If you like vintage science fiction, space adventures, killer robots, and eye-popping illustration art, I think you’ll enjoy MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY #15, the Science Fiction Issue.
MAQ #15 is out now on Amazon in the US and worldwide.
You can also order a signed copy directly from me via my MensPulpMags.com bookstore.
The theme of this issue is science fiction. It reprints six sci-fi stories from vintage men’s magazines.
It also includes new articles by pulp culture mavens Gary Lovisi, Sean CW Korsgaard, and Mike Chomko, a spectacular retro science fiction art gallery created by MAQ co-editor and designer Bill Cunningham, and a new interview I did with legendary pinup and artists’ model Eva Lynd.
As usual, I wrote introductions exploring the backgrounds of the stories, their authors, and the artists who illustrated them.
Science fiction isn’t the first thing most people associate with men’s adventure magazines.
But MAMs provided an important market for a surprising number of writers and artists whose work helped shape the genre.
MAQ #15 explores that connection through stories, artwork, and articles that take us from the wild imaginings of the pulp era to the Cold War, the Space Race, and visions of wars fought beyond the Earth.
Our first story in this issue, “Spacemen in the Dark,” was written by Robert Sheckley (1928–2005), one of the major science fiction writers whose career was launched by the 1950s sci-fi boom.
It was first printed in CLIMAX, April 1953, which has a superb cover painting of an Iroquois warrior by Tran Mawicke (an artist I profile in the introduction to another story in this issue).
Even if you don’t know Sheckley by name there’s a good chance you’ve listened to or watched something based on his work. His stories were regularly adapted into episodes of NBC’s sci-fi radio show X MINUS ONE (1955–1958).
A famous example is his story “Seventh Victim” in GALAXY, April 1953. In 1957 it was adapted into an X MINUS ONE episode. Then in 1965, it was loosely adapted into the film THE 10TH VICTIM, starring Marcello Mastroianni and Ursula Andress.
The illustration for Sheckley’s story was done by another science fiction luminary, Ed Valigursky (1926–2009). Much of his early work was done for the same sci-fi mags Sheckley’s stories were published in.
As discussed and shown in the intro to the story, Valigursky also did terrific artwork for MAMs, paperbacks, POPULAR MECHANICS and other mainstream magazines, Time-Life Books, and NASA.
Our second story, “Interplanetary Agent,” comes from MAN TO MAN, February 1953. It was written by Milton Lesser (1928–2008). In the early ’50s, Lesser was primarily a science fiction writer.
In the mid-’50s, he changed course and began writing mystery and detective stories under the name Stephen Marlowe. They appeared in crime digests like MANHUNT, ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE, and ELLERY QUEEN’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE, and in men’s magazines published by Volitant and other houses.
In 1955, using his Marlowe pseudonym, he created the character Chester “Chet” Drum, a hardboiled private investigator based in Washington, D.C. He went on to write 19 more Chester Drum novels over the next 13 years. The series was a massive success for him and Gold Medal, selling millions of copies.
The interior illustration used for “Interplanetary Agent” was done by artist Mark Schneider (1919–1982).
Schneider initially did artwork for comics. Then in 1951, publisher Adrian Lopez tapped him as a top in-house artist for virtually all of his Volitant periodicals, including the men’s mags MAN TO MAN, SIR!, ACTION, ESCAPE TO ADVENTURE, JUMBO MAN’S MAGAZINE, and SOUTH SEA STORIES.
The third story we included in MAQ #15 is “The Lieutenant Must Die” by Martin Caidin (1927–1997), from MALE, March 1956. Caidin was a regular contributor of stories to men’s adventure magazines, an aviation historian, a journalist who covered NASA’s space program, a bestselling novelist—and a stunt pilot who flew vintage planes at airshows.
He wrote more than 100 fiction and non-fiction books and over 1,000 short stories and non-fiction articles for magazines, including many for MAMs. His best-known book is the 1972 novel CYBORG, the basis for the TV series THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN. (Keith Roysdon wrote an excellent piece about the popular Bigfoot episodes of that show you can read in MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY #14, The Bigfoot Issue.)
