The Pulp Jungle

Los Angeles: Sherbourne Press, 1967. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Good. 189 pages. DJ is in a plastic sleeve. Name of previous owner in ink on fep. Minor scuff on the front flap of the dust jacket. Frank Gruber (born February 2, 1904, Elmer, Minnesota, died December 9, 1969, Santa Monica, California) was an American writer. He was a writer of stories for pulp fiction magazines. He also wrote dozens of novels, mostly Westerns and detective stories. Gruber wrote many scripts for Hollywood movies and television shows and was the creator of three TV series. He sometimes wrote under the pen names Stephen Acre, Charles K. Boston and John K. Vedder. February 1927, he sold his first story. It was bought by The United Brethren Publishing House of Dayton. It was called "The Two Dollar Raise" and he got a check through for three dollars and fifty cents. In his book, The Pulp Jungle (1967), Gruber details the struggles (for a long time, at least once a day he had tomato soup, which was free hot water in a bowl, with free crackers crumbled in and half a bottle of tomato sauce added) he had for a few years and numerous fellow authors he became friendly with, many of whom were famous or later became famous. Gruber's income from writing in 1934 was under $400. In 1935, his stories were suddenly wanted and he earned $10,000 that year. Gruber wrote more than 300 stories for over 40 pulp magazines, as well as more than 60 novels, which had sold more than 90 million copies in 24 countries, sixty five screenplays, and a hundred television scripts. 25 of his books have sold to motion pictures, and he created three TV series: Tales of Wells Fargo, The Texan and Shotgun Slade. The Pulp Jungle is Frank Gruber's account of his days as a pulp writer, starting during the Great Depression and through to the early forties when he moved to Hollywood as a screenwriter. An early draft of the manuscript was entitled "The Hungry Years." It's now a rare book - long out-of-print and increasingly difficult to find on the secondhand market. Comments found on-line at My Bookshelf: A fascinating collection of colorful reminisces of the Frank Gruber‘s years as a writer, covering his years in New York from 1934 to 1943, as he struggled to-and eventually succeeded-in establishing himself in the highly competitive world of the pulps. Regrets? Gruber had a few, but when you're an aspiring writer in what was often a dog-eat-dog field, you do what you gotta do, paying your dues and writing your ass off. And it seems to have paid off-he may not have been an A-lister, but in his long career, Gruber churned out over 400 short stories and novellas, over fifty novels, over 150 screenplays and TV scripts, and more than 150 articles. He also created a slew of note-worthy sleuths and private eyes along the way, including Oliver Quade, Johnny Fletcher and Sam Cragg, Simon Lash and Eddie Slocum, Otis Beagle and Joe Peel, and Shotgun Slade. So if Gruber toots his own horn a little, well, at least it's justified honking-he made a living doing what he loved. And along the way, he offers plenty of tales from the trenches, as well as mostly fond reminisces of fellow writers like Max Brand, Erle Stanley Gardner, L. Ron Hubbard and so many others. Wannabe writers will also appreciate his thoughts on editors, word counts, plotting, discipline, the loneliness of writing, and in particular his own "Fool-proof" 11 Point Formula for Mystery Short Stories. From Steve Scott (November, PulpsScans) "I've long been meaning to read this short, breezy remembrance of Gruber's pulp writing days, but in some ways I feel as if I already have. It's been quoted and referenced in virtually every pulp history I've ever read, from Tony Goodstone's The Pulps (1976) to Ed Hulse's 2018 revision of The Blood ‘n' Thunder Guide to Pulp Fiction."-.