Image credit: freeimages.com / riesma pawestri

Shelf Introduction

There are only four sections to this shelf, but they are all fairly significant.

Everyday Life – I entitled the final section in Monday’s article “A world is for living in”. Before that can happen, you have to understand that world and how it works, what the ordinary everyday experiences are, and so on. You can’t just assume that it’s like 2016 only simpler, or with less technology. Fortunately, there are some really excellent resources to help you travel back in time to the world of yesteryear.

History & Historical Events – Of course, everyday life is just the small picture. The big picture is comprised of and punctuated by events – what happened, where, when, why, and what people did about it.

Politics – As always, the big picture is dominated and shaped by politics more than anything else. You can’t understand the decisions that were taken until you understand the politics that lay in back of that decision, and you can’t determine the effect on the inhabitants of the world without understanding the decision and its impact. Or to put it another way, politics defines the size and shape of the societal “box” within which an ordinary life is lived. If the game world was just like the real world, it would be relatively easy – but it’s not likely to be, and every change alters the driving forces behind decisions that have real impacts on the lives of inhabitants – including the PCs.

Hollywood, Cinema, and Entertainment – When the crushing burdens of real life threaten to become too much to bear, people turn to their entertainments to relieve the pressure and restore some balance within their lives. Hollywood was big before the advent of the talkies and the Great Depression; they grew to be enormous during and after. At this time, few if any of the stars realized just how much commercial power they could wield with advertising and endorsements, and even if they had, the sort of thing that’s commonplace now would be considered the crassest form of commercialism then. The public perceived their stars as operating in a more pure world, of having risen above such petty concerns; the idolizing of strangers because of their public image was in its infancy. In some ways, the world of then is as alien to our modern routine existences as the planet mars.

A Recurring Note On Images:

Wherever possible, we have provided an illustration showing the cover of the book or DVD under discussion scaled to the same vertical size (320 pixels for Recommended Books, 280 for DVDs, 240 for items in the ‘For Dummies’ Sections). Where there was none available, we have used a generic icon.

Prices and Availability were correct at the time of compilation.

Books About Ordinary Life in the Pulp Era

There are a lot of books in this section, and if we could have found a reasonable way to subdivide it into reasonable even chunks, we would have.

749. Everyday Life from Prohibition through World War II – Marc McCutcheon

Organized by decade/era, this is essential period cultural reference – everything from slang to clothing to crime and media – a must-read for every Pulp GM.
http://amzn.to/1PP1CmI

750. Daily Life in the United States, 1920-1940: How Americans Lived Through the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression – David E. Kyvig

This book came to our attention in the course of compiling this list, and sounded too good not to include – but we haven’t actually read it. According to Amazon, the prize-winning author …”describes everyday life in these decades, when automobiles and home electricity became commonplace, when radio and the movies became broadly popular”. The Amazon blurb goes on to say, “The details of work life, domestic life, and leisure activities make engrossing reading and bring the era clearly into focus.” That description, plus a whole heap of authoritative recommendations, earns the book a place.
http://amzn.to/1mankda

751. 1930’s Fashion: The Definitive Sourcebook – Emmanuelle Dirix and Charlotte Fiell (Carlton Books)

A little on the expensive side (the cheapest copies were US$35 at the time of our review) but might be worth it to the GM who wants to nail this important element of period color. Amazon has two different editions, one published about a year after the other and losing 64 pages in the process – though, given that it was still over 500 pages in length, that might well be down to a change in font or typesetting. The covers are identical. The newer edition is marginally cheaper than the older, however, so there might be more substantial differences. For that reason, we recommend the older edition be considered ahead of the newer, even though they cost slightly more.
Older edition: http://amzn.to/1PdhIXL
Newer edition: http://amzn.to/1SqcHS8

752. 1920’s Fashion: The Definitive Sourcebook – Emmanuelle Dirix and Charlotte Fiell (Carlton Books)

Everything written about the 1930s sourcebook above also holds true for the volume detailing the preceding decade. 512 pages, featuring 600 totally original, period photographs and illustrations. Paperback: 36 new from $24.67, 15 used from $30.26.
http://amzn.to/2glNXd5

753. American Culture in the 1930s – David Eldridge

This is a great book for understanding the impact that the Great Depression had on American Society. Although the primary focus is on what the economic situation and the response from what Washington did in terms of the Arts, that in turn changed what was popular and how it was delivered to the masses. When you read the chapter on radio and music, for example, you not only see the foundations of the studio system of 1970s television, but the primal gestation of MTV as a concept. Critically, if you change history to create a more pulp-like world, you also change the degree of cultural impact and hence change the everyday society. Mike and Blair had part of that puzzle solved for the Adventurer’s Club campaign; reading this book gave them the rest of it.
http://amzn.to/2c377F4

754. Only Yesterday: An informal History of the 1920s – Frederick Lewis Allen

Originally published in 1931, when the author could not know what would turn out to be significant and what wouldn’t last – so he provided context and included it all. The important events are covered – Prohibition, Al Capone, and so on – but the prosperity society leading up to the crash of 1929 is also exposed, covering everything from flappers to speakeasies to the pioneers of radio to the scandalous rise of hemlines. Hailed at the time as an instant classic, it says something that it is still available today.
http://amzn.to/2coNKsn

755. Since Yesterday: The 1930s in America – September 3, 1929 to September 3,1939 – Frederick L. Allen

The sequel to “Only Yesterday” (listed above) picks up the story with the Wall Street Crash. Acknowledged for its lack of political bias, you can always tell the writer was a supporter of FDR but he quotes the criticisms of others fairly and even agrees with them from time to time. This is not a history book about events, but about the look and feel of living through the events of the decade.
http://amzn.to/2cb31cT

756. The 1930s House Explained – Trevor Yorke

This is a book about English houses of the period, not American ones. But from a distance of more than 85 years, the two were more similar than they were different. More importantly, the Brits never fell out of love with the style and fashion of the times (they just regarded them as rather dull and tawdry for a while); these days, restoring houses to the old-time look and feel is a popular practice in the UK, and that’s given modern analysts a chance to examine the styles at arms-length in terms of what worked and why, and why it was popular. Unusually, new copies can be cheaper than second-hand ones (and there are more of them, too) – which indicates that most people aren’t reselling the book, they are keeping it.
http://amzn.to/2cz12i4

757. Dust Bowl: The southern plains in the 1930s – Donald Worster

No-one who hasn’t lived through a dust storm can fully appreciate the misery that they can cause, and no-one who wasn’t there at the time has ever lived through anything like the dust storms that befell the Midwest during the 30s. We wanted to link to a documentary on the subject but no links could be found; this book is the next best thing. The book was updated and revised in the 1950s as time brought a new perspective on events, and as a warning that it was about to happen again. Emergency action prevented the return of the Dust Bowl at the time – at least to the same degree – and again, in the late 70s and early 80s – but the documentary in question made the point that conditions and land management practices are once again “right” for the return of the dust-bowl, just as the GFC was a mirror-image of the Great Depression. That comment isn’t meant as a call to action or to influence anyone’s political views, but as a way of providing an association that should be meaningful to a reader of the book.
http://amzn.to/2coQO7L

758. The 1920s (American Popular Culture Through History) – Kathleen Drowne and Patrick Huber

We really shouldn’t list this book here (for availability/price reasons), but the next one in the series (the 1930s, listed separately) was so good that we couldn’t turn it down.

