Previous Post This is the Pulp Factory "best short pulp story" award for "The Last Deposit" in Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective vol 2 from Cornerstone Books I was nominated for "The Girl in the Glass Coffin" from Gideon Cain - Demon Hunter and for best novel for Robin Hood: King of Sherwood, and for the same things in the Pulp Ark awards, but I didn't win any of those. The awards were in Chigago, which is a long bus ride from Yorkshire, England, so I had to send a speech for a proxy to read, author Wayne Reinagel, as follows: "Sorry I can’t be with you tonight. Wish I could be, but it’s quite a commute for the UK. In England the phrase “pulp fiction” isn’t quite as well known, so I occasionally get asked what the difference is between pulp fiction and regular old everyday fiction. Sometimes I answer with this joke: In a searing high summer, a random spark ignites the corn in a farmer’s field. A thirty-foot high sheet of flame sears across the crop towards his farmhouse. As the fire service rides up in their Firemaster 500 engine the farmer begs them to save his home and family and offers them $1000 to stop the fire. The firemen struggle hard, but the flames are too high. They call for help. Soon the big city fire department turns up in their state of the art Firemaster 5000. The desperate farmer promises them $2000 to save his livelihood. The slick city firemen turn their digitally-controlled high-pressure hoses on the blaze – but it’s still not enough. The last available help is the small town fire service. They race over in their rather old-fashioned Firemaster 50. As they approach, the farmer begs them too to stop the fire and offers them $5000. The guys on the Firemaster 50 don’t even stop. They drive straight into the heart of the blaze, and there, surrounded by flames, they tackle the inferno. They’re totally committed. There at the fire’s core it’s do or die. They’re using blankets and buckets and everything they’ve got. And that absolute commitment pays off; the flames are quenched and the farm is saved. The delighted farmer pushes a wad of notes into the hands of the small town fire captain. The crew from the Firemaster 500 and the Firemaster 5000 crowd round to congratulate the heroes. “That was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen,” one of the big city guys says. “You totally deserve that reward. What are you going to do with it.” “Well,” says the small town fire captain, “first thing we do is get those f-ing brakes fixed on our fire truck!” Pulp fiction is fiction with the brakes taken off. It’s visceral and emotional and totally committed. Okay, it’s often served up in cheap small disposable print run media – but it has stories that make you feel, and think, and dream. It’s not an accident that we say of some great pulp fiction that it’s gut-wrenching or heart-stopping or rib-tickling or blood-curdling. Pulp fiction, perhaps more than any other writing style, is about making the reader live the raw events of the story. And sometimes when people ask me what pulp fiction is I just try to sell them a novel. Thanks for this award. It means a lot, especially when I consider the quality of the other nominees. Congratulations to all of you. Best wishes. Go write something brilliant." Meanwhile I'm pressing on with the as-yet-untitled Vinnie De Soth novel. I stealth-posted a very tiny sample down the board a way in reply to Vizh. Elsewhere I also answered Scott's enquiry about the in-jokes in the Doctor Who episode The Doctor's Wife. Finally, I've been meaning to tell you about an odd research fact I stumbled across: While looking up some background on London's oldest commercial cemetary, Kensal Green, I came across this odd story of one of its inhabitants: Dr James Barry could be a figure from a 19th century adventure series. A British Army surgeon, he served at Waterloo, in India, in South Africa, in Mauritius, in Trinidad and Tobago, and at Malta, Corfu, the Crimea, Jamica, and in Canada. In a career spanning 1813-1864 he relentlessly fought for better conditions for medical patients, even lepers, although this brought him into regular conflict with "the authorities", who felt him to be a dangerous maverick. He was the first surgeon to successfully perform a ceasarean section in Africa. He was arrested and deported for "politicking" on St Helena. He scandalised the clergy of Malta when he sat in a pew reserved only for bishops. He quarreled with Florence Nightingale at Balaclava. He fought at least two duels when people insulted his apparance or professionalism. His military record included many punishments for insubordination and discourteous behaviour, but as many citations for medical innovation and brilliance. A vegetarian teetotaller, he introduced the pear to the diet of the common British soldier. In most of his latter adventures he was accompanied by his faithful Negro manservant John and his dog Psyche. It was only after his death that Barry's secret was revealed. When he was laid out for burial it was discovered that Dr Barry was actually... a woman! This makes him the first female Briton to be qualified as a medical doctor. The British Army sealed his records from his death in 1865 for a hundred years. And they say the Parodyverse is weird! HH

Strange to consider that people often shake their heads when a plot turns on a woman successfully passing herself off as a man, yet James Barry's contemporaries at Edinburgh didn't notice anything unusual about her beyond a lack of interest in boxing.