Thursday, January 19, 2012

Paperback 491: 24 Hours to Kill / James McKimmey (Dell First Edition B169)

Paperback 491: Dell First Edition B169 (PBO, 1961)

Title: 24 Hours to Kill
Author: James McKimmey
Cover artist: Robert McGinnis

Yours for: $10


DellFE169.24hrs


Best things about this cover:
  • Dishevelment, thy name is this lady.
  • I like the double entendre of this title: "She had 24 hours to kill ... everyone in the room!"
  • Let me answer the obvious question: yes, Robert McGinnis painted everything in sight from about 1957-64. Every paperback cover, every magazine cover, every line on every freeway, etc.
  • Her slip is behaving oddly ... in relation to gravity, I mean. It's somehow coming together in a lacy, snowflaky formation to prevent us from getting the upskirt view we all so richly deserve.
  • Her smirk is killer.

DellFE169bc.24Hrs


Best things about this back cover:
  • Paradox! The back cover copy writer's second-best friend after HYPERBOLE!
  • I want a business card that states my occupation as "Killer-hero of the state's young punks."
  • "Teen-age" my eye. I mean, look at her feet. Those bunions say a hard-worn 28, minimum.

Page 123~

He blinked, stunned. Then he said, "I'll be right down, Rod." He hung up and picked up the machine gun. "Stay here, Sue. Lock the door and don't leave this office under any circumstance." He strode out and down the marble steps, trying to control the wild anger surging in him. . . .

I find that when I'm trying to control my wild, surging anger, I'm more often successful when I'm *not* holding a machine gun.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]

7 comments:

Pete said...

"I find that when I'm trying to control my wild, surging anger, I'm more often successful when I'm *not* holding a machine gun."

Rex - You don't understand. When you're the CEO of a large corporation, you have to control your murderous rages the entire time you stride through the executive offices, get on the elevator down to the loading dock and track down the idiot who sent the mink coat to your wife rather than your girl friend. Then you give your wild, surging anger free rein. Those three, four minutes can be a real test of one's self control.

Jackie said...

Gravity is not being kind to her slip, it's true, and space is not being kind to that wall behind her. Where, precisely, is she sitting? I feel as if we need to see a set of stairs here, not just a floor and a wall. Her hand is way behind her, and her ass is levitating off the ground.

Other than that, she looks like the prototype for the famous Farrah Fawcett poster from the late 70s.

Rick said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Rick said...

Looks to me,Jackie, that she's sitting on a curb in front of white-washed adobe or stucco wall. (That doesn't explain the gravity-defying lacy slip. of course...)

Deb said...

I'm glad you explained that the white frilly thing under her skirt is a slip--given the early sixties time-frame of the book, I thought it was either pettipants or a very elaborate pair of knickers.

Anonymous said...

If once, just once, a woman leaving my house in the morning just had to sit down on the stoop looking like that, with that smile on her face, I could die a happy man.

Larry said...

I know Michael would instruct his students that when including a sub machine gun in any scene, you should not also name characters "Rod" or "Gat."

Dishevelment thy name is the type face of titles in the McGinnis era. Search on 1961 for instance about half of them!