Following dealer set-up on Thursday evening, PulpFest 2010 officially got underway at 8 AM this morning. As always, the show began with the typical feeding frenzy as book and pulp collectors scoured the room searching for this or that long elusive volume. The convention’s programming schedule began at 2 PM when Mike Nevins discussed his forthcoming book, Cornucopia of Crime. Dave Walker follwed with a reading from his new Captain Midnight story, The Dawn of Midnight. There will be a lot more programming during the evening hours including Bill Nolan’s guest of honor presentation and Don Hutchison’s panel on the pulp Western. Rounding out this evening’s programming will be publisher Steven Haffner’s multi-media look at science fiction author Leigh Brackett and Anthony Tollin’s discussion of the 80th anniversary of the Shadow’s radio debut.

There’s still plenty of time to join in on the fun. The dealers’ room will be open until 5 PM on Friday and from 9 AM to 5 PM on Saturday. Sunday will be a bit shorter, from 10 am to 3 PM. The evening programming schedules for Friday and Saturday nights will run from 7 PM until 12 AM. Tomorrow’s programming will include afternoon presentations by Doc Savage author Will Murray and another by popular culture expert Martin Grams. The evening programming will include an auction, a panel on the classic detective pulp, Black Mask Magazine, and presentation of the 2010 Munsey Award.

Admission to the show is $15 per day or $35 for all three days, allowing entry to all convention activities. The general public is very much welcome to attend.

As of June 16, the PulpFest dealers’ room is totally sold out. Any dealer registrations received after Tuesday, June 22, 2010 will be placed on a waiting list in case of last minute cancellations.

Visitors to this year’s show can look forward to seeing material for sale on 100 tables spread across our expanded exhibit space at the Ramada Plaza. PulpFest’s exhibitors offer a wide variety of product. In addition to original pulp magazines, attendees can purchase hardcovers and paperbacks, new fiction written in the pulp tradition, and other collectibles related to American popular culture of the pulp era. Rare and particularly desirable books can cost many hundreds, even thousands of dollars, but our dealers offer many inexpensive items as well. Collectors on a tight budget can still find lots of appealing stuff at PulpFest, and newcomers to the hobby will be surprised to see how many vintage magazines they can purchase at affordable prices. Those looking to sample pulp fiction without investing a lot of money in collectible items can choose from among dozens of newly published reprint volumes in trade-paperback format. In short, PulpFest’s dealers’ room offers something for everybody!

Although PulpFest 2010 is nearly nine months away, there could very well be a pulp con coming up, right in your home town. The first two Saturdays of November will feature three pulp-related shows, scattered across the United States.

Classicon 36 will be held in Lansing, Michigan on November 7. Ray Walsh’s long-running show features pulps, paperbacks, comics, calendars, pin-ups, original artwork and more. There will be 35 tables of goodies available. For further information, contact Ray at his Curious Book Shop in East Lansing, MI.

Down in Bordentown, New Jersey, just off Exit 7 of the Turnpike, you’ll find about three dozen tables filled with rare pulp magazines, vintage paperbacks, pulp reprints and movie collectibles. Rich Harvey has been putting on this one-day show for about ten years and it’s a blast. For further details about Pulp Adventurecon, please visit the Bold Venture Press website or drop Rich an email.   (more…)

PulpFest 2010 continues the proud tradition of a summer pulp con, now in its 39th year. A new and improved version of the venerable convention catering to fans and collectors of vintage popular fiction, join us…

Friday, July 30th – Sunday, August 1st
at the Ramada Plaza Hotel and Convention Center
in Columbus, Ohio

For further details on a variety of topics including the Munsey Award, please explore our website. We hope to see you at the end of July 2010.