Pulp Today
Writer, filmmaker and raconteur David Avallone talks about and reads selections from classic pulp fiction. And day-drinks. Sometimes with special guests!
We have voluntarily self-rated this production as PG-13. Some material may not be suitable for children.
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Episode Archive
You Can’t Win Part Two, With Salt Chunk Mary
Episode Number: 16Another reading from the 1926 true crime memoir YOU CAN'T WIN, and an indelible character out of hobo legend, Salt Chunk Mary.
Episode download: PulpToday016.mp3
Release Date: May 3, 2021
Run Time: 7:21You Can’t Win Part One, and Mother’s Day
Episode Number: 15Today's book is the amazing crime memoir YOU CAN'T WIN, from 1926. And in its way, this reading of the first chapter is all about the importance of Mothers… so this one was originally recorded for Mothers' Day.
Episode download: PulpToday015.mp3
Release Date: April 26, 2021
Run Time: 10:32What’s Up, Doc?
Episode Number: 14The first great hero of the 1930s pulps: some words of mine, Doc’s first few pages, a fan letter and words to live by. The Man of Bronze, my friends.
Episode download: PulpToday014.mp3
Release Date: April 19, 2021
Run Time: 11:20Pal Joey, John O’Hara, and Some Fashion Tips
Episode Number: 13“If it’s going to happen, it can happen before nine o’clock.” A little funnier and less dark than the usual Pulp, and this one premiered in magazines with nice paper. Never wear a hat indoors. (Sorry I talk about some visuals in this one, but you could look it up on YouTube if you want to see me in a hat…)
Episode download: PulpToday013.mp3
Release Date: April 12, 2021
Run Time: 9:51Tarzan, and Other “True Stories”
Episode Number: 12Did you know Tarzan started in the pulp magazines? Of course he did. I talk about that, and the long tradition of presenting fantastic stories as coming from "true" sources...
Episode download: PulpToday012.mp3
Release Date: April 5, 2021
Run Time: 8:37Red Harvest, and Men With No Name
Episode Number: 11Dashiell Hammett drafts the blueprint for so many 20th Century pop culture heroes with RED HARVEST: a holy text of pulp fiction. Often “unofficially” adapted to film, often imitated, but never done real justice and never surpassed. Meet The Continental Op.
Episode download: PulpToday011.mp3
Release Date: March 29, 2021
Run Time: 8:47Ed Noon and Dead Game
Episode Number: 10Today, it's back to basics and back to Dad: DEAD GAME, the third Ed Noon novel by Michael Avallone. As I like to say, this is the real stuff, the actual vintage poured from the original bottles, with a baseball twist just in time for Spring Training!
Episode download: PulpToday010.mp3
Release Date: March 22, 2021
Run Time: 7:46A Pulp Fiction Mystery Novel
Episode Number: 9All sorts of things are Pulp. We'll get deeper into that as we go along. Here's something which is now considered high literature, but first appeared in a cheap paperback with a lurid cover. The "voice" is not unlike the voice of any private eye novel from the same year (1953). It's the hard-boiled New York City voice, speaking the hard-boiled New York City lingo. I recognize it because my father spoke it, fluently, and I grew up hearing it. Listen, and see if you can guess the author and title. The subject matter may just give it away…
Episode download: PulpToday009.mp3
Release Date: March 15, 2021
Run Time: 15:06Ross Macdonald is the Holy Ghost
Episode Number: 8I read Ross Macdonald's account of the beginnings of his writing career, complete with a special shout-out from Ross to a certain colleague of his who is near and dear to my heart.
Episode download: PulpToday008.mp3
Release Date: March 8, 2021
Run Time: 8:05James Urbaniak and Fante’s Ask The Dust
Episode Number: 7Now with guest stars! My pal James Urbaniak (star of stage and screen, writer, bon vivant) joins me to talk about, and read a funny chapter from, John Fante's Depression Era Hollywood classic, ASK THE DUST.
Episode download: PulpToday007.mp3
Release Date: March 1, 2021
Run Time: 24:19Chandler, The High Window, and Love Poetry
Episode Number: 6I wrap up my Chandler trilogy with a little something sweet from THE HIGH WINDOW. Next time... more authors, more drinking, and now with Special Guests!
Episode download: PulpToday006.mp3
Release Date: February 19, 2021
Run Time: 4:15Chandler, Carmen Sternwood, and the Big Sleep
Episode Number: 5I talk about that time Phil Marlowe met Carmen Sternwood -- 1939’s version of Kim Kardashian -- and reacted how you might expect. Bonus shoutout to Aimee Mann.
Episode download: PulpToday005.mp3
Release Date: February 19, 2021
Run Time: 6:45Raymond Chandler and the Simple Art of Murder
Episode Number: 4“Down those Mean Streets a man must go who is not himself mean.” What makes a great private eye? I drink and read a little bit from Raymond Chandler's seminal essay, "The Simple Art of Murder."
Episode download: PulpToday004.mp3
Release Date: February 19, 2021
Run Time: 7:33The Postman Always Rings Twice
Episode Number: 3Let's talk about literature and poverty and sex and desperation… and why you shouldn’t cast forty years olds in parts written for kids in their twenties. Pour yourself a drink and give a listen.
Episode download: PulpToday003.mp3
Release Date: February 19, 2021
Run Time: 11:39The Maltese Falcon/The Flitcraft Story
Episode Number: 2Dashiell Hammett invented existentialism in 1930, and I'm here to tell you all about it, in a little parable he called "The Flitcraft Story."
Episode download: PulpToday002.mp3
Release Date: February 19, 2021
Run Time: 9:00The Tall Dolores
Episode Number: 1I kick off our literary adventures with a little day-drinking, and reading the first pages of my father Michael's classic 1953 private eye novel THE TALL DOLORES.
Episode download: PulpToday001.mp3
Release Date: Feb 19, 2021
Run Time: 7:53
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