Tessera

"What are you two doing?" "Well, we don't have one of the three of us, Chief." "One what?" "A photograph! Smile, 99." #GetSmart

From s5ep26. Max and 99 are using the security camera in the Chief's office to get a photo of the three of them together. They're all smiling up at the camera in the corner of the room—Max's grin is positively manic, the Chief's is awkward and apprehensive, and 99's is by far the most normal and natural of the bunch. That said, they all look like dorks (affectionate).

Rob Imes @robimes.bsky.social · 6h ago

My CANDLELIGHT ROMANCE (1967-1982) index is missing only 4 covers. Does anyone have a scan or photo of these? #234: ONE LOVE FOREVER by Meredith Babeaux Brucker #249: THE SEARCHING HEART by Suzanne Roberts #556: WHERE SHADOWS LINGER by Janis Susan May #584: TOUCHED BY FIRE by Mary Lee Stanford

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 24h ago

DeGrasse: That's a very interesting picture of you in the CONTROL file, Mr. Smart. Max: Thank you. DeGrasse: But why were you sitting on a pony? 99 (archly): It was taken on his birthday. #GetSmart

From s5ep23. Max and 99 are being held at gunpoint by the Baddie of the Week in a nursery. Max wears tan coveralls, as he was working undercover there, and 99 is in a blue-and-white plaid skirt suit.

Baddie of the Week, Algernon DeGrasse, holding a gun. He's a distinguished white man with dark blond hair, and wears a black pinstripe suit, a white shirt with pink stripes, a yellow vest, and a black tie with a decorative pin right below the knot.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · yesterday

Ohohoho, 99 finally gets her own imposter. Also, interesting to note that the bedroom set up changes for this ep: Previously, Max and 99 have been shown sleeping in the same bed, but here they suddenly have separate ones, as that isn't the real 99, meaning they aren't actually married. #GetSmart

From s5ep21. 99 and her imposter stand next to each other in the Smarts apartment during the climax. 99 wears a bright red jacket/blouse with a black-and-white decorative scarf around her neck, while her doppelganger wears a black-and-white mod blouse.

From way earlier in the episode. Max has just come home and is sitting on the side of his twin bed in his suit while "99" is propped up in hers in a nightgown, reading a magazine. Previously they've been shown to share what's probably a queen.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · yesterday

Another coat from 99 that I desperately want for myself. ❤️ Also, you don't often see Max in green, but it isn't a bad color on him? Anyway, six episodes left! If I don't finish the series today, I'll definitely be able to do so tomorrow. #GetSmart

From s5ep20. Max and 99 are searching a lab for some rocket fuel late at night. He's in his light grey suit (with the subtle plaid), a pink shirt, and a maroon tie. She's in a long brown coat with beige plaid patterning it. It's belted at the waist and has some nice pockets.

Max and 99 are undercover in a foreign embassy as a butler/valet and maid, respectively. Max is dressed in your standard butler garb (tailcoat, black bow tie, white gloves, etc.), except his vest is an interesting yellow-green. 99 is dressed in your standard black and white maid outfit.

Chris Mautner @cmautner.bsky.social · yesterday

The Adventures of Prudence Prim by Carolyn Wells and Nell Brinkley

Jen Rice @jenrice.bsky.social · 2d ago

BREAKING: It made the final cut. Congratulations, Michigan, you might have the best voting sticker of 2026.

Jen Rice@jenrice.bsky.social · 3mo ago

I am obsessed with this finalist in this year's Michigan “I voted” sticker design contest

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2d ago

That's a hell of a suit jacket. #GetSmart

From s5ep17. Max is on a plane, blowing up a balloon phone. He wears a single-breasted medium-grey suit jacket with a tight black plaid pattern. Underneath he's wearing a medium blue turtleneck.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2d ago

The last episode was a dud, but thankfully this one is a return to form—a nice 99-centric ep that sees her confronting the Chief about keeping her on low-risk assignments simply bc she's a mom now. Some more great outfits (and glasses!) as she acts as secretary to an Orson Welles expy. ❤️ #GetSmart

From s5ep14 ("Moonlighting Becomes You"). 99 sits in the Chief's office, talking to him. She wears a blue-and-white plaid jacket over a pale yellow blouse.

