Acquired Tastes XLIII: Gay Pulp Fiction, Part 177 - Black Knight Classics, Pt. 3 of 4

Acquired Tastes XLIII

Gay Pulp Fiction, Part 177

Black Knight Classics

Pt. 3 of 4

Today, we take another look at the Guild Press imprint, Black Knight Classics.

As per usual, very little is known about the publisher.

All of the titles are attributed to anonymous authors, most likely due to the censorship laws in place at the time.

The publisher, Guild Press Ltd., operated out of Washington D.C. and had several imprints. Under this imprint, they published 39 titles 1969-1970.

Black Knight Classics were distributed by Potomac News Corporation which had a post office box at Benjamin Franklin Station in Washington D.C. 20044 - P.O. Box 7410.

They use the pamphlet form, which means the books are folded and stapled in the middle and lack a spine. Originally $1.95, they would eventually raise the price to $2.25.

There is no numbering system, so no way to determine what order they were published. I have listed the books in the order they appear on Hommi Publishing's Big Ass List, no matter the year of publication.

The covers are all the same: Gray background with black picture frame border featuring the Black Knight Classics distinctive knight on horseback logo. Bonus points for creative use of fonts! In red.

Some of the titles were also published by Monkey Publications and Centaur Publications - but, because they were sometimes published the same year, it's hard to say who got there first. That said, all the books claim to be copyrighted.

Note: This imprint seems to specialize storylines about underage boys and their early sexual explorations. 

And that's all I have on them. If you know anything more about Guild Press - and we will be getting to their other imprint soon - please leave the info in the comments section. I'm always excited to learn more about these slices of gay history.

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Marine Studs

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

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 Men’s Lake

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

According to Hommi Publishing's Big Ass List, this one takes place in a "college setting".

Available as a downloadable PDF or ebook at Hommi Publishing.

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 Mr. Harrison’s Boarding School

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

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 My Last Time... Never Again!

Author: Anonymous

 1970 

Black Knight Classics

This is a specially priced, photo-illustrated collection of "stories of young boys who will never trust queers again!"

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 Navy Discipline Below Deck

Author: Anonymous

 1970 

Black Knight Classics

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 Off Duty Studs

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

According to Hommi Publishing's Big Ass List, this one is about "servicemen".

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 On the Farm in Old Missouri

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

Available as a downloadable PDF or ebook at Hommi Publishing.

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 One Man’s Meat

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

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 Our New Friend / Cock-Crazy Cowboy

Author: Anonymous

 1969 

Black Knight Classics

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And that's all for now.

Next time: ten more Black Knight Classic titles.

Until then...

Thanks for reading!

Never Again - Kelly Clarkson

Acquired Tastes XLIII: Gay Pulp Fiction, Part 171 - All Star Novels

Acquired Tastes XLIII

Gay Pulp Fiction Part 171

All Star Novels

Today we take a look at All Star Books.

Not a great deal of information is available about the imprint. From the contents of the books themselves it can be determined that they were published by Challenge Publications as the All Star Books/All Star Novels imprint and operated out of North Hollywood, CA from 1961-1966.

Early titles appeared imprinted as " A Private Edition Book" with an alternative numbering system.

Some books include the tagline:  "Dynamic, lusty All-Star Books-- the finest in virile, action packed fiction and non-fiction for adult readers."

I've included all the gay male titles I could readily find and several lesbian offerings I found as part of the Lesbian Popular Fiction collection archived at Cornell University and at AbeBooks.

The cover art varied greatly throughout the imprint's existence, as did the back covers.

Not sure what possessed me - I tend to get impulsive when it comes to these books - but once I started researching this imprint, I started buying some of the copies I found. I've noted the various prices I found them at (I don't like to pay over $30 if possible, so a few of these are out of my price range.)

In the course of researching, I also found the occasional description or a bit of info. I've included that as well. 

There are nine gay male titles (frequently masquerading as straight or bi) and a number of lesbian-themed books, but I did manage to find covers for most. As for the rest of the books which make up the imprint's output, it's the usual lot of hetero swingers, bondage/kink, nympho/stud stuff - ranging in price from $4-$65. The funniest of the bunch: 1966's Nights of Forbidden Fruit by Lew deNaste, an interracial-themed book with the tagline: "Consumed by the burning desire for illicit thrills, they lived for strange beds and unnatural partners. Black and white men and women, they intermingled as if there were no RIGHT way at all."

They also republished the occasional well-known adult title, such as Candy by Terry Southern, published under the pseudonym Maxwell Kenton, AS-43 and The Complete Uncensored Edition of Fanny Hill ~ the Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure by John Cleland, AS-10.

Let's take a look, shall we?

