A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER

I have long been fascinated by the works of H.P. Lovecraft and the authors who surrounded and associated with him (and, of course, with Weird Tales magazine, their primary showcase and venue). Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E. Howard, Robert Bloch, Ray Bradbury, Frank Belknap Long, and so many others…including Carl Jacobi (1908-1997). I never got to meet Carl, but I was certainly aware of his literary shadow. He had the requisite Arkham House books—Revelations in Black (1947), Portraits in Moonlight (1964), Disclosures in Scarlet (1972)—and I certainly saw his work often enough in print. I even bought his story “The Tunnel” when I was co-editing Weird Tales in 1988. But for some reason, much like Frank Belknap Long, Carl Jacobi never really fired my collector’s interests—until recently, when I actually sat down and read a lot of his work.1

You know what? He’s good…really good. You don’t sell hundreds of stories over a 60-year career without being a more-than-competent wordsmith, but at his best he’s as good as Howard or Lovecraft.

But why didn’t he take off the same way they did?

I think I know the reasons, and there are four of them:

First, Carl Jacobi didn’t have a literary champion (and he was too humble to toot his own horn). To be a huge success, you need someone to build you up to the public at large. August Derleth did it with Lovecraft; L. Sprague de Camp, Lin Carter, and Glenn Lord did it with Robert E. Howard.

Second, he never made the leap from short fiction writer to novelist. You can be a success without short stories, but it’s a lot harder to do it without novels. And having both helps.

Third, he was viewed as part of the second generation of Weird Tales writers, following after Lovecraft. His work might have been as good as the first generation’s…but (as they say) who remembers the second man to set foot on the moon?

Fourth, he wrote in too many different genres.

Let’s look at the cumulative effects of these points in greater depth.

The most successful authors spend their whole careers building a public image. They make themselves (or those promoting them do!) so identified with a type of story that their name becomes synonymous with it. It’s a form of branding. Think of H.P. Lovecraft and you think of horror (thank you, August Derleth, for your promotional efforts). Think of Robert E. Howard and you think of sword & sorcery (thank you, Lin Carter and L. Sprague de Camp). Think of Robert Bloch and you think of horror (thank you, Psycho and Alfred Hitchcock). Ray Bradbury? Literary science fiction. Clark Ashton Smith? Weird fantasy.

Think of Carl Jacobi, and what comes to mind? Probably not a lot. “Oh, yes, a member of Lovecraft’s circle. Didn’t he write science fiction, too?”

Unlike Lovecraft et al., Jacobi was not a specialist in his writing. He wrote horror, yes—some very good stories, in fact. And he wrote science fiction—well-written space opera and space adventure. Sometimes a bit dated now, but fun. And he wrote mystery stories. (I’ve just started tracking down his mystery work in The Saint Mystery Magazine, Mike Shayne’s Mystery Magazine, and others from the 1960s and 1970s, so I haven’t formed an opinion of them yet.) And he wrote adventure stories—well researched, exciting tales of far-off lands.

The problem for magazine writers is that their work is ephemeral. It’s hard to build a following when you’re writing short stories—and four times as hard if you’re writing in four different genres, spreading your work out (and diluting its cumulative effect). Whenever you stop writing, your name disappears.

A steady stream of novels might have fixed this problem for Carl Jacobi. Books linger. They get reprinted. They attract reviews and attention, and they don’t have a built-in expiration date, unlike the cover dates of magazines.

Alas, it was never to be. All these factors conspired against Carl Jacobi becoming a commercial success, and by the time he had a willing and enthusiastic representation (R. Dixon Smith), he was in failing health and soon went into a nursing home, where he spent the last decade of his life. Dixon Smith managed to get a collection of Jacobi’s pulp-era adventure stories published (East of Samarinda, 1989), a new collection of fantastic work (Smoke of the Snake, 1994) and found homes for a scattering of short stories…but by then it was too little, too late.

Now we readers get to stumble over the bones of his literary career, discovering treasures undreamed-of. At least that’s how it feels to me, reading so much of his life’s work in a few sittings. It’s a voyage of discovery. Carl Jacobi deserves to be the first ranks of fantastic writers of the 20th century, and I hope you will agree.

Wildside is also releasing a horror collection simultaneously with this volume (The Carl Jacobi Horror MEGAPACK™) which I hope you will enjoy, too.

—John Betancourt

Publisher, Wildside Press LLC

www.wildsidepress.com

About the MEGAPACK™ ebook series

Over the last few years, our “Megapack” series of ebook anthologies has grown to be among our most popular endeavors. (Maybe it helps that we sometimes offer them as premiums to our mailing list!) One question we keep getting asked is, “Who’s the editor?”

The Megapacks (except where specifically credited) are a group effort. Everyone at Wildside works on them. This includes John Betancourt (me), Carla Coupe, Steve Coupe, Bonner Menking, Colin Azariah-Kribbs, A.E. Warren, and many of Wildside’s authors…who often suggest stories to include (and not just their own!)

Recommend a favorite story?

Do you know a great classic science fiction story, or have a favorite author whom you believe is perfect for the Megapack series? We’d love your suggestions! You can post them on our message board at http://movies.ning.com/forum (there is an area for Wildside Press comments).

Note: we only consider stories that have already been professionally published. This is not a market for new works.

Typos?

Unfortunately, as hard as we try, a few typos do slip through. We update our ebooks periodically, so make sure you have the current version (or download a fresh copy if it’s been sitting in your ebook reader for months.) It may have already been updated.

If you spot a new typo, please let us know. We’ll fix it for everyone. You can email the publisher at wildsidepress@yahoo.com or use the message boards above.

1 Wildside Press purchased Carl Jacobi’s literary estate in 2014, and my readings were done in preparation of putting his entire body of work back into print.