There has been a delightful resurgence in fanzines in the last few years - in particular within the tabletop rpg community. Back in the day, these constituted a kind of pre-internet, grassroots form of social networking amongst gamers, and could be purchased by mail-order, directly from the producers at gaming cons, and even from Games Workshop stores (indeed, gaming zines used to be advertised in White Dwarf back in the day). Titles of these classic rpg zines variec from the sublime to the weird, with perhaps my favourite being Tempestuous Orifice.
The new breed of ‘zines, whilst representing a return to the DIY mentality, tend to be of a more professional cast (as a result of the virtual ubiquity of desk-top publshing software these days), and ate often tied to forms of digital media such as podcasting (which I think is, in many respects, the digital descendants of the ‘zine mentality).
Indeed, today’s offering - issur 2 of The Blasphemous Tome - is the analogue, hardcopy offspring of one of the Ghooroc Zone’s favourite podcasts, The Good Friends of Jackson Elias. Whilst the Blasphemous Tome takes the Call of Cthulhu rpg as its prime focus, it also engages (as with its parent podcadt) more widely with Lovecraftian media - and in this respect is reminiscent of the now-legendary Lovcraftian ‘zine, Dagon. Whilst The Blasphemous Tome is only available to patreon backers of The Good Friends of Jackson Elias, you can pick up annual edition by backing said podcast for the paltry sum of $1 a month. Go on you know you want to!
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