The France 75
A well-known true crime writer wrote that he met Ed Wood at International Publications, Inc.'s France Books while they were both writing those sleazy pulp novels with the racy covers we all know and love (ca. 1962-1963). Wood is often cited as being The Worst Director of All Time and was immortalized in Tim Burton's 1994 film Ed Wood with Johnny Depp in the lead role. Few know he was a prolific writer.
My pal, Greg, and I are big Ed Wood fans. Based on what we've coined The France Connection and a recently rediscovered 15-year-old document, he and I furthered a controversial claim that Wood wrote short stories and articles for France magazines on Greg's Ed Wood Summit Podcast, an offshoot of Ed Wood Wednesday for which he co-writes, a subset of Joe Blevins Dead 2 Rights blog--
https://d2rights.blogspot.com/2021/09/ed-wood-wednesdays-ed-wood-summit.html
--and now we're trying to find the unknown novel(s) that he wrote at France. There are 75 France books. This is The France Revolution!
We've enlisted some friends to help, Jim who wrote The Unknown War of Edward D. Wood, Jr.: 1942 - 1946 and Paul who, along with Greg, will soon bring an unpublished Wood script to print about, of all things, Notre Dame coach Frank Leahy!
Our primarily findings have unearthed so far other authors just as fascinating as Ed Wood! A co-creator of a famous comic heroine that is presently on the silver screen, the most prolific Canadian author ever, and a Who's Who of sci-fi writers.
The plan is to launch a new podcast series (which may lead to a book). We will unveil the author of each work(s)--there are so many pseudonyms!--, provide a full biography, synopses of the work(s), and we hope to have special guests: an octogenarian writer, a son of another, a daughter of yet another, and a co-worker of publisher (who is a remarkable person just like the late publisher). But we need your help to obtain the raw material, as we only have about a dozen of The France 75.
What We Need & What You Get
With your financial assistance, we can purchase more of the France line of books, which are the fodder for our podcast series. This is a passion project, so the reading, research, and interviews (and writing if this project sees print) is done on our own spare time. We just need help procuring stinky old paperbacks from dealers and sellers. These are collectable items, so we posit we need $1,000 to complete the set. I think there will be 20 podcast episodes. If it's a real success, we'll move on to another publisher!
Besides helping us by the means to the ends (i.e., the podcast we hope you'll enjoy), we will be offering a number of perks ranging from scans of France paperbacks and magazines, a scan of an unpublished work by a sci-fi legend (from the desk of his legendary agent), and an autograph of the last known living France author (another sci-fi legend), as well as a chance to appear on the podcast with the project principles and be name as sponsor of all iterations of the project.
Be a part of history, documenting the lost, neglected and forgotten!
Long live Ed Wood!
Other Ways You Can Help Besides Financially
- Spread the word of the campaign via your own channels!
- Use the Indiegogo share tools!