Known by many names, the 20s were an especially vibrant time, until, despite, – or perhaps, because of – the Great Depression and its precursor investment boom. Known variously as the Jazz Age, Dry Decade, Flapper Generation, or (most famously) as the Roaring Twenties, this was a colorful bright spot that stands in stark contrast with the preceding period of history.

http://amzn.to/2gi7tZ8

759. America in the 1930s – Jim Callan

A children’s book for ages 10-13, but don’t turn away just yet! Described as “solid, well-written” and “poorly formatted”. The list of subjects covered is robust, and would make an excellent primer for the pulp era; but the layout conjugates text with completely-unrelated imagery. Furthermore, small type is used on thin paper, which is somewhat unusual in a children’s book. Bottom line: Those who grew up in America may not need this book, for everyone else it makes a good foundation. As a bonus, it includes an extensive bibliography.
http://amzn.to/2fYEMzZ

760. Farming in the 1920s and 30s (Shire Library) – Jonathon Brown

Although there’s nothing we can explicitly point at to state it definitively, we suspect that this is about farming in England during the inter-war period. But there would be a very substantial crossover in farming techniques throughout the western world, regardless of locality. Certainly the tractor on the cover could be English, Australian, or American – or Canadian, or French for that matter.

This book looks at the challenges of farming in a recessed or depressed economy, the effects of peace after a Great War with its inherent labor disruptions, the crops and livestock being produced, and the new technologies that enabled the farmer to respond to the challenges. Agriculture is an essential but often-overlooked element of real life in ANY historical era or location.

64 pages, Kindle ($6.04), Paperback 27 New from $3.69, 16 Used from $3.68
http://amzn.to/2gic24u

761. Diamonds at Dinner: My Life as a Lady’s Maid in a 1930s Stately Home – Hilda Newman and Tim Tate

Hilda Newman was a maid to Lady Coventry at the Worcestershire stately home of Croome Court in the 1930s. This is her memoir of the life she experienced and the one that she witnessed from her position. A lot of readers will also be drawn to her observations of the War years, when Croome Court housed the Dutch Royal Family, who escaped the Nazi occupation, and was also home to the top-secret RAF base Defford, where radar was developed and repairs were carried out on aircraft fighting in the Battle of Britain, even though they aren’t pulp-relevant.

Although clearly and distinctly British in subject, there would be a certain amount of overlap with the upper-class residents of other parts of the world. 272 pages, Kindle ($4.40) and Paperback (32 used from $0.77, 38 New from $4).
http://amzn.to/2g6kIeJ

762. Minding the Manor: The Memoir of a 1930s English Kitchen Maid – Mollie Moran

Moran was born in 1916 in Norfolk and left school at the age of 14 to become a scullery maid. This book walks similar terrain that of the previous listing but has perhaps a greater emphasis on the social life that was enjoyed beyond the house. 360 pages, MP3-CD (3 used from $21.03, 12 new from $16.33) and Paperback (61 used from $2.81, 36 new from $7.13).
http://amzn.to/2gD3o4S

763. Queen Bees: Six Brilliant and Extraordinary Society Hostesses Between the Wars – Sian Evans

“In the aftermath of the First World War, the previously strict hierarchies of the British class system were weakened. For a number of ambitious, spirited women, this was the chance they needed to slip through the cracks and take their place at the top of society as the great hostesses of the time. In an age when the place of women was uncertain, becoming a hostess was not a chore, but a career choice, and though some of the hostesses’ backgrounds were surprisingly humble, their aspirations were anything but. During the inter-war years these extraordinary women ruled over London society from their dining tables and salons.” “Queen Bees looks at the lives of six remarkable women who made careers out of being British society hostesses between the wars” and who became the matriarchs of inter-war society in England.
416 pages, Kindle ($12,52), Audible ($26.14) and Hardcover (6 used from $18, 20 new from $16.75).
http://amzn.to/2gD0NHV

764. The Age of the Dream Palace: Cinema and Society in 1930s Britain (reissued) – Jeffrey Richards

The Australian experience of cinema in the 1930s was not all that dissimilar to that of the US, producing a particular myopia on the subject from other perspectives, an unwritten and untested assumption that it was like that everywhere. Well, it was and it wasn’t; there were subtle differences, and this book exposes that even as it examines the role of the cinema in everyday British life of the 1930s. On top of that, Richards scrutinizes the film industry, censorship, cinema’s influence, the nature of the star system and its images, as well as the films themselves, including the visions of Britain, British history and society that they created and represented.

384 pages, paperback ,25 new from $10.56, 29 used from $4.08, 1 collectible at $50.23.
http://amzn.to/2f9EKbD

765. Britain in the 1920s – Fiona McDonald

Sometimes it’s helpful to be an outsider looking in, because you can see the shape of the forest more clearly from a distance, even if some of the trees are obscured. Fiona McDonald is Australian, born in Armidale and educated at the Julian Ashton Art School before discovering a passion for making dolls and toys, especially dragons. That makes her just about as outside of 1920s England as you can expect to get! And the results from that examination are comprehensive, accessible, and indispensable, even for those whose .Pulp Campaigns are set later in the Pulp Era. Operating without the benefit of this reference, Mike and Blair’s campaign Britain clearly bears a greater resemblance to the Britain of the 1920s than that of the 1930s; recognizing that, they can either play into it and enlarge on that theme in future, or apply a correction the next time the PCs visit London.

The 20s were an exciting time in England. The war was over, new technologies and fashions were everywhere, and there was a sense of optimism for the future. Social progress granted women new freedoms and rights, automobiles were more accessible and houses became filled with electrical gadgets. And yet, counterbalancing that were high unemployment rates, extreme poverty in parts of the country, high inflation, and workers were shamelessly exploited. This book embraces the social, political, and cultural landscapes of the era to provide a comprehensive summation of a place that American readers would recognize only as “similar but different”.

Hardcover, 256 pages, 12 used from $16.52 and 13 new from $20.36.
http://amzn.to/2fr4nA3

766. 1920’s Britain (Shire Living Histories) – John and Janet Shepherd

From Amazon: “How does a society recover from a devastating war? This was the question posed in the 1920s as people searched for normality in the aftermath of terrible trauma. Written from the perspective of those who lived, worked and played in the metropolis of greater London, 1920s Britain uncovers the hardships and stresses of the age, strains which manifested in the general strike of 1926. However, the 1920s was also a time of recovery and hope for the future; London itself was a place of international significance and hope. Delve into the past in this intriguing insight into a difficult time for Britain and the people tasked with its recovery.” This book is short, but the prices are a reasonable reflection of that, and if your campaign is not going to feature Britain extensively, this might be all you need.

88 pages, paperback, 30 used from $1.86 and 36 new from $4.46.
http://amzn.to/2fHOwOp

767. Britain in the 30s and 40s (Ticktock Essential History Guide)

“This title explores the times of 30s and 40s Britain, and uses essential facts and engaging imagery to give the reader an understanding of this period in history – from rationing and evacuations to the Great Depressions and antibiotics.”

For it’s minuscule size (only 32 pages) and categorized by Amazon as a children’s book, this is quite expensive – but there is not a wealth of alternatives to choose from. 14 used copies from $8.16, 10 new from $16.88. NB: This is a “bargain book” and even new copies may have marks from publishers and price stickers.
http://amzn.to/2fU8rN0

768. The Hollow Years: France in the 1930s – Eugen Joseph Weber

“Caught between the memory of a brutal war won at frightful cost and fear of another cataclysm, France in the 1930s suffered a failure of nerve.” Everyone knows about American isolationism in the period between the World Wars but far fewer understand it. This book corrects the gap in comprehension by looking at how the same forces of fear and economic distress affected a nation that was right in the firing line – and knew it.
http://amzn.to/2cb6isU

769. Negrophilia: Avant-Garde Paris and Black Culture in the 1920s – Petrine Archer-Staw

In the years after World War I, many Africans and African Americans emigrated to Europe’s urban centers in search of work and improved social conditions, where they had a major impact on European society. Nowhere responded more strongly than Paris, at the time the most culturally experimental city in Europe. Now known as the Negrophilia period in Parisian society, this book examines a cultural revolution whose traces were all but obliterated by the Nazi Occupation two decades later. The contrast in the Parisian mindset of the twenties, as described in this book, and that of the thirties described in “The Hollow Years” (above) is particularly stark and noteworthy.
http://amzn.to/2ggutrF

770. The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 – Tim Madigan

A white mob with thousands of members descended on the black community of Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 1, 1921. They obliterated 34 square blocks of Tulsa’s Greenwood community, then one of the most prosperous black communities in the US, which had been nicknamed “the Negro Wall Street Of America”, reducing them to smoldering rubble. It was virtually impossible then to put an accurate figure to the death toll, and it is a task that has not grown easier with the passage of a further 80 years of history; it could be 100, it could be three times that. This book provides both the detail and the emotional narrative to recreate the town, the era, and the incident, as well as its precursors in the distant past and the silence that surrounded the events for almost 80 years afterwards.