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I Want You

Author: Lester Lake

AS-330

1961

Front cover: "No man could satisfy her. Four men tried to tame this wildcat who knew no end to the daisy chain game of sex savagery... until she met a woman as explosive as herself. Together they stormed into an arena of perverted pleasures that knew no parallel except in hell!"

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Passionate Amazons

Author: Harry Barstead

AS-528

1963

Front cover: "The Middle Sex - seething with the devilish hungers of their twisted souls." 

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Love Teacher

Author:

AS-11

1964

Front cover: "Can a woman ever be satisfied with normal love after tasting the sweet elixir of strange fruit? A most unusual lesbian school."

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Runaway Wanton

Rasher Owens

AS-17

1964

Front Cover: "She hated men... but couldn't resist them... she desired women, but feared lesbian viciousness."

Back Cover

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The Maybe Sex

Author: Jack Kahler

AS-18

1964

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The Beds of Bronson Canyon

Author: Robert Bledsoe

AS-20

 1964

Front Cover: "Caught in the vortex of her own desire, she made her way from one bed to another to that part of Hollywood known As Dyke Alley."

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Passion Fruit

Author: Nelson Edge

AS-21

1964

Front Cover: "It was hard to figure out who was male and who was female. Sometimes they were interchangeable. Her lover left her cold.. so she thought she was queer."

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Hot Pants Homo

Author: Percy Fenster

AS-22

1964

Front Cover: "Women lusted after this handsome virile jazz man... it took him years of agony to realize he wanted a man. Bisexual... he took on male and female alike."

The overheated cover art is by Doug Weaver. I also learned that the book was produced as a play in 1996 at San Francisco's Lavender Lounge. Percy Fenster? Most definitely a pseudonym.

Note the 'CN' just below the price. It's a Challenge Publication, but I'm not sure what the 'CN' refers to, but it's on every cover of the imprint.

There's a copy available at Kayo Books for $99.99

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Color Her Hot

Author: Lester Lake

AS-28

1964

Front cover: "She was the slave of her perverted cravings. The sight of others loving whipped her passions into a frenzied flame and she had to have satisfaction... from man or woman."

Back Cover

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Homo Alley

Author: Gregory Barnes

 1965 

AS-46

Front Cover: "His eager fingers seared the young boy's body."

The adventures of a handsome young man who is repeatedly harassed in the workplace by both women and by gay men. Like so many of the pre-Stonewall gay pulps, the protagonist cannot decide if he is homosexual or heterosexual.

There's a copy available for $99.99 at AbeBooks/Kayo Books. Too rich for my blood, I'm afraid.

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The Fruit Plucker

Author: Ralph Churie

AS60

1965

Front Cover: "She was a switch-hitter in the game of sex!"

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 Good Night Sweet Dyke

Author: Barry Smith

  AS 61 

1965

Front Cover: A hot eater virgin, she learned depravity at an early age!

As was typical of the times, this lesbian-themed book is written by a man with straight males as its target audience.

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Fruit Farm

Author: F.L. Davis

1966

AS- 63

Front Cover: "They were sex-crazy men, taking love where they found it! No perversion was too sordid for their cannibal hungers."

So, I think they put females on the covers of these to throw off the scent. I mean, if you get caught reading this, you're 'just one of the guys', right?

I purchased a copy for $22. Keep in mind, I also have to pay tax and shipping, so it adds up quickly. I bought this one primarily because I couldn't find a cover for it. Nor did I know it's catalog number.

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 Queersville

 Author: Ed Culver

 1965 

AS-64

Front Cover: "Insatiable in his desire for unnatural thrills, the male whore made every trick a treat!"

Found this description online:

"Queersville by Ed Culver. Published in 1965 by All Star Books AS-64. Listed in the Cornell University Library's Guide to the Gay Men's Popular Fiction Collection. Like so many pulps of the era, the cover has nothing to do with the story. Not a badly written pulp novel; a tale of a young hunk who goes to Ft. Lauderdale for the summer to work with his older brother who has opened a bar. A fun coming out story. Culver is the author of several gay pulps from the late 1960's including Kept Boy (1964), Gay Three Way (1966) and Queer Hustler (1967).

Found a copy online for $49.99.

So, this is a gay male-themed book with a misleading cover. 

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Never On Sin Day

Author: Peter Dunning

1965

AS-65

Front Cover: Queers of a feather flock together.

I managed to buy one for $17 and there's one available at Amazon for $65.

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Any Sex Will Do

Author: Evan Prinz

 1965 

AS-66

Front Cover: Hungry for success, he prostituted himself with a lecherous queer! When he ran out of perverted sex acts, he invented some new ones!

There's a copy available at Amazon for $95.

 

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Hush Hush Sweet Harlot

Author: Jack Vast

AS 71

1966

Jack Vast has a dozen titles to his credit, mostly heterosexual stuff. He wrote a gay male title for National Library Books imprint, Wrong Kind Of Love, and also wrote for Saber Books, Greenleaf Classics, Satan's Press, and PEC.

