Paperback 1094: Mardios Beach / Oakley Hall (Perma Books M-4042)

 Paperback 1094: Perma Books M-4042 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: Mardios Beach

Author: Oakley Hall

Cover artist: Tom Dunn

Condition: 8-9/10 (mild dings to the corners, else perfect)

Value: $15-20

Best things about this cover: 

• "Wilma!"
• "Stella!"
• He was a heel and worshiped only one god—SUSPENDERS!
• William Holden just woke up and wants to know where his goddamn shirt is!
• The lady looks sad and frightened, but actually she's just petting and gently whispering to a small mouse on her arm named Marvin. "I don't know why the mean man is yelling, Marvin. Maybe he's rehearsing a play. You want some cheese?"
• His left hand is so dramatic, perhaps because his right fingers are caught in the hinges of the door?

Best things about this back cover: 

• "Frank" alert! "Frank" alert. We have "Frank," I repeat, we have "Frank"! (And "Brutally frank" at that—that's the best kind of frank!)
• Now I'm wondering how louses (lice?) are typically made.
• From what I gather from this back-cover description, this is a novel about a guy who just punches people in the groin over and over. It's a hard life, but if you wanna be a louse, you gotta put in the work.

Page 123~

"All right. Quick! What's a woman's function?"

"Give up? The answer is: to Find My Damn Shirt! These suspenders are startin' to itch! Now open this door right now. Hey, is Marvin in there? You and Marvin better not be talkin' about me again ..."

~RP

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Paperback 1090: Operation Intrigue / Walter Hermann (Avon 706)

 Paperback 1090: Avon 706 (PBO, 1956)

Title: Operation Intrigue

Author: Walter Hermann (aka Walter Wager)

Cover artist: Uncredited, dammit

Condition: 8/10 

Value: $10

Best things about this cover: 

• "Operate!?" "It takes a very steady hand..."
• I feel like Pensive McGee there is about to exclaim, "Hey, what if we split this into two different games: Battleship ... and Operation!" "You mean, 'Operation Intrigue', of course." "No, there's no intrigue. There's just this goofy looking guy on an operating table and you try to remove his various body parts without getting an electric shock." "O ... K, but can I still use my baton? I must insist that this be a baton-based game. Look how fun it is, pointing and pushing, doo doo doo..." And somehow this all leads to a war in Southeast Asia 10 years later.
• I love the hard edge dividing the foreground from the background of this painting. It's like the guy on the right is mad at the people on the left 'cause their side of the painting is boring as hell. "I'm over here looking like the baddest hardboiled motherfucker this side of Flatbush, and those dorks are playing board games? Nah, this won't stand. This is my cover. They gotta go."
• Seriously, that's a great-looking fist and a perfectly level gun. I like how the guy is literally too big for the frame. "They think these little white lines can hold me? Me and my fedora will show 'em, we'll show 'em all!"

Best things about this back cover: 

• Wow, that is ... quite a "7". They're really leaning into that numerical visual concept. Big, fat Pop Art-lookin' "7." Nothing scarier, nothing more ... intriguing ... than a "7," that's for sure. 
• You got a cool name like OPERATION MINOTAUR and you decide to call your book OPERATION ... INTRIGUE? INTRIGUE? Not exactly evocative of anything or memorable in anyway. And then you put a "7" on the back? Real missed Minotaur opportunities here, is what I'm saying.
• That third paragraph reads like a question on a standardized math test. "If five men and two women are checked by four counter-espionage agencies, how many Minotaurs etc."

Page 123~

He had done this massive thing. He felt so strong and proud and clever. Then he thought of the women's clubs and creamed chicken luncheons he would never have to face again, looked at the handsome muscular sailors, and smiled. They were fine healthy lads. They were his friends.

I'm just gonna assume the "massive thing" is coming out, good for him, Happy Pride, everyone!

