It Wouldn't Be Day One of Comic Con...

without a bit of controversy.

This morning an open letter was posted by Anthony Tollin on one of the Yahoo Message Boards. Tollin, as everyone in pulp knows is one of the few pulp scholars and editor of the DOC SAVAGE and SHADOW reprint series.

An open letter to the pulp community:

For those taking advantage of the discounted SHADOW and DOC SAVAGE volumes at Half-Price Books, please be aware
that Nostalgia Ventures began remaindering these books last summer in direct violation of its sub-contract with
me. Also, as of today (July 22, 2009), Nostalgia Ventures has still not paid royalties to either Condé Nast or me for any books it has sold since July 1st, 2008. (A semi-annual royalty payment was due back in February, and
another six months of royalties are coming due in August.) There is a very good reason why Nostalgia Ventures/Nostalgiatown is no longer co-publishing these books, and it involves a continuing series of contract violations.

And for anyone who may not be sympathetic because Condé Nast is a huge corporation, please be aware that Condé
Nast has chosen to continue the oral agreement it had for decades with Walter Gibson, and is splitting its royalties for the SHADOW reprints with Walter's family. This is an extremely rare and decent act that is quite unusual in the publishing world.

I think my SHADOW and DOC SAVAGE double-novel trade paperbacks are a great value at the $12.95 cover price.
Obviously, the books are an even better value at discounted prices. However, please be aware that purchasing these books from either Half-Price Books or Nostalgiatown does nothing to encourage the continuation of these series. And since Nostalgia Ventures still hasn't paid its contract-required royalties for any of the books it has sold during the past 12 1/2 months, the money from Nostalgia Ventures' and Half-Price Books' sales also hasn't been continuing on to Walter Gibson's family.

It's not necessary to purchase THE SHADOW and DOC SAVAGE directly from Sanctum Books to support the ongoing
publishing operation and encourage the continuation of these reprints. Bud Plant Comic Art, Adventure House, Mike Chomko, Vintage Library, Girasol, Edge Books, The Mysterious Bookshop and any comic specialty shop that orders its books from Diamond Comic Distributors all get their books either directly or indirectly through Sanctum Books (which continues to make its regular royalty payments to Condé Nast and would like to continue publishing these reprints for many more years).

Please feel free to forward this message on to other pulp-oriented email groups.

--Anthony Tollin
Sanctum Books

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First off, I want to say it's admirable beyond belief that Conde Nast is honoring a verbal commitment it made to one of its creators (who put a lot of money in their coffers when they were Street & Smith).

Secondly, purchase your Shadow reprints through one of the retail entities listed above so that the money that is rightfully due Gibson's family gets to them.

Three, stay tuned. I am sure there will be more to this soon.

Pulp Report from NYCC: 2009 - Tollin Leaves Nostalgia Ventures, Shadow Feature Development, Murray to Write New Doc, More...

Pulpster Kevin Byrne answered the call to action and submitted this report on the "Pulp Panel" at this year's New York Comic Con:

Anthony Tollin announced that he split from Nostalgia Ventures and has moved his properties to Spectrum (which I believe is his own imprint).

Attending were Joe Gentile of Moonstone Publishing, Ron Fortier of Airship 27, Steven Seagel (sic?) of Weird Tales, Anthony Tollin (formerly) of Nostalgia Ventures, author Will Murray, producer F.G. DeSanto, Charles Ardai of Hardcase Crime, and Mark Halegua of NY Pulp Club.

In talking about new projects, Joe Gentile announced new Doc Savage collection of original radio scripts (didn't know that it had been on radio), as well as a collection of new Avenger stories; Ron Fortier has new Captain Hazard, Secret Agent X and Jim Anthony stories coming soon; Steven Seagel talked about how Weird Tales in trying to bridge the comic/fiction divide in the wake of their 85th anniversary.

Anthony Tollin talked about how he just printed the 25th edition of the Shadow and the 24th edition of Doc Savage, and will be publishing a collection of Orson Welles' radio shows from when he was the Shadow, as well as new Avenger, The Whisperer and Captain Fury stories. He also spoke of how he had warned DC Comics about the tagline for The Whisperer, which is 'The Secret Life of James W.Gordon.'

Will Murray and Anthony Tollin talked about how most of the early comics were nothing more than full-blown adaptations of those adventure pulps, citing Batman and the Green Hornet as prime examples (turns out Batman's first story was a full adaptation of a Shadow story).

F.G. DeSanto spoke about the current Shadow feature he has in development with Michael Uslan and Sam Raimi, and that they're currently working on the second draft. It will be a period piece, and they're aiming to maintain a tonal consistency with the original material - it will not be an origin story and it will stay away from the previous movie.

Oh, and the Shadow may not be Lamont Cranston...

Charles Ardai spoke about how Hard Case Crime is going to expand its scope, from just pulp crime to include pulp adventure as well. He has a series planned around a character - Gabriel Hunt - and that the first book is written and the second book is being written.

The two big pieces of news were saved for last:

• Will Murray announced that he is currently writing a new Doc Savage story based on old Lester Dent notes (due to be released either next year or the year after that), and...

• Joe Gentile announced that Moonstone will be publishing new Green Hornet material later this year, and that it will be pure pulp crime fiction.