Book Review: Dark Masques

Book Review: 'Dark Masques' edited by J. N. Williamson

3 / 5 Stars 

 

'Dark Masques' (508 pp.) was published by Pinnacle Books in 2001. The cover artist is uncredited.

 

The 'Masques' franchise was one of the more high-profile horror anthologies issued in the Paperbacks from Hell era. Originally published in hardcover by small press publisher John Maclay in October 1984, the first volume was successful enough for Williamson to edit and published 'Masques II' in 1987. Both collections subsequently were reprinted in various paperback editions, such as 'The Best of Masques' (Berkeley, 1988). A 2011 deluxe hardcover edition, 'J.N. Williamson's Illustrated Masques,' consists of only 52 copies and is expensive to acquire.

 

Williamson issued two additional volumes in the series, 'Masques III' in 1989, with 'Masques IV' following in 1991. 

 

(You can get Masques from the Internet Archive, too) 

 

The Pinnacle Books paperback editions contain between them all of the content from Masques and Masques II: 46 short stories and poems. 

I'm skeptical about a lot of these Paperbacks from Hell short story collections because many of the contributors phoned in their entries, stuff that was extracted from their personal slush piles and submitted because, well, they'd been invited to contribute and it was not good to refuse..... 

So how does 'Dark Masques' stack up ? Here are my capsule summaries of the contents:

 

Nightcrawlers, by Robert R. McCammon: it's a dark and stormy night at Big Bob's gas station and diner in rural Alabama. Things get complicated when a disheveled drifter enters the place......Vietnam veterans and Post-traumatic Stress Disorder were major tropes in the 1980s, and McCammon works those themes reasonably well into this tale. 

Somebody Like You, by Dennis Etchison: aghhhh.......typical Etchison. A thin plot involving a sibylline woman who makes Enigmatic Remarks; a narrative comprised entirely of vapid dialogue; and an atmosphere that is banal, rather than disturbing. 

 

Third Wind, by Richard Christian Matheson: Michael, a self-centered 80s yuppie, is intent on running 50 miles (?!). En route, some unsettling things happen. A phoned-in entry from Matheson.

Redbeard, by Gene Wolfe: an older man.........his young wife......a remote farmhouse......in the basement, a locked door that she never must open........one of Wolfe's more accessible stories, with a twist ending.

 

The Turn of Time, by David B. Silva: en elderly man visits the house where he grew up, now an abandoned structure. The man sees visions, with these having implications for the family line. As the story progresses, things take a very strange turn. This story has an interesting premise, but is too overwritten to be very impactful.

 

Soft, by F. Paul Wilson: the first-person narrator and his daughter are among the few survivors of a new epidemic, one that afflicts people in bizarre fashion. This story is an early manifestation of what would come to be known as 'body horror,' and it's one of the best stories in 'Dark Masques.'

 

House Mothers, by J. N. Williamson: when her boyfriend Barry tries to get too gropey in the front seat of his Buick, Pamela breaks free and runs into the nearby woods. She stumbles across what might be a haunted house. This is a feeble entry from editor Williamson, with fanfic-quality prose: She became aware then of moonlight groping at the solitary window pane in the living room.........

 

Party Time, by Mort Castle: a three-page treatment of the 'mutant child housed in the basement' theme. And it works !

 

Everybody Needs a Little Love, by Robert Bloch: embittered by a recent divorce, David Curtis decides to seek new love from an unusual source. A decent tale from Bloch.

 

Down by the Sea Near the Great Big Rock, by Joe R. Lansdale: early Lansdale. People are moved to sudden acts of violence. No splatterpunk, but a surprise ending.

 

The First Day of Spring, by David Knoles: Barry Locke is about to get married, but the joyful day is complicated by ill-health on his part. This story tries to create a facetious 'creature feature' sensibility, but comes across as contrived and cutesy.

 

Czadek, by Ray Russell: plodding tale of an egomaniacal actor whose career stalls, and ultimately implodes, in bizarre fashion. It's more of a dark fantasy piece than a horror piece.

 

The Old Men Know, by Charles L. Grant: it's November, and Atmospheric. Dead leaves piling on the ground, overcast skies, chilly temperatures, a sense of loss, personal alienation, an awareness of the end of things, imminent darkness, etcetra, etcetra, etcetra. You know how Grant is..........

 

The first-person narrator is a children's book illustrator whose relationship with his live-in girlfriend is fraying. He increasingly spends time conversing with a group of elderly men who congregate in the local park. Some Vaguely Spooky things happen. The ending has a tacked-on quality. 

 

The Substitute, by Gahan Wilson: the sixth grade at Washington School has a substitute teacher, Miss Or. She is a strange woman, who comes from someplace very, very different from what the kids are used. to. An imaginative, entertaining tale from Wilson.