Max and 99 in their apartment. She's just spilled some coffee, and Max is cleaning it up while she laments the fact that his clumsiness seems to have rubbed off on her. He's in a light blue shirt with his sleeves rolled up, but she's in a long-sleeved navy blue blouse and slacks, with a red-white-and-blue belt, and a blue, yellow, and orange scarf tied loosely around her neck.

Max and 99 in a radio studio. He's in a carnation pink shirt with the collar open (no tie), with a bright red vest over it. She's in her secretary get-up: hair up in a bun, glasses, in a light pink blouse with a maroon vest over it. They're both looking off screen at Hannibal Day, the radio star.

The radio show announcer, 99, Hannibal Day, and the organist all standing next to each other. The organist is a middle-aged white woman in glasses, and she's wearing an impressive (if demurely high-necked and long-sleeved) blue dress with a black damask pattern all over it. It might actually be my favorite outfit of the episode?

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2d ago

Ah, yes, the infamous "Ice Station Siegfried" (s5ep13), generally considered to be the worst episode of the series. Don Adams has what is effectively just a cameo in the cold open, and Bill Dana narratively takes his place as bumbling CIA Agent Quigley. At least 99 has a nice coat? #GetSmart

Quigley and 99 being briefed before they go on their mission. Quigley (as played by Bill Dana) is a dark-haired, dark-eyed, cherubic-faced white man in a beige trench coat. 99 wears a long tweed coat of varying shades of grey and dark pink (though mostly grey).

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3d ago

Motivation to finish up this series has struck, and VINCENT PRICE JUMP SCARE. (⁠✿⁠☉‿☉⁠) #GetSmart

From s5ep12, showing Vincent Price as KAOS's "mad pharmacist" Jarvis Pym, as he gives a television address.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 4d ago

In case you missed this little thread late last night. 😘 #pulp #romance #romancelandia

Lucynka@lucynka.bsky.social · 5d ago

Oh no, against my better judgment I started reading Hope Campbell's "A Kiss Between Friends" (ALL-STORY LOVE, April 1943). 😂 #pulp #romance #romancelandia #wack

"Acid, aren't you?" Nash said, more and more pleased. "Dropped in a vinegar barrel at an early age, no doubt. Well, as long as you didn't land on your head and it only took in your tongue, that's fine."

"You," Phyllis said, pushed beyond human endurance, "are a wack."

keri @keristars.bsky.social · 4d ago

This line from a Hope Campbell story that @lucynka.bsky.social shared last night came to mind when I read this post, for some reason. 🤭

With ominous slowness she got to her feet, wondering if in this day of shortages and priorities it really was a military sin to bounce a typewriter off a boss's head. Nash would never be missed but the typewriter might, she decided regretfully.

John Bull@garius.bsky.social · 4d ago

The US Army realised in 1941, as it spooled up for war, that it needed around 500,000 typewriters to function. so great was the need that they had to requisition and ration them. HALF A MILLION. Equivalent to 40% of the entire US domestic supply at the time. Logtics wins wars.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 5d ago

One of the better little poems you find in the romance pulps—"Reminders" by Pauline Booker (ALL-STORY LOVE, April 1943). 💔 #pulp #poetry #poem

Reminders

Here is a book you left behind,
A pipe of yours, a tie or two;
Familiar things that linger on,
Like echoes of the love we knew.

I can return all these to you,
These things of tangible design;
But, oh, I never can send back
The memory of your lips on mine.

By Pauline Booker.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 5d ago

Oh no, against my better judgment I started reading Hope Campbell's "A Kiss Between Friends" (ALL-STORY LOVE, April 1943). 😂 #pulp #romance #romancelandia #wack

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

In case you missed it over the last couple days, my ramblings about some of the #romance #pulp editors, and particularly about how horny their magazines were (or weren't). I may yet add more, who knows! #romancelandia

Lucynka@lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

1/ (a thread of sorts): I've been casually trying to figure out the styles of the various #romance #pulp editors from back in the day, and at this point I feel pretty confident in saying that both Amita Fairgrieve and Jane Littell seem to have been pro-horny (relatively speaking). #romancelandia