~RP

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Paperback 1060: The Troubled Midnight / Rodney Garland (Lion Library LL 128)

Paperback 1060: Lion Library LL 128 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: The Troubled Midnight

Author: Rodney Garland

Cover artist: Charles Copeland

Condition: 7/10

Value: ~$15

Best things about this cover:

• Satan Had Yellow Eyebrows!
• Love this dude's "sneering supercilious billionaire face." Too bad half of it got blown off somehow.
• "Look at the little worms, fighting over nothing, doomed to fail ... pathetic. I regret that I have but one eye to glower at them with."
• If there aren't airplanes involved, you cannot call it a "novel of flight." That's the rule.
• For a grade A thriller, make sure you steep your novel in reality for at least three but no more than five minutes. Any longer and it loses that delicious cheesy taste.

Best things about this back cover:

• The searing tale of a woman's forbidden love for her bedpost! "When her midnight became troubled, she turned to the one solid, upright thing in her life ..."
• Wow, they really don't want you to know anything about the plot, do they?
• Marseilles? Huh. Did not see that coming. With that build-up, I was thinking maybe "Rome" or "Moscow" or something, but no, Marseilles, sure, let's go with that.

Page 123~

The shop was full of people, some trying out fountain pens or buying postcards, others, like a girl I noticed with hairy legs like a deer, and obviously from the Midi, browsing.

Dude needs to go back to Comma School. Also, "like a deer?" Like a deer's legs ... are hairy? Like a deer browses? Like a browsing hairy deer from the Midi browses? I honestly don't know what I'm supposed to be picturing here. Some kind of sexy bibliophilic satyress?  Maybe just buy your mystery novel and go back to your garret, Pierre.

~RP

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Paperback 1019: The Primitive / Chester Himes (Signet 1264)

Paperback 1019: Signet 1264 (PBO, 1956)

Title: The Primitive
Author: Chester Himes
Cover artist: [Tony Kokinos] (signature top left)

Condition: 6.5/10
Estimated value: $30

Best things about this cover:

• White lady trying hard not to think about centuries of brutal racism and her own complicity therein ... I assume.
• There's drunk, there's very drunk, and then there's "I only made it half way through taking my shoes off" drunk
• The red of the red shoes is very red against the non-color of everything else. Echoes the title font color. I like.
• This novel was heavily cut for the US audience, which, like, couldn't deal, I guess. It was published right before Himes made the turn into hardboiled crime fiction with his Coffin Ed Johnson and Gravedigger Jones series (so great)

Best things about this back cover:

• The End of a Primitive was the original title of the book (the title used when the book was finally published in unexpurgated versions, 40+ years later)
• So the white woman is just white but the "Negro man" is "embittered"? Normally I don't beg for more adjectives, but come on.
• Van Vechten tryna get cute with that "white heat" shit, I bet. He's a white dude who wrote a book called Ni**er Heaven. A key figure in white people's "discovering" Harlem. I highly recommend Mat Johnson's current comic, Incognegro: Renaissance, which is set in Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance and features a Van Vechten-like figure in the first issue. Good stuff.

Page 123~

"Oh, sure," he said, thinking, "I like de big gut, do you like de big gut?"

~RP

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Paperback 1006: The Pusher / Ed McBain (Perma Books 3062)

Paperback 1006: Perma Books 3062 (PBO, 1956)

Title: The Pusher
Author: Ed McBain
Cover artist: Charles Binger

Condition: 6/10
Estimated value: $35


Best things about this cover:

• This cover is full of wonders, but the very most amazing part, for me, is luminescent cop face looking back over his shoulder like, "Uh ... wasn't me."
• Pictorially, I love the placement of the bare light bulb, but looks to be hanging about waist-high, which ... come on, even shitty apartments have to be moderately practical. Maybe he didn't kill himself 'cause of dope. Maybe he just got so frustrated at trying to get the light bulb to hang right that he was just like, "fuck it, I'm out."
• This seems an unlikely position / location in which to hang oneself. I'm no expert. But still.
• Detective: "This looks like ... what is this some kind of miniature turkey baster? Hey, Jim, come here and look at this?"
• The turn of his ankle is lovely and tragic. Same with the stubbed out cigarettes.

