Thursday, June 5, 2008

Paperback 108: Tobacco Road / Erskine Caldwell (Signet CW 985)

Paperback 108: Signet CW 985 (43rd ptg, I think, ca. 1970)

Title: Tobacco Road
Author: Erskine Caldwell
Cover artist: somebody Baxter

Yours for: $8


Best things about this cover:
  • It would be very sexy ... you know, if someone hadn't blown the right side of her face clean off. Really ruins the mood.
  • There is something Klimt-y about the shapes and floral patterns in and around her ... dress. I guess that's a dress.
  • This book is in near perfect condition. Feels unread, though if I hold it up to the light I can see the very faintest reading crease. Still, it's about as square and tight and shiny as a read book gets.
  • Tobacco Road is paperback legend. This is the 43rd printing. It sold tons. A certain rural sexual frankness made this book good fodder for at least two generations of cover artists. I'm just really glad this "Baxter" guy signed, and dated, his cover painting, because Signet is crap for giving artists credit (or for dating their reprint editions clearly).

Page 123~

Dude said he was hungry, and that he wanted to go somewhere and eat. Sister Bessie had half a dollar; Jeeter had nothing. Dude, of course, had nothing.


~RP

5 comments:

Orange said...

Wait, is she lying down, or is she running and trying to hail a cab toplessly?

Anonymous said...

I was thinking that the color choice for the background of the cover was very fleshy, and was only more horrified to see those polyp looking things between the girl and the spine of the book.

Given that information, I've decided the girl is swimming in a diseased pancreas. With flowers.

Rex Parker said...

Why is the post reading "0 Comments" when there are clearly 2 comments? I reloaded the page and everything. Harrumph.

rp

Anonymous said...

Holy cow. The chick can fart daisies.

Noah Cicero said...

the woman in the book that actually has sex is like 40 and has a flat nose with just nostrils.

The cover doesn't have anything to do with the book. It looks cool though.