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d ago

A very important picture. #GetSmart

Don Adams as Maxwell Smart in a promotional still. He's holding a pistol in his left hand, has another tucked into the breast pocket of his suit jacket, a literal bunch of dynamite tucked into the front of his pants, a grenade hanging from the other side of his pants, at least a couple dozen bullets lining his suspenders like bandoliers, and then another gun in his right hand, but this one would appear to be a phone as it has a horn/funnel and he's holding it up to his ear. There might also be a knife handle sticking out the other side of his jacket (like it's tucked into the inside pocket). Anyway, he's smoking a cigarette and looking off to the side as if this is Totally Normal.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 6d ago

A very important picture. #GetSmart

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 7d ago

Back on my personal essay bullshit. (Feels good to get back to it after literally, yanno, like two months, pfft.)

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

As Wordpress was so kind to remind me, it was a year ago today that I formally revisited Hortense McRaven's insane kidnap romance, "The Love Pawn" (LOVE STORY, March 10, 1934)—the first #pulp #romance story I ever reviewed, and the one responsible for everything that has come after. ❤️ #romancelandia

“The Love Pawn” (Redux): It’s still insane, and I still love these maniacs.

“There will be no search,” said the man who called himself “Red,” calmly. “I’ve fixed that. We leave the car at Philadelphia, and I’m taking you by airplane to Santa Barbara, California.” The cou…

lucynka.wordpress.com

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

As Wordpress was so kind to remind me, it was a year ago today that I formally revisited Hortense McRaven's insane kidnap romance, "The Love Pawn" (LOVE STORY, March 10, 1934)—the first #pulp #romance story I ever reviewed, and the one responsible for everything that has come after. ❤️ #romancelandia

“The Love Pawn” (Redux): It’s still insane, and I still love these maniacs.

“There will be no search,” said the man who called himself “Red,” calmly. “I’ve fixed that. We leave the car at Philadelphia, and I’m taking you by airplane to Santa Barbara, California.” The cou…

lucynka.wordpress.com

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

In case you missed it over the last couple days, my ramblings about some of the #romance #pulp editors, and particularly about how horny their magazines were (or weren't). I may yet add more, who knows! #romancelandia

Lucynka@lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

1/ (a thread of sorts): I've been casually trying to figure out the styles of the various #romance #pulp editors from back in the day, and at this point I feel pretty confident in saying that both Amita Fairgrieve and Jane Littell seem to have been pro-horny (relatively speaking). #romancelandia

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

I ran across this AMAZING ad for Marian Stearns Curry's "I'll Love You Always" in the Sept. 1938 issue of RADIO STARS. (Divided in 2 for easier reading.) #pulp #romance #romancelandia Reminder that this was the Gothic DILF proto-erotica I wrote abt last year: lucynka.wordpress.com/2025/06/23/i...

"I'll Love You Always"

What was the frightening secret of the old Selkirk mansion—the secret that threatened to forever keep apart two ardent lovers who would have preferred death to separation?

That question had an answer, and pert little Molly Flynn was determined to find it. What if French Selkirk had allowed the ancient mystery to haunt him since he was a child—she wasn't going to let it shatter HER life—their life together!

But solutions don't hang on doorknobs, and many times before the terrifying night was over, Molly was to wish she had never entered the great house … and never set eyes on the passion-possessed madman who ruled it. For the riddle she found concealed behind the grey walls was more dreadful, more incredible than she had ever dreamed!

Don't miss "I'll Love You Always", a heart-thrilling story of impatient love and a dangerous adventure, appearing in the SEPTEMBER issue of SWEETHEART STORIES.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

1/ (a thread of sorts): I've been casually trying to figure out the styles of the various #romance #pulp editors from back in the day, and at this point I feel pretty confident in saying that both Amita Fairgrieve and Jane Littell seem to have been pro-horny (relatively speaking). #romancelandia

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

"It's hard enough to understand girls when you've been one yourself." From THE AUTHOR & JOURNALIST, April 1933. #pulp #romance #romancelandia

Miss Amita Fairgrieve, editor of ALL-STORY [LOVE], 280 Broadway, New York, writes to a correspondent: "Men hardly ever land in our magazine. They don't know how to write from the girl's point of view, you see. And after all, why should they? It's hard enough to understand girls when you've been one yourself."

