- RAIN 050 -
Introduction: Rainfall Records & Books 2005 – 2007 – Randolph Stephens – 4 Pages
Randolph Stephens’ introduction takes the reader through the potted history of ‘Rainfall Records & Books’, from the birth of the initial ‘Rainfall Records’ arm back in May 1992 by Steve Lines, Clive Jones and Paul Ricketts (of Unhinged Magazine), all the way through to the publication of this, the fiftieth chapbook.
The first couple of pages of the introduction are focussed on documenting the early life of Rainfall, as a record company, before it’s publishing arm was formed. Here Stephens talks about Rainfall’s early Stormclouds releases (the band Steve Lines was in), and then on to the initial book publications of John B. Ford’s Lovecraftian fiction.
The last page of the introduction is where Stephens moves on to the publication of the first Rainfall chapbook, in December 2005, and the DIY process by which these chapbooks were originally put together.
It’s a solid introduction, with plenty of details documenting the early years of Rainfall. Stephens does start the piece providing a wonderfully detailed history of the birth of Rainfall Records, with details of each initial record pressing. However, when we move on to the book and chapbook publishing, Stephens speeds through these aspects with much more haste, only providing sporadic details here-and-there, rather than the in-depth history we’d seen with the first Rainfall records. It’s a shame as this is the aspect the majority of the readers of the chapbooks will probably be most interested in. Nevertheless, it’s still a good introduction, giving you a nice oversight of those early Rainfall years.
The First 50 Chapbooks – Bibliography – 25 Pages
The main bulk of the chapbook is taken up by the bibliography section, which provides detailed listings of the first fifty Rainfall chapbooks. Here we’re provided with the following details for each chapbook:
- Rainfall publication number (i.e. RAIN 001 – RAIN 050)
- Chapbook title
- Editor(s) and author(s) involved
- Date of publication
- Page count
- Original price
- Contents (list of story titles and the respective author names)
- Notes (generally detailing the cover artist, the number of chapbook copies printed, and any other interesting notes regarding the chapbook contents)
Each listing also includes a small tick box, so you can tick off the chapbooks as and when you’ve purchased or read them.
Index Of Authors – 10 Pages
The ‘Index Of Authors’ section provides an alphabetical list for all the authors who contributed stories (or poems) within these first fifty chapbooks. For each author it lists out the chapbook name as well as which series that chapbook was within. This comprehensive list allows you to easily identify which chapbooks specific authors were featured within (handy if there was a specific author you wanted to seek out).
Cover Art – 17 Pages
The final section in the chapbook provides full colour reproductions of the covers for the first fifty chapbooks, alongside the key details for each chapbook (Rainfall publication number, chapbook title, authors/editors, date of publication, page count, and price).
This is a handy final section to flick through to see which titles catch your eye, and simply enjoy looking through the various pieces of cover art adorned by these first fifty chapbooks.
The chapbook runs for a total of 60 pages.
© DLS Reviews