There are quite a number of books that have now been written about the Tulsa Riot. We chose this one initially through chance and kept it (rather than searching further) because of the scope and context that it seems to offer. If copies run out, consider one of the others. Most can be found by searching for “Black Wall Street”, a few by searching for “Tulsa Race Riot 1921”.
http://amzn.to/2gcEhBw

771. When Harlem Was In Vogue – David Levering Lewis

Mike’s first exposure to the existence of Harlem was in the James Bond film “Live and let Die”, at least as best as he can recall. His second and third were from the TV series “Welcome Back, Kotter” and “Good Times” – which weren’t even set in Harlem (Brooklyn and Chicago, respectively). It is from such disparate and largely inaccurate sources that an impression of the locality within New York City is compounded for those who aren’t American. Self-education in music and music history proved a revelation to him; although not a Jazz aficionado, he learned enough about the subject through various sources over the years to completely reevaluate his perception of what was, in his lifetime, one of the most legendarily downtrodden slum districts of the city.

This 448-page book gives the history of Harlem and its African-American subculture from 1890 until the riot of 1935. For part of that time, this was the cool place to be and to be seen, and that period just happens to coincide with part of the Pulp Era. So, if your perceptions of Harlem bear even the slightest resemblance to those of Mike when he was younger, you need this book or you will be ignoring one of the cultural landmarks of the era.(We don’t think any of the players will ever forget Father O’Malley and Dr Hawke’s expedition into Harlem, which ended with one of them singing on stage and the other dancing on the tables after a bluff went horribly “wrong”).
http://amzn.to/2gH22Xu

772. Jump For Joy: Jazz, Basketball, and Black Culture in 1930s America – Gena Caponi-Tabery

For some, the 1930s were a time of exuberance, buoyed by high-profile successes in various fields, including the 1936 Olympics, the 1937 union victory of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and Joe Louis’ 1937 and 38 heavyweight championship bouts. For the first time, black Americans had cultural heroes and ambassadors and could aspire to the heights that they represented. While the focus of this book is 1941 and the years that followed, it starts by chronicling these successes and the influence they had on the developing African-American subculture.
http://amzn.to/2f2wqKv

773. Everyday Stalinism: Ordinary Life In Extraordinary Times: Soviet Russia in the 1930s (English Language edition) – Sheila Fitzpatrick

I don’t think we need say too much to sell the inclusion of this book. There are those who would suggest that it should have been placed in the section dealing with Russia, but the focus on daily life, and the potential to extrapolate to large parts of Eastern Europe in general, were – in our opinion – enough to justify its placement here. Kindle, Hardcover, and Paperback; at the moment, of the latter two formats, the Hardcovers represent the best value for money, but that could easily change, so look carefully at the options and prices when you consider purchasing. 304 pages.
http://amzn.to/2flZhoy

774. Decades Of Crisis: Central and Eastern Europe before World War II – Ivan T Berend

A holistic approach to the history of the region yields a work that even those who lived through the period find educational. “Berend’s book is the broadest synthesis of the modern social, economic, and cultural history of the region that we possess, probably in any language. Much of the narrative is masterful, and of an unparalleled richness, both in fact and insight. This work displays well the broad erudition of its author.”–John Connelly, Journal of Economic History.

There were any number of places where this 485-page book could have been placed. It could be in the Politics section, or the Eastern-Europe “places” section, for example, and we can’t actually state any particular reason why we have chosen to list it here; just an instinct that says you can’t deal with such a broad palette without describing everything that defined life in these nations during the period in question, almost as a side-effect.
http://amzn.to/2gcZaMN

775. Bartender’s Bundle (e-book)

Contains Bartending For Dummies and Whiskey and Spirits For Dummies – We aren’t complete teetotalers but there are hundreds more drinks than we’ve ever heard of, and that’s not counting the cocktails! How relevant these books will be to an earlier age is unknown, and our only concern. Do you know the difference between a Parrot Bay Sunset, a Tropical Sunset, A St Croix Sunset, a Perfect Sunset, and a Sunset Strip? – let along which of them should be your character / NPC’s favorite cocktail when ordering a tipple in, say, New Caledonia? Or perhaps one of the world’s 1+ varieties of beer is more your style?
http://amzn.to/2g6W25Y

776. Bartending For Dummies – Ray Foley

If e-books aren’t your thing, you might consider buying the two books conflated into the Bartender bundle in more physical form. This is the first of them, listing over 1, drinks recipes. Two editions are available; this is the older and cheaper. Forget the new copies; there isn’t enough value for the GM for the pieces being charged. If you really want a new copy, click through to the more recent edition. There are 50 used copies from one cent.
http://amzn.to/2gk1oh8

777. Whiskey and Spirits For Dummies – Perry Luntz

The latest edition of the other physical book contained in the e-book bundle has somehow reached the conclusion in the title that Whiskey is not a spirit, which gave us a wry chuckle. Setting that peculiarity aside, this book is supposed to be a “complete guide to selecting and enjoying this family of noble beverages, flavor by flavor”. Kindle $11.74 (but the Bundle listed earlier is better value for money) or Paperback (36 new from $8.16, 50 used from $0.50).
http://amzn.to/2fueya0

778. Wine For Dummies

The complexities of cocktails and spirits are dwarfed by the complications of fine wines and champagnes. Our only concern is the question of how much of the content would be relevant to the pulp era, but this is one area where it’s probably easier just to pretend that the modern range is available back then.

We’re actually linking to two different forms of this book, because they are very comparable in price. The first one, and our first choice (Pictured), is the Wine-All-In-One For Dummies; this contains the central book and four regional wine guides – French, Italian, Californian, and Australia/New Zealand Wines – though it’s worth noting that neither of the last two amounted to very much in the world of fine wines during the Pulp era. 696 pages, Kindle ($17.40), Paperback 28 New from $14.67 and 31 used from $9.57.
http://amzn.to/2g75O84

Compare that with the core book on it’s own, which we recommend only when the price of the breaks the $20-or-so barrier through scarcity, even though it is two editions later than the bundled one. 432 pages, Kindle ($13.28), Paperback 43 New from $10.40, 19 used from $12.74. Is the added color worth paying less for? Is that a silly question? Turn it around: would a pulp GM (as opposed to the general public) get enough additional value out of the updated information to justify the higher price?
http://amzn.to/2fup80L

779. Cooking Around The World For Dummies all-in-one

There are a number of regional cuisine books in the Dummies series, but we don’t think that any one of them is worth getting just for RPG purposes. Getting all eight of them in one volume, on the other hand, seems reasonably cost-effective. After all, one of the easiest ways to make different places around the world distinctive is through the food that’s on offer, especially when discussing a time before McDonalds!

