Title: Sweet and Deadly
Author: Verne Chute
Cover artist: [A. Leslie Ross]
Yours for: $12
Best things about this cover:
- So Many Great Things that I'm kind of paralyzed. I saw this last weekend at a bookshop in Ithaca and snapped it up without even looking at the price. I think this is one of my 20 favorite covers of all time.
- So Much Action. The cover would be worth it for her alone—the baddest-looking Girl With a Gun in my collection—but we get Smashed Face McTireIron thrown into the bargain as well. How many ways were they planning on killing that poor blond guy?
- Suicide doors!
- Double Fear Hand! Or is he just dancing because she said so?
- The art here balances pure hard-boiled action with a soft, luminous delicacy. Love.
Best things about this back cover:
- That's what they all say.
- Wow, that's some pretty overt gropiness there at the beginning.
- "What did you say your name was? 'Methane?'" "It's MEL Thane, doll. Don't you forget it." "I already have."
- If that blond guy is Mel, I am *super* glad she shot him.
Page 123~
Mel's match lighting a cigarette made a harsh sound. "I've got a sort of client who's being blackmailed. He managed to steal a few things out of a blackmail mob's file . . ."
Ew, Mel is the *detective* in this story? Oh well, my desire that he get shot stands.
~RP
[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]
5 comments:
The "complete and unabridged" brag on these things gets me every time.
That back cover excerpt makes renowned curator Dan Brown sound like Shakespeare.
I know you love the cover, Rex, but so much of it just seems weird to me.
I think everyone has some kind of vestibular disorder, or perhaps a neuromuscular condition, as their postures all seem bizarrely unnatural.
And what the heck is going on with those cars? The one on top seems to have lost its front wheel, perhaps melted by the odd acid scum they seem to be standing on, but gained a pillar right in front of the driver's seat.
This whole scene seems surreal to me.
Okay,tire iron guy's pose is a little odd, almost like he's still sitting. But I don't care. Her cigarette makes up for any flaws this cover may have! It totally sets her character here.
Wow, so much awesome in that cover. The weird angle, the blues-and-greens color scheme, the dress(!), the cigarette, the lipstick... and I didn't even notice the suicide doors until you mentioned them.
This one's a gem; I'm surprised you're willing to part with it.
The passage under "I'm not that kind of girl!" on the back cover is not actually in the book.
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