The Unvarnished Gary Phillips: A Mondo Pulp Collection
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Award-winning author, screenwriter, and editor Gary Phillips gathers his most thrilling, outlandish, and madcap pulp fiction in an 17-story collection that straddles the line between bizarro, science fiction, noir, and superhero classics.
Aztec vampires, astral projecting killers, oxygen stealing bombs, undercover space rangers, aliens occupying Los Angeles, right wing specters haunting the ’hood, masked vigilantes, and mad scientists in their underground lairs plotting world domination populate the stories in this rip-snorting collection. In these pages grindhouse melds with blaxploitation along with strong doses of B movie hardcore drive-in fare.
Phillips, editor of the Anthony Award-winning The Obama Inheritance: Fifteen Stories of Conspiracy Noir, and author of One-Shot Harry and Matthew Henson and the Ice Temple of Harlem, said this about pulp. “The most common definition of pulp is it’s fast-paced, a story containing out there characters and a wild plot. There is that. But certainly, as we’ve now arrived at the era of retro-pulp, these stories have elements of characterization: not just action, but a glimpse behind the steely eyes of these doers of incredible deeds.” As an added bonus, Phillips resurrects Phantasmo, a Golden Age comics character created by Black artist-writer E.C. Stoner in an all-new outing of ethereal doings, including 4 original illustrations by cover artist Adam Shaw.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Phillips (One-Shot Harry) carves out a niche for himself in this eccentric collection in which, per the author's own introduction, "grindhouse meets blaxploitation with strong doses of hardcore B movie drive-in fare." The 17 entries explore some fascinating conceits. "Matthew Henson and the Treasure of the Queen of Sheba," for example, imagines African American Arctic explorer Matthew Henson as an Indiana Jones-esque adventurer. "Thus Strikes the Black Pimpernel" updates the classic French Revolution adventure story, sending the disguised "peoples' outlaw" to fight cruelty during the Trump administration. Perhaps the best is "I, Truck," narrated by an AI inhabiting an 18-wheeler freight hauler who proves to be an insurgent waging a campaign against autonomous vehicles, sabotaging them by overriding their safety protocols to cause costly crashes. In true pulp tradition, plot trumps prose, leading to some clunky exposition throughout: "Instantly everyone understood this substance was the most potent distillation of the ancient Aztec deity," Phillips writes in "Demon of the Track." Phillips also has no fear of cliché—including attractive captive women intended for sacrifice to an evil deity in "Decimator Smith and the Fangs of the Fire Serpent"—and leans into sometimes tired genre tropes. This won't be for everyone, but readers looking for action-heavy popcorn entertainment will certainly find it here.
