A complete issue · 193 pages · 1923
Munsey's Magazine, May 1923
A complete, restored issue of Pulp Fiction from 1923 — all 193 pages of painted-cover fiction magazines that launched science fiction, horror, and hardboiled crime, free to page through at ComicBooks.com.
A complete issue · 193 pages · 1923
The Bathurst Complex by Wyndham Martyn is a mystery drama serialized across the magazine. The story follows Rhona King, a literature lecturer, who encounters a distraught middle-aged woman fleeing a dark mansion on the eve of a social gathering. Drawn by the woman's distress, Rhona agrees to wait inside the house while the stranger attends to an unspecified matter. Left alone in an oppressive library, Rhona discovers a man with his throat cut lying on a bed upstairs. After calling for help from a window, she attempts to hide as police and a detective arrive, only to be discovered, handcuffed, and taken into custody—her presence at the crime scene rendering her a murder suspect. The narrative emphasizes Gothic atmosphere and psychological tension as Rhona confronts mounting circumstantial evidence.
Each page has its own page — the cartoon, who’s in it, and what the satire means.