As you would expect, under the circumstances, the page-count is high: 744 pages. Available in digital format (e-book by another name?) for $4.99, or as a paperback (29 new from $15.50, 54 used from one cent).
http://amzn.to/2goYMfq

Documentaries About Ordinary Life in the Pulp Era

Four items in this subsection that are heartily recommended. Books are a great way to impart specific information and details; actually seeing something permits the incorporation of details not even consciously perceived, leading to a greater appreciation for the way the world felt beyond the known details, and providing a foundation for decisions about the look-and-feel of those details.

See also a number of documentaries listed in the “Era Inventions” section, as many of them make great efforts to place the problems these technologies were to solve in period context.

The “Hidden Killers” Documentary Series:

780. Hidden Killers of the Edwardian Home

Even if this was nothing more than a detailed examination of the typical home in 1901-1914, it would be deserving of a very strong recommendation. Since it is so much more than that, examining the deadly threats and dangers that the radical new inventions such as electricity and domestic chemicals brought with them, it gets top scores. (It should be remembered that outside the larger cities, Edwardian technology and the social consequences it carries will still be the contemporary reality!) On top of that, any city-based character over 25 will have experienced these conditions first-hand, and may be suffering from ill-effects as a result – something that can be a useful plot point for any Medically-oriented PC.

781. Hidden Killers of the Victorian Home

Less directly relevant at first glance, this predates “The Edwardian Home” (above) in time period. But that only means that you have to travel further into the backwoods and backwaters to find people living lives of a Victorian standard. All the reasons for the other “Hidden Killers” documentary to be relevant are just as valid for this one – only the context of the applicability has changed.

782. More Hidden Killers of the Victorian Home

No more need be said.

Availability:

Unfortunately, this series is not available on DVD anywhere as far as we have been able to determine. US residents can stream the entire series for $9.99 per episode http://amzn.to/1PRZLx7, local DVD suppliers might carry it, and at least two of them are available through youTube and – at least at the time of writing.

783. New York

Known variously elsewhere as “An American Experience: New York: A Documentary Film In 8 parts by Ric Burns”, or some combination of those elements, this is a collection of thematically-related documentaries spelling out the history of New York City. Originally aired as elements of a longer-running series over multiple seasons, this collection excerpts them to form a continuous narrative that is indispensable for any pulp GM.

Firstly, it brings the era to life; secondly, it brings the politics of the city in the pulp period to life; and third, it grounds the GM in what is inevitably going to be one of the featured locations in any Pulp Campaign.

We are recommending the series for 5 episodes: “The Power & The People”, “City Of Tomorrow” (Parts 1 and 2), and “The City & The World” (parts 1 and 2). (Mike: To my great regret, I missed episodes 1-3, or the recommendation might be even more expansive)! This 8-DVD set isn’t cheap, but it’s worth it, and there may be cheaper options available to you, depending on where you live.

Amazon US: $54+ http://amzn.to/1NziSMK, or rent the entire series through Amazon streaming for $3.99, or buy the series streamed for $30 http://amzn.to/22KUQWi

Amazon UK: limited copies of the US import from about £52 http://amzn.to/23Ibewk

Amazon Canada: CDN$85+ http://amzn.to/1VB9xvM, which is far more reasonable than usual, relative to the US Price.

784. Turn Back Time: The High Street (Eps 1, 2, 3, and 4)

A 6-episode British series looking at the industrial/retail sectors of society and how they have been transformed by society and technology over the course of a single century, and how they in turn have transformed society within that century. While the series is British, the social and economic forces that affected the UK had their equivalents in Australia, and in the US, and – I’m sure – in Canada as well.

Amazon US has a single copy of the UK import and four copies through other vendors, all starting at around US$20 http://amzn.to/1spoGEz.

Amazon UK has not many more copies, but links to several more second-hand http://amzn.to/1O2NQTp.

Amazon Canada doesn’t list the DVD at all, but they do list the book of the series, with second-hand copies available http://amzn.to/1WvfiMn at the bargain price of CDN$0.01!

Amazon US also has the book for very reasonable prices http://amzn.to/1UfzlIb
and Amazon UK has the greatest availability of all, in terms of the book http://amzn.to/1sJlX92.

785. Turn Back Time: The Pharmacy aka Victorian Pharmacy (3 eps)

Examines medicine in the Victorian era, when skin creams contain arsenic and cold medicines were based on opiates. Any pulp-era character’s parents will have experienced the pitfalls and social impacts of this era’s pharmacology (in many cases, may still be experiencing the aftereffects), and certainly any doctor with a medical practice anywhere in the western world during the pulp era would be familiar with the ailments and supposed treatments. (Interestingly, the DVD has a run-time of 240 minutes, suggesting a full hour’s worth of extras).

Amazon US has only a limited supply of UK imports that won’t play on most domestic US equipment http://amzn.to/1TIpxae.

Amazon UK has a few more, and quite good availability second-hand http://amzn.to/1spqu0j.

Amazon Canada also has a few British imports for the relatively reasonable price of CDN$20 or thereabouts http://amzn.to/20RNhgj and has a few more listed separately at totally outrageous prices of up to CDN$900!

When the reasonably-priced DVDs run out, there is also a book (we are not sure whether the book is based on the TV series or vice-versa) available:
Amazon US: http://amzn.to/1TVV647, Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/1ZbhAxY, and Amazon Canada: http://amzn.to/1r1vJlK and http://amzn.to/1sJqTup and http://amzn.to/1P22uFx and a few more on top of those at less attractive prices.

Books About History & Historical Events

We weren’t able to subdivide the everyday life section very effectively – there was too much crossover in the value to be provided by the different titles being recommended – but we were able to subdivide the second-largest section into four subsections: World History, US History, British History, and Histories of Elsewhere.

See also specific items by location on the “Places” shelves.

Books About World History & Historical Events in general

This subsection holds 11 books, three of which are “For Dummies books that we thought worth promoting to the main list of recommendations.

786. Reader’s Digest Book Of Facts – Robert Dolezal

The list of past rulers from different Kingdoms, Empires, etc, has been very useful any number of times. And you can get adventure ideas from elsewhere in the book using the techniques offered in Campaign Mastery’s 2013 article, “Trivial Pursuits: Sources Of Oddball Ideas”.

There are a mountain of cheap copies available at http://amzn.to/1PSeNJO and, if they run out, there are some more here http://amzn.to/20mr1iX and if that’s still not enough, for the third edition they changed the name to “The Book Of Facts” and there are even more copies of that available at this page http://amzn.to/1PdjJTV!

787. The Concise Encyclopedia Of World History – Rodney Castleden

Every major event from 38, BC to 1993 by date. Also some very useful appendices. Very limited detail on any given entry, we use it as an index of events, because it permits you to “flip through time” very quickly. Published with a couple of different covers, the cover shown is the one that we have and use.
http://amzn.to/1PwCEN1

788. A History Of The Modern World from 1917 to the 1980s – Paul Johnson

A more narrative approach that gives context and insight into events. Mike has the paperback and paid a lot more than these prices for it! The cover is very plain – orange for the paperback (pictured) and green for the hardcover, so this book almost escapes attention, which is a shame – one that you should take full advantage of. Mike and Blair (metaphorically) ripped almost two full pages of narrative from the content to use as player briefing on the Yakuza in Japan during the 1930s without need to edit it at all – they just took the book into the gaming venue with them and read aloud from it!
http://amzn.to/1PSgp6s

789. Chronicle Of The 20th Century

Newspaper headlines, photographs, and story excerpts day by day and month by month, from 1900 to 1989 (and possibly beyond – keep reading). You can also get a subsequent and much thinner volume covering 1990; the plan was to keep issuing them; that never seemed to happen. But there was a second edition (with the same cover as the first, pictured), with a slightly different page count – and, very helpfully, there was still another edition (with a different cover, and 100 more pages, taking the total to well over 1400) released in 1995. These are essentially a-month-to-a-page, so 100 extra pages is roughly 100 more months – or about 8 more years.

