Pulp Classics: Strange Tales #7 (John Gregory Betancourt) Review
In this issue of Strange Tales is Hugh B. Cave's Murgunstrumm, an intense, chilling and well told vampire tale that is marred somewhat by an anticlimactic resolution. Still, this story is very atmospheric and the plotting is smartly done in medias res.
The remainder of this issue of Strange Tales is mediocre or bad, featuring a below par tale by the often superb Clark Ashton Smith, whose riff on premature burial seems more like a discarded sketch than an actual story. Also similarly disappointing is the tale by Robert E. Howard that is choked with exposition and obvious. August Derleth provides a sloppy simulacrum of Algernon Blackwood (rather than his more typical Lovecraft worship), and the overwritten tale by Henry S. Whitehead proves to be both obvious and stultifying.
Recommended pulps would include issues of Weird Tales, Dime Detective, The Spider, Operator #5, Secret Agent X, Terror Tales, Uncanny Tales, and Adventure.