Black Cat Weekly #5

THE CAT’S MEOW, by the Editor

THE CAT’S MEOW, by the Editor

Welcome to our sixth Black Cat Weekly—which features our usual eclectic mix of science fiction, fantasy, crime, and mystery. This time we have two novels and ten short stories—more than enough treats for every reader to find something of interest. And probably more than a few somethings.

Best of all, in this issue we have not one, but two original stories.

First up is Bobbi A. Chukran’s wonderful “The Passing of Big Mama Mayhall,” a mystery we originally wanted to include in Black Cat Mystery Magazine, but we couldn’t fit it in due to space limitations. It’s a terrific read.

Second is a Halloween tale by our very own editor, Barb Goffman, which we had to have when we saw it. (That’s why there is no “Barb Goffman Presents” this time...we have a Barb Goffman original instead!)

Since it’s October as this issue is going out, I thought I’d build on the Halloween theme and decided to reprint one of my own stories, “Sympathy for Zombies.” It features a traditional Haitian voodoo zombie. I was on a monster kick in the 1990s and wrote a bunch of “Sympathy for...” stories covering vampires, werewolves, mad scientists, dragons, and a bunch of other classic monsters. If there is interest, I’ll include more in later BCW issues. “Sympathy for Zombies” originally appeared in Weird Tales.

I’m also happy to share one of my favorite Edith Nesbit supernatural stories, “Man-Size in Marble.” It’s a classic. If you haven’t read it before, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it, too.

Of course, no issue would be complete without a Hal Charles solve-it-yourself mystery. Can you figure out the clues before skipping to the solution?

We are up to our sixth Carlton Clarke tale by Thomas Lovell Nelson. These rare “telepathic detective” stories first appeared in newspaper syndication in 1908. We have six more waiting in the queue.

Add a Continental Op private detective story by Dashiell Hammett, a Chicago-based mystery novel by Edwin Balmer, and a hardboiled crime story by Martin Suto, and you have a packed issue. But of course we can’t wait to jam more in—how about an A.R. Morlan science fiction story (she’s always a teller of very strange tales), a science-fantasy involving the Martian Foreign Legion by Ralph Milne Farley, and a classic novel by Dwight V. Swain? You bet!

Our circulation has been increasing since we changed the Black Cat Weekly format to an e-magazine, which means we have more money to spend on acquiring material for our readers. As promised, all money received from subscriptions goes toward acquiring and digitizing new content for our readers.

Enjoy!

—John Betancourt

Editor, Black Cat Weekly