We’re recommending the newer edition even though it costs more, for that reason, but there are copies of the other editions that we have mentioned available for ridiculously cheap prices.

One word of caution: At 9 lb in weight or thereabouts, postage will be expensive. No, Very expensive.

NB: We are basing this recommendation on a specially-prepared Australia-and-New-Zealand edition, but the links we have provided all lead to a US edition, so far as we can determine, except as otherwise noted.

1995 edition (newer, larger. more complete): http://amzn.to/1KUcWN4
Second Edition (older, cheaper, less complete): http://amzn.to/1mauazp

BRITISH EDITION (slight cover differences, presumably greater content differences – and yes, we’re tempted…): http://amzn.to/1nCX4ZT

790. Chronicle Of The World – edited by Jerome Burne

NOT to be confused with the previous recommendation, even though the title is similar and the cover is clearly related. This is a history of the world, but it’s written in modern journalistic style, arranged in chronological order from 3.5 Million B.C. To 1945. There are also more than 50 essays to supplement the main text. Interestingly, major events after 1945 are only summarized, showing that the focus isn’t on modern history but how we got to the modern day – and part of that “to” includes the Pulp Era.
The last 100 pages of the book contain an alphabetical compendium of the nations of the world.

This book is almost 1300 pages in length and again, tips the scales at more than eight-and-a-half pounds, so postage costs will be exceptionally high even though the book itself is quite affordable.
http://amzn.to/1PSlrzE

791. The World’s Worst Historical Disasters – Chris McNab

A couple of pages each on various disasters from Sodom & Gomorrah through to the Pacific Tsunami. While only a few entries will be of direct value there are a lot more that can be historically relevant to characters and their families. Amazon carries three different editions of this book, and most of them are outside the price limits of this list – including the edition we have and use. So buyer beware, your mileage may vary!

2005 Edition (cheapest): http://amzn.to/1QENf7E

2007 Edition (only one used copy, priced at $41.43): http://amzn.to/2060pNB

2008 Edition (not enough copies, but they are reasonably priced): http://amzn.to/1PSn5Bv

792. Debunking History: 152 Popular Myths Exploded – Ed Rayner & Ron Stapley

Many of the articles within this broad work will not be relevant, but there are enough to make this worth listing anyway. Amazon has four listings for this book, but only one falls within our price limits. If the affordable copies are all gone, you may be able to find one of those more-expensive ones by searching for the title.
http://amzn.to/1X0fEaT

793. Day Of The Bomb – Dan Kurzman

This is the story of the Manhattan Project and the men who worked feverishly to construct an atomic bomb. Historically, the big threat that the US perceived was that Heisenberg would give Nazi Germany atomic weapons. At the end of the War in Europe, it was learned that the Nazis were years away from that achievement, and that they had never devoted the resources to the problem that were necessary to solving it. What is not well known, even today, and will be even more interesting to a Pulp GM, is that a more serious threat was a Japanese nuclear weapon; they knew it was possible and they were making great strides towards success.

With weird science to accelerate technology, the Manhattan Project becomes cutting-edge Pre-war research – and the Japanese Bomb a serious (and completely unrecognized) threat to world security (they were all too busy panicking over the possibility of a Nazi Bomb, but the Germans were never really close to achieving one and Hitler didn’t really believe in the concept, possibly because of the Jewish Scientist element). It’s this International aspect that has led to this being included in this subsection and not in the one on the US.

In addition, the scientists of the Manhattan Project are many of the leading scientists of the day, who can perform consultative roles for many Pulp Heroes – that is why they are featured in “The Proteus Operation” by James P. Hogan (http://amzn.to/1kcs1mT), as experts called in to solve the mystery of why the time machine isn’t working the way the time travelers expected it to!

Our copy of “Day Of The Bomb” is a hardcover with a different cover to the one shown.
http://amzn.to/1PSotUA

794. The First World War For Dummies – Seán Lang

The broadest possible definition of Pulp is “adventure set in-between the two World Wars.” That means that anyone who is old enough to be an adult character in a Pulp campaign will have been touched by the First World War, making this volume a no-brainer. The author has an acute in his christian name that horribly mangles Amazon’s search results and means that searching for “Sean Lang” can result in no titles found.
http://amzn.to/2fuA4f4

795. World History For Dummies – Peter Haugen

Of course, anything older than World War I will also have left it’s mark. Ancient castles, monasteries, stone circles, the age of exploration (and anything they might have missed) – these are all fertile grounds for pulp adventures. Quite often the problem lies in identifying what detailed research is required, as intimated earlier; a broad overview of world history is therefore very useful to have around.
http://amzn.to/2fuGN8R

796. World War II For Dummies – Keith D. Dickson

Drawing a line in the sand at the start of the first battle or of the declarations of war is probably the worst way of delineating periods in history. Wars never “just happen”, they are the culmination of long buildups and rising tensions. You can’t understand World War II without understanding the context of the 1930s; you can’t understand the First World War without understanding the tangled web of alliances between the great powers and how those came about (in essence, it was to prevent wars between them by guaranteeing mutual defense – ironic, that). All of which means that books on World War II are entirely relevant resources to understanding the world prior to that war, and vice-versa. Hence the inclusion of this volume.
http://amzn.to/2faRiQ5

For-Dummies Books About World History & Historical Events in general

In most cases, we haven’t read any of these, and are recommending them for consideration based purely upon the publisher’s descriptions and on general principles except where otherwise noted. This also shifts the content of each review from one of “this book is recommended and here’s why” to “this book might be useful and here’s why”. We have made the assumption that availability and price would fall within our parameters, or close enough to them; we have rarely found this not to be the case.

Selected works were so promising and so relevant, that they have been promoted to the main list of recommendations, excluding them from the above caveats.

A note about Complete Idiot’s Guides

While the “For Dummies” series has a website that lists all the books currently available in the series, there is no equivalent for the “Complete Idiot’s Guides”.

Our blanket advice is that if Amazon lists a “Complete Idiot’s Guide” that matches the subject of one of our “For Dummies” recommendations, you should buy both.

797. Twentieth Century History For Dummies – Seán Lang

By the same author as “World History For Dummies” listed earlier, and the same notes about the spelling of his name apply. A bit less than half of this will be directly relevant to the Pulp GM, though some future developments in history can be foreshadowed as “current trends” within a campaign. In terms of the value of this book as a reference, a lot depends on how heavy the focus is on the two world wars, because that content would be redundant given the existence of specific references on the subject.
http://amzn.to/2gkuIEp

Books About US History with a Pulp-era focus or relevance

See also a number of the books in the World History section, above.

798. The Plot To Seize The White House: The shocking true story of the conspiracy to Overthrow FDR by Jules Archer

The subtitle should tell you all that you need to know about the subject, but in brief, a former general, Smedley Butler, alleged that he had been approached by moneyed interests from the highest echelons of American Society and pressed into a conspiracy to overthrow FDR and take his place as President and Fascist Dictator. There are no less than seven different Amazon pages covering this product, but none of the others has prices below the $20 threshold. If this page is out of cheap copies, search for the title and hope to find one of the others.
http://amzn.to/1PwN9Qv

799. War Is A Racket – Smedley Butler

This is an anti-war booklet or pamphlet (80 pages long) by the decorated US General which includes a section on the alleged attempted coup in the US, which was the basis of Mike & Blair’s “Five Star” adventure in their Pulp Campaign. There are no less than four different editions of this book listed on Amazon, each of which has its own separate Kindle edition, each of which is at a different price. Three of the four also have different covers. So far as we’re aware, these are all the same in terms of content. Check all four for your best purchase option at the time.
Link 1: http://amzn.to/2c5upKH
Link 2: http://amzn.to/2bZz6lP
Link 3: http://amzn.to/2cBTOKg
Link 4: http://amzn.to/2ceyE40

800. US History For Dummies – Steve Wiegand

While most Americans should be familiar with the subject, do they really know enough specific detail to build encounters and adventures around except in the broadest possible sense? And how familiar with those details is someone from outside the US likely to be? Everyone needs this reference.
http://amzn.to/2gDP63E

801. Native American History For Dummies – Dorothy Lippert, Stephen J Spignesi, and Phil Konstantin

It’s possible that Americans won’t need this reference; the rest of the world almost certainly will. But it’s our impression that even most US Citizens don’t know all that much more on the subject than the rest of us (and the same is often true of other indigenous cultures – Mike admits, for example, that he doesn’t know as much as he perhaps should about Indigenous Australian history).

