Paperback Fanatic

I grew up in the 1960s and 1970s surrounded by books; my Dad was a voracious reader of crime novels and Westerns and I could always find a discarded James Hadley Chase or John Creasey laying around if I had nothing else to read; my Nan read Agatha Christie and lots of historical romances -- I borrowed the former and left the latter behind after a couple of Jean Plaidy's failed to ignite my enthusiasm for the genre.

Since most of my pocket money was being spent on comics (Valiant, TV 21 and others at various times), my saviour as far as paperbacks was concerned was the Chelmsford second hand market where, for 5p or 10p a book, you could buy Richard Allen, Petra Christian, Timothy Lea and a whole host of other authors who rode in on the paperback boom of the 1970s.

Paperback Forum revels in that era's cheap and tawdry paperbacks. New English Library, Sphere and Futura all feature heavily along with the American titles published by Pinnacle who seemed to be the American equivalent, churning out genre titles as quickly as their British counterparts. The articles are a mixed bag, lots on horror titles (which I think is editor Justin Marriott's favourite area) but also on kung-fu books, war novels, articles about artists and literary smut merchants like Paul Tabori. Issue 4 has an interview with Robert Lory, author of the Dracula and Horror Scope series.

The two published issues -- confusingly numbered 3 and 4 -- have 32 and 36 pages respectively, with dozens of cover reproductions. Justin appears to have had two other magazines prior to this: The Paperback Dungeon (which I never saw) and Pulp Mania (which I think I did, although it's lost from sight). I think the numbering continues from Paperback Dungeon, although that's just a guess based on the fact that he mentions the possibility of a Pulp Mania #2 in the editorial of Paperback Fanatic #3.

Ordering details can be found at the Vault of Evil website.