Front Cover: "Both men and women were suckers for her special brand of sex!"

There's a copy of this one on Amazon for $145.

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Luscious Lesbian

Helen Highwater

AS-79

1966

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Queer For A Day

Author: Jarlene Post

AS-81

1966

Front Cover: "Sex was a two-way street... lesbian lust drove her both ways."

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The Dungaree Jungle

Author: Riley Benton

 1966 

AS-88

Front Cover: "Two people shared his secret - one was a woman who denied it - the other a man who knew him as no woman had..."

Found a copy for $100 at AbeBooks.

Back Cover

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 The Satin Prince

Author: Lee White

 1966 

AS-91

Front Cover: The gripping story of a strong man trapped by his own weakness!

Description found online: Explicit erotic novel of a strong man trapped by his own weakness...to dress like a woman, act like a woman... make love like a woman.

A copy is available online for $12. I snagged one for $18 at Thrift Books.

The book's cover and verbiage gives one the impression that this is a cross-dressing novel, but it's also gay male-themed (and a total hoot!)

Back Cover

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 The Gay Savages

Author: Simon Masters

 1966 

AS-96

 Front Cover: The weren't interested in bunnies - they watched other boys!

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And that's all for now.

Next week: more tantalizing, titillating vintage gay pulp fiction covers.

Until then...

Thanks for reading!

Never On Sunday - Melina Mercouri

from the 1960 motion picture Never On Sunday

Acquired Tastes XLIII: Gay Pulp Fiction, Part 170 - Lynton Wright Brent

Acquired Tastes XLIII

Gay Pulp Fiction, Part 170

Lynton Wright Brent

In the course of researching a pair of gay novels published by Brentwood/Anchor Publications, I fell down a rabbit hole and ended up learning a great deal about their author.

Lynton Wright Brent was an American film actor and a writer. He appeared in over 240 films between 1930 and 1950.

Born in Chicago in 1897, Brent was the son of William Lynton Brent, founder and developer of the Los Angeles suburb known as Brentwood. That last bit becomes important a bit later.

Lynton Wright Brent, circa 1930's 

As an actor, he's primarily remembered for his prolific work with Columbia Pictures in the Three Stooges short subjects series and a dozen cheap westerns starring the likes of Roy Rogers, Buster Crabbe, Hoot Gibson, and Tex Ritter. He bounced from studio to studio, notably appearing in 1933's King Kong, 1934's Three Little Pigskins with Lucille Ball and The Three Stooges, and 1938's Mr. Wong Detective with Boris Karloff. He actually received third billing in the classic 1938 exploitation film, It's All In Your Mind, later re-released as Fools Of Desire.

 

Fools Of Desire

1938

Brent was also the author of a number of pulp fiction novels, a few with sexual themes, though he also seemed to specialize in westerns and crime novels. He initially used a pseudonym and was quite prolific, working with a number of publishers including: Gold Star, Nite Time, Carousel, Anchor, and Powell.

After Brent's movie career came to an end, he returned to writing. According to Taxonomy Domine, it's believed that he had "a portfolio of straight Westerns [which] failed to find a publisher. Several of these seem to have been published by Brentwood [Publishing] - I assume that Brent couldn’t find a publishing house, so he founded one!"

In order to find a niche market, sex scenes were added. The success of these led Brent to write a number of adult novels with sexual themes - and he appeared quite comfortable writing about gay men and lesbians. In fact, his most well-known work is 1964's lesbian-themed Lesbian Gang. Also, his two gay male novels, 1965's Sir Gay and The Gay Bunch, are quite sought after by collectors due to their cover illustrations. 

However, by 1968, he was only writing straight Western short stories and detective/crime novels.

Brent never married and died at the age of 83 in Los Angeles in 1981.

 Lynton Wright Brent

August 2, 1897 – July 2, 1981

Lynton Wright Brent

Bibliography

*Titles by Scott O’Neill

Gittin’ in the Movies – Moderncraft, 1936

The Bird Cage – Dorrance & Company, 1945

 

A New Look at the Lesbian – Nite-Time, 1963*

Campus Call Girl – Gold Star, 1964*

Flaming Lust – Brentwood, 1964

Lavender Love Rumble – Brentwood, 1964

Lesbian Gang – Carousel, 1964

Sex and the Jet Set – Gold Star, 1964 *
Sex and the Starlets – Gold Star, 1964*

The Sex Demon of Jangal – Brentwood, 1964

The Desert is a Woman – Brentwood, 1965

The Gay Bunch - Anchor, 1965

Lust Gallops into the Desert – Brentwood, 1965

The Passion Tree – Brentwood, 1965

Passionate Peril at Fort Tomahawk – Brentwood, 1965

Sex and the Alcoholic – Gold Star, 1965*
Sex and the Divorcee – Gold Star, 1965*
Sex and the Hospital – Hemisphere, 1965*

