Publishing Plans

We have currently got Charlie McQuaker's Die Hard Mod and Alan kelly's Bloody Rag/Let me Die A Woman going through the treacherous process of production. We have also got Dominic Milne's My Bloody Alibi and Chris O'Grady's Man Down currently being read and prepped. Danny Hogan's Windowlicker Maker is rumoured to be finished and he is said to be in talks with ex-enforcer Danny Woollard regarding a collaboration.

Why Pulp Press only puts out 23,000 word “novellas”

The reason for this is because we would like to encourage reading in people who would normally read, or do not have the attention span for full-sized novels. We believe that the short attention span, as mentioned above, is a symptom of the continuous bombardment of rubbish TV and dubious entertainment via the internet.
By providing action packed, exciting, compact stories we have stronger chance of weaning people away from the TV, internet etc and back to good old fashioned reading.

Sally F**king Reynolds joins Pulp Press

Pulp Press is pleased to announce that esteemed knicker model, and muse to the equally esteemed photographer Dark Daze, is joining us and will be taking over editing duties, thank God.

Sally also runs a new and flashy fashion magazine, Gang Up, which is well worth checking out. Trust me I own a copy and enjoyed it immensely. If you appreciate any kind of art at all you will be blown away by the photography in it. Welcome aboard Sally.

Allan Guthries Noire Originals

Check out the interview off between legends of noire Tony Black and Nick Stone on Allan Guthrie's Noire Originals

The Fat-Quarter Magazine

Check out the article I wrote on lesbian pulp fiction for The Fat-Quarter Magazine.

The Fat-Quarter is a new feminist mag, set out to contrast all the dopey bird's rags and the celebrity toilet paper that fill the racks these days. You know the gig, the kind that feature those dead eyed cover girls with their eating disorders and bad attitudes.

We say: yeah, Fat-Quarter, bring it to'em... bring it to'em but good.

Bella de Jac at Club Smooch Brighton 21/08/09

Pulp Press rep Bella de Jac, and international woman of mystery, will be doing her stuff at the Club Smooch Burlesque show at the Komedia in Brighton this friday. There will also be comedy, booze and that Atters fella from Chap Magazine. What more could you ask for? If you're one of the few unfortunates who have never seen Bella dance, here's your chance.

Bella is an expert at carefully choriographed old school burlesque, that entertains, titillates and leaves the beholder in awe. At only £10-a-go, you'd be a fool not to attend.



For more info check out the facebook group, here.

Getting paid: Advance vs Royalties

Instead of advance payments Pulp Press offers a much higher rate of royalties, over twice the usual rate in fact. This is because the current market does not support a business model that operates a non-refundable advance on royalties system. It just does not make business sense. In these uncertain times it would be one hell of a job to try to predict a how many books will sell prior to the fact. I have managed to successfully do this for Indepenpress Publishing Ltd, Pulp Press’s parent company, but have been very wrong in a good few occasions as well.

Of course this has not been popular with established authors and their agents who have expressed an interest in publishing with Pulp Press. It is also interesting that even decent agents don’t seem to realise the costs involved with publishing and, also, how much we get shafted by distributors. I have found on many occasions that even the good guy authors and agents do not take into account very few of our needs as publisher in dealings with us which is an aspect that you don’t see very often at all when thrashing out a partnership in any other sector.

We obviously want to keep Pulp Press being a viable company and give the authors the best returns possible on their output and that is why we do not offer advances but a much higher rate of royalties. Because we do not offer advances, we do not tie our author’s up in five book deals etc, leaving authors to come and go as they please as long as the output is the stuff we’re looking for.

How to write scenes of violence

Like a good joke it’s all in the build up, and like a good joke the act itself, or the punch line, has to be short and comprehensive.

Any act of violence has to be preceded by the perpetrations of a sufficiently odious antagonist. This may sound like a moot point but is something that is often overlooked. It is advised that a reason as to why a protagonist resorts to violence rather than find a peaceable way be made clear to the reader. If you are writing a character who goes around dispatching people who have only infringed on him or her negatively to a relatively mild degree will probably leave the reader finding it difficult to relate to the character.

In real life serious acts of violence happen very quickly with little warning. However in prose we have to slow the whole thing down.

The violent scene, say between two parties, should go a little like this:

The opening

Our hero/heroine finds themselves squaring off to their suitably leering nemesis, or one of the nemesis’s henchmen.

The build up

By this point in the story the reader should have been made aware of the withering torrents of abuse bestowed on our hero/heroine by their nemesis and his/her associates. Plus the virtues of the protagonist and be in sufficient knowledge that the antagonist is a bastard that needs to get done. This is a good point to start the feelings of rage and fury, in as much description (both physical and psychological) as possible. Maybe throw in a few of the protagonist’s memories of both their present grievances and perhaps of past similar hard times for good measure. Into the mix add the characters feelings regarding justice and the unjust actions of the antagonists et al, to give it that old school feel. This should be punctuated at the end of this phase by the protagonist resolve that ‘they ain’t having it’.


The wait for it

Now your character is nice and primed to loose control of their sensibilities and give’em some ‘what for’. This part should describe the protagonist weighing their opponent up, and deciding on a cause of action based on the circumstances. Like a sports commentary this will take into account strengths, weaknesses and any injuries or aspects that may impact on any of the parties’ performance at the time of the scene.

