaze into high art.

Hungarian-born Fred Fixler’s first career was as a diamond cutter, but by the early 1950s his focus shifted to art, which he studied in both the U.S. and France. He began illustrating paperback covers, and for years was an illustrator for the sleaze publishing imprint Brandon House. During that time his instantly identifiable style resulted in some of the most dynamic paperback covers ever seen on U.S. book racks. The piece above, with its shadowy lovers, is a prime example. Brandon House used Fixler as the primary illustrator for their line of lesbian paperbacks, and because of his talent, these books, which originally sold for around one dollar, go online today for in excess of seventy-five bucks. Fixler also worked in the commercial art field, and taught at schools like the California Art Institute, The Brandes Art Institute, and Parsons School of Design. Below are several more great Fixler pieces that we corralled from around the internet. You can see more of his art by searching online, and learn a lot more about him from his website. 

Hungary, France, Brandon House, Parsons School of Design, Brandes Art Institute, Fred Fixler, lesbian, cover art, cover collection

BLAZE OF GLORIA

It was an Affairs to remember.

Above is a cover scan of Victor Jay’s 1964 novel The Affairs of Gloria, a book that is significant because it’s the first from the LGBT author whose real name is Victor J. Banis. He happens to be the person who, writing under Leisure Books’ communal pseudonym Don Holliday, gave the world the mystery series The Man from C.A.M.P., as well as many other books that are classics in the gay pulp genre. Some of those unforgettable and decidedly un-PC titles include Blow the Man Down, Man into Boy, Homo Farm, and Rally Round the Fag.
 
Gloria isn’t what you’d call a gay pulp. Banis hadn’t yet taken that direction with his fiction (which was all short stories up to that point), but he was literarily bi-curious, you could say, so what he did was create a protagonist whose sexual appetite allowed him to experiment with lesbian themes. The book sold well, and despite an obscenity indictment in Sioux City, Iowa, Banis came away from the experience more convinced than ever that an untapped gay market was waiting. In 1966 Greenleaf Classics published Banis’s first gay mystery The Why Not, which resulted in the go-ahead for similar novels.
 
Banis is still churning out books today, and is well reviewed by entities as middle of the road as Publisher’s Weekly, who, according to the author’s website, called him a literary icon who made a difference. All of that began to take shape with his first novel, The Affairs of Gloria. You can read Banis’s own account of writing Gloria and get the skinny on that obscenity trial here. 
 
Brandon House, Victor J. Banis, Victor Jay, Don Holliday, Fred Fixler, cover art, literature
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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

1946—Cannes Launches Film Festival

The first Cannes Film Festival is held in 1946, in the old Casino of Cannes, financed by the French Foreign Affairs Ministry and the City of Cannes.

1934—Arrest Made in Lindbergh Baby Case

Bruno Hauptmann is arrested for the kidnap and murder of Charles Lindbergh Jr., son of the famous American aviator. The infant child had been abducted from the Lindbergh home in March 1932, and found decomposed two months later in the woods nearby. He had suffered a fatal skull fracture. Hauptmann was tried, convicted, sentenced to death, and finally executed by electric chair in April 1936. He proclaimed his innocence to the end

1919—Pollard Breaks the Color Barrier

Fritz Pollard becomes the first African-American to play professional football for a major team, the Akron Pros. Though Pollard is forgotten today, famed sportswriter Walter Camp ranked him as “one of the greatest runners these eyes have ever seen.” In another barrier-breaking historical achievement, Pollard later became the co-head coach of the Pros, while still maintaining his roster position as running back.

1932—Entwistle Leaps from Hollywood Sign

Actress Peg Entwistle commits suicide by jumping from the letter “H” in the Hollywood sign. Her body lay in the ravine below for two days, until it was found by a detective and two radio car officers. She remained unidentified until her uncle connected the description and the initials “P.E.” on the suicide note in the newspapers with his niece’s two-day absence.

1908—First Airplane Fatality Occurs

The plane built by Wilbur and Orville Wright, The Wright Flyer, crashes with Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge aboard as a passenger. The accident kills Selfridge, and he becomes the first airplane fatality in history.

1983—First Black Miss America Crowned

Vanessa Williams becomes the first African American Miss America. She later loses her crown when lesbian-themed nude photographs of her are published by Penthouse magazine.

  • FEATUREd PULP

Orwellian Doublespeak

Pulp style book covers made the literary-minded George Orwell look sexy and adventurous.

WRITTEN IN THE STARS

Ten covers from the popular French thriller series Les aventures de Zodiaque.

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