Sex in the Service – Gold Star, 1965*
Silent Sex Trail – Brentwood, 1965
Sir Gay – Brentwood/Anchor, 1965 

Squaw Trail – Brentwood/Anchor, 1965

Violent Love Stalks The Plains – Brentwood, 1965

Blood in the Street – Powell, 1968 (w/ Richard Fusilier)

Outlaw Village – Powell, 1968

Apache Killers – Powell, 1969
Apache Massacre – Powell, 1969
Apache Tomahawk – Powell, 1969

Death of a Detective – Powell, 1969

Detective on the Prowl – Powell, 1969 

Hollywood Crime and Scandal – Powell, 1969 

One Man’s Crime – Powell, 1969

The Sundown Kid – Powell, 1969

Warpaint in the Desert – Powell, 1969

Daughter of Bonnie & Clyde – Producer Books, 1971 

(the novelization of a Norman Hudis screenplay) 

 
Note: Peggy O’Neill Scott Fields also wrote under the pseudonym Scott O’Neill. So, I've eliminated two titles which have been credited to her and her husband Lynwood.

Below you'll find a selection of Brent's books. I did my best to track down his 'Adult Only' offerings, but I decided not to include them all. 

The Bird Cage: A Theatrical Novel Of Early Tombstone 

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

 Published by Dorrance & Company

 Philadelphia, PA

1945

His first work of fiction published. A novel about Tombstone and the thrilling story of a theatrical troupe that came by stagecoach to open its historic Bird Cage Theater in 1881. His first book is actually a 'how to' about finding work as an actor in the motion picture industry published in 1936.

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A New Look at the Lesbian 

Author: Scott O'Neill

Nite-Time Books

1963

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Campus Call Girl

Author: Scott O'Neill

Gold Star Books

IL7-35

Derby, CT

1964

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Sex and the Starlets

 Author: Scott O'Neill

Gold Star Books

 IL7-50

Derby, CT

1964

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Sex and the Jet Set

Author: Scott O'Neill

 Gold Star

 IL7-55 

Derby, CT

1964

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The Sex Demon of Jangal
Author: Lynton Wright Brent
Brentwood Publishing Co.

Hollywood, CA

 1964

Described as an "erotic horror novel."

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Lesbian Gang

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

 Carousel/Frima Publications

North Hollywood, CA

1964

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The Gay Bunch

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

Anchor Publications

WL-102

  1965

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The Desert is a Woman

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

Brentwood Publishing

Hollywood, CA

1965

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Lust Gallops Into The Desert
Author: Lynton Wright

Brentwood Publishing

Hollywood, CA

FB 1021

1965

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Passionate Peril At Fort Tomahawk

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

 Brentwood Publishing 

FB 1020

Hollywood, CA

1965

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Sex And The Divorcee
Author: Scott O'Neill 
 Gold Star Books

IL7-61

Derby, CT

1965

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Sex & The Hospital
Author: Lynton Wright Brent
 Hemisphere Publishing

FB 1018

1965

Lots of intriguing things about this title. The inside of the book says: "first in a new series Sex And The Hospital. a fictionalized documentary based on fact." Then it goes on to talk about the author - Scott O'Neill. It's even copyrighted by Scott O'Neill, yet the front cover shows authorship by Lynton Wright Brent. Initially I thought that either someone else wrote this book or Lynton Wright Brent was going to use a pseudonym, but the publisher got the cover wrong. The latter happened more frequently in this sort of genre than one would like to believe. I have since then discovered that Scott O'Neill is, indeed, a pseudonym used by Brent.

The other interesting tidbit - while the illustration in the bottom right shows the typical nurse/patient scenario, in the upper left we have what appears to be a male orderly and a male patient. Almost enough for me to want to purchase a copy - I found one on Amazon for $21.

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Silent Sex Trail

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

Published by Brentwood Publishing

Hollywood, CA

1965

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Sir Gay

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

Brentwood Publishing Co.

Hollywood, CA

BL-101 

 1965

Soon to be available as a PDF or ebook download at Hommi Publishing.

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Violent Love Stalks The Plains
Author: Lynton Wright Brent
Brentwood Publishing

Hollywood, CA

1965

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Apache Massacre

Author: Lynton Wright Brent

Powell Publications

Reseda, California

PP 134

1968

Brent did a whole series of these short story collections for Powell, as well as a crime/mystery series.

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Thanks to: 

LibraryThing, Wikipedia, AbeBooks, and Taxonomy Domine 

for all the information and graphics.

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And that's all for now.

Next week: more titillating, tantalizing vintage gay pulp titles.

Until then...

Thanks for reading!

New Look - Rita Orr