Action: The Sevenpenny Nightmare (Special Offer)

Action: The Sevenpenny Nightmare
Published: 10 March 2026
Format: A4, 179 colour pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay (coming soon)

PLEASE NOTE: The book is currently on special offer for early buyers. The offer will end in two weeks on 24 March.

Orders can also be made via Paypal (steve [at] bearalley.co.uk), price £26.49 including p&p. Please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. 

US orders can also be made via Paypal, £29.49 sterling including p&p. Again, please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. 

Please ask for other overseas prices; I can usually offer postage at a cheaper rate than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

"I tried to get a mix of violence, good storytelling and magazine-style features, but the thing that dominated the comic, unfortunately, was the violence," recalled Action-creator Pat Mills in 1986. Violence brought the paper to the attention of the tabloid press and inspired headlines like "AARGH lives—but the blood is printed red", "Comic Strip Hooligans" and "The Sevenpenny Nightmare".

For eight glorious months, fans revelled in the comic that gave them the over-the-top action of adult TV and cinema unavailable to kids in their early teens, but visible all around them in cinema posters, newspaper articles and TV's many news programmes: Jaws, The Sweeney, the Dirty Harry movies, Death Wish and Rollerball were out of the reach of children... but Action wasn't.

Then, without warning, it disappeared...

Tabloid complaints and an excoriating interview on Nationwide alerted IPC's management to the moral panic building around the comic; pressure groups began to make their voices heard; and the Newsagents Federation and major distributors threatened to take action, just as IPC were launching new titles. Action vanished from the newsagents' shelves and was frantically retooled and relaunched six weeks later in a neutered form that removed two featuring violent teenagers and stripped the rest of the paper of all politics, body horror or hooliganism. Even the infamous 'Hook Jaw' was moved from the centre pages... and the blood was no longer printed red.

The latest book from Bear Alley delves deeply into the history of the paper, how a moral panic grew around it and how fans, the publisher and the tabloid press reacted to it. It looks at the changes made to the strips to make them acceptable to the paper's critics and what might have been, with examples from the artwork and storylines of lost issues.

Action: The Sevenpenny Nightmare is a comprehensive history of Britain's most infamous comic. 

.

The Air Ace Picture Library Companion

The Air Ace Picture Library Companion
Published: 14 November 2025
Format: A4, 121 colour pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay 

Orders can also be made via Paypal (steve [at] bearalley.co.uk), price £27.49 including p&p. Please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. Please ask for overseas prices. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

"Stories of heroism these may have been, but Air Ace did not shy away from the fact that they were also stories of savage aerial combat and that the pilots and the crews of these fighters and bombers were fighting for their very existence and to protect their families from bombs and firestorms."

The first volume in this revised and expanded series covering the Fleetway war libraries features updated and corrected issue lists co-compiled by David Roach, along with all-new introductions, extensive biographies of many of the major artists and a creators index which includes shorter biographical sketches of artists and writers not covered in the Biographies section. Amongst the artists included are cover artists Ian Kennedy, Graham Coton, Alan Willow, Nino Caroselli and Pino Dell'Orco; other artists covered include F. Solano Lopez, George Stokes, Aldo Di Gennaro, Fernando Fernandez, Juan Zanotto, Victor Hugo Arias, Juan Abellan, Marcello Ralli, Luis Martinez Mira, Leopoldo Ortiz and Leopoldo Sanchez.

The book is contains over 500 illustrations, many of them taken from original artwork which has rarely been seen outside of private collections.

Mytek the Mighty Volume 4

Mytek the Mighty Volume 4
Published: 14 November 2025
Format: A4, 199 b/w pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay

Advance orders can be made via Paypal (steve [at] bearalley.co.uk), price £27.50 including p&p. Please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. Please ask for overseas prices. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

"From the beauty of the African jungle emerged 
a nightmarish creature unknown to man!"

Mytek is still suffereing the aftereffects of Gogra's missiles when a new menace emerges: thanks to a serum thrown carelessly away, microscopic creatures are growing into gigantic monsters! Soon after, Gogra once again goes on the rampage, this time accompanied by a giant robot-rhino!

Vanishing sea vessels lead Professor Boyce—Mytek's creator—and Dirk Mason to investigate a mass of weed, only to find that it is controlled by their old enemy, Gogra.

Boyce, Mason and Mytek are sent to an uninhabited Pacific island after swarms of giant insects reach America's coast. A nuclear device may be to blame... but will they make it safe before chromo-rays from the device create more giant creatures.

Mytek is launched into space to rescue two lost astronauts who have crash-landed on the planet Umbra. The planet is bathed in a strong light, and almost as soon as Mytek lands, something bizarre happens... his shadow comes to life and creeps away, slipping into a cleft too narrow for the giant ape to follow.

