Kev Demant of the Vault of Evil web-site on issue 5...
"Right. Stuff in your strongest stomach because the eagerly awaited ‘When Animals Attack!’ special is finally upon us, 14 glorious glossy A4 sides devoted to the ‘Nasty’ creature feature novels that proliferated in the wake of James Herbert’s sex, gore and social commentary smash The Rats. As with the rest of the magazine, the article is offset with a plethora of cover reproductions treasury from the golden age. Even if you’ve never sampled the delights of Eat Them Alive, The Maggots, Worms, Night Killers or the mighty Crabs On The Rampage, you’ll qualify for the dreaded ‘overnight expert’ status once you’ve stomped and squelched your way through Justin’s crash course.
Following on from the Robert Lory scoop in the previous issue, an interview with Robert ‘Big Bob’ Tralins, a new name on me but responsible for a respectable stream of sexploitation and warped horrors for Popular, Belmont, Paperback Library and similar US cheapo publishers through the ’swinging’ ’sixties and ’seventies. Sword & Sorcery he-men and she-women are well catered for with a Rivals Of Conan round-up and this issue also sees the conclusion of Legion Of The Damned, an exhaustive meditation on the joys of the pleasant, long-lived escapist Nazi war pulp craze. Finally, a welcome new feature is the self-explanatory Fanatical Thoughts - News, Updates, Letters, Gossip where various reprobates get to air their views.
For this reader, the best and most frustrating thing about Paperback Fanatic is that just when I think I can finally put a lid on all the genres I need to watch for when creepy crawling the junk-shops, Mr. Marriott will write something utterly intriguing about some old pile of rubbish or other and I’ll be all ‘Hmmm, but can I really live without Captive Of Gor‘?"
Curt Purcell of the Groovy Age of Horror web-site posted the following on issue four-
"The fourth issue of Justin Marriott's Paperback Fanatic is out, and it's even more outstanding than usual. This issue that amazingly includes a Robert Lory interview. I didn't know he wrote a Vigilante series under the V. J. Santiago pseudonym, and am certainly interested in checking it out, now that I do know, thanks to Justin.
That interview, by itself, is well worth the price of admission, but Marriott also treats us to an article, "Legion of the Damned," devoted to the Sven Hassel school of nihilistic WWII fiction so popular in Britain, that gloried in the depredations and tribulations of German soldiers on the Eastern front. He really knows his stuff, tracing the lineage of this subgenre back to All Quiet on the Western Front and other notable antecedents, and following it through several stages of development (with a follow-up article promised for the next issue!). The article on Philip Jose Farmer is also outstanding, and a couple of profiles of cover illustrators top this off into a real must-have."
Renowned crime author Ed Gorman shared a few thoughts on the Bookgasm blog-
"Terry Southern once said that the lower echelons of publishing provided glimpses of America you just couldn’t get in the mainstream. I take that to mean he believed that you could find some interesting takes if not exactly Higher Truths in, for instance, the downmarket paperback market of the era he wrote in during the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s.
Such magazines as Paperback Parade certainly examine those decades carefully and well. And so do several websites. Thanks to Curt Purcell’s groovy Groovy Age of Horror you can revisit the newstands of your youth in lurid living color. And with savvy commentary to boot.
It was thanks to Groovy that I heard of The Paperback Fanatic. I have the two most recent issues at hand and they should be enough to inspire literary web dreams for collectors and paperback aficionados around the world.
They’re well laid out, packed with cover reproductions and filled with interesting and entertaining articles and interviews of writers and artists alike. Though the slant is British, a good deal of the subject matter deals with American PBs. Editor Justin Marriott is an incisive interviewer and writer. In the two issues I have, he deals with the mostly forgotten Robert Lory and the famous James Herbert. His piece on Herbert is especially good because of his take on a huge bestseller for whom neither fame nor money is quite enough; he wants respect, too. I like Herbert’s books, so I sympathize with his anger and frustration to some degree. But given the number of struggling wrters in the world, my sympathy is limited.
Justin covers everything from British porn (think MIDWOOD AND BEACON with a Cockney accent), the kung-fu PB phenom and even a collection of war novels (viewers of the Nazi channel in America – better known as The History Channel – would drool over these covers, if not the books themselves). For mystery readers, there’s a look at what Peter Tremayne was doing back in the ’70s and ’80s, writing originals with titles such as ZOMBIE!, KISS OF THE COBRA, SWAMP! and TROLLNIGHT. I’m assuming this is the same Tremayne who is the author of many notable mystery novels and stories. If you’re into paperbacks you’d better be into The Paperback Fanatic. No fooling."
Steve Holland, expert on all things pulp related posted this on his Bear Alley blog about issue five-
"I've collected old British paperbacks for years and a decade or so ago published a paperback fanzine called PBO. Maurice Flanagan also published a paperback fanzine in book form (Paperbacks, Pulps and Comics) but, when both folded, there was a void. Now superbly filled by Justin Marriott's Paperback Fanatic. Justin's main interest is the paperback boom of the 1970s and the various issues of PF have included an astonishing array of covers and genres. This issue includes an interview with 'Big Bob' Tralins, who churned out dozens of sleazy novels for the US paperback market in the 1960s before going semi-legit. writing genre fiction in the 1970s -- everything from horror to slaver novels.
There's more horror as Justin takes a look at the paperback 'nasties' that sprung up in the wake of James Herbert's The Rats (1974) and Guy N. Smith's Night of the Crabs (1976). Before long, every insect, rodent and reptile had a novel named after it as nature rebelled and eviscerated mankind with every tooth, claw and mandible available. There are articles on the rivals of Conan and the second part of a look at Leo Kessler-esque war books. Next issue promises an interview and features on the late Peter Haining."
Here's Curt Purcell again, this time on issue five-
Here's the latest incredible treasure trove of trashy paperback awesomeness from Justin Marriott! The first and most obvious point to mention is that eye-popping cover by Ade Salmon (a rising comics star and friend of the blog)--bats and rats and cats and crabs, oh my!! And the back cover is a juicy treat as well: a gorgeous, glossy, larger-than-life blowup of the Gray Morrow cover of Robert Tralins's Ghoul Lover. Speaking of Tralins, this issue opens with an outstanding overview of his work complete with an entertaining and informative interview, and also a checklist.
From there, we move into the cover story, a comprehensive feature about one of the most revolting genres ever to disgrace the paperback industry--the "nasty." Marriott, typically for him, provides excellent background and antecedents before coming around to the genre's explosion following the success of James Herbert's The Rats. I quite enjoyed the Rats series, but godawmighty it inspired some nauseating fare. It's basically every kind of creature you can imagine going on the rampage--with special emphasis on the most disgusting things that could ever attack en masse. I can't even stand to look at many of the covers, and I'm trying not to gag as I type this, just thinking about it. The genre's popularity in the UK is kind of confounding to me, but there you go.
Rounding out this issue are a survey of Conan knockoffs and the concluding installment in the Nazi fiction overview. This is one zine that truly continues to impress, and I only hope Justin can keep it up for many, many more issues."