 

The Alteration, by Dennis Hamilton: Harry Crawley does odious things at the El Lobo bar in Puerto Valencia. His partners in crime, greasy Mexicans all, dislike Harry as much as he dislikes them, but money is money and trumps dislikes. But that's about to change..........an effective story, with a splatterpunk sensibility, from author Hamilton. Another of the better entries in the anthology.

 

Trust Not a Man, by William F. Nolan: Elise Malcolm is young, beautiful, unmarried, and longing for a 'quality' man. On a visit to a singles bar she meets a guy who could be The One ? I suspect most readers will see where this story is going well before the denouement.

 

My Grandmother's Japonicas, by Charles Beaumont: an 'unpublished' fragment, possibly of a planned novel, from Beaumont (aka Charles Leroy Nutt, who died in 1967 at age 38). It's an 'Adams Family' mixture of mild horror and humor. There are accompanying encomiums ('A Short, Incandescent Life,' and 'Charles Beaumont: The Magic Man,' from Ray Russell and William Nolan, respectively). 

 

I had to wonder why editor Williamson included this slight piece, when there were more deserving potential (Splatterpunk) contributors out in the world......

 

Popsy, by Stephen King: Briggs Sheridan likes to hang out at the Cousintown Mall. He's looking for lost children, for nefarious reasons. A good story from King !

 

Second Sight, by Ramsey Campbell: a middle-aged man named Key takes up residence in a new flat, but finds himself troubled by scratching noises, noises coming from the flooring. Is he imagining things ? One of those Campbell stories where you're not sure if the supernatural is 'real,' or just a manifestation of somebody's mental instability. I was underwhelmed.

 

The Yard, by William F. Nolan: in the Midwest town of Riverton, there is a junkyard, a sinister place that the kids and adults both avoid. An imaginative tale and one of the better ones in 'Dark Masques.'

 

The New Season, by Robert Bloch: Harry Hoaker, an emcee for a late night talk show, experiences some troubling phenomena. A dull, phoned-in entry from Bloch.

 

The Near Departed, by Richard Matheson: three-page short with a 'Twilight Zone' sensibility.

 

Ice Sculptures, by David B. Silva: Stairway to Heaven is a montane artist's commune, lying on the bottom slopes of Eagle Peak. One of the members of the commune can produce some unusual, if disturbing, artwork........the premise is interesting, but the prose, badly overwritten.

 

Wiping the Slate Clean, by G. Wayne Miller: the first-person narrator has a girlfriend who comes into and out of his life. Although she's very disruptive, he can't say no to her. George R. R. Martin did this psychological horror theme better, with his 1981 story 'Remembering Melody.'

 

The Litter, by James Kisner: author Kisner wrote a number of Paperbacks from Hell in the 1980s and 1990s for publishers like Pinnacle, Leisure, and Zebra. This tale is about a white, suburban, progressive All-American family that has a nice little cat named Harriet. Harriet is expecting; should the children be allowed to witness the Miracle of Birth ? Suburban horror, very well done. 

 

Splatter, by Douglas E. Winter: not a short story, but a series of vignettes that make allusions to horror in various media during the 1970s and 1980s (Dawn of the Dead, 'The Keep,' The Last House on the Left, etc.). This has something to do with efforts by politicians to censor horror content. This entry is a real dud......   

 

American Gothic, by Ray Russell: Ray Russell meets Erskine Caldwell in this grotesquerie featuring some inbred country boys, and a well-built young lady who is easy with her favors. There is a horror note introduced in the closing sentences.

 

Moist Dreams, by Stanley Wiater: a water bed (very 80s), and disturbing dreams that one hopes don't come true.....

 

Nothing from Nothing Comes, by Katherine Ramsland: Dr. Alan Kensey, a psychiatrist, discovers that a female patient at the asylum may be from the future. Overly melodramatic prose and a weak plot make this story one of least impressive in the anthology.

  

Maurice and Mog, by James Herbert: the master of British splatterpunk makes it into an American horror anthology ! Here, Maurice is a fallout shelter dweller who discovers that a cat (Mog) with a bad attitude, has managed to sneak inside. A decent story from Herbert.

 

Fish Story, by Dennis Hamilton: avid angler Morris Hooke learns that Fowler's Crescent, a lake in an isolated corner of Indiana, has some unusually big fish in it. The old-timers at Feer's Stock and Bait are a bit unwilling to impart their fishing knowledge to a stranger. Particularly knowledge about the effects a massive chemical spill has had on the lake fauna........a great eco-horror tale, and another of the better stories in 'Dark Masques.'