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

Three years ago on this day, I reviewed Beth Farrell's (AKA: Pearle Botsford's) "Lady Snob" (LOVE STORY MAGAZINE, April 25, 1936), featuring an unusually slim and effete hero, and some surprising poignancy to the heroine's journey. Happy anniversary, you crazy kids. #pulp #romance #romancelandia

“Lady Snob”: I would read a whole series about Lace Flowers: Sissy Detective.

Simonné looked the young man over, gray eyes amazed. He should have wilted in his tracks, but he didn’t. Merely stood at smiling attention, one brow quizzically raised. There was so much about hi…

lucynka.wordpress.com

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

Reposting this on its own, because it really is one of my favorite covers, for all the wrong reasons. (Also, ignore the forgotten word, and how it's clearly supposed to read, "looks *like* she's getting ready to murder that guy." 🙃) #pulp #romance #romancelandia

Lucynka@lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

Omg, I didn't even notice her hand because I've always been too focused on her "help me I'm being kidnapped" rictus grin! The artist did some fine work, but they def had some off days—see: this cover, which (when combined w/ that story title) TOTALLY looks she's getting ready to murder that guy. 😂

The cover for ALL-STORY LOVE, September 1944 (artist unknown). A white woman holds a model ship and stares off into the distance with a dead-eyed smile on her face, while a white man in a naval uniform smiles (unsuspectingly) down at her from over her shoulder. Karen Cookson's story "You Are My Past" is advertised on the left, and it's like, well, if he isn't already her past, he soon WILL be, with that look. 👀

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · last wk.

My April 1943 issue of ALL-STORY LOVE has arrived! Copyright info indicated this held the conclusion to Maysie Greig's "Enemy Husband," but my sources were wrong! 😱 Turns out it's 5 parts, not 4! Still, it's exciting to have another piece of it. #pulp #romance #romancelandia Anyway, I didn't…

The cover of the issue (artist unknown), showing a white, black-haired woman in uniform, sitting in a Western Union office, seemingly composing a letter/message. She's holding her pen thoughtfully against her cheek and smiling off into the distance. Vina Lawrence's "Wings For the Bride" is advertised on the left.

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 3w ago

FYI, the ebook for DEEP WATER, by Beulah Poynter & Edwina Levin (MacDonald) is on sale! (Regular $3.99, now $2.99.) ICYMI when it came out last year, it's a romantic mystery/crime novel, originally serialized in the #pulp magazine ARGOSY and never collected in book form! www.amazon.com/dp/B0DZQ8ZB22

An image advertising the featured tropes, but done a bit facetiously. The front cover is in the middle (featuring a mysterious white woman seemingly stealing some jewels), against a dark blue background, with a whimsical text around it. It reads:

INSIDE YOU'LL FIND:

Jewel theft!
WWI intrigue!
TWO romantic subplots! (both HEAs!)
Working class woman clearly wants to punch her Karen of an employer in the face
Dead girls and their living doppelgängers (is there a connection?)
Hot riding instructors
Is your dad's male secretary secretly in love with you?
Diverse cast! (relative to the era)

Originally published in 1918and never before collected in book form!

Lucynka @lucynka.bsky.social · 2w ago

Hope Campbell's "Marriage of Inconvenience" is now up on my Pulp Romance Story Catalogue! Catalogue link here: lucynka.wordpress.com/pulp-romance... Direct story link here: drive.google.com/file/d/1oZIy...

"Marriage of Inconvenience" - Hope Campbell (ALL-STORY LOVE, January 1943)

Illustrator: Unknown

Secretary Elida is fed up with the way her overbearing (if incredibly charming) boss Mac has taken over her life, and the last straw is when he arranges for her to be his live-in house-sitter while he's away on war work—only her sense of patriotism keeps her from quitting on the spot. When his handsome, playboy friend Jerry shows up one night, the two concoct a fake-dating scheme to finally make Mac jealous—but will Elida's pride lead to her marrying the wrong man? Ends a little chauvinistically, but the screwball tone and snappy dialogue helps it go down. Overall, recommended.