Search

IN MARCH 1923, the first issue of Weird Tales hit the sidewalk newsstands. Subtitled the "Unique Magazine," it created a venue for weird fiction and poetry. Until then, there was no magazine devoted to horror, fantasy and the occult. In September 1954, after 279 issues, publication stopped. FROM the VAULTS of WEIRD TALES: VOUME 2 (Edited by Ron D'Alena) collects ELEVEN tales gathered from the original 279 issue run. Guarded (Mearle Prout, March 1938, Vol. 31/#3); The Dead Man's Tale (Willard E. Hawkins, March 1923, Vol. 1/#1); Train for Flushing (Malcolm Jameson, March/April 1940, Vol. 35/#2); Behind the Screen (Ronal Kayser, April 1934, Vol. 23/#4); At the End of the Corridor (Evangeline Wilna Ensley, May 1950, Vol. 42/#4); Werewolf of the Sahara (Gladys Trenery, August/Sept. 1936, Vol. 28/#2); The Medici Boots (Pearl N. Swet, August/Sept. 1936, Vol. 28/#2); Dagon (H. P. Lovecraft, Oct. 1923, Vol. 2/#3); Dreamer's Worlds (Edmond Hamilton, Nov./Dec. 1941, Vol. 36/#2); The Garden of Adompha (Clark Ashton Smith, April, 1938, Vol. 31/#4); Beyond the Black River (Robert E. Howard, May/June 1935, Vol. 25/# 5/6).

DANCE TO THE TUNE OF THE GUN! The cops told Joe Moran he was through as a private eye. They’d revoked his license, taken away his gun permit, and given him orders to get out of the state. They’d had enough of his two-fisted methods and the trickery by which he’d short-circuited the law to gain his clients’ brand of justice. But neither Joe nor the police realized that at that very moment his detective future was filled to overflowing with: A dancing girl playing postoffice with crime . . . An ex-carnie sadist with a bullwhip mania . . . A lip-reading night club snooper . . . A hot-and-cold running murder tub . . . And Joe and the cops found themselves dancing opposites in a fever-paced MAMBO TO MURDER!

Though he did work for a small-town newspaper, Ken Svederup had been around, and to him the expense-paid trip he had won for a front-page news beat seemed pretty phony. But never look a gift horse... He was off to meet the Big Boss in California -- and no doubt he’d get the real story. Ken did meet the Big Boss, but he had not anticipated Clara Kelly, whose beauty and peppery temper made him forget the girls back home in Milquevais, Minnesota. And the story was revealed...through a body pulled from the pounding surf after what seemed a deep-sea accident...and Ken found himself on the trail of an underwater killer.