The cover of MALE, March 1956 features one of a small number of men’s adventure mag covers painted by Tran Mawicke (1911–1988). In the 1930s, Mawicke created advertising artwork for blue-chip national accounts like Camel Cigarettes, Pepsi-Cola, Schlitz, and Phillips 66. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Mawicke was a regular artist for mainstream “slicks” like MACLEAN’S, REDBOOK, MCCALL’S, THE AMERICAN MAGAZINE, and COLLIER’S. He didn’t do a lot of work for MAMs, but what he did is excellent.
The gorgeous blue duotone interior illustration for “The Lieutenant Must Die” was done by Robert E. Schulz (1928–1978). Schulz created hundreds of paperback covers and MAM cover and interior illustrations. He also did cover art for many top book publishers, including Ace, Ballantine, Dell, Doubleday, Fawcett, Pocket Books, and Signet. His most famous paperback cover is the 1956 Signet edition of I, ROBOT by Isaac Asimov.
Our next story reprint, “The Monster” by Dan Tyler Moore (1908–1998), originally appeared in ADVENTURE, June 1957. It’s a prescient tale about an autonomous killer robot. The illustration was done by H.R. Van Dongen (1920–2010), an artist whose career was closely associated with science fiction.
As I read it, I thought about a June 2026 article in NEW SCIENTIST magazine. It said Ukraine had conducted a battlefield test in which ten fully autonomous AI-controlled drones operating in “Terminator mode” reportedly located and killed Russian soldiers without human control.
From the 1950s on, Moore also wrote adventure and suspense stories for top mainstream slick magazines and men’s adventure magazines, including THE SATURDAY EVENING POST, COLLIER’S, REDBOOK, ADVENTURE, and BLUEBOOK.
Moore expanded his 1956 SatPost speculative fiction story “The Terrible Game” into a bestselling novel that’s been reprinted several times. In it, an American athlete volunteers to go to a remote Asian kingdom to compete in a deadly traditional “game.” The country’s leaders say they will allow the U.S. to establish a military base there—but only if an American can win their bloody competition. Moore’s novel was the basis for the 1985 movie GYMKATA. The film actually kept Moore’s basic plot but updated the military objective to a Reagan-era satellite monitoring facility. The star is Olympic gymnast-turned-actor Kurt Thomas, who wins the competition using a mind-boggling combination of gymnastics and karate.
The cover of ADVENTURE, June 1957 is a MAM classic by Mort Künstler. It’s one of the many covers he did that are showcased in the latest Men’s Adventure Library book I co-edited with Wyatt Doyle, MORT KÜNSTLER COVERED, VOL. 1. Before Mort passed away in 2025, Wyatt and I began working with him on a planned series of full-color art books that will ultimately showcase virtually all of the men’s adventure magazine covers he created. MKCV1 is the first in the series.
Two stories I picked for this MAQ issue come from REAL WAR, October 1958. The cover calls it a SPECIAL ISSUE: THE WAR IN SPACE! The masterful cover painting by veteran illustrator Vic Prezio features space-suited soldiers on the moon, with a rocket ship in the background and the Earth in the sky beyond.
One is “Get the Convoy Through!” by Bob Lichello, an action-packed account of a convoy of supply ships attacked by enemy spacecraft as they are trying to deliver desperately needed supplies to an American military base on the moon. The illustration for it was done by John Schoenherr. He’s especially famous for creating iconic covers for Frank Herbert’s DUNE novels and the serialization of those novels in the science fiction magazine ANALOG in the 1960s. His artwork created the now-familiar look of the giant sandworms of Arrakis and the Fremen people of that desert planet, which the movie versions are largely based on.
Schoenherr’s sci-fi art also played a role in another famous movie franchise. STAR WARS creator George Lucas loved Schoenherr’s cover painting of a shaggy alien for ANALOG, July 1975. He showed it to concept artist Ralph McQuarrie to use as inspiration for the look of Chewbacca.
The second REAL WAR story is “We Died Like Flies on the Beach-Heads of Space” by Bill Becker. This grim combat story sends U.S. Marines on the space-age equivalent of a bloody World War II landing—an assault on an enemy satellite orbiting the Earth.
