Cheap Thrills: The Amazing! Thrilling! Astonishing! History of Pulp Fiction

by Ron Goulart

Hermes Press is proud to announce the release of Ron Goulart's classic history of the pulps: Cheap Thrills. This book is more than just a reprint of Goulart's ground-breaking 1972 history of the pulps though. Hermes Press' complete redesigned version of this classic contains mountains of material not used in the original Amazing! Thrilling! Astonishing tome about the great pulps and pulp writers. Extra: the new edition of Cheap Thrills presents many remembrances by pulp fiction greats never before seen and not included in the original version of the book. Hermes Press is pulling out all of the stops with Cheap Thrills. The book is being printed in an all color 12" square fromat filled with pulp cover art that inspired readers, artists, and everyone who ever read the pulps.

Genres: Nonfiction, Pulp, Reference, History

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Pseudonyms: Howard Lee; Frank S Shawn; Kenneth Robeson; Con Steffanson; Josephine Kains; Joseph Silva; William Shatner.
Ron Goulart is a cultural historian and novelist. Besides writing extensively about pulp fiction—including the seminal Cheap Thrills: An Informal History of Pulp Magazines (1972)—Goulart has written for the pulps since 1952, when the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction published his first story, a sci-fi parody of letters to the editor. Since then he has written dozens of novels and countless short stories, spanning genres and using a variety of pennames, including Kenneth Robeson, Joseph Silva, and Con Steffanson. In the 1990s, he became the ghostwriter for William Shatner’s popular TekWar novels. Goulart’s After Things Fell Apart (1970) is the only science-fiction novel to ever win an Edgar Award.

In the 1970s Goulart wrote novels starring series characters like Flash Gordon and the Phantom, and in 1980 he published Hail Hibbler, a comic sci-fi novel that began the Odd Jobs, Inc. series. Goulart has also written several comic mystery series, including six books starring Groucho Marx. Having written for comic books, Goulart produced several histories of the art form, including the Comic Book Encyclopedia (2004).

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interesting overview of the pulp magazine, and serves as a good, if non-comprehensive, introduction to the era. Goulart devotes chapters to different genres such as the dime detectives, super science, and Westerns, and gives brief summaries of the publications devoted to them, and also offers some interesting insights from interviews with writers, editors, artists, and publishers with knowledge of the time. There's also a nice section that presents some representative covers and interior illustrations. It's a fun book, and a nice starting place for readers who think they might be interested in learning about the field.

[Alvaro Zinos-Amaro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Solid resource. Though other volumes have superseded some of the theme-specific chapters of Goulart's historical overview, this book remains useful and informative (and often quite droll, e.g. "You can't build a large circulation solely with necrophilia fans..." p 146).

The sample prose excerpts are a lovely touch, giving us first-hand contact with the styles and tropes alluded to. It's a shame that Goulart elected to omit these in the chapter on Weird Tales and other horror pulps. The closing section of letters is valuable. The artwork is often gorgeous. From a production standpoint, however, I wish its placement had been a little better "synchronized" with the text--sometimes you have to turn back or forward a few pages to see the covers of the specific pulps discussed in the text on that particular page.

Still, a commendable effort, specially considering when it was written. Kudos for all the primary research.

[John Adkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good general history of the pulp fiction era. The author includes considerable first hand material in the form of interviews with early pulpsters. Other works go into far more detail on specific genres or magazines but if you are looking for a good place to begin you studies you could do far worse than to read Cheap Thrills.

[Tom Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a reprint of Goulart’s 1969 An Informal History of The Pulp Magazines paperback. This 2007 edition is a trade paperback (8.5 X 11). It has been updated with corrected information, as well as additional material, and packed full of color cover scans. It contains chapters on the Dime Novel & Paper Stories of the 19th century, the beginning of the pulp magazines, heroes, soldiers of fortune, The Shadow, Doc Savage, the masked heroes, Tarzan ands the Jungle Lords, Conan & the barbarians, Captain Future and the science fiction heroes, and much more.

This is a book for the old pulp and new pulp fan alike. It belongs on everyone’s shelf. Highly recommended.

[Vultural · Rating 3 out of 5]

Goulart, Robert - Cheap Thrills

2007 updating of the classic 1972 overview of the Pulp era.

Goulart does a nice job showing the origins of the periodicals, explores various genres, then details various reasons for their eventual demise.

Final 50 pages are copies of letters he received in 1969 from still surviving writers, artists, editors. Insightful and entertaining.

I am still boggled how they could churn out 10,000 - 20,000 words daily!

Most have faded from memory, though a few names linger on. Max Brand, king of the Western. Maxwell Grant, The Shadow. Ron E Howard, Conan. HPL.
Penny a word.

[Brigid · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great introduction to the pulps, starting with Frank Munsey's early attempts and running through the 1950s, leavened with plenty of anecdotes and quotes from writers and editors. Although this book is 40 years old, reading it gave me a whole new perspective on 21st century culture, as I realized how many familiar characters and tropes started out in the pulps. It's a short read and a good one.

[Plum · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ron Goulart's classic 1972 history of the pulps is given new life with spectacular images that sent thrills, cheap or not, to young and old readers in the first half of the 20th century. My only regret is that the artists of these illustrations are identified.

[Ronald · Rating 5 out of 5]

A light history

[Derek · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was interesting to see the relationships between the companies and magazines (who is an imitator of whom, and so forth) which I'd never seen spelled out before, but in all this was an unfocused and shallow treatment. The chapters had a tendency to meander, starting with one subject and ending on another.

I'm not sure what Goulart's view on the subject was: sometimes it seemed that he warmed to the topic (cowboys and detectives) and others were beneath his notice (science fiction and horror).

The topic could easily have consumed another two hundred pages and a narrower subject.

[Michael P. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This being an “informal” history, I suppose the author is free to write about whatever interests him on the subject and skip what does not. Goulart assumes this privilege, so it seems off-base to criticize the book for not being comprehensive as some have done. The approach is more quirky, perhaps a bit fannish, but the author is highly skilled so this purposefully skewed approach to pulp history never fails to be entertaining. It also fails to give this reader what he wants.

[Freder · Rating 2 out of 5]

Merely serviceable.

[Kerry Olivetti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice historical overview, even if it's a little thin in terms of content. Goulart has a highly entertaining authorial voice, though.