Here’s the thing: the Wild West is astonishingly close to the pulp era in time. When does the latter end? 1870? 1900? 1910? Wikipedia puts the date as 1912. Did anyone tell those who were living in remote backwaters? How hard is it to imagine that some vestiges persisted into the 1930s in a pulp campaign?

Yeah, that’s what we thought, too.

But, while there are lots of very specific books on this tribe or that, this native American subculture or the other, such as the Navajo or the Sioux, there aren’t very many general overviews of the subject. That’s why this book makes our main list.
http://amzn.to/2gpsz7R

802. US Citizenship For Dummies – Cheri Sicard and Steven Heller

In the last half of the 19th century and the first third or so of the 20th, more than at any other time in its history, US Citizenship was a passport to a prosperous future, a ticket to the land of opportunity. Say, from the start of the Irish Potato Famine in 1845 through to the attack on Pearl Harbor, when the US could no longer be seen as a refuge from the War. Throughout the Pulp era, immigrants swarmed into the country as fast as they could be accepted – and one of their highest priorities on getting there was making sure that they couldn’t be sent away again, by becoming naturalized citizens. Probably half this book deals with events and changes post-pulp in time, but the rest would be of absolute bang-on-subject relevance.
http://amzn.to/2fIE499

803. US Military History For Dummies – John C. McManus

There are a number of urban legends that circulate based on the impression that the rest of the world knows more about US History than Americans do. Like most urban legends and internet memes, there is at best only a grain of truth to the impression. It follows that this volume may or may not be essential reference material for any given GM, and this is doubly true for any American pulp GMs!

Our greatest concern is that there may be too great a focus on conflicts that post-date the second world war; Our greatest hope is that there is enough material on WWI and II, The Spanish-American War, the Civil War, and the Revolutionary War (to name just a few) to make this relevant. Some pulp-era characters will have grandparents who remember the civil war and great-grandparents who fought in it!
http://amzn.to/2g7schO

804. The Civil War For Dummies – Keith D. Dickson

…which fully justifies having this volume somewhere at hand, we think. Well, that’s what we decided after a bit of debate, anyway; debate which started Mike thinking along the lines that eventually led him to devise the character-background planning tool he described in Throw Me A Life-line: A Character Background Planning Tool. The example of use which forms part of that article shows clearly that an adult character in Pulp 1933 could have known grandparents who fought in / endured the war, and whose parents were certainly affected, with who knows what ripple effects. The Civil War is probably the outer stretch for relevance, but throw in various groups in the South who might want to relive those glory days, and justifying this book’s presence on the list gets a whole lot easier.
http://amzn.to/2frQ3Hs

Documentaries About US History with a Pulp-era focus or relevance

One entry, and it’s slightly tangential – but very important.

805. Frontline: Money, Power, & Wall Street (Ep 1)

Although this 4-hour production is all about the GFC, the opening hour is directly relevant to the pulp GM. You see, the GFC arose because banks did certain things that they had been forbidden to do until a succession of presidents began to weaken the restrictions holding them back. And who imposed the restrictions in the first place? FDR, following investigations into the causes of the Great Depression.

Available from Amazon US for reasonable prices (especially second-hand) http://amzn.to/1reSHGR, and from Amazon UK http://amzn.to/23Woz0H and Amazon Canada http://amzn.to/23WoHgG in limited quantities as a US import – but also with second-hand copies available at reasonable prices.

For-Dummies Books About US History with a Pulp-era focus or relevance

The usual caveats (described earlier) apply.

806. US Presidents For Dummies – Marcus Stadelmann

Most people no matter where they are from can name most of the US Presidents of the 20th and 21st centuries and get them more or less in the right order. But it’s easy to build a pulp plotline with its roots in American political history prior to that date, and for that, most of us – Americans included – might need reference material. The first resource we would turn to is “The Universal Almanac” (listed elsewhere) because it has an excellent section on the US Presidents, and the second is Wikipedia, where we would expect each to have a dedicated page and links to more detailed discussions. This book seems likely to slot in-between those first and second resources in terms of quantities of specific information – more than the entries in the Almanac, and less than Wikipedia’s totality – and that is enough to earn this a recommendation, especially for anyone who can’t get a copy of the Almanac mentioned. We intend to use it as a filter to prevent us wasting time doing research on US Presidents that don’t fit our plot needs.
http://amzn.to/2fVgf17

Books About British History with a Pulp-era focus or relevance

807. Britain in the 1930s: A Deceptive Decade – Andrew Thorpe

Britain’s 1930s are a very different decade, with mythologies having become encrusted around controversially different perceptions of events. The tumult around the resignation of Prime Minister Chamberlain and installation of Sir Winston Churchill are the most famous manifestation of the conflict, but its roots ran deeper. “Were the 1930s in Britain a decade of growing prosperity, unprecedented levels of ownership and sane, competent government? Or was it a time of grinding poverty, long-term unemployment and political timidity?” Blair and Mike have their own interpretation of events, viewing Chamberlain as neither dupe, villain, or victim but as a leader who gave Fascist Germany enough rope while desperately trying to avoid another war like WWI and who ultimately was betrayed by Hitler reneging on his given word. Had he responded with more outrage and vitriol, his position might have been salvaged, with Churchill brought in as an advisor and member of a bipartisan war cabinet; but upper-class British Reserve saw him hold back, and appear too weak to inspire the nation in the way that Churchill did.

It’s a slightly more forgiving position than that taken up by Andrew Thorpe in this book, but one with which he would be more comfortable than discomforted. In its pages, he examines the politics, economy, and society of the period and concludes that while not particularly dynamic, [the] governments [of the day] did as well as could be expected in the face of unprecedented problems. Without whitewashing the administrations, he cuts through the myths and unravels the half-truths to show that things were never as bad as the jaundiced and traumatized view of a nation at war would recall.

