Paperback 1080: Maharajah / Richard Cargoe (Popular Library 451)

Paperback 1080: Popular Library 451 (1st ptg, 1952)

Title: Maharajah

Author: Richard Cargoe

Cover artist: [Raymond Johnson]

Condition: 5/10 (intact, but with split spine)

Value: $6-10

[Another book from the recently acquired Larry D Collection]

Best things about this cover:

• At first it looks like he's scratching his chin as he's contemplating his next move, but then you look closer and realize he is nibbling. On a grape. And cupping a whole bunch of grapes in his other hand. And she's like "Yes, you like nibbling on my grapes ... there is much more fruit where that came from ... but I'm going to hold it over here out of view ... I know you are hungry for my fruit, but I will not simply give you the fruit; you are going to have to work for my fruit? I withhold the fruit until you are good and hungry. You are hungry, yes?" Fruit doing a Lot of work on this cover.  
• Dude's eyes are intense, predatory, vaguely insane. They are almost enough to distract you from the bright white shaving brush growing out of his forehead. Almost.
• I love these covers where intense desire is conveyed in a backward glance that totally defies the laws of physics (no way she can see him even peripherally from that angle) but still *feels* smolderingly real.

Best things about this back cover:

• Ah, Orientalism. How I don't really miss you. The "exotic" natives doing their carnal things in fancy garb, served up for westerners to gawk at. Like the fruit on the front cover, "exotic" is doing a lot of work here (as well as on the front cover!)
• I see how "INTRIGUE IN INDIA" might seem to have some inherent alliterative appeal, but it's really rather dull.
• Tbh I'm kinda invested in the storyline now. Team Tegra, for sure. That Halim guy seems like a jerk I would not like to have a beer with.

Page 123~

They are blackmailing us into a state of perpetual fear. I keep remembering how the tiger clawed off the monkey's limbs one by one. They may murder one person each day—every day they may murder a little closer to the throne. Have you thought of that?

Have I thought of what? I'm still thinking about the monkey. Is he OK? Did he get revenge? You can't just start a tiger/monkey story and then abandon it like that, man. You gotta see it through. Now bring me some fruit and start over.

~RP

P.S. the cover artist is Raymond Johnson. This exact painting was on the cover of Illustration #77, which contains a big article on Johnson:

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Paperback 1079: Jonathan Wild / Henry Fielding (Signet CQ660)

Paperback 1079: Signet CQ660 (1st ptg, 1962) (actually 3rd ptg, year unknown, probably early-mid '70s)

Title: Jonathan Wild

Author: Henry Fielding

Cover artist: Milton Glaser

Condition: 7/10

Value: $5

Best things about this cover:

• Another acquisition outside my normal (1939-69) collecting range, but Glaser's covers for Signet are special, so I think I'm going to start making them a special subset of my collection (esp. since they can be found all over and procured for super cheap)
• There's a borderline cartoon quality to Glaser's pop art take on the classics (his most famous work for Signet was the covers of all the Shakespeare plays). Love the intricacy of his designs, and the low-key bawdiness of this particular image—the deep cleavage, the hint of thigh above the stocking, the (I'm guessing) randy bewigged leonine figure standing behind her. . . though if he's randy for anything, it's probably that jewel he's fondling.
• The colors are vibrant and the design on her stockings is absolutely aces. Her shoes are special too.

Best things about this back cover:

• Bah! Mere description! 
• I've never read this novel, but the cover copy here is promising. Love the idea of naming your wild-ass main character "Wild." 
• The book is part biography (of an actual criminal), part social satire, part picaresque novel. Honestly, it sounds amazing, and I am tempted to dive right in.
• Is Gin Lane bad? I want to live on Gin Lane. There's gin there, right?

Page 123~

Wild, immediately at his return to town, went to pay a visit to Miss Laetitia Snap, for he had that weakness of suffering himself to be enslaved by women, so naturally incident to men of heroic disposition.

"Suffering himself to be enslaved" is some choice phrasing, but not as choice as the name "Miss Laetitia Snap"—that is an all-time name. The implications of "Snap" are suggestive but ambiguous ... unlike the implications of "Miss Straddle" (p. 88), which seem pretty straightforward.

~RP

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Paperback 1078: Showdown / Lee Stevens (DimeNovels #1) (DN 0010)

Paperback 1078: DimeNovels 1 (PBO, 1990)

Title: Showdown

Author: Lee Stevens

Cover artist: J. Wayne Anderson

Condition: 7/10

Value: $5

Best things about this cover:

• I love how much this guy hates cards. Or maybe this is some kind of shooting trick. I'm really impressed that he got such even distribution of cards (and chips!), all in the air at once. 
• It's like he's using the table for a shield, but shooting at ... what, the chandelier? 
• This is a dumb little book! Seriously, it's literally ... little. 3 x 4.5 in. Here it is next to some grown-up-sized books:

• I got this book at one of the used bookstores in Longmont, CO (I forget which ... Barbed Wire, maybe?). Lots and lots (and lots) of vintage westerns there. And then this novelty book. 
• I wonder about DimeNovels. This is literally #1. "DMN 0010" it says on the copyright page. Let's do some googling and Holy Moly, jackpot! Not numbered consecutively—numbered by the genre (!?!?!). Such good info here:

And now the back cover ...

Best things about this back cover:

• Text! I mean ... this must be like a quarter of the book, right here on the cover. Leave us *something* to discover inside!
• This sounds like every western ever written / filmed / conceived
• Yup, I was right: Barbed Wire Books. There's their address and everything, in case you're ever out that way.
• The logo's kinda sweet...

• ... Would wear that on a t-shirt, for sure.

Page 123~ (LOL, jk, this book is only 91 (small!) pages long, so here's Page 23)

But there weren't no clay anywhere else at that point of the trail.

Shouldn't that be "there weren't no clay nowhere else" ... I'm no dialect expert, but it sounds better, plus the triple negative kinda takes you back to a single negative situation, which is what you wanted, grammatically, in the first place. But I'm sure the publisher knows what he's doing, Now let's just flip to the last page of the book for no particular reason and ... whoa:

Randy L. Byrd's 1980 album "Byrd Dog" sold in excess of a dozen copies, though the lead single, "Geez's! (I Say to Myself)," sadly never charted.

~RP

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