This special edition of Strange Tales #9 is presented in the original magazine's dimensions. In addition to great work by Hugh B. Cave, L. Sprague de Camp, and many more, this edition adds "The Devil's Crypt," a novelet by E. Hoffmann Price.

When the pulp magazine Weird Tales appeared on newsstands in 1923, it proved to be a pivotal moment in the evolution of speculative fiction. Living up to its nickname, “The Unique Magazine,” Weird Tales provided the first real venue for authors writing in the nascent genres of fantasy, horror, and science fiction. Weird fiction pioneers such as H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, Robert Bloch, Catherine L. Moore, and many others honed their craft in the pages of Weird Tales in the 1920s and 1930s, and their work had a tremendous influence on later generations of genre authors. In The Unique Legacy of Weird Tales: The Evolution of Modern Fantasy and Horror, Justin Everett and Jeffrey Shanks have assembled an impressive collection of essays that explore many of the themes critical to understanding the importance of the magazine. This multi-disciplinary collection from a wide array of scholars looks at how Weird Tales served as a locus of genre formation and literary discourse community. There are also chapters devoted to individual authors—including Lovecraft, Howard, and Bloch—and their particular contributions to the magazine. As the literary world was undergoing a revolution and mass-produced media began to dwarf high-brow literature in social significance, Weird Tales managed to straddle both worlds. This collection of essays explores the important role the magazine played in expanding the literary landscape at a very particular time and place in American culture. The Unique Legacy of Weird Tales will appeal to scholars and aficionados of fantasy, horror, and weird fiction and those interested in the early roots of these popular genres.

The sixty-fifty anniversary issue of Weird Tales showcases the work of Featured Author Gene Wolfe and Featured Artist George Barr (who contributed all the artwork). Also includes work by Ramsey Campbell, F. Paul Wilson, T.E.D. Klein, Tanith Lee, and many more.

The famous "Spicy" pulp magazines of the 1930s and 1940s are among the rarest and most sought-after publications by collectors. The "Spicy" magazines -- which included Spicy Mystery, Spicy Adventure, Spicy Detective, and others -- published a titilating mix of fantasy, horror, mystery, action-adventure, and suspense, punctuated by episodes of torture, sadism, sex, and other risque elements. Although tame by current standards, and sometimes of dubious literary merit, these publications presented tales which thrilled a sensation-hungry audience. Despite the themes and constraints of the market, writers who would later become famous -- including Hugh B. Cave, E. Hoffman Price, Robert Leslie Bellem, and many more -- were frequent contributors. The December 1939 issue of Spicy Adventure Stories includes contributions from Robert Leslie Bellem, Lew Merrill (Victor Rousseau), Hugh Speer, Ken Cooper, Clayton Maxwell, Clark Nelson, and Harley L. Court.

"The Thrill Book" is a legendary magazine, one of the holy grails of pulp collecting. Original copies sell for thousands of dollars -- if you can find them. Running for sixteen issues in 1919, it was a magazine of "strange, bizzare, occult, mysterious tales," but not quite a fantastic-fiction magazine, mixing various types of adventure stories with often outstanding fantasy, horror, and science fiction by Murray Leinster, Seabury Quinn, Francis Stevens, Perley Moore Sheehan, Tod Robbins, Edward Lucas White, Greye La Spina, and other giants of the pulp era. While sheer scarcity may have once added something to the lustre of "The Thrill Book," now that an issue is finally made available at an affordable price, the reader may appreciate that this truly was a pioneering -- and supremely entertaining -- publication.

This biography of the creator of Conan the Barbarian is “deep dive work,” in which “this ‘mysterious’ Texas scribe gets his most complete story arc told” (Houston Press). Robert E Howard’s most famous creation, Conan the Barbarian, is an icon of popular culture. In hundreds of tales detailing the exploits of Conan, King Kull, and others, Howard helped to invent the sword and sorcery genre. Todd B. Vick delves into newly available archives and probes Howard’s relationships, particularly with schoolteacher Novalyne Price, to bring a fresh, objective perspective to Howard's life. Like his many characters, Howard was an enigma and an outsider. He spent his formative years visiting the four corners of Texas, experiences that left a mark on his stories. He was intensely devoted to his mother, whom he nursed in her final days, and whose impending death contributed to his suicide in 1936 when he was just thirty years old. Renegades & Rogues is an unequivocal journalistic account that situates Howard within the broader context of pulp literature. More than a realistic fantasist, he wrote westerns and horror stories as well, and engaged in avid correspondence with H. P. Lovecraft and other pulp writers of his day. Vick investigates Howard’s twelve-year writing career, analyzes the influences that underlay his celebrated characters, and assesses the afterlife of Conan, the figure in whom Howard’s fervent imagination achieved its most durable expression. “A tour de force.” ―Modern Age “A compelling read.” —S. T. Joshi, author of I Am Providence: The Life and Times of H. P. Lovecraft

The birth of modern fantasy in 1930s Britain and America saw the development of new literary and film genres. J.R.R. Tolkien created modern fantasy with The Lord of the Rings, set in a fictional world based upon his life in the early 20th century British Empire, and his love of language and medieval literature. In small-town Texas, Robert E. Howard pounded out his own fantasy realm in his Conan stories, published serially in the ephemeral pulp magazines he loved. Jerry Siegel created Superman with Joe Shuster, and laid the foundation for perhaps the most far-reaching fantasy worlds: the universe of DC and Marvel comics. The work of extraordinary people who lived in an extraordinary decade, this modern fantasy canon still provides source material for the most successful literary and film franchises of the 21st century. Modern fantasy speaks to the human experience and still shows its origins from the lives and times of its creators.