Best things about this back cover:

• Seriously, this is one of the grimmer back covers, after one of the grimmest covers I've ever seen. This book's not messing around.
• Aha! It *wasn't* suicide by hanging. Well, let me be the first to say, it honestly didn't look like suicide by hanging.
• Not a big fan of back covers that basically describe the front cover, tbh. SEEN IT! Tell me something I don't know.

Page 123~

She supposed, of course, that there were men who would try anything once, just for kicks. Why not a girl who couldn't hear or talk?

My favorite part of this is, "of course."

~RP

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Paperback 964: This Kill Is Mine / Dean Evans (Graphic 131)

Paperback 964: Graphic 131 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: This Kill Is Mine
Author: Dean Evans
Cover artist: Oliver Brabbins

Estimated value: $12-15
Condition: 7/10

Best things about this cover:

• She knows we know she's justified. If anyone's begging to be shot, it's that guy. I can almost hear him saying "Cheers, m'lady [hic!]"
• I'm oddly mesmerized by the lamp, which appears to be apparating.
• I believe those are what Christa Faust would call "bitch eyebrows."
• Liquor gone. Glasses empty. Nothin' left to do but shoot this bozo and burn the place down. (At least I assume what that matchbook in the foreground is for)

Best things about this back cover:

• When Musical Chairs Gets Out of Hand.
• She Taunted the Loser ... with Dance!
• Awesome double fear-hand on our anonymous victim here.
• I literally don't understand that first sentence.
• "Arnold Weir figured" is an awkward way to intro your protagonist's name.
• The more I read, the stranger—and less grammatical—this story gets.

Page 123~

Little burrs and clicks floated across space between us while I thought about it.
"Well?"
"All right," I said finally. "Your place."

~RP

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Paperback 942: Q.B.I. / Ellery Queen (Pocket Books 1118)

Paperback 942: Pocket Books 1118 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: Q.B.I.
Author: Ellery Queen
Cover design: Milton Herder

Estimated value: $5-8
Condition: 5/10

Best things about this cover:

• It's like the F.B.I. but queer. I imagine.
• This cover wins awards for "Most Visible Thumbprint" and "Best Kempt Cilia"
• Where can I get one of these switchblade micro-monocles? Judging by this guy's pupil dilation, they seem fun.

Best things about this back cover:

• Type script is best.
• No Nouns Allowed Without Adjectival Guardian
• Kid Naping. That word *never* looks right to me.

Page 123~ (first line of "Dying Message Dept.: G. I. Story")

Ellery swung off the Atlantic State Express in his favorite small town disguised by earlaps, muffler, and skis, resolved that this time nothing should thwart his winter holiday.

You'll Never Guess What Happens Next! (spoiler: holiday thwarted)

~RP

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Paperback 875: Live and Let Die / Ian Fleming (Perma Books M-3048)

Paperback 875: Perma Books M-3048 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: Live and Let Die
Author: Ian Fleming
Cover artist: James Meese

Estimated value: $75-100

Best things about this cover:

• The world's most ruthless diving coach doesn't want to hear your bullshit about the Chinese judge having it in for you.
• "Scrooge McDuck had to go on vacation. You deal with me now."
• You'd think with all those gold coins, he could afford a nicer office. Something less in-a-cave.
• Just in case you didn't notice: this cover is all kinds of fabulous.

Best things about this back cover:

• Tee-Hee. No, I'm not laughing, that's his name. His name is Tee-Hee. Tee-Hee. OK, now I'm laughing. Keep up!
• No reaction shot from Bond. I assume he just stiff-upper-lipped it, then bagged a leggy stewardess/assassin, then had a martini.
• "Take Mr. Bond to Central Perk … introduce him to Ross and Phoebe. You're job's a joke, you're broke, your love life's DOA, Mr. Bond."

Page 123~

Soon they were over Miami and the monster chump-traps of the eastern seaboard, their arteries ablaze with neon.

Monster chump-traps! Nice phrase, Mr. Fleming.