 

Outsteppin' Fetchit, by Charles R. Saunders: the author of the 'Imaro' sword and sorcery novels tells the tale of Peanut Posey, star of old-time black-and-white films in the prewar era.  Despite his small stature and Bojangles sensibility, Peanut had a fine time with the ladies. And those fine times, have a price.....a nice story from Saunders, one that had me wishing Paperbacks from Hell anthologists had been more diligent in soliciting stories from him, as opposed to any number of 'regulars'..........  

 

In the Tank, by Ardath Mayhar: it's a cold winter's night and Shag the wino (errr, Shag the Unhoused Person) is looking for refuge. Can he find it in the Halesburg Memorial Park....?!

 

Hidey Hole, by Steve Rasnic Tem: Jennifer isn't all that thrilled to be living in a new house, with a new stepfather and bratty stepbrother Robert. But the foundation of the house has a gap in its brickwork, and inside that gap is a hiding place with a strange allure. Maybe Robert can investigate ?

 

The Night is Freezing Fast, by Thomas F. Monteleone: Grandma's out of shortnin' for her baking, so even though it's a cold and snowy day in rural Iowa, Alan and Grandpa set out in their SUV for the store. En route, they pick up a hitchhiker; a man with disturbing mannerisms. I suspect most readers will guess early on where this story is going, but it's effective in its evocation of the bleak and isolated nature of the rural Midwest in winter.

 

Buried Talents, by Richard Matheson: have you ever wanted to read a story where those small-town traveling carnivals and their rigged games of chance get their comeuppance ? Well, 'Buried Talents' is for you !!!!

 

Lake George in High August, by John Robert Bensink: the Felder family has a nice cottage on the shore of Lake George in the Adirondacks. Taking a swim in the cool waters of the Lake is their first priority. This tale, which posits a 'road not taken' sensibility, is too confusingly plotted to be effective.

Wordsong, by J. N. Williamson: stilted prose dominates this tale of an anthology editor whose most valued contributor is the mysterious 'Wordsong.' The editor decides to track down Wordsong and meet him or her in person. There is an inconclusive ending.

 

The Man Who Drowned Puppies, by Thomas Sullivan: MacIver is the man's name, and he alone is willing to do what other people won't. Extremely well-crafted, and the best story in 'Dark Masques.' 

 

The Boy Who Came Back from the Dead, by Alan Rogers: the boy's name is Walt Fulton, and at age 8, he was run over by a car. Now Walt has indeed come back from the grave, whole and healthy. He claims his resurrection was mediated by space aliens ?! This story reads like something Joe R. Lansdale would've written (think 'Bob the Dinosaur Goes to Disneyland') and its horror content is negligible.

  

Then we have some prose poems and blank verse poems, contributed by Ardath Mayhar, Jessica Amanda Salmonson, Ray Bradbury, Mort Castle, and Joe R. Lansdale, that aren't especially memorable.

 

The verdict ? 'Dark Masques' has a sufficient number of quality contributions to earn a Three Star Rating. I can't call this book a must-have anthology, but if you're a diehard fan of Paperbacks from Hell and an avid collector, then this volume may be worth purchasing.  

Two Good Horror Anthologies from DAW Books: 1976 / 1977

Two Good Horror Anthologies from DAW Books: 1976 / 1977

Time for a nostalgia trip: hard to believe that fifty (!) years ago, I went to Gordon's Cigar shop and picked up these two high-quality DAW horror anthologies, each for my precious dollar-fifty (I was sixteen years old, and had a modest disposable income).

 

Nowadays you can go to amazon and with a Search for 'horror anthologies books,' call up over a hundred entries . These books can be delivered to your address within a few days. Amazing ! 

 

Back in the mid-70s paperback horror anthologies were quite rare; DAW book's 'The Year's Best' franchise was pretty much the only game in town, aside from the Alfred Hitchcock anthologies. While there was a surge in horror magazine publishing starting in the seventies, led by semi-professional periodicals such as Whispers, newsstand distribution of these titles was spotty at best and you had to find a specialty shop, or risk snail-mail ordering, if you wanted copies.

 

'The Disciples of Cthulhu,' released with apt timing in October, 1976, featured 'Where Yidhra Walks' by Walter C. DeBill, Jr.; ‘The Feaster from Afar’ by Joseph Payne Brennan; ‘Darkness, My Name Is’ by Eddy C. Bertin; and ‘The Fairground Horror’ by Brian Lumley.

'The Year's Best Horror Stories: Series V' (July 1977) contained a number of quality entries, including 'Long Hollow Swamp' from Brennan; Karl Edward Wagner’s ‘Sing A Last Song of Valdese;’ Manly Wade Wellman’s ‘Where the Woodbine Twineth;’ Arthur Byron Cover’s ‘The Day It Rained Lizards;’ and H. Warner Munn’s ‘The Well.’

