Paperback 796: Stacked Deck / Frank Kane (Dell First Edition B197)

Paperback 796: Dell First Edition B197 (PBO, 1961)

Title: Stacked Deck
Author: Frank Kane
Cover artist: Bob McGinnis

Yours for: $8


Best things about this cover:

• I see why she is drawn as a reflection of herself—the whole playing card angle—but dear god this cover would be 10x better if the top half of the painting just Continued. Down. I feel slightly ripped off. Let's just say that McGinnis had a knack for the lower half.
• The upper half is, however, is exquisite.
• Black hearts = nice touch.
• Ooh, short stories. That's cool. You don't see that very often in single-author paperbacks.

Best things about this back cover:

• Love the description of the Hollywood swimming pool as "well-stocked." 
• "Debonair" is one of those words that can cut both ways—teeters on the wall between "cool" and "repulsively slick."
• Last line there is a super-weak attempt to drum up some Marlovian mystique. Face it: you're never going to get more succinct and bad ass than "Trouble Is My Business," so don't even try.

Page 123~

He stared glumly at the coffee, pulled himself out of the chair and spilled the coffee into the sink. He lifted the Scotch bottle from the closet, spilled three fingers into a glass.
"What a waste of good material," he groaned.
He lifted the glass to his lips, drained it, shook his head sadly. "What a waste!" [end of story]

This after a woman left his apartment, telling him that she was going to turn herself in to the police. I can only assume that that last line is an aural pun that is utterly lost in print.

~RP

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