In The Face Of….

 Jack Pimlico looked Death in the face. “You again” he said, and laughed. Death looked back at him.
            “This can not go on,” he said. “Sooner or later you will pass away, then I can do my job” Death was not a towering skeletal figure with a scythe and a black hooded cloak, as you might assume. The suit was a dusty black alright, but Death looked like a dumpy middle aged businessman, short enough that most men could see the top of his bald head.

 

Posting Time

 I’m changing the frequency of posting here. I need to concentrate on my second blog, The North Bucks Wanderer and on other blog related work, so I will be posting here once a fortnight instead of once a week.

But it’s not too bad. The posts here are generally about twice as long as I had originally intended, so I’m publishing just as much material as planned; it’s just on a different timescale.

There’s already plenty to read here, and here’s a few to try: (Links in the captions)

Geoffrey Wellum, Spitfire pilot

Five Reasons to Visit Used
Book shops instead of
going online

Life on Mars

 

How to find classic science fiction
writers you’ll Really Like. 

I’ll see you in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, if you would like to keep up to date with Roger The Reader, why not subscribe?

Pulp science fiction

 

One glance at this table, and I knew I wasn't leaving without buying some books. The trap was sprung...

Regular readers will know three things: I like to frequent used book shops, I like science fiction, and I like photography books.

A couple of Weeks ago I popped into Wolverton Books on my way home and went away with ten books. What a result! One book on photography by an author I already know, and nine science fiction books. Most of those were what the shop calls pulp science fiction, and nearly all of them from the table in the photo. That is, cheaply printed books from the late 60s. Here’s some of them.

Pulp (Science) fiction in a Railway Town

Last Wednesday I popped into Wolverton Books, a few miles from home, and of course bought a few books.

I thought you’d like to hear more about this fine used book shop, so on Friday I went back to the shop to take some photos and talk to the manager, Carrie Bollom.

She has been the manager for nearly two years, and the shop has been there for almost ten, in what was once the Railway Company fire station in Wolverton, Bucks. Wolverton books is part of Milton Keynes Age UK.

Carrie Bullom and some pulp (science) fiction.

Carrie started work at 17 in the H.J. Lears book shop in Cardiff, but left aged 24 to have a baby. Then she went to university to get a degree in English Literature. “I don’t do anything much, but I can read”, she says modestly.

“I’d like this shop to be part of the community” she told me. One hot day this summer they gave a regular customer an ice lolly from a big box they’d bought at Tesco next door. The next time he came into the shop he brought them a cake.