 

 

If you can find copies of these two volumes for under $20, by all means, grab them ! I note that on eBay, someone recently had the entire set (23 volumes) of 'mint condition' DAW 'Year's Best Horror Stories,' for sale for $800..........

Playboy October 1973

Playboy 

October 1973

October, 1973, one of the most momentous months in the entire decade of the 1970s. I was 13 and the beginning of the month was unremarkable, just Fall coming into focus as it always did at that time of the year.

 

Atop the Billboard 200 album chart was Goat's Head Soup by the Stones. Leading the Top 40 singles was Cher, with 'Half Breed.'  

Looking at the Cashbox Hot 100 for the middle of the month, at the lower reaches there are all sorts of overlooked little gems......like 'Outlaw Man' by the Eagles, sitting at number 49. A great rock n roll number !

The mellow mood of October began to change with the start of the Yom Kippur War on October 6, and the increasing threats by OPEC to leverage oil exports to the West as a political weapon.

On October 19, angry that Nixon had sent massive amounts of military and financial aid to Israel, and worried that the Israelis were going to invade Syria and Egypt, King Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia implemented an oil embargo on the U.S. The effect was catastrophic for a nation that was unaware of its reliance on oil imports. The economic shock of the embargo would resonate throughout the decade.....

For now, though, let's pretend it's the second week of the month and no crisis is in the offing. Let's open up the latest issue of Playboy, with centerfold Valerie Lane posing on the cover. 

There's a spicy pictorial of American Indian actress and activist Sacheen Littlefeather, aka Maria Louise Cruz. After her death in October, 2022, Little feather's family revealed she had no Indian ancestry. But for that magical early October of 1973, she was a 'legitimate' Native American.

For a fiction piece, we have another of Robert Sheckley's many contributions to the magazine, a short story titled 'Voices,' featuring a middle-aged, paunchy, secretive accountant named Mr. West. Mr. West begins hearing a voice in his head; they seem to know a lot. Initially skeptical, West discovers that following the recommendations of the voice is an invaluable aid in business. 

There is a creepy, sleazy note to the story, involving West's niece, but that's how things were 50 years ago. 'Voices' does have a great illustration by Dan Morrill.

One of the men profiled in 'On the Scene' is an up-and-coming Country and Western artist named Waylon Jennings.  

Playboy's History of Organized Crime has another installment, this one about the New York City mob during Prohibition. It's rather dull.

Considerably more rewarding is the pictorial of Ms Lane, a hair stylist at 'Mr. Ron's' salon in Newport Beach.

 

 

 

 

The Air Force, like all military services, was struggling to attract recruits. Perhaps the promise of working with computers - and tape drives and punch cards - would aid recruitment ?

Morton Hunt provides an article on 'Sexual Behavior in the 1970s,' an opportunity for Playboy readers to see who was doing what, as compared to their own erotic behaviors. This type of 'survey research' always is suspect, so I'll simply provide the graphs, without comment.

And so we end our little sojourn, fifty-three years into the past, and bask in that Autumn glow, when gas was 36 cents a gallon, when an LP record cost $5, and when soft-focus redheads looked alluring........

Book Review: The Vengeance by Robert C. Sloane

Book Review: 'The Vengeance' by Robert C. Sloane

1 / 5 Stars

'The Vengeance' (247 pp.) was published by Crown in 1983. This is the sequel to the 1981 horror novel 'A Nice Place to Live.'

 

[ My review of 'Nice Place' is here.]

 

As 'Vengeance' opens, we learn that Hyrmgar and Thagnar, the brother and sister trolls featured in 'Nice Place,' are quite upset about the deaths of their mother and brother at the hands of Nick and Christine Martino. The eponymous Vengeance is of course aimed at the Martinos.  

 

Unaware of the trolls, and hoping to put the horrors of what happened in Mill Harbor, Long Island, behind them,  Nick, Christine, and their son Joey have started a new life as restauranteurs in the skiing destination of Torchester, Vermont. But through various unpleasantries the trolls discover where their quarry has relocated, and begin a cat-and-mouse game of terrorizing the Martinos before administering a final, brutal death by dismemberment, with a special sauce of rape and mutilation beforehand !

 

As sequels go, 'The Vengeance' is dire. I had to struggle to finish it.

 

Author Sloane keeps the trolls off-stage for most of the narrative, preferring to have the Martinos deal with all manner of domestic crises, as well as confronting Kyle Thorne, the chairman of the Mountaincrest condo association, who schemes to allow developer Baxtor Cabot to erect a hotel at the base of the Mad Mountain ski resort. Such a structure might imperil the community's water supply, but the mercenary Thorne has dollar signs in his eyes. Then there's a sub-plot in which Joey gradually is brainwashed into adopting the troll mentality - ?!