Follow Professor Boyce, Dirk Mason and Mytek in their final adventures from the pages of Valiant.

Mytek the Mighty Volume 3

Mytek the Mighty Volume 3
Published: 19 September 2025
Format: A4, 206 b/w pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay

Orders can also be made via Paypal (steve [at] bearalley.co.uk), price £27.50 including p&p. Please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. Please ask for overseas prices. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

"As the giant ape stared at Gogra, hateful memories stirred in its electronic brain"

Mytek the Mighty roars into its third volume, with Bill Lacey at the artistic helm and its arch-nemesis Gogra planning to build a robotic replica of himself: Gogriath! To power this giant monstrosity, Gogra needs something from Mytek—his brain!

Fitted with a new brain, Mytek needs to learn all over again who are friends and who are enemies. The sight of the massive mechanical Gogra sends Mytek crazy, but the battle between the two is no even match, as Gogra has fitted his replica with weapons and can control the giant ape with a form of electronic hypnosis.

Adding to Mytek's problems, a system of underground volcanic caverns contain a fantastic lava-monster that finds its way to the surface...

And Gogra isn't finished: he has used Gogriath to steal vast quantities of electronic equipment and has built a device that can be used to attract the Moon and cause earthquakes and tidal waves around the globe... unless he receives a huge ransom from every country on the World Council.

How Professor Boyce and Dirk Mason save their mighty friend from these monsters—both natural, mechanical and gravity-magnetic—is a thrilling adventure that will leave you breathless. 

Mytek the Mighty Volumes 1 & 2

Mytek the Mighty Volume 1
Published: 3 July 2025
Format: A4, 190 b/w pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay

Mytek the Mighty Volume 2 
Published: 3 July 2025
Format: A4, 180 b/w pages, paperback with matte cover

Available via Ebay

Orders for the pair can be made via Paypal (steve [at] bearalley.co.uk). The two volumes are £52.50 including p&p. You can order the books individually, price £27.50 including p&p. Please make sure you include your address when paying by Paypal. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

The latest titles from Bear Alley Books begin a run of four volumes reprinting the entire run of Valiant favourite, Mytek the Mighty. The giant robot ape ran between 1964 and 1970, the creation of Professor Arnold Boyce as the answer to rioting by Akari natives who worship a clay representation of an ape as a symbol of power and destruction. 

Boyce, whose laboratory is destroyed, creates a colossal robot in the shape of the ape-god which he and local game-warden Dirk Mason use to quell the riotous actions of the natives... but the Professor's problems are just beginning, as his villainous assistant, Gogra, begins making plans to steal the robot ape and use it to march against mankind.

The kidnapped ape leaves a trail of devastation behind it, unaware of its actions... but Professor Boyce has equipped the ape with a learning brain and Mytek begins to develop self-awareness...

This classic from era when Valiant was at its height of popularity was written by Tom Tully and drawn by Eric Bradbury, two masters of British weird menace stories, who are introduced in essays over the two volumes. Volume one contains the first of a two-part look at the career of writer extraordinaire Tom Tully, who penned many of the most fondly remembered strips during his decades-long time as a scriptwriter. Heros the Spartan, Johnny Cougar, Kelly's Eye, The Steel Claw, Slave of the Screamer, The Toys of Doom, Raven on the Wing, Football Family Robinson, Look Out for Lefty (the strip that got Action shut down), Death Game 1999, Harlem's Heroes, The Mean Arena, Johnny Red and twenty years of Roy of the Rovers — just some of the strips written by Tully. Volume two also takes a look at artist Eric Bradbury, using interviews with Eric in the 1990s and information from his daughter to build a picture of his life and works.

Note: Volumes three and four will follow at roughly two monthly intervals. 

REVIEWS
"Tom Tully packs each two-and-a-half page episode with bombastic scenes of battling mechanical monsters ... Eric Bradbury's atmospheric linework adorns the first two volumes, giving way to Bill Lacy's more dynamic style in three and four. There's much to admire about both artists, who never over-cram the action despite Tully's frequent, dense exposition." SFX 391, May 2025.

"[I]t’s quite clear Bear Alley have put a huge amount of effort in to making these collections look as good as possible ... Not only do you get some fantastic comic tales to read: the collections also include features on Tom Tully and Eric Bradbury, two masters of British weird menace stories." John Freeman, Down the Tubes, 4 July 2025

Dreaming of Utopia

Dreaming of Utopia by Steve Holland
To be published: 24 November 2024
Format: A4, 88 full colour pages, softcover with matte cover

The book is now available on my eBay store.