~RP

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Paperback 770: The Man Who Japed / Philip K. Dick // The Space-Born / E. C. Tubb (Ace D-193)

Paperback 770: Ace D-193 (1st ptg / 1st ptg, 1956)

Title: The Man Who Japed / The Space-Born
Author: Philip K. Dick / E. C. Tubb
Cover artist: Ed Emshwiller / Ed Valigursky

Yours for: $25


Best things about this cover:

• Jackie gonna be *a* severed-headball sta-ar!
• When college pranks go awry. "We said 'japery,' Jackie. 'Japery.' You call beheading the dean 'japery'!?"
• The best, and I mean the Very Best, part of this cover is the teeny arm waving goodbye / pleading for help from beneath the jagged stick pile.

Best things about this other cover:

• Death was their pilot, fear their fuel, underground hot-oil wrestling their passion!
• Hey, you've got to hide your love away! (from the flying pestle-wielding space golems)
• "Halt! Halt! Freddie Mercury wants his boots back! Remove the boots at once or face extreme golem-pestle interrogation enhancement!"

Page 123~ (from The Space-Born)

He stared at the knives in the hands of the searchers.

"Wait … those aren't knives," Tom whispered to Jerry. "Those are just pestles. I say we run for it!"

~RP

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Paperback 748: Fair Prey / Will Duke (Graphic 142)

Paperback 748: Graphic 142 (PBO, 1956)

Title: Fair Prey
Author: Will Duke [pen name of William Campbell Gault]
Cover artist: Oliver Brabbins

Yours for: $22


Best things about this cover:

• Will duke for food.
• She is sporting some pretty serious shoulder muscle definition. 
• It's like fair play. Only it's prey. Get it?
• It's all kind of chaotic. Too crowded, too many things happening. Like some reality show where people compete to see who gets to be the actual cover subject. Dead man is very convincing, but the lady is going full axilla … that's going to be hard to beat. But wait, here comes a cop … with a drifter in his wake, trying to impede him … this is tough to call, Jim.

Best things about this back cover:

• Golf. Huh. Didn't see that coming.
• "Out of my way, baby. That breakfast buffet's calling my name."
• This is some pretty low-grade cover copy. I'm at least vaguely familiar with golf terminology, but … can you be "in" par? Is that a recognizable play on words, or just faux-sensational nonsense?

Page 123~

I remember the gulp and the moisture in my eyes, but I don't remember what I said. 

"The Gulp and the Moisture" was, of course, Norman Mailer's far, far less successful follow-up to "The Naked and the Dead."

~RP

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Paperback 714: The Violent Hours / Frank Castle (Gold Medal 554)

Paperback 714: Gold Medal 554 (PBO, 1956)

Title: The Violent Hours
Author: Frank Castle
Cover artist: Lu Kimmel

Yours for: $14


Best things about this cover:

• "Hi, Murder? Hi! I was wondering, if you weren't too busy, maybe you'd like to come over for some love? .... You would!? Great! I'll put on something red and light a candle. See you soon!"
• There is a whole subgenre of cover art that involves Girls Spilling Over The Edges Of Beds. Here's one. I know I've seen Many, many more.
• This position offers Optimal Breast Viewing but does pretty terrible things to every other part of the body. Her hair looks like a wasp's nest.

Best things about this back cover:

• "Ooh, it's half past murder. Time to look in my pants again!"
• "Sheeted."
• "Webb Grayburn" is not a name that inspires confidence. Sounds like a guy who owns an above-ground pool dealership.
• OK, it's mostly text, but I still love the asymmetrical, crayon-like design with the whimsical, face-free clock hands. 
• The book comes pre-distressed, so the actual wear and tear around the edges of the book fits right in with the book's original aesthetic.

Page 123~

It became so quiet in the room that the distant clatter of a teletype became loud.

It's not the most elegant sentence, by a longshot, but I do like the aural experience it provides.