 

Along with a plodding, padded narrative, the reader has to deal with sparkling dialogue passages such as this:

 

...Christine spoke softly.

 

"I have good new for you, Daddy, and I have bad news."

 

"Tell me, my zucchini. I'm all ears."

 

"How sexually unfortunate for me. However. First the bad news. I can not get Henrietta to go home these afternoons to take care of Joey. We haven't got a sitter, we have a career woman." 

 

"I know, I know. She fired me yesterday and I own the place. I cut the cheesecake too large. The woman is out of control." 

 

More than once while reading 'Vengeance,' I suspected author Sloane was being facetious with this novel.......

 

The climactic battle with the trolls doesn't come until page 222, and is accompanied by pages of "Bwa-Ha-HAA !" dialogue, as the trolls sit and detail the horrors they will visit on the apprehensive Martinos.  

 

Summing up, if you've read 'A Nice Place to Live' then you've gotten the better installment of Sloane's troll franchise. Staying away from 'The Vengeance' will help maintain your appreciation for Paperbacks from Hell......  

Fall 2026 is Spooky Stories Season at the PorPor Books Blog

Fall 2026 is SPOOKY STORIES SEASON at the PorPor Books Blog

October is here, and that means it's Spooky Stories Season here at the PorPor Books Blog. For the next couple of months we'll be taking a look at horror fiction and nonfiction, at novels and anthologies, all centered on the 'macabre.' Look for murderous trolls......subway stations to nowhere.....the triumph of the Old Ones.........and some late 80s, Paperbacks from Hell-vintage stories from the bigger names in the genre. And some other stuff, too. All this Fall, at the PorPor Books Blog !!

Book Review: The Guv'nor: The Autobiography of Lenny McLean

 September 2026 is ENGLAND AS IT WAS Month at the PorPor Books Blog

Book Review: 'The Guv'nor: The Autobiography of Lenny McLean'

5 / 5 Stars

'The Guv'nor' first was published in the UK in 1998. This trade paperback edition (303 pp.) was issued by John Blake Books in 2017.

 

Lenny McLean was born in April, 1949, in the London neighborhood of Hoxham. McLean's father died when Lenny was four, and his mother married a man named Jim Irwin, who was physically abusive towards Lenny and his siblings. From an early age McLean was involved in various acts of street crime, and as a teenager he served time at the juvenile prison at Wormwood Scrubs, outside of London.

 

Also as a teen, McLean entered the world of bare-knuckle boxing, and as he grew to maturity, standing 6 feet 3 inches and weighing 280 lb, he became a formidable presence in the ring. Prohibited from fighting in licensed matches due to his criminal conviction, during the 1970s and 1980s McLean earned a considerable income (as much as 25,000 pounds sterling for one match, a great sum in those days) from matches with all comers. 

 

McLean became a bare-knuckle superstar, with American celebrities like Christopher Reeve and Gene Hackmand attending his match against Roy Shaw. He once was flown by the Mafia to New York city, there to fight in "....a big warehouse on the other side of the Bronx" against a 6 feet, 8 inch black man named McCormack (McLean was expecting a white Irishman). Although McLean broke both of his hands in the bout, he won the fight. 

 

Along with boxing, McLean did stints as a bouncer and bodyguard, with these episodes earning him gunshot and stabbing wounds. And a murder charge, when, in 1992, at a London nightclub called the Hippodrome, McLean ejected a streaker named Gary Humphries. Humphries died later that night after being apprehended by the police, who used a degree of violence to subdue him. McLean wound up serving 18 months in prison.

 

In the late 1990s McLean got his acting guild card, and got supporting roles in TV and feature films. Just as it appeared he had found a new occupation in show business, he developed lung cancer and died in July, 1998, just before the release of the film Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, in which he had a role as Barry, 'the Baptist.'

 

'The Guv'nor' is a very readable autobiography, with co-author Peter Gerrard keeping a light touch and letting McLean, and his distinctive East London, gangster vernacular, stay front and center for the book's entirety. There's plenty of action in terms of boxing and street fights; collusions with underworld figures; McLean's observations on the sociology of the working-class neighborhoods in the greater London area; and the reality of imprisonment in the UK's various juvenile and adult institutions.

 

As with any autobiography there are some aspects of the subject's life and career that are obscured; for example, McLean spends little time recounting his two defeats at the hands of Cliff Fields. And for all of McLean's rosy allusions to being a good husband and father, according to his daughter Kelly, the household could be filled with tension due to McLean's (undiagnosed) bipolar disorder.

 

When all is said and done 'The Guv'nor' provides an engaging, at times disturbing, street-level look at working class life and crimes in the UK in the postwar era. Fans of UK crime cinema and popular culture will want to have their copy.  