The Punch line

Boom. The Clash. Ideally, you’re not looking at doing some kind of Jerry Bruckheimer chestnut where everyone is adhering to some kind of rules and it looks all fancy. Keep it real. Punching, kicking as well as biting, gauging, head buts, fish hooking, stamping, hair pulling, scratching, crotch shots and working on the joints should be the order of the day here. First rule of the actual fight scene: there are no rules.

Try and get your facts right

As with all things in writing a little research will go along way. Such as a human skull will often cave in, as if soft, like an Easter egg, rather than crack apart like a nutshell.

If you are in a situation were the protagonist is up against a larger party the best way to approach this is to have one or two of the henchmen being really handy, and maybe even secondary characters, or even featuring the primary antagonist him or herself, while the majority of them are mugs. If, however, the protagonist is up against a crack team of nutters, in the interest of keeping it real it is best to have the character receiving a great deal of injury and even getting soundly beaten. Have the character ruminate over this and maybe dispatch the perpetrators when they’re in more manageable portions.

There are many day-to-day things that will help put you in the mood for writing violence. Things like dealing with bureaucrats, bank managers, other authors, an idiot in a pub or printers for example. Reading the newspaper and beholding the latest sleazy escapades of a politician can do the trick too, as well as trying to derive sense from any given authoritarian. In brief; get mad, write violence.

Recommended reading

Dr. Ben Goldacre has written a really good article in his Guardian column, Bad Science, on a recent study of revenge obsession and its links with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder that’s well worth checking out.

Strange Transpirings at Hove Town Hall

Swine flu has reportedly hit our offices. It’s a bloody difficult one I tell ya, especially as the health services refused to treat our probie face-to-face and chose instead to diagnose her over the phone. The fact that Donald Rumsfeld is reportedly the holder of the Tamiflu patent is also raising suspicions here. While there is strong evidence to suggest that people have become very sick with swine flu and, in some cases, unfortunately died as a result it is difficult to judge as to what extent reasonable precaution turns into hysteria. Suffering a long term chronic illness as I do I am eligible to receive Tamiflu, but again was not permitted to see a doctor face-to-face. I had to receive a call from some locum who told me not to turn up at the clinic but that my prescription would be faxed to the Brighton Flu drop-off point which is at Hove Town Hall.

Later that evening I arrived at Hove Town Hall and was met by authoritarian signs telling me to go around the corner and warned me not to make contact or speak to anyone along the way. The sight that met me in an office, not unlike the one you got to get your parking permits from, was worthy of a Hogarth etching. The whol ambience felt as if some bastard had unleashed a Zombie virus on the good burghers of Hove, with a general sense of panic and excitement thick in the air. I had not be told by the locum that I would need to assign a “flu friend”, a trusted individual to pick up my drugs in my stead, as it was not permitted for the actually recipient to pick up their own prescription.

A detergent bottle, for washing was placed on each counter and draconian messages with all kinds of commands where plastered on the walls. Behind me a gang of middle class folk, thieves, degenerates and grubby looking urchins, squawked, grumbled and wept.

‘Look, there is clearly nothing wrong with me,’ I said with a wide smile, in an effort to calm the individual behind bullet proof glass, who seemed to be in the teeth of fear itself.

After being given a raffle ticket I awaited for around an hour before being presented with some strange pills whose effects are largely unknown. The only sound at this point was the song the Lincolnshire Poacher, which was being piped through the P.A system, over and over again.

Think you've got what it it takes?

Pulp Press are currently considering submissions. We are looking for well written pulp fiction style stories, 23,000 words, featuring vengeance and comeuppance, the more extreme the better. Seriously, go to town. We want these to be feel good efforts where the reader puts the book down and is left with the sense that justice has been done rather than cautionary tales. Science fiction and westerns will be welcomed, though; if you do write crime chestnuts, something that doesn't promote coppers (i.e. a vigilante protagonist as opposed to a police person, now matter how hard bitten he/she is) will be preferred. Send first three chapters and synopsis, along with S.A.E to:

Pulp Press
25 Eastern Place
Brighton
BN2 1GJ
UK

Please note: If you submit work without having previously read a Pulp Press effort then it's your own damn fault if you get rejected. So cowboy up.

Just trying to work, do pub reviews and soldier on with the Windowlicker Maker at the minute while I contemplate the fiendishly swinish exclusivity deal Penguin has just signed with WH Smiths.

A quick synopsis of the Windowlicker Maker goes a little like this:

Joe Tatum thought he had left a life of brutality behind until, on a visit to the cinema with his new wife Ava, she is slain. Victim of what looks like a series of random and senseless attacks.
Months of deep depression pass until the day Joe learns that a psychotic underworld figure is encouraging young thugs to carry out these unprovoked assaults on the public to “prove” themselves to him.
Joe gathers himself together and resolves to teach these bastards why they used to call him the Windowlicker Maker.

Yes, for all you hardcore fans out there, the look of Joe Tatum is based on the legendary Paul Bearer of Sheer Terror and Joe Coffee. The Windowlicker Maker should be out by the end of the year. I’ll keep you posted.

Pulp Press' attitude to revenge fiction

Pulp Press specialises in revenge fiction done in the style of the pulps of the 50s and 60s. here is some clarity regarding Pulp Press’s attitude to revenge fiction.

This ain’t eye for an eye shit, not at all. This is what I believe to be a logical expectation of cause and effect. If you fuck with someone, that is to say, cause detriment to another person, or people, for your own benefit or entertainment, you cannot seriously expect for there to be no repercussions or reprisals. For there are surely people who will feel a righteous gut reaction to your activities and will want to see that your score is settled. And, if you do go around effecting peoples lives negatively, you cannot rightly whinge when you get a slap for it.