Three more very cheap purchases from that storage locker sale:
Not a bad haul for $1.50…
Archive for the ‘Horror’ Category
Library Additions: Three Paperbacks
Wednesday, September 18th, 2024Library Additions: Three Firsts (Asimov, King, Ruff)
Tuesday, September 17th, 2024Three used books, two of which were bought extremely cheaply.
Library Addition: Joe R. Lansdale’s In The Mad Mountains
Thursday, September 12th, 2024Another Tachyon Lansdale first.
Lansdale, Joe R. In The Mad Mountains. Tachyon, 2024. First edition trade paperback original, a Fine copy. Stories inspired by H. P. Lovecraft.
I will have copies of this available in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog.
Library Addition: Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Little Orange Book of Odd Orchestrations
Wednesday, August 28th, 2024Another Borderlands Little Book:
Doyle, Arthur Conan (Mark W. Whitback, editor). A Little Orange Book of Odd Orchestrations Borderlands Books, 2024. First edition hardback, #463 of 500 copies signed by the editor, a Fine copy, sans dust jacket, as issued. Fantastic stories, several of which are covered in Bleiler’s Supernatural Fiction, pages 159-161, and Bleiler’s Science Fiction: The Early Years, pages 203-209. Part of their “Past Masters of Horror and Fantasy” series, focusing on late 19th/early 20th century writers.
I will have a small number of copies available in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog.
Library Addition: First of S. P. Somtow’s Valentine
Monday, August 5th, 2024This is another item from that third major Zelazny purchase that I’ve finally gotten around to adding to my library.
Somtow, S. P. (AKA Somtow Sucharitkul). Valentine. Gollancz, 1992. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket, with a signed bookplate laid in. Second book in the Vampire Junction trilogy (and I already had a first of Vampire Junction, also with signed bookplate laid in). The Gollancz edition precedes the U.S. edition by about six months.
Library Additions: Two Signed Lansdale Firsts, One Lettered
Monday, July 22nd, 2024Two more signed Lansdale firsts, one I got him to inscribe to me at his signing at Book People here in Austin on Friday, July 19, the other a lettered edition I was previously unaware of that I bought directly from the publisher.
I didn’t scan the traycase because the design is identical to the book.
Reminder: Through it’s sold out from the publisher, I still have copies of the signed/numbered edition of Dark Kin available at cover price.
In addition, Joe also signed the few books I had by him that he hadn’t already, including Apache Witch, The Gonzo Tapes, Mule Tales and Cody’s Army.
Library Additions: Three Signed Lansdale Firsts, Two New
Monday, June 24th, 2024The first of these is a somewhat odd Lansdale item I passed up when first offered, while the other two are new books in from their publishers.
Note: The scanner wasn’t picking up the blue of the lettering, so I had to turn the saturation way up, with the side effect that the very slight age darkening on the left side and at bottom has been greatly exaggerated.
I will have copies of the SST Donut Legion and The Unlikely Affair of the Crawling Razor available in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog.
Library Additions: Robinson, Straub, Watts, Walton Firsts
Wednesday, June 19th, 2024Four more books from that estate purchase.
Library Addition: Numbered Edition of Philip K. Dick Collected Stories
Wednesday, June 12th, 2024A science fiction associate put out a call for help with the science fiction library of an Austin area friend of his who died. Despite living in the area, this friend evidently didn’t make any local friends or visit any SF events or signings. He had a few modern SF books worth buying, either for myself or to deal through Lame Excuse Books, which I picked up for a combined price. This set was the best thing from that purchase.
Dick, Philip K. The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick, Volumes One Through Five (Beyond Lies the Wub, Second Variety, The Father-Thing, The Days of Perky Pat, The Little Black Box). Underwood Miller, 1987. First edition hardback, #135 of 400 numbered copies, all Fine copies in a Fine slipcase, sans dust jackets, as issued, with chapbook for Brief Synopsis for an Alternate World Novel: The Acts of Paul laid in. Wintz and Hyde, Precious Artifacts COL8.3 (though they erroneously state 300 rather than 400 sets). Chalker/Ownings, page 438. Supplements an unnumbered set (the varying shades of red set) and the later Subterranean Press set.
The Most Obscure Films We’ve Watched at the Saturday Movie Conspiracy
Thursday, June 6th, 2024Here are some of the most obscure films we’ve watched at the Saturday Movie Conspiracy since we started keeping The List. These are arranged in roughly chronological order of release, with Amazon links for those who want to track them down.
- Trick Baby: Blaxplotation film starring Kiel Martin and Mel Stewart as a pair of con men in 1970s Philadelphia. Based on an Iceberg Slim novel. Really good film that’s worth tracking down. (Note: It’s a Kino Lorber Blu-Ray, and they have periodic sales.)
- Cockfighter: Solid low-budget film starring Warren Oates as the titular character. Based on the Charles Wilford novel.
- Killdozer: Mediocre science fiction TV movie about a bulldozer possessed by a malevolent alien entity based on the much-superior Theodore Sturgeon short story of the same name. Not to be confused with the documentary Tread, which we still haven’t seen yet.
- Golden Needles: A pretty decent Joe Don Baker action mystery set in the U.S. and Hong Kong about a stolen golden statue with acupuncture needles that, if used in the proper sequence, give a man tremendous sexual power. Yeah, they’d never remake that today…
- The Barbary Coast: The TV movie pilot for a William Shatner series featuring him as a master of disguise working as the governor’s agent to clean up rough, corrupt 1870s San Francisco with a casino owner partner. Both the movie and the show are a hoot, and both available in the DVD set, now sadly out of print and pricey.
- Taoism Drunkard: Absolutely insane Hong Kong action film. Come for the titular drunkard riding in a giant shoe, stay for the giant penis-eating kung fu ball.
- The Siege of Firebase Gloria: Sort of an 80s remake of the base siege segment of The Green Berets, but not as good. Interestingly, the tactics in both those films, as well as those seen at the beginning of The Lost Command (the fall of Dien Bien Phu) are all broadly similar. A Kino Lorber Blu-Ray that slipped out of print while I wasn’t looking.
- Elves: Grade-Z, thrill-free horror movie starring Dan Haggerty fighting Nazi elves. Actually, there’s only one “elf” in evidence, and it’s so pathetic it makes the Hobgoblins in that MST3K staple look good by comparison. Only available in a long out-of-print VHS, so the link goes to a YouTube rip.
- Upstream Color: Intelligent Shane Carruth science fiction film focused on two people victimized by the same scammer using an organism that has linked them and other victims into a sort of meta-organism. Well worth watching, and his some great sound design.
- Chasing the Dragon: Solid Hong Kong crime drama loosely based on the real life triad boss and drug lord Crippled Ho, and partially set in Kowloon Walled City.
- The VelociPastor: Complete schlock that knows its schlock about a priest who turns into a velociraptor to fight bad guys. And ninjas. Look for the “[Insert VFX here]” scene…
- Girls of the Sun: Interesting but not great film about a Kurdish Pershmerga unit of former female captives fighting the Islamic State done on what appears to be a European TV movie budget. About 40% of the film is about the lead character’s captivity and escape, which is probably a bit much. Also has a French photojournalist that provides a coda of commentary about The Meaning of It All. Not available from Amazon for some reason, but available through through Kino Lorber (again, worth waiting for one of their sales.)
I’m excluding anything from the Criterion Collection (Haxan, Daisies), anything with a major Hollywood star, and any MST3K/Rifftrax/etc. films.
Feel free to share obscure films down in the comments.