~RP

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Paperback 570: The Big Bite / Charles Williams (Dell First Edition A114)

Paperback 570: Dell First Edition A114 (PBO, 1956)

Title: The Big Bite
Author: Charles Williams
Cover artist: Arthur Sussman

Yours for: $30


Best things about this cover:

• If, god forbid, I ever get taken hostage, please let it look like this.
• I love this so much. Sexy, menacing, and depraved. Manages to combine realism, abstraction, and surrealism into one hot, delicious tableau. The orange background is inspired. That bed frame is like something out of a Tim Burton film.
• The small details make this painting exquisite—her: the haughty eyebrows, the cocky hand-on-hip, the neglected negligee strap, the ambiguously hovering cigarette hand (Will she offer him a drag? Burn his thigh? Who knows!?). Him: the resigned backward tilt of his head, the perfectly framed limp hand, the perfect-electric-white shirt. This is hall-of-fame cover art, for sure. 

Best things about this back cover:

• MWAH!
• That "life's a jungle" paragraph is about as good an expression of noir philosophy as I've read since the Flitcraft story in "The Maltese Falcon."
• Charles Williams was a paperback hero. Well admired by crime fiction aficionados, long forgotten by most others.

Page 123~

She said nothing. I went on out and got in the car. On the way out of town I stopped at a small grocery and bought a dozen cans of beer and some more supplies for the kitchen. I picked up a roll of the plastic film they use to wrap things in a refrigerator with, and two rolls of scotch tape. I bought fifty pounds of ice, wrapped it in an old blanket, and shoved off for the lake. 

I love the "How-the-fuck-am I-supposed-to-know-what-Saran-wrap-is-called!?" attitude of this paragraph.

~RP

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Paperback 544: Nightfall / David Goodis (Lion Books 131)

Paperback 544: Lion Books 131 (1st thus, 1956)

Title: Nightfall
Author: David Goodis
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: $50

Best things about this cover:

• There are really too many things going on on this cover for it to make any kind of visual sense. It's like I"m watching a stage play about some woman who was hurt in a tragic accident and is now, through the love of one strong man, learning to walk ... but then the soul of the dead body represented by the chalk outline on the ground is so disgusted by the false pathos of the scene that he rises up in horror and flees ... and immediately has a heart attack. Nightfall!
• David Goodis was good at writing. His books are pretty collectible, and this one, despite some bumps and bruises, is clearly unread. Gorgeous. One of my earliest two-figure (i.e. it cost me more than $10) purchases, and probably the first that made me realize "holy shit, you are really collecting these things now."
• I do love the unusual, if creepy, color of this cover, and the bright, nutso font on the title.
• Movie tie-in! Collectible subgenre! Hey, is the ghost of the corpse ... is that ... fear hand?! Behind the "A" and the "L"!? Judges say .... ding ding ding!

Best things about this back cover:

• Bancroft! So early ...
• Aldo Ray sounds like a prog rock band.
• "Taut" ... "swift" ... "searing" ... nope, sorry, no "frank." 

Page 123~

The type he was dealing with was the most dangerous and clever of them all. On the surface a soft-voiced innocence, an unembroidered sincerity. Beneath the surface a chess player who could do amazing things without board and chessman.

"What are you doing?" "Playing chess in my mind." "Amazing."

~RP

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Paperback 538: Nightmare Alley / William Lindsay Gresham (Signet 1326)

Paperback 538: Signet 1326 (4th ptg, 1956)

Title: Nightmare Alley
Author: William Lindsay Gresham
Cover artist: James Avati

Yours for: $21



Best things about this cover:

• A noir classic. Early editions (Signets, like this one) are pretty rare. New York Review of Books reissued this book a couple years ago.
• "Nightmare Alley, or The Carny's Ennui"
• "I'm so ashamed that Eddie Munster has to see me in this get-up."
• Not just "frank"—"Brutally Frank!" This book is so frank, it hurts my eyeballs.
• No lie, I love her outfit. Pants could be a little lower-waisted, but the bra is a total win.

Best things about this back cover:

Ooh, the rarely seen "Double Frank" paperback. Nice. Whoa, triple ... though that SF Chronicle quote is really just a callback of the front cover copy.

