Men's Adventure Quarterly, Vol 1 by Bob Deis & Bill Cunningham

Color me impressed!

This is the first volume of what I sure hope is a continuing quarterly publication of stories and essays from the golden age of what are known as “MAMs” or Men’s Adventure Magazines. These were magazines mostly from the 1950s-60s that were geared toward men, often violent and with pulpy adventure style yarns. More often than not, the stories were accompanied by colorful art that featured scantily clad women. The publishers, after all, knew their target audience.

Now, Robert Deis and Bill Cunningham have put their considerable knowledge of the MAMs to work for our enjoyment. Each volume will focus on a single theme. This first one focuses on westerns and the second revolves around the world of espionage while the third devotes itself to the world of vigilantes. I own them all will be posting reviews of them as well, shortly.

This is a large, slick, high-quality product.  The cover alone makes my mouth water. But it is the contents that really blow me away. It’s chock full of reprinted stories and articles from the original MAMs as well as wonderful introductions by Bob Deis, Bill Cunningham, and guest editor, Paul Bishop. There are nine stories presented from the likes of “MALE”, “Man’s Life”, and “All Man” magazines complimented by impressive original full color and B&W artwork. It’s absolutely gorgeous. Additionally, there are a couple of in-depth articles as well as a full color art gallery of classic covers.

All of that would have added up to a sure-fire winner. But, for me, what really drives it over the top are the introductions to each story and article. Often when I read anthologies, I feel lucky when a story is introduced with a paragraph or two providing some background. But here, we get two and three pages of intro, describing each story’s origins, the author’s life, the artists involved and even the publishing background. The folks behind this publication really know their subject and their passion for all of it shines through in spades.

This will have a permanent place on my shelves, right alongside every issue that is published in the future. Highest recommendation!