Wednesday, February 23, 2022

Men's Adventure Quarterly, Vol 4 - Jungle Girls by Bob Deis & Bill Cinningham

The fourth edition of the Men’s Adventure Quarterly magazine is, once again, another fine addition to the stable. As much as I enjoy each one, the next one always seems to top the previous one by a slim margin. I’m not sure how that’s possible, but there it is. 

The first three volumes were devoted to specific topics: Westerns, Espionage, and Vigilantes. Obviously, the next topic to be conquered is Jungle Girls. All of the content, prose and artwork, is sourced from the men’s adventure magazines (MAMs) of the 1950’s, 60s’ and 70’s.

About half of this volume is devoted to the inestimable Jane Dolinger. Here was an adventurer like few others. She billed herself as an "adventure travel writer” who traveled the world’s exotic locations to experience the cultures and then write about them. She became known as “Jungle Jane Dolinger”. Ultimately, she would produce a half dozen or so books and hundreds of travel articles for magazines and newspapers. She was also a model, often posing for scantily clad photos to accompany her articles and stories, many of which are included here as well.

The other real-life jungle girl in this issue is German born Marion Michael, billed as the next Bridget Bardot and cast in a couple of German films, (Liane, Jungle Goddess), while still in her teens.

Four Jungle Girl stories are presented as well, all in the faux-realism style that was common for the MAMs (written in the style of a true-life adventure even though fictional). Of course, there is much more here than just the stories and articles. The artwork alone is worth the cover price but there are also oodles of informative content about the authors, artists, and publishers behind the work. Very informative, just as I expect from this high-quality production.

No comments:

Post a Comment