William Lindsay Gresham is not happy with how this photo session is going.

"Magician."

Page 123~

Under that brilliant stare she began to simper and found it difficult to control her hands.

This explains why she's looking away from him and anchoring her hands on the edge of the, let's say, dunk tank.

~RP

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Paperback 442: Intruder in the Dust / William Faulkner (Signet S1253)

Paperback 442: Signet S1253 (6th ptg, 1956)

Title: Intruder in the Dust
Author: William Faulkner
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: $6


Best things about this cover:

• Unsure of how to deal an effective kidney punch, Ted consulted the mob. "Here? Is this right?"
• One way to put a black guy on the cover without putting a black guy on the cover: put him way in the distance and make him bend over to pick up his hat. Also, looks quite natural...
• "Murder and Violence Rip a White Man's Hat-Wearing Convention"

Best things about this back cover:

• Signet covers are generally sedate, often to the point of being dull as dishwater. Back covers are rarely sensational either. What I like about this one is that someone gave the tagline writer / designer permission to go crazy. "Red letters ... some kind of 'tribal' font ... my lands!"
• "Mob Fury" would be a good band name.

Page 123~

"What's going on around here, Shurf?"

"I'm going to open this grave, Mr. Gowrie," the sheriff said.

"No, Shurf," the other said, immediate, with no change whatever in the voice: not disputative, nothing: just a statement: "Not that grave."

"Yes, Mr. Gowrie," the sheriff said. "I'm going to open it."

First, "Shurf"! That's good dialogue. Second, you gotta admire the writer so unafraid of colons that he'll put three in one sentence. Just 'cause.

~RP

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Paperback 415: Galaxy (January, 1956)

Paperback 415: Galaxy, January 1956

Authors include: Alan E. Nourse, James E. Gunn, Lester del Rey, Robert Abernathy, Robert Sheckley, and Richard R. Smith

Cover artist: Ed Emshwiller

Yours for: $8


Best things about this cover:

• A cover painting of astonishing detail, complexity, and charm. Hang out with it for a few minutes—it's really something.
• The sweat on Santa's brow does not look like sweat. The only comments I have border on the sacrilegious, so I'm gonna move on.
• Is he doing calculus?
• LOVE the way "EMSH" embeds his signature in his paintings (today, he's the author of the awesomely titled "How to Manage Reindeer in Space")
• I want that coffee pot So Bad...
• I know the dude has four arms, but he'd still never need more than two to hold a coffee cup, ergo that coffee cup is ridiculous.

Best things about this back cover:

• I just like that the "Science-hyphen-Fiction Book Club" has a "Dept. GX-1" — that's got government front / conspiracy theory written all over it.

Page 123~ (from "The Ties of Earth" by James H. Schmitz)

It sounded like an esoteric classification of varying degrees of human psi potential — an ascendant individual "new mind" threatening the entrenched and experienced but more limited older group, which compensated for its limitation by bringing functioning members of the "new mind" under its control or repressing or diverting their developing abilities.

That's what I like to call "teaching."


[More by EMSH...]
~RP

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Paperback 347: The Race of Giants / Matt Kinkaid (Dell First Ed. A118)

Paperback 347: Dell First Edition A118 (PBO, 1956)

Title: The Race of Giants
Author: Matt Kinkaid
Cover artist: Sam Bates

Yours for: $10


Best things about this cover:

• "... do you smell something funny? Hmm ... probably just my mustache. No, wait, my ass is on fire."
• Wow, he is a giant—keeps a herd of cattle in his back pocket.
• Love how he Fills the frame; also love the partial view of the horse. Not so keen on being able to see his long johns, but whatever.

Best things about this back cover:

• "Blood on his hands ... money on his mind!"
• Not the most realistic flames, but they are pretty.

Page 123~

Julius made a small sound of grim satisfaction. "Here comes the wagon."

