Experience Muscle Boy (PlanetMonk Pulps Book 19) Picturized By Bud Clifton Provided As Text

finished Muscle Boy and loved it if only for the PULP FICTION style:

"The way he got sucked into it was this way: He was almost eighteen he was sort of wet behind the ears, and, worse than that, was afriad to admit it.
What kid isn't You can't blame him, No one can. "

The story is typical for the time, the innocent young man in the clutches of the deviant gays, but still, a good read with enough subtle gay moments.
Unusual

Bud Clifton is the pseudonym of author Davis Stacton who wrote a number of historical,fiction novels in the fifties as well as some pulp novels under the Clifton name and some westerns under the name Carse Boyd.
His book is about the bodybuilding scene in California and is weird, With homosexual overtones it was dafi g at the time but not so much now, Still it moves quickly and has some appeal,
ed on Hearts On Fire, . . sitelink com/

This was a great piece of pulp fiction written back inthat I came across at a yard sale, Body building was a big thing at the time and many of the muscle gods were in love with themselves, Narcissism ran high and these men made a good living either by giving strong man shows or playing in he illegal skin trade, Jerry Carpenter was one such young man that got sucked into the porn end of the Muscle Beach crowd in Oakland, Ca, He started off innocently by placing third in a Mr, Oakland competition and falling to the flattery of some shady men, Jerry needed the money and was easily talked into being photographed for catalogs and muscle magazines in nothing but what is now a gstring.
This soon led to nude shots from behind, which were borderline legal, His photographer and friend who was in the porn trade soon was selling faked pictures and movies of Jerry with other men, The harder Jerry tried to get out of the business the farther down he spiraled into it until people started to die, I enjoyed this blast from the past with the bad editing and very mild language, The story pulled me in from the very beginning and kept me hooked right until the disturbing but HEA end, I tried to be sympathetic toward Jerry because he was an innocent sucked in by high end crooks but just couldn't manage it, Mr. Clifton did a great job of developing all of his characters and gave a realistic look into the underbelly of the world of body building in the late's.
I recommend this book highly to anyone who has never read any pulp fiction when gay writers were just breaking down the barriers, More thrilling for its historical significance than its story, thisnovel is noteworthy for being one of the earliest examples of gay pulp fiction.
It dares to venture into the illicit world of "beefcake" photography and muscle magazines, which were largely a front for illegal gay pornography before obscenity laws began to relax in thes ands.


The plot revolves around eighteenyearold Jerry, who's dazzling good looks attracts the kingpins of an underground photography operation catering to gay clients.
Needing extra cash to take out his girlfriend, Jerry agrees to do some seemingly innocent photoshoots before getting caught up in a cabal of blackmail and sex dungeons.
Soon enough his very life is on the line, Will he escape this ruthless den of bodybuilding homosexuals Or is he already in too deep

Although this may all sound like a thrilling premise, it takes a long time to get there and most of the juicy bits are wellhidden by subtext to prevent legal issues.
Making all gay characters the "bad guys" was also necessary, I'm sure, to keep the censors at bay, The writing is generally good, with some nice wit and humor peppered in, However, a freeflowing point of view and huge cast of characters are cause for a jarring experience, The number of characters is quite shocking for such a slim novel, There are so many that the publisher includes a glossary to help you keep track, but it's still a challenge to remember who's who.


Flaws aside, this is a fascinating slice of history packaged in a generally entertaining thrill ride, Bud Cliftonpseudonym of David Derek Stactonhimself was openly gay to his close friends, had a flamboyant personality and enjoyed dressing in drag, His literary output was impressive, including dozens of novels under various pseudonyms, poetry, short stories, and even biographies, Recently there's been some renewed interest in his works, Finding a first edition paperback of Muscle Boy is an expensive endeavor, but fortunately it has been republished as an eBook, Thank goodness for the publishers out there who've navigated complicated copyrights to keep these historically significant novels in print, even ones like this which is only of soso literary quality.
As Gay as a Day at the Races

I was really surprised when I read this that's why the Five Stars.


I had expected a bunch of regular guys, You know, like we all thought weightlifters were, but it turns out they're all shirtlifters too,

Who'd have thought that weightlifters were all homos I mean, just because the guys I see going into the gym all have tattoos and shaved heads and wear a little makeup, I figured they were just "cool".


I was wrong, They're all a bunch of polesmokers, And any book that opens my eyes like this, gets Five Stars, Originally published:

A NOVEL EXPOSING THE BEEFCAKE KINGS
Most men fall in love with women, But some men fall in love with themselves men like the weightlifters of Muscle Beach, For these body worshippers, their physique is their fortune, Whether it's being exhibited performing feats of strength, or leered at in glossy photos by thrillseekers of every sex and taste, there's big money in those biceps.
And it's often dirty money! Teenager Jerry Carpenter found that out when he, for kicks and vanity, got himself involved in the sordid dealings of a notorious photographer and the strange characters that surrounded him.
What you've heard about in whispers is frankly, startlingly revealed in MUSCLE BOY, a novel that bares the naked truth about the Beefcake Kings.
I've always found American pulp fiction of thes ands to be a fascinating time capsule of the dreams and desires and vices that plagued middle America in middle of the Twentieth Century.
The gayish pulp novels of the era are particularly interesting in how nimbly they dance around the situation to avoid being labeled pornography, I imagine it was thrilling to be a young gay man in this time period and see something in which you could recognize the homosexual codes and the homoerotic

scenery.


Books like "Muscle Boy" were purely a mercenary effort by authors like Bud Clifton the pseudonym being used here by the very good writer, David Stacton.
Not surprising to me, the writing is far better than it actually needs to be, but that's because the author actually knew how to write a novel.
He leans in to the lurid details and goes for it, It's camp. It's awful. It would be offensive if there wasn't an obviously gay voice telling us the story and winking at the absurdity of getting paid to write this stuff when he had far better manuscripts waiting to be published.
It sounds like something one of the older gay men I met at the bars of my youth might have told me over drinks on a slow night, if I was willing to listen and not be judgmental.


There is no point all these years later trying to "rate" something like this, This is a historical record as much as anything else is, and can be read for that purpose or simply enjoyed for what it is.
I'm glad that digital copies of these things now exist because this wasn't the sort of book that anyone saved and preserved in their library or on their treasured bookshelves.
It was trash, and meant to be, But it was also a small step on the long road of gay men finding their identity and expressing it, A pseudonym of sitelink David Stacton A pseudonym of sitelink David Stacton sitelink,