Dan Dare The Biography by Daniel Tatarsky

 September 2026 is ENGLAND AS IT WAS month at the PorPor Books Blog

 

'Dan Dare: The Biography' by Daniel Tatarsky

This little book (238 pp.) was published by Orion Books (UK) in 2010. It is amply illustrated with color inserts consisting of photographs and scans of issues of Eagle, Dan Dare memorabilia, and vintage photographs of the creative team. There also are some black-and-white illustrations.

Most Americans have only a vague understanding (if they are aware of it at all) of the period following World War Two when the entire UK endured what the British euphemistically called 'Austerity.' In truth, Austerity was a period of privation that lasted from 1945 to the early 1960s. For much of that time the population of the UK was for all purposes malnourished, and exposed to unpleasantly high levels of air pollution (which at times could be lethal) due to the mandate to use a lower grade of coal. The depletion of foodstocks and energy was the result of a national effort to export goods, in turn to earn money with which to pay back the loans that Britain owed U.S. banks for economic aid during the war years.

 

It's mind-boggling, in an era in which massive debts held by countries in South America and Africa routinely are 'forgiven' by the IMF and World Bank, to realize that the citizens of the UK suffered for almost two decades in order to see payment (with interest) completed to their allies, the United States. 

Quoting Terry Jones (1942 - 2020), a writer for the comedy troupe Monty Python, who was a child at the time of Austerity: 

 

I can remember also it was very difficult to heat the house. I remember waking up in the winter - there was no central heating, of course, there were no cavity walls - and I remember not [just] having ice on the inside of the windows, but ice on the walls. 

 

I can remember rationing, but that's just what you did. It was odd for our parents. I remember when they stopped the national loaf: instead of having white you had this loaf that had a grain in it, but it was better for you. But I remember the moment when my mum said we could get real white bread again. Which has got everything milled out of it !

 

The British handled Austerity with the traditional stiff upper lip and a 'we must get on' spirit. But the younger Brits were helped by the appearance, in April of 1950, of the weekly boy's paper Eagle. And inside that first issue of Eagle, the first installment of a two-page, color comic titled 'Dan Dare: Pilot of the Future.'

Dan Dare was the product of a team of writers and illustrators headed by the talented artist Frank Hampson, who saw the comic as a point of light in an otherwise grim situation:

 

I....felt that young people were getting a rough deal in those years so soon after the end of the war. Everything was so pessimistic, what with the bomb and all.....I wanted to give them something that made the future more helpful, in human terms.

 

Eagle, with its brilliant color printing and depictions of a future UK where everything is clean and new and shiny and prosperous, was a welcome escape from the bleak reality of Austerity.  

Author Tatarsky covers the full scope of the Dan Dare franchise, from the beginnings of Eagle and the efforts of Anglican minister Marcus Morris to produce an uplifting magazine for British youth. There is an in-depth examination of the process, which was quite grueling and laborious, by which Hampsen planned and produced each installment of the series. There are profiles and reminiscences of the staff involved with 'Dare' from 1950 to 1967, when the comic was discontinued and reprints were used in the remaining issues of Eagle until April 1969, when the magazine was absorbed into Lion.

Later chapters in 'Dan Dare: The Biography' cover the various reincarnations of the franchise: the edgy series published in 2000 AD comics in 1977, and the highly politicized 1990 series that Garth Ennis did for the short-lived Virgin Comics imprint. There also are reminiscences about Eagle and Dare from well-known, UK-born figures in the comic book and graphic art scene, such as Chris Claremont and Bryan Talbot.

The book closes with an Appendix providing capsule summaries of each story arc in the Dare canon. 

One thing Tatarsky deserves commendation for is his refusal to view Dare and Eagle through the lens of postmodernism and Wokeness. Tatarsky understands that the material was a product of its time, and hand-wringing such content over issues of identity politics is a failed and fatuous exercise.

Who will want a copy of 'Dan Dare: The Biography' ? Well, certainly older Brits, who were children during the postwar years and remember the series with affection, likely will find the book of value. It's also of interest to those with a fondness for the popular culture of the UK in the 50s and 60s. I doubt many Americans will find the book of interest, simply because so few of the UK's comic book and boy's paper cultures succeeded in making the trans-Atlantic passage to our shores and print media. But regardless of country of origin, if you've a liking for well-written and superbly illustrated comics and graphic art, then 'Dan Dare' will have its appeal. 