~RP

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Paperback 342: I Fear You Not / Ben Kerr (Popular Library 763)

Paperback 342: Popular Library 763 (PBO, 1956)

Title: I Fear You Not
Author: Ben Kerr (pseud. of William Ard)
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: Not For Sale

Best things about this cover:

• "C'mon, this is prime lady flesh. At $4.95 / lb. ... you're not gonna get a better price than that!"
• "Take My Wife... seriously, take her, she's drivin' me and my pal Barney here nuts!"
• "Hi, Steve? I'm just calling you from my bubble bath to tell you that I fear you not, OK? OK, bye."
• *He Bought Cops The Way He Bought Women ... With A Nice Dinner And A Little Sweet Talk*
• "Down I Go," HA ha.
• The exclamation point motif (continued, in spades, on the back cover) is Exquisite.

Best things about this back cover:

• Poor Rita: "Ok, I've got on a sweater, parka, overcoat, headscarf ... so how 'bout now?" "Nope, sorry, you still look naked." "Damn it!" "Maybe tweed will work. Try tweed."
• Poor Paul: It's hard to come out to your mom, on the phone, in the '50s.
• Poor Gloria: She just looks really, really stupid.

Page 123~

He watched dispassionately as her shadowy figure gathered up clothes and put them on. It was a lithe young figure, a pleasure to watch in motion, but its bloom was aborning."

Easy on the thesaurus work there, Yeats. "Aborning?!" As in "Your writing is 'aborning' me to tears?"

~RP

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Paperback 320: Gunpoint! / John L. Shelley (Graphic 124)

Paperback 320: Graphic 124 (PBO, 1956)

Title: Gunpoint!
Author: John L. Shelley
Cover artist: Saul Levine

Yours for: $11


Best things about this cover:

• I love how excited the title is just to be alive! Exclamation point! And I *love* how the exclamation point is *so* excited that it's falling over.
• I also love how the shooter is making that great, wincey, western, "I'll get ye, ye rascally varmint" face.
• His partner has fallen in perhaps the most awkward position I've ever seen a dead body in on a paperback cover.
• Check out the interior title page — very cool:

And the back cover:


Best things about this back cover:

• "Let Sleeping Lawdogs Lie" is phenomenally lame. Is "lawdog" even a word?
• "Lived to kill ... killed to live ... wrong end of a rope ... right end of a gun" — somebody's been practicing his bad movie trailer patter.

Page 123~

Broady came to him, an ancient Sharps buffalo gun in the crook of his arm. His broad face split in a dusty grin and he patted the stock of the weapon.

~RP

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57 Books from the University Book Sale: Book 57

Title: Fightin' Fool (Pocket 2316, 5th ptg, 1956)
Author: Max Brand
Cover artist: Tom Ryan

Yours for: $7

• "Fightin' Fool!" — well, title, you're at least half right.
• Before the Tiger Woods fist pump, there was this.
• You gotta love this guy's enthusiasm. He hasn't even managed to get out of the manacles, and yet he's still super-psyched: "That's right, I got guns ... plural!"

• Best tag line in a long, long time. Jingo! It's like Jenga and Yahtzee rolled into one, and yet dangerous close to a racial slur at the same time. Edgy! I only wish it read, "Nobody plays Jingo, sucker!"
• This back cover copy is a random excerpt and tell us nothing about the story. Except that Jingo is kind of shooty.
  
• The last simile doesn't really work, in that getting your fingers into a glove can be awkward and would likely involve way more time than your enemy would need to drop you. You also need two hands to do it (unlike drawing and firing a sidearm ... assuming westerns haven't been lying to me all these years). I think the writer was thinking of the idiom of something's "fitting like a glove," and then just ... went off track.

Page 123~

Wheeler Bent was silent. He stared at the girl with half-closed eyes, for suddenly it came over him that Jingo was as like this girl as though he had been born her twin.

First, why are the girl's eyes half-closed? Second, "Wheeler Bent" indicates that Max Brand was awesome with names, and that Jingo was no fluke. Third, everything after "Jingo" in that second sentence is a stylistic disaster. We could start with the redundancy of "born" (how else can you be somebody's twin?) but by the time the sentence gets there, it's already an ungainly mess.

~RP

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