American orders can be made via PayPal, price £25.49 UK pounds paid to steve [at] bearalley.co.uk. Please make sure you include your address. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

DREAMING OF UTOPIA

The story of Lloyd Cole, Benson Herbert and Utopian Publications stretches from cycling around Sunderland selling religious tracts to studying paranormal activity in Wiltshire. For a decade between 1941 and 1951, the two founded and managed a dozen different companies, publishing novels, non-fiction and magazines, some of them now highly prized by collectors. But the business also led authorities to condemn Cole for being "without any sense of commercial honesty" and accuse Herbert of making "a large profit out of pornography" before fraud, theft and court cases brought an end to their publications.

This is their story...

... and the stories of the authors who provided so much of their output, with essays on Edmund Burton (Edmund Burton Childs), R.C. Finney, N. Westley Firth and Sydney J. Bounds. The latter two wrote dozens of stories for Benson Herbert's 'spicy' magazines, many of which were deemed by post-war era's magistrates to be obscene and resulting in over 600 destruction orders issued against them. The magazines were Herbert's way of publicizing his more lucrative business of selling 'art studies' from his home.

Norman Firth, who had earned himself the nickname 'The Prince of Pulp Pedlars', lived with his family at Herbert's home in Kensington, churning out book after book, but was forced to leave when he developed TB. A writer of potential, Firth was dead before he reached 30.

The book also includes an essay on Reina Sington, later Reina Bull, who went from drawing stylistic book covers for paperbacks to drawing fetish illustrations for Herbert's Fads & Fancies magazine and covers for his 'spicy' titles that emphasized legs, stockings, suspenders, frilly knickers and super-high heels.

x

The Phantom Patrol

"Here come the Trojans — armed to the teeth! Get ready for big trouble!"

The Phantom Patrol by Willie Patterson and Gerry Embleton, edited and introduced by Steve Holland
To be published: 1 October 2024
Format: A4, 130 pages, b/w, softcover, with matte cover

 

Available now: CLICK HERE to visit my eBay Shop. Due to recent postal changes, American and other overseas orders should be made through Paypal in UK sterling; just e-mail me and I can offer postage much cheaper than Ebay's Global Shipping. Same offer applies if you want to buy more than one volume at a time.

Available on AMAZON.CO.UK.

THE PHANTOM PATROL

In the summer of 1941, Sergeant Joe Timm and his infantry patrol were trapped in the Greek hills a mile away from the sea and a hidden landing craft that would take them to safety. The Germans hold a vital Pass ahead of them and escape seems impossible. German shells begin to drop around their heads, uncovering a cavern with a curious looking craft. Inside, Joe grabs a strange-looking apparatus and rejoins his men just as the Germans advance into their hiding place. Escaping through the cave system, they reach their landing craft only to face more danger as Stuka dive-bomber turns and screams down at them. As the men hit the deck, Joe accidentally pushes a switch on the apparatus.

The Stuka disappears. Instead, on the horizon they see ancient galleys battling and Corporal Jock McLuckie realises the truth... it was they who had disappeared, transported back 3,000 years. With a tank, a landing craft, a handful of guns and a captured Nazi, the British infantry unit find themselves in the midst of the Trojan Wars.

The Phantom Patrol is a superb yarn of a kind that British comics did best. Fast-moving and wildly plotted, the story grows more complex as the patrol battles its way through Egypt and Private Paddy O'Connell finds himself adrift in time with a police trooper from the future. Flitting from past to future, will the Sarge and his men manage to escape back to now... and, given the situation they left behind, will they survive even if they do get back?

This lost classic with artwork by Gerry Embleton has been rarely seen since it's original appearance in Swift. The Phantom Patrol reprints all 57 episodes in one blockbuster volume with a wraparound colour cover by Chris Weston.

Female Detectives in Early Crime Fiction 1841-1920

An extensive survey of female detectives in works of fiction published between 1841 and the end of 1920. Nominated for the H.R.F. Keating Award at CrimeFest 2025 for Best Biographical or Critical Book.

Female Detectives in Early Crime Fiction 1841-1920
Published: 13 September 2024
Format: A4, 460 pages, with matte cover

Available in print from Amazon in the following territories: Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon DE | Amazon FR | Amazon ES | Amazon IT | Amazon NL | Amazon PL | Amazon SE | Amazon JP | Amazon CA

