Pulpy (albeit un-PC (but I repeat myself)) goodness

[essentialsaltes]

Picked up a few things at the Westchester Rotifer Book Sale. Mask of Fu Manchu (1932), with a nice blindstamped spiderweb on the cover, and The Radium Terrors (1912), which is also "culturally insensitive and scientifically impractical". But I just couldn't resist the pull quote from the frontispiece: "The Duchess of Marister was conducted to the Scarlet Room and stood gazing at the picture called 'The Haunted Pagoda'." It was equally hard to resist the first line: "I've been hunting for a little god that escaped from some pitchblende, Tony!"

Comments

[stevenkaye.livejournal.com]

Rotifer as in microscopic creatures?

Mask does have the benefit of one of the stupidest romantic leads in the history of pulp, a fact that's even commented on by one of the villains.

[essentialsaltes.livejournal.com]

It's actually the Rotarians, but I often refer to them as the rotifers, for reasons... actually, I really don't know why.

As for Mask, the important thing is to imagine Myrna Loy as the very unlikely Miss Manchu.