Paperback, 152 pages, 26 new from $32.03 (too expensive for our restrictions), 22 used from $0.77
http://amzn.to/2fTTz19

808. From Scottsboro to Munich: Race and Political Culture in 1930s Britain – Susan D Pennybacker

To those of us who aren’t from the US, it sometimes seems that America has trouble recognizing that other parts of the world have their own racial issues and problems, and have had for as long as America has struggled with its own race relations and Civil Rights issues. In fact, there’s been more than a little spillover of America’s problems in these areas through the years with other developed societies, as this book makes clear. Pennybacker examines the British Scottsboro defense campaign, inaugurated after nine young African Americans were unjustly charged with raping two white women in Alabama in 1931, explores the visit to Britain of Ada Wright, the mother of two of the defendants, considers British responses to the Meerut Conspiracy Trial in India, the role that antislavery and refugee politics played in attempts to appease Hitler at Munich, and the work of key figures like Trinidadian George Padmore in opposing Jim Crow and anti-Semitism in England and Great Britain. This book sheds new light on the racial debates in the Britain of the 1930s.
408 pages, Kindle ($15.92), Hardcover (too expensive for our restrictions), and Paperback (15 new from $18.97, 19 used from $0.58).
http://amzn.to/2gDf1sk

809. Exporting Fascism: Italian Fascists and Britain’s Italians in the 1930s – Claudia Baldoli

How did Italians living in Britain respond to Mussolini’s fascism? What links did ex-pat fascists forge with the British Right? To what extent did Italophilia exist in Britain during the Mussolini years? Exporting Fascism addresses these questions, which have long been ignored by historians, exposing the effects of Mussolini’s policies of transforming local Italian communities around the world into “little Fascist Italies” and the Italophilia that dominated the British Union of Fascists (BUF) in the first half of the 1930s, later replaced with an admiration for National Socialism as the fascists forged connections with Britain’s right-wing.
288 pages, Hardcover 20 new from $19.15, 18 used from $15.77; Paperback 21 new from $1.98, 20 used from $1.96.
http://amzn.to/2gopMvQ

810. British History For Dummies – Seán Lang

There are two great poles around which pulp adventurers would orient themselves: they would either be Americans or subjects of the British Empire. Similarly, most pulp GMs would stem from one of those backgrounds. Most colonial citizens don’t know enough about the history of Britain to GM British-history and institution-based plots effectively, and that includes Americans – especially such history that predates WWII.

Written by the same author as “World History For Dummies” and “Twentieth Century History for Dummies”, both listed earlier; the same notes about the spelling of his name apply.
http://amzn.to/2frZGpv

811. British Military History For Dummies – Bryan Perrett

See the comments under “British History For Dummies”, above! There are more copies than those to which we have linked, but they are all over the $20 threshold.
http://amzn.to/2fe21Jm

Documentaries About British/Commonwealth History with a Pulp-era focus or relevance

812. Edward & George: Two brothers, One Throne

A documentary that appears to never have been released on DVD. A Google search for “Two brothers One Throne” shows that in many countries it is available through local streaming catch-up services, at least for the moment. Consult your local networks or do a Google search for “two brothers one throne”. Note that the image shown is a fictitious cover.
Google Search:

Books About History & Historical Events outside the US & Britain

813. The Pope and Mussolini: The Secret History of Pious XI and the rise of Fascism in Europe by David I Kertzer

Although Pious XII only took the reigns in 1939, it is easy to translate his rule back in time a decade to make this yet another enemy force for the PCs to counter. But at best it historically falls at the very end of the pulp era, even by the most generous of definitions.
http://amzn.to/1PdxMZD

814. Saints and Sinners Popes Edition – Aemon Duffy

The only thing not covered by the preceding recommendation is the mysterious death of Pope Pious XI, and the other first “fathers” of the Catholic Church. To rectify that, we recommend this volume, firstly because it is well illustrated, and secondly because of the review by Peter Stanford of The Daily Telegraph, who (in part) wrote, “As [Duffy] works his way through the papal roll of honor and dishonor, he is always careful to re-create the political, social and economic background to different reigns. He eschews opaque ecclesiastical jargon and, where a theological or doctrinal dispute has to be explained, he does so in a way that even those unversed in biblical concepts or Christian history will immediately grasp.”
http://amzn.to/1QqGgNb

815. European History For Dummies – Seán Lang

The late 19th and early 20th centuries were a transition from a European-dominated period of history to an America-centric one. While the most immediately-relevant European influence was England, most of English history is either in reaction to, or an action targeted at, some other part of Europe. That, of course, means that English History is only half the story. This is part of the other half.
Search by title, not author, as explained several times already.
http://amzn.to/2gpBWEt

816. Medieval History For Dummies – Stephen Batchelor

Of all the European structures that can make their way into a pulp plotline, a medieval castle is one of the most likely. But you can’t understand such structures without understanding their historical and social role. Because of the pulp world’s inheritances from medieval times, this resource is both indirectly relevant and something approaching indispensable when that relevance comes into play.
http://amzn.to/2fVjDc9

For-Dummies Books About History & Historical Events outside the US & Britain

The usual caveats apply.

817. Napoleon For Dummies – J David Markham

With all due respect to George Washington, Colin Powell, and Ulysses S. Grant, Napoleon Bonaparte is arguably the most famous and influential military commander and civil leader in modern history. The codes of justice that he introduced, for example, are the foundations of the modern jury system, and you can’t fully understand the failure of the military invasion of Russia by Germany in World War II without referencing Napoleon’s earlier failed attempt to do exactly the same thing. Therefore, while this book has very little direct relevance to a pulp campaign, it has enough indirect relevance and context to re-float the Titanic.
http://amzn.to/2fs7kjG

Books About Politics in the Pulp Era

We thought seriously about subdividing this section along similar lines to the histories, above, but there didn’t seem to be enough references to make it worthwhile. Then we found more references when it was too late and we were committed to the current structure (these articles are a lot more complicated than they might seem). The best we’ve been able to do is list them in roughly the sequence in which they would have appeared had we been able to create the subsections structure in time.

818. The Book Of Rule: How The World Is Governed – Timothy Cain (‘Editorial Producer’)

Gives details of how different governments around the world work at the time of publication. Essential for jet-set games in the modern day – but by including historical reference and context, invaluable for the Pulp GM as well.
http://amzn.to/293ibk6

819. Supreme Power – Jeff Shesol

Brings the political and legal worlds of Pre-WWII America to life, Supreme Court vs Roosevelt over the New Deal.
http://amzn.to/1RYcmp7

820. Isolationism In America 1935-1941 – Manfred Jonas

The US was highly resistant to participating in another European War. This was known as the Isolationist Policy or movement. This volume details the people at the forefront of the movement and the maneuverings to keep America out of the War. Not many copies available.
http://amzn.to/1Pdz9HG

An excellent alternative source is – surprisingly – a work of fiction. The debate is at the heart of part of “The Winds Of War” by Herman Wouk, and there are plenty of cheap copies of THAT available.
http://amzn.to/1WdoZet

821. The Sphinx: Franklin Roosevelt, the isolationists, and the Road to World War II – Nicholas Wapshott

There were many reasons why America didn’t want to enter the war that everyone could see coming to Europe. GMs need to understand all of them to understand the time period, and why some were so intent on avoiding war that they would commit treason, or appease the Nazis, to stop it. (It may help modern readers understand the title to know that “The Sphinx” was FDR’s nickname in the pre-war period).
http://amzn.to/20mJFqV

822. Black Culture and the New Deal: The Quest for Civil Rights in the Roosevelt Era – Lauren Rebecca Sklaroff

The Roosevelt era was rife with contradictions forced on the administration by the practicalities of politics. In order to avoid antagonizing a powerful southern congressional bloc, they refused to endorse legislation that openly sought to improve political, social and economic conditions amongst the African American population, instead doing an end-run around the southern opposition to progress by providing federal support to notable black intellectuals, artists, and celebrities.

While this may have been a short-term setback to Civil Rights, it was arguably more beneficial in the long run in terms of convincing the wider public to support the notion, despite the contemporary flaws, injustices, and bias within these programs.

This is the story of one major skirmish in the war of race relations and social enlightenment. Unusually, it’s new copies of this book that are cheap enough to permit its inclusion (just) and not used ones.