Down and Out in Britain by Jeremy Sandford

 September 2026 is ENGLAND AS IT WAS month at the PorPor Books Blog

 

Book Review: 'Down and Out in Britain' by Jeremy Sandford

4 / 5 Stars 

  

'Down and Out in Britain' (174 pp.) was published by the New English Library in November 1972. Author Sandford (1930 - 2003) was a documentary filmmaker who focused on portraying the lives of the poorer segments of British society. According to his obituary at the Guardian, he was something of an eccentric: 

 

Some have accused Jeremy of sentimentalising his subject matter from a comfortable and secure position. For visitors to his home, however, the reality of Jeremy's country lifestyle came as rather a shock. One could usually find the house, with its disastrously broken gate, and then follow the trail of rusting cookers, wheel-less trailers and dented iron bins that led to the front door, which was usually swinging open. Inside, missing floorboards presented unexpected hazards and windows hung giddily from single hinges. 

 

'Down' is a work of social activism, as that enterprise stood in late 60s Britain. In its initial  chapters, the book provides overviews - many in the first-person - of the welfare of the homeless, and the response to homelessness on the part of the state (Sandford sees this response as inadequate, in the main). Subsequent chapters cover the situation of homeless children and 'unmarried' mothers (the term 'single mother' was not in use in the late 1960s). A final chapter excoriates the state for visiting 'violence' upon the disadvantaged in the form of imprisoning the homeless and destitute, as opposed to implementing progressive social welfare programs.

 

While of course dated, 'Down' provides some interesting observations about the life of the lower classes and disadvantaged in the UK up 'till 1970. For example, I had no idea that for a good part of the 20th century, each year saw mass movement of tens of thousands of British men throughout the isle, as they traveled from one seasonal employer to another. There was an informal network of 'doss houses' and other questionable abodes that provided shelter to these men, many of whom were not indigent in the traditional sense, but merely following an economic pathway that began to fade in the latter decades of the century. 

 

Sandford concludes his book with a demand that the UK government apply more money towards social services for the indigent, unwed mothers, and children, taking on a greater role from the private, religious-based entities that were struggling to meet demand. In urging these actions, Sandford displays that degree of wishful thinking and willful naivety that (arguably) applies to all social reformers...........

 

In the 55 years since 'Down' was published the UK government has indeed expanded its role in social services, so much so that the able and resolute are being taxed into extinction in order to support not just the swelling rolls of the indigenous population, but the massive numbers of migrants that have taken up residence in the country over the past 40 years. The message of 'Down thus is rather depressing: as bad as things were in 1970, they have only gotten worse in 2025........... 

 

'Down and Out in Britain' retains value as a picture of the UK and its poorer residents in the late 20th century. It is at odds with the popular sensibility of that era, contradicting the popular imagery of 'swinging London' and the 'groovy' era of 'geezers' and 'dolly birds.' 

 

Away from the neon and glamour of Last Night in Soho, throughout the country, scores of ragged men and women would take nightly refuge in bombed-out buildings, Waterloo Station, and the Embankment Gardens. They would prepare whatever meals they could, and settle down for whatever sleep they could manage, and wake up the next morning with no expectation of their lives improving.......

Book Review: The Kingdom By the Sea by Paul Theroux

 September 2026 is ENGLAND AS IT WAS month at the PorPor Books Blog

Book Review: 'The Kingdom by the Sea: A Journey Around Great Britain' by Paul Theroux

5 / 5 Stars

And then it went bad again, with slapped-together bungalows and parking lots  and holiday camps called Silver Sands and Pontins. There were no people here, but the buildings made this part of Camber look blighted. The beach was undeniably lovely and unspoiled, but at this western end of it were peeling, collapsing huts and rusting caravans and weeds and even a dump full of twisted metal and yesterday’s plastic – this disfigurement was reminiscent of a third world country, where they did not know any better, and just let the detritus pile up as evidence that this rubbish was another aspect of civilization. 

 

It struck me that as time passed some countries with nothing in common but poverty would begin to resemble one another, because, while great civilizations are often vastly different and each culture is unique, everyone’s junk is just the same. 

  

'The Kingdom By the Sea: A Journey Around Great Britain' first was published in 1983. This paperback edition was issued by Washington Square Press in November, 1984.

 

From May to late July of 1982, the American author Paul Theroux (b. 1941) decided to circumnavigate the UK on foot and train. He started in Margate and followed the coast in a clockwise direction. He made a point of avoiding the more traveled or touristy locations, using the soon-to-be-abolished 'branch' train lines, keeping to country paths and byways, and staying at bed-and-breakfast establishments.

 

At that time the Falkland Islands war had begun, and it serves as a sort of sociopolitical backcloth to his travels. As he progresses on his journey, so, too, does the war effort. The war is something of a distraction from the severe economic malaise that grips the country.

 

For a man in his early forties, Theroux exhibits considerable stamina in the pages of ‘Kingdom,’ sometimes walking up to 20 miles in a day, this in ‘oiled’ hiking shoes, not $200 Salomon or Hoka hikers.

