Phoenix's Future Plans

[Phoenix]

Derek are you not doing a complete list of serials in the dct girls comics with a synopsis on a select few hundred.

I can't really see the point of such a list. I think it's important in the planning stage to distinguish between the very good stories and those that look to me much like space fillers, which I would certainly omit. It is therefore true that I will be selective, but when you bear in mind that there are ten comic titles for girls from DCT that supported Bunty's run between 1958 and 2001, it should be obvious that by presenting thirteen synopses to a page, as I did for the serials from The Wizard, I am going to need a lot more than the 100-page section in This Was The Wizard. If I were to present every single serial from all eleven comics, I would be looking at a book of between, at a guess, 500 and 650 pages, and that would still mean missing out other useful things such as illustrations of the heading block accompanying the first instalment of all the selected serials, and a colour section or two covering interesting front covers across the eleven titles, omissions that I would not be able to accept. There is also the financial aspect to consider, as I will be funding the printing and binding, along with decent advertising coverage. The one component that will make it relatively easy for purchasers to seek out their favourite stories will be my decision to present all the story synopses in alphabetical order.

[Tammyfan]

I think an index is a good idea, but it is clearly not for this publication. Maybe it could be used another way, such as with the Girls Comics of Yesterday, and in collaboration with someone?

[Phoenix]

I think an index is a good idea, but it is clearly not for this publication. Maybe it could be used another way, such as with the Girls Comics of Yesterday, and in collaboration with someone?

Just a suggestion, Briony, but it might well be worth your while exploring the possibility of working jointly with Lorraine on an index that both of you could be happy to produce. No harm done if no agreement can be reached.

[Tammyfan]

I think an index is a good idea, but it is clearly not for this publication. Maybe it could be used another way, such as with the Girls Comics of Yesterday, and in collaboration with someone?

Just a suggestion, Briony, but it might well be worth your while exploring the possibility of working jointly with Lorraine on an index that both of you could be happy to produce. No harm done if no agreement can be reached.

My collection is scanty compared with yours though, so I may not be the best qualified for this. It is perhaps better left to others.

[Phoenix]

A taster to whet your appetite. As things stand preparation-wise, being half way through M&J 1993, the first serial to get the three-line summary in my alphabetical-ordered book will be A Boy-Friend For Brenda, which starts in issue 27 of Tracy. Just thought you'd like to know! Hopefully my package of issues of Judy will arrive later this morning. Andrew is reliable, and a man of his word so they should do.

[Phoenix]

Hopefully my package of issues of Judy will arrive later this morning. Andrew is reliable, and a man of his word so they should do.

The postal system was rather less reliable than my son, as the First Class to-be-signed-for package didn't arrive at all yesterday. Presumably it will be with me tomorrow.

Nothing so far on those four instalments of The Silver Sword I'm sorry to say. It's a good job I like the British Library and feel comfortable working there. I'll order up the relevant bound volume by phone from here a few days prior to my next visit. It's a straightforward procedure, all they need is my membership number, and they will then fetch the volume in for me from their storage facility in Boston Spa. I won't need more than ninety minutes to make the notes I need.

[Phoenix]

Derek are you not doing a complete list of serials in the dct girls comics with a synopsis on a select few hundred.as i think its more beneficial to have a complete list for future generations

I have thought hard about your suggestion, Bri, which seems perfectly sensible. Obviously I'm not promising anything at this stage but I am prepared to consider listing in an addendum all the serials that I don't provide a synopsis for, with just the starting and ending issue numbers and dates, also in alphabetical order. I can certainly do what you are asking but the bottom line will be the cost. The finished book has to be priced to sell as I would quite like to get my outlay back. I'm roughly breaking even with This Was The Wizard, and I'm comfortably in pocket with Free Gifts In The Big Five. However, generally books are costing more now than they used to, clearly reflecting increased publishing costs. There can be huge disparities though. For example, Robert J Kirkpatrick's magnificent 576pp hardback From The Penny Dreadful To The Ha'penny Dreadfuller, subtitled A Bibliographic History of the Boys' Periodical in Britain 1762-1950, produced by the British Library in 2013, currently costs £65.64 plus p&p on Abe Books, whereas his much smaller and slimmer 118pp paperback volume Bullies, Beaks and Flannelled Fools, subtitled An Annotated Bibliography of Boys' School Fiction, published in 1990, costs, on the same Abe Books platform, £95.99 plus £6.75 p&p from the USA. As far as I can see, it isn't available in this country. I bought my copy at roughly the same time as I bought his hardback about the penny dreadful, and it cost me £7.50. There is no price on my copy of his hardback but it will have been somewhere around the £30/40 mark, and well worth it.

[Tammyfan]

Putting the list of stories into an addendum sounds like a good idea, if budget and costs will allow it.