FROM THE INTRODUCTION

This is a survey of female detectives in works of fiction published between 1841 and the end of 1920. The start date simply acknowledges that the female detective as a recognisable character did not exist before 1841. There is slightly less rationale for the end date but after the First World War crime fiction moved in new directions and the twenties and thirties are often referred to as its ‘Golden Age’. The aim of this survey is to chronicle the formative era of the genre, before this Golden Age, and to focus on its first seventy or eighty years.
     The book is divided into entries, each of which deals with a work of fiction which generally falls into one of three categories: a novel, a series of stories or a standalone short story. Both periodical appearances and appearances in book form are covered. The entries are stand-alone commentaries with only a little cross-referencing. Relevant works by the same author are mentioned and, for those works written in the early years of the genre, there is some discussion of their context and place in the historical development of the female detective.
     The treatment of each work is not rigidly uniform but contains a variable blend of bibliographic information and critical commentary with the discussion focussing on the character, career and capabilities of the detective. However it is often impossible to discuss the activities of the detective without revealing details of the plot and so — caveat lector — there are ‘spoilers’ ahead.
     Featured here are private detectives and, although some authors have taken liberties with historical authenticity, official police detectives. There are also the committed amateurs who would proudly describe themselves as detectives but alongside these there are others whose membership of this illustrious sisterhood is more problematic.
     In some stories there is a protagonist who becomes involved with a mystery and helps with its resolution but who cannot be considered a fully fledged detective in that she makes a positive contribution to the problem only in an ad hoc or fragmentary way. She may thwart a criminal, make logical deductions, uncover clues or assist others in apprehending a wrong-doer, but still not function as a detective.
     Clearly, to resolve these issues, one needs a working definition of what does and what does not constitute a detective. In fact it is useful to have two definitions: the definition of a ‘detective’ and the definition of a ‘detective story’. Taken together these will help to establish criteria for a work to be included in this survey.
     A detective resolves to solve a mystery and is prepared to make a sustained and determined attempt to do so. There should be a planned and purposeful approach to interpreting facts, gathering clues and making logical deductions with the aim of furthering the investigation. The detective will take proactive steps and, ideally, achieve something that no one else has done, such as making new discoveries or finding new explanations to fit the facts. On its own, an intense desire to learn the outcome is not enough; nor is having occasional insights or asking pertinent questions unless these are translated into positive, constructive actions. Nor is it enough just to thwart or foil villains in a purely reactive way. The detective need not be infallible but should nevertheless be seen to adopt a methodical and focussed strategy that has at least the potential to succeed.
     For a few humorous works, where there is undeniably a female detective, these requirements have been applied flexibly or waived all together.
     Over the years commentators and critics have suggested criteria to define what is meant by detective fiction and those given here follow the broad consensus. To qualify as a ‘detective story’ there is a bare minimum that must be true:

• The story must contain a detective.
• There must be a criminal problem or a mystery and the detective must actually perform acts of detection in an attempt to arrive at its solution.
• The detective must be an important character.
• The mystery and the detective’s attempts to solve it must be a major — arguably the major — plot strand.

So the mere appearance of a character described as a detective does not define detective fiction. Romances or adventure stories where there is a minor detective strand to the plot are also unlikely to qualify.

High Seas and High Adventures

High Seas and High Adventures
Published: 29 July 2024
Format: A4, 134 pages, with matte cover

AVAILABLE AT MY eBAY SHOP. EBay also allows foreign shipping, so the book should be available to anyone wherever they live (warzones excluded).

ALSO AVAILABLE VIA AMAZON.

HIGH SEAS AND HIGH ADVENTURES

Here is a collection of three classic stories by Jeffery Farnol and H. Rider Haggard, brought to life by one of the finest of all comic strip artists: Jesus Blasco.

Originally published in the pages of Look and Learn, 'Black Bartlemy's Treasure' and 'Martin Conisby's Revenge' (based on Martin Conisby's Vengeance) adapt two of Jeffery Farnol's most famous books – a tale of vengeance and death that begins with Conisby a galley slave on a Spanish ship. He escapes to a British ship and heads back to England to take his revenge on Sir Richard Brandon, the man responsible for his years of slavery, only to rescue and fall in love with Lady Joan, his enemy's daughter.

Thus begins a tale that follows Conisby's adventures on the high seas as he sails in search of Sir Richard aboard the ship of Adam Penfeather, who is looking for the treasure of pirate Black Bartlemy, left on an island with a treasure map hidden in a daggar the only clue.

The story (originally written as one epic book) continues through the pages of 'Martin Coniby's Revenge', where his discovery of Sir Richard's whereabouts leads him to rescue his enemy and takes him to an island where he is confronted by Lady Joan Brandon.

The third of our strips is another grueling tale of high adventure and vengeance as Thomas Wingfield sets off for the Indies, only to be wrecked at sea and rescued from certain death by his enemy. Escaping, Wingfield is washed up on the shores of a strange land and captured by its natives. He is saved from being sacrificed and taken to meet the emperor, Montezuma.

The adventure that follows sees Wingfield marry into the royal household and face the encroachment of Spanish invaders led by Cortez. All the time, Wingfield still burns with the desire to avenge the death of his mother and kill the man responsible.

.