The illustration is credited to Jack Griffin. Initially, that name was a mystery to me. But several years ago, when I posted a scan of it on social media, there was a comment by artist Ian Schoenherr, John’s son, that solved it. “Family secret,” he wrote, “’Jack Griffin’—the illustrator credited for this piece—was actually John Schoenherr.”
As noted in my main intro to MAQ #15, in addition to story reprints, it includes new articles by several notable pulp culture experts: Gary Lovisi, Sean CW Korsgaard, and Mike Chomko. That initial intro also mentions some other recent projects Bill Cunningham and I have been involved in.
Recently, we worked with artist Ron Lesser to publish the deluxe hardcover edition of THE ART OF RON LESSER, VOL. 3: WILD, WILD, WESTERNS, which showcases Ron’s classic Western paperback covers, movie posters, and Western history paintings. That book also includes a foreword by James Reasoner, the NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author of more than 400 Western and action/adventure novels, plus an article about collecting Ron Lesser paperbacks by our series co-editor, vintage paperback expert Tim Hewitt.
Bill recently completed CELLULOID WARS 2: THE MAKING OF FORBIDDEN WORLD, a behind-the-scenes book about one of Roger Corman’s most successful films, and HELLOWEEN, an in-depth look at the UK horror-thriller that taps into the killer clown phenomenon of several years ago. Meanwhile, Wyatt Doyle and I published MORT KÜNSTLER COVERED, VOLUME 1 and GIL COHEN: INSIDE/OUT—THE ARCHIVE COLLECTION, a retrospective overview of Gil’s classic MAM covers and interior illustrations.
MAQ #15 contributor Gary Lovisi is a pulp magazine expert, a prolific author, and the longtime editor and publisher of PAPERBACK PARADE. His article about the Australian sci-fi pulp THRILLS INCORPORATED is a fascinating look at a colorful, little-known corner of the SF universe.
In case you didn’t know, Gary also has a must-watch YouTube channel where he discusses old and new pulp. One of his latest videos is a flip-through review of MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY #15.
Sean CW Korsgaard is an author, editor, journalist, and publicist whose work has included projects with ANALOG SCIENCE FICTION & FACT, Baen Books, and Writers of the Future. His article in MAQ #15—“Science Fiction in Men’s Adventure Magazines”—provides an in-depth look at some of the many top science fiction writers and artists whose work appeared in men’s adventure magazines.
Mike Chomko’s MAQ #15 article “PulpFest and a Century of Science Fiction” connects the centennial of AMAZING STORIES with the presentations and celebrations at PulpFest 2026. Mike traces the magazine’s history and discusses some of the writers, editors, artists, and characters associated with it. As a PulpFest organizer, bookseller, and longtime resource for pulp collectors and researchers, Mike brings both historical knowledge and a firsthand perspective to the subject.
Bill Cunningham’s “The Future Is WOW!” is an expansive visual gallery showing how depictions of the future evolved from pulp fantasy toward the technology and imagery of the real space program. It ranges from ray guns and robots to spacecraft and planetary exploration, bringing together artwork from pulps, men’s adventure magazines, and artists associated with NASA.
And, of course, we have an MAQ Gal-Lery feature in #15. The gal we celebrate in this one is my friend Eva Lynd, who is now 89 years young. As regular readers of this blog know, Eva was a top model for pinup photos and artwork that appeared in men’s magazines in from mid-1950s to the mid-1970s. Several years ago, Wyatt Doyle and I worked with her on a lushly illustrated book about her and her career titled EVA: MEN’S ADVENTURE SUPERMODEL.
When I selected “The Monster” story for MAQ #15, I noticed that the same issue of ADVENTURE included a glamour photo spread with photos of Eva taken by Wil Blanche. That inspired me to call her and do a fresh interview about her work with Blanche and other top pinup photographers and artists she worked with.
If this preview of MEN’S ADVENTURE QUARTERLY #15 makes you want to buy a copy, you can get it on Amazon worldwide or directly from me via the MensPulpMags.com bookstore.
If you buy a copy, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed putting it together. And, if you do, please spread the word by posting a review of MAQ #15 on Amazon or elsewhere online.
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