Kindle and Paperback, 328 pages.
http://amzn.to/2ggsYdh

823. Congress For Dummies – David Silverberg

Everyone has some idea of how the US Congress works. Very few have enough information to actually write and roleplay a scene involving Congress. This seems to have everything you could possibly need. We needed this (but didn’t have it) when working on the “Five Star” adventure for the Adventurer’s Club campaign, finding out the hard way.
http://amzn.to/2fs3vuM

824. How Washington Actually Works For Dummies – Edited by Greg Rushford

This book actually contemplates and demystifies the rather murky world of Federal Politics. It’s an essential Pulp reference whether you’re American or not, even though it doesn’t cover everything that we hoped it might (did you know that Congress writes the City’s budget and not the Mayor’s office?).
http://amzn.to/2fVwCKP

825. The Supreme Court For Dummies – Lisa Paddock

Completing this trilogy of vital Dummies titles is this offering, which covers everything from how cases get assigned to the Supreme Court, how they are argued, and how they are decided.
http://amzn.to/2g7LX93

826. Democracy In A Depression: Britain in the 1920s and 1930s – Malcolm Smith

The sun may have been setting on the British Empire (in fact, the process was well advanced) but that hardly dents the importance of the island nation at this point in history. This book looks at the politics, society, and economy of Britain during the period in question. Not enough copies, and even fewer at a relatively cheap price, but the lack of alternatives has forced us to include it anyway.
http://amzn.to/20676PF

827. Twisted Paths: Europe 1914-1945 – Robert Gerwarth (editor)

Described as “a concise look at European History” between the years stated, this 464-page volume completes the primary historical references that the GM should have available. There was lots of the “the rest of the world” but there’s no unified reference to events there; this is as good as could be found. Prices are all outside our normal limit, but this is the cheapest comparable reference book on the subject that we could find.
http://amzn.to/20EnBEE

Books About Hollywood, Cinema, and Entertainment in the Pulp Era

There’s one book from this section that we really wanted to list, but it was just too far outside our restrictions. There will be an extensive review in the honorable mentions.

See also “The Age of the Dream Palace: Cinema and Society in 1930s Britain”, above.

828. The Great Movie Serials – Jim Harmon & Donald Glut

Talks about the behind-the-scenes creation of the movie serials and the directors, producers, and stars that created them. This book is available for Kindle but at $43 I don’t see many people rushing to buy it in that format. Fortunately there are still some physical copies left at half that price.
http://amzn.to/1QF31j1

829. Continued Next Week, a history of the moving picture serial – Kalton C. Lahue

More of the same, plus synopses of some of the plots. Amazon has several pages listing this book, for up to $706 a copy. Fortunately, the copies we have linked to are more reasonably-priced.
http://amzn.to/1NOEiEe

830. Hollywood Babylon – Kenneth Anger

Hollywood scandals of the era and the people involved in them – unsubstantiated anecdotes & gossip for the most part.
http://amzn.to/1o2ZuBz

831. Hollywood Babylon II – Kenneth Anger

More of the same.
http://amzn.to/1SqBd5J

832. The Rise of Radio, from Marconi through the Golden Age – Alfred Balk

We have three books to recommend on radio in the pulp era. This is the broader and more general, covering the entirety of the history of the medium in America from birth to the modern-day, and is the one we would be more interested in reading – which is the reason for it’s primacy here. There aren’t quite enough cheap copies but we’re making an exception to the usual rules.

Radio was the dominant form of mass communications from the 1930s into the 1950s, when it began to be slowly killed by a combination of television and ill-conceived media laws. “This anecdote-rich sweep of radio history, from its birth as Marconi s wireless telegraph through its current status under deregulation, analyzes the changing medium s social, political, and cultural impact…[casting] new light on many topics, including the roles of women and African Americans, programming sources outside the Hollywood-Broadway nexus, and arguments about Amos n Andy once the hit that jump-started radio s young networks, now a controversial remnant of a bygone era.”
http://amzn.to/2gd2iZi

833. Radio’s America: The Great Depression and the Rise of Modern Mass Culture – Bruce Lenthall

This is more specific in scope, and more affordable. This book’s main contribution, distinctive to all the others, is that it examines how ordinary people integrated radio into their lives. Much of modern perception of that aspect of the subject is a cliché of the family gathered around the set of an evening, and while that is a part of the story, it is by no means the whole. Even in the Adventurer’s Club campaign, Mike and Blair are probably guilty of underplaying the value and impact of radio within the society of the time, a flaw this book promises to correct. Kindle and paperback (hardcovers exist but are ridiculously-priced).
http://amzn.to/2fnUxSG

834. On The Air: The Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio – John Dunning

A complete reworking and rewrite of the definitive one-volume reference on old-time radio broadcasting by the author of the original. 1500 radio shows from the 1930s, 40s, and 50s are presented in alphabetical sequence, with a complete broadcasting history, timeslot, network, advertisers, major cast and production members and even the theme song of the show. Not only does the book provide a synopsis of each series but takes the reader behind the scenes to capture the feelings invoked by the shows in their audiences and how they were achieved. On top of that, umbrella sections provide an overview of one particular aspect of the medium.

As a bonus of sorts, there will be a number of pulp-style radio serials that will have written up in individual entries!
http://amzn.to/2f3srO3

835. FDR’s Fireside Chats – edited by Russell D Buhite and David W Levy

This book collects, into a single volume, transcripts of all 31 of FDR’s “fireside chats” in which the President of the day talked things over with the American people. More in-depth and narrative in form than the modern-day press conference, these were an unprecedented attempt to achieve intimacy with the nation. Ridiculed by some at the time as a cynical and self-serving stunt, their effectiveness cannot be overstated in terms of the unity experienced by Americans during the war years and the winning of an unprecedented 5 consecutive terms as Commander-in-chief.
Link One: Kindle, Paperback (1993), cheaper copies (pictured): http://amzn.to/2gd81OB
Link Two: Paperback (2010), more expensive but quality may be better due to younger age of copies: http://amzn.to/2fZTbf4

836. The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era – Thomas Schatz

This book “…recalls Hollywood’s Golden Age from the 1920s until the dawn of television in the late 1940s, when quality films were produced swiftly and cost efficiently thanks to the intricate design of the system. Schatz takes us through the rise and fall of individual careers and the making—and unmaking—of movies such as Frankenstein, Casablanca, and Hitchcock’s Notorious. “ Also explores the distinctive styles of the different studios. 528 pages.
http://amzn.to/2f3CkuR

837. The Star System: Hollywood’s Production of Popular Identities – Paul McDonald

The development and evolution of the Star system within the American film industry, tracing the popularity of star performers from the early “cinema of attractions” to the modern-day internet era, this book examines how Hollywood makes and sells its stars. 144 pages, which is a little on the short side.
Link One – fewer copies but cheaper ones: http://amzn.to/2fCqcNJ
Link Two – more copies but more expensive: http://amzn.to/2fmdKRu

Documentaries About Hollywood, Cinema, and Entertainment in the Pulp Era

838. The Story Of Film: An Odyssey – Pts 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5

This is the first third of an epic 15-episode 15-hour documentary series. I found the strong Irish accent of the narrator & director, Mark Cousins, to be a little distracting and hard to get used to, but the fascinating story of the interplay between social development being reflected in cinema and, at the same time, being driven by cinema, soon overrode any hesitation in watching (or recommending) this excellent series.

However, the scale of the series does make it rather expensive. Currently there have been 5 editions of the set in the US alone according to Amazon, a strong indicator of popularity; the cheapest of these is the second at the fairly reasonable price of US$21, but make your own comparisons at the time of purchase http://amzn.to/1sJanL0.

Amazon US also has the first five episodes available through their streaming service, at a price that’s about the same for the entire ‘first season’ of 5 episodes $40 or the 5 episodes individually for $10 each – (even though all 15 parts formed a single season when broadcast in many places if not all). By happy coincidence this ‘first season’ is completely comprised of the five episodes that are relevant to the pulp era so this is a viable option http://amzn.to/1VtkL52.

Amazon UK lists the series for the relatively reasonable price of £12.75 http://amzn.to/1UbrlZ8 while Amazon Canada has only one or two copies at the ridiculous price of CDN$80 or so, but lists several more second-hand at the marginally more reasonable price of CDN$60 or so http://amzn.to/20RGoeY.