[Phoenix]

Putting the list of stories into an addendum sounds like a good idea, if budget and costs will allow it.

I have no idea yet, Briony, how much the book will cost to produce, and while I can always contact the printers of my last book for a quotation, there isn't much point until I can tell them how many pages it will have. All I can promise now is that I will be following my late father's advice, "If you are going to do a job, do it properly. If you are not going to do it properly, don't do it at all." This approach will also be evident in the Introduction, in which I will be looking at fiction for girls prior to the first issue of Bunty, both in comics and novels, for which I will use categories such as School, Wild West, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Animals, Sport, Magic, Historical, Ballet, WW2, Mystery, Futuristic, etcetera, etcetera. Every serial in the eleven DCT comics will also be allotted an appropriate category, in some cases more than one, but first I have to complete the listing of the stories in M&J that I plan to feature, and finally decide on those from Diana and Bunty. I will be taking a couple of weeks off over Christmas, which I will be spending in Cornwall with Lois and Alex, not forgetting my younger son Russell and his wife Rachel, one or both of whom will be cooking my Christmas dinner while I keep the children in order, most easily achieved by playing over and over the card game Speed and the board game Sorry, or taking them to the local skate park. As soon as possible after I get home again I will start to write the book, which I hope to have written within six months or so. Hope springs eternal. Speaking of which, maybe my issues of Judy will arrive this morning!!

[Phoenix]

The postal system was rather less reliable than my son, as the First Class to-be-signed-for package didn't arrive at all yesterday. Presumably it will be with me tomorrow.

It hasn't arrived today either!! Hope still springs eternal. Maybe my issues of Judy will now arrive tomorrow morning!!

Update
I am no longer grumpy. Parcel Force have just delivered Andrew's Post Office box full of the 34 issues of Judy. They run basically between January 1981 and October 1984, eight issues being from 1981, three from 1982, nine from 1983 and fourteen from 1984. I now have all issues from 1981 and 1983, I'm short of three in 1982, two of which are contiguous, and four in 1984, none of which are. I don't need to check that all their pages are present as I did that last Friday but one over a pint of Youngs Special in a pub in Roehampton while I was waiting to go up and collect Kelsey from her nursery. Happy days are here again!

[helsbels]

Hi Phoenix - I have Judys for sale on ebay - what issue numbers are you looking for?

[Phoenix]

Hi Phoenix - I have Judys for sale on ebay - what issue numbers are you looking for?

Rather than complicate matters immediately with a lot of numbers, Helen, can I just start by telling you that my years of greatest need are 1972 (13 issues), 1973 (8 issues), and 1979 (13 issues). If you have spares in those years please let me know, at which point I will list my missing issues for you.

[helsbels]

Hi Phoenix - sorry for the delay, I've just got home. I'm afraid I no longer have any of the issues from the years you've listed, the ones I'm selling are from 1984 to 1991.

[Phoenix]

the ones I'm selling are from 1984 to 1991.

Thank you for getting back to me, Helen. The numbers I am missing in those years are as follows:-

1984 - 1297 : 1299 : 1300 : 1303.
1985 - 1305 : 1317 : 1319 : 1320 : 1350 : 1353.
1986 - 1381 : 1382.
1987 - 1424 : 1445.
1988 - 1465 : 1467 : 1481 : 1487.
1989 - 1532 : 1533 : 1536 : 1542 : 1547 : 1548 : 1550 : 1553.
1990 - 1573 : 1591 : 1593 : 1594.
1991 - 1622 : 1623 :1632.

If you have any of the above issues for sale I am certainly prepared to buy them from you. I look forward to your reply.

[Phoenix]

In the light of Big Bad Bri's desire to have me present a complete list of the serials in DCT's girls' papers, with a synopsis "on a select few hundred", which was never my intention, I have thought the matter through again very carefully. I am not persuaded. However, on the alphabetical order issue, I now think that it might be better to present the serials in sequential order within the comic title in which they appeared, the alphabetical order idea to be used just for the comic titles, BUNTY and TRACY being the alpha and the omega so to speak.

If my arithmetic is correct, never an absolute guarantee as my 'O' level pass mark all those years ago was a mere 50%, largely due I believe to my inability to understand calculus (What were those dys and dxes all about?), there are 5174 serials across the eleven comics. Now if I were to include every one with a three-line synopsis, my book would have 391 pages plus a comprehensive Introduction and a complete list of the serial titles at the back of the book. At 70 per page, as in This Was The Wizard, a further 74 pages would be required just for the list. Common sense alone puts that in the Non-Starter category. Sorry, Bri.

I will obviously be making the selection of serials myself but if any members are anxious to ensure that their particular favourites are included, please let me know what they are to be on the safe side. The chances are that I will have selected them anyway as I believe that we are on the same metaphorical page.