New book out: Marton Taiga's two pulp serials

I'm sure you are all getting tired of this (and I don't even much like blogs that are all about advertising the bloggers' own books!), but here's the cover for my new book. Calling it "my book" might be a bit of a stretch, but here goes nevertheless: it's a collection of two novella-length serials (both somewhat under 30,000 words) by the Finnish pulp fiction great Marton Taiga, put together by me. The book has also my lengthy foreword, and as an appendix the book also contains the forewords Taiga wrote for the readers that started the stories from the middle.

The serials in the book are called "Osiriksen sormus/The Ring of Osiris" (1934) and "Viiden minuutin ikuisuus/The Five-Minute Eternity" (1936). Only the latter has previously been published in book form, in 1945. Both are about time-travel, in "Osiriksen sormus" the lead character is taken to the ancient Egypt.

The cover is by Anssi Rauhala who's done some great covers for Turbator. See for yourself: Sherlock Holmes, Tapani Bagge, Tapani Maskula.

Seikkailukertomuksia/Adventure Stories zine out

As you well may remember, I've been publishing some fictionmaggish fanzines of my own. I decided to move Isku and Pulp to the web, but Seikkailukertomuksia (Adventure Stories) still keeps coming in print. The fourth issue came out of the printers today and boasts a stellar cover by Anssi Rauhala. It's for an old Orientalist story by one Kaarlo Julkunen from the early twenties, called "Dzarir and Nechedil".

Other writers are Pietari Virtanen with a wonderful adventure story set in the 1950's Spain, Garnett Elliott with "Rendezvous on Zombie Island" from the Blazing Adventures webzine (which seems to be down), and me, with a fourth issue of my Pesäri saga. It's set entirely in a never-never-land, even though the setting resembles Finland of the bronze age of Kalevala. Well, then again it doesn't, and I'll very carefully advise you not to point out any historical errors in the stories. I thought the fourth story would end Pesäri's story, but it seems I'll have to publish yet another issue of Seikkailukertomuksia for the Pesäri saga to reach the end. (Even though I think writing this kind of pulpy trash only as rehearsing how the stories are narrated and how the pace the story, I'm kind of proud bringing the influence of Richard Stark's Parker books into the sword & sorcery stuff.)

The package is five euros. If you're interested, just post a comment.

Sherlock Holmes in Finland

Here's the cover for my newest book, an anthology I edited called Sherlock Holmes in Finland. There are fourteen short stories and one play (!) in it, a mix of new and old. The play is from 1936, called Sherlock Mopsi, from a forgotten writer called Arvo Salmivaara. It's hilarious.

But I'll post more details later; the book will be out on Friday, 11st. The cover (which is simply great) is by Anssi Rauhala and you can see by taking a look at this how it refers to the famous painting by the Finnish artist Axel Gallén-Kallela.