 

Reading of Theroux’s visits to the seaside towns and villages, which in the early 1980s were showing signs of wear, I can’t help but realize that these places nowadays are profiled in a lurid manner by the Sun: 

 

Sinister ‘Frankenstein heroin’ ripping through ‘Drug capital of the South’… forcing homeless into shanty towns on beach (this being Bournemouth) 

 

Skegness, in particular, wins the greatest censure from the Sun:

 

Skunk-addicted louts & crumbling homes… can UK’s ‘worst seaside town’ turn fortunes around as the ‘next Sandbanks’ ? 

 

We live in ‘worst’ seaside town ranked alongside North Korea – haters brand it a ‘pile of dirt’ but it’s NOT our fault

 

"There's not a soul to be seen on the pier." Skegness. Photo credited to Les Gibbon, The Sun, November 10, 2024

 

 And then there is Blackpool:

 

CRIME WAVE We live in UK’s most dangerous seaside town where ‘zombies’ roam streets & knife-wielding thieves terrorise shopkeepers

 

"Boarded-up homes in Blackpool." Photo credited to Steve Allen, The Sun, March 8, 2025

 

In his travels around the countryside Theroux notes the presence of what appear to be compounds of some type; large institutions “…surrounded by prison fences, with coils of barbed wire at the top. There were dog patrols and BEWARE signs stenciled with skulls. The main entrances were guarded and had turnstiles and a striped barrier that was raised to let certain vehicles through.......The whole affair reminded me a little of Jonestown (i.e., the compound in Guyana, where in 1978 over 900 people committed mass suicide).”

 

These compounds turn out to be the the Butlin's 'holiday camps.' Theroux decides to obtain a day pass, and visits the Butlin’s in Minehead in Somerset. Behind the grim exterior he finds a resort steeped in Englishness: “…a cricket pitch, a football field, a launderette, a supermarket, a bank, a betting shop, and a number of take-away food joints.” He also learns that Butlin’s is a favorite vacation spot for the many Britons who are ‘on the Dole,’ as a week’s stay (as it was in 1982, that is), at 178 pounds for a family of four, is affordable for families.

 

Curious, I went online and looked up the Minehead Butlin’s, which seems like quite the pleasant place, one well worth visiting (?!).

 

Theroux has a good eye for the quirky and unexpected places he encounters in his journeys, which is what the best travel writers do. He is even-handed in his appraisal of both the good and the bad to be witnessed in the UK. Among the good, is Tenby:

 

But Tenby was more than pretty. It was so picturesque, it looked like a watercolor of itself.

For the bad, there is a disturbing sight in Wigan, on a cold overcast June day, of Prole Children at play:

On the way out of Wigan on the train I looked out the window and saw a group of white-faced children. The rain had plastered their hair against their tiny heads, and their clothes were soaked, and their bare legs were dirty. They were struggling to pull down a fence at the back of a ruined house. They were busy and violent, they hammered at the pickets, they looked like small and dangerous men. When they saw the train they spat at it, and then they went on breaking the old fence.

Theroux's visit to Northern Island is bleak and depressing, as the 'Troubles' then were in full force. He finds redemption in Scotland, where Cape Wrath is one of the most beautiful and magical places he ever has seen. The Scots in that area have learned to bend, but not break, with the high (at times dangerous) winds and rain.

 

Theroux is not a foodie, and his remarks in 'Kingdom' simply state that the food he encountered was, in the main, not very good. At a cafe in Middlesbrough, he does abstain from the 'chip butty,' which apparently is this abomination: a sandwich made of french fries ?!

 

The nationwide rail strike, which began on July 4 and lasted two weeks, severely curtailed Theroux's travel plans, as he was forced to rely on county buses, which were overcrowded and rarely timely. As a result, the closing chapters of 'Kingdom' have a forlorn quality, particularly as the final destination, Southend, is deserted as a consequence of the strike:

 

This was high summer, but Southend was as empty as it had been in March.....Without trains, it was hard to get in or out....The physical link (e.g., to London), the railway, had been severed by the strike, and now Southend was revealed in this empty condition as a mixture of river rawness and sleazy elegance.  

Washington Post headline, July 15, 1982

Theroux's message in 'Kingdom' is that Britain is its railways, and when the railways serving the smaller communities are discontinued, it has the effect of transporting those smaller communities back in time, as it were, to the pre-railway era. With cars and petrol too dear for most families, and the bus service so dismal, many Britons were (at least, back in the midsummer of '82) being forced to stay close to home in the manner of the days of horse-and-buggy or bicycle.

 

'Kingdom' is one of the best travel books, and best observations of the UK, that I ever have read. Its 433 pages flow by in a smooth and informative manner (my only complaint is that the book has no maps). All in all, it's a solid Five Star read.