Paperback 1028: Footsteps in the Night / Dolores Hitchens (Permabook M-4261)

Paperback 1028: Perma Books M-4261 (1st ptg, 1962)

Title: Footsteps in the Night
Author: Dolores Hitchens
Cover artist: Harry Bennett

Condition: 8.5/10
Estimated value: $15

Best things about this cover:

• I have no idea what this book is about, but I love trying to work out what the hell is going on in this scene. Is she being stalked? Or is that just her husband wondering why the hell his drunk wife is wandering off in one shoe while holding the other shoe?
• Love her little fingernail-biting gesture. So perfectly pensive. "Hmmm ... now where did I leave my other shoe?" This is the shoe equivalent of losing your glasses because they are on top of your damned head.
• I'm not the biggest fan of Harry Bennett's art work—a little too sketchy/sloppy-looking for my tastes—but this scene is pretty evocative and intriguing. I just wish there were ... more of it. The '60s are a fast-moving tragedy for fully painted cover art. Canvas shrinks. Text takes over. I don't even like thinking about it.
• Dolores Hitchens is one of those writers I keep meaning to read but not reading. I think I read something of hers a while back and liked it. I just opened to a random page and this is the first thing my eyes hit: "Mrs. Holden's pouter-pigeon bosom strained the buttons of the blue quilted housecoat." OK, sure, I'm in.

Best things about this back cover:

• LOL text shaping. Actually, it's kind of perfect that her quizzical face is being used as the top end of a "?"
• This isn't the greatest back cover copy. There's no context for any of these names. You could just keep asking questions with random names and I'd be like "I ... don't know. Still don't know. Should I care? Who Are These People? What Is Happening In This Book?"
• Dronk! When you're not just drunk ...

Page 123~

"Cops are like this, as long as you admit what they want you to admit, they're okay. So I admit I was up there, in your house, and I left at such-and-such a time, and I got home at a certain hour and all that crap. You think they're going to lean on me, try to make me say what we were doing?"

Now I want to know what they were doing. According to an earlier paragraph on this page, it involved "hot yearnings." Hot shoeless yearnings, no doubt.

~RP

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57 Books from the University Book Sale: Book 4

Title: Stairway to an Empty Room (Popular Library, undated — early/mid-60s)

Author: Dolores Hitchens

Cover artist: uncredited

Yours for: best offer

• Oh, snap!
• Stairway to a massive car interior
• His left hand is Disgusting — like the claw of some mythical, horrifying sea creature
• "They said 'just lift the neck' ... why ain't there no candy comin' out! What good's a life-sized Pez dispenser if it don't put out!?"
• Dolores Hitchens is actually a pretty good writer

• One-armed, bow-legged spy with wide, rectangular wang = interesting logo choice
• "Expertly tautened!" — next time I see a pair of high, firm breasts, I'll know what to say

Page 123~

Biddy's fingers writhed inside Monica's. The hot eyes were frightened and unsure. "You let me alone. You get out of here."

If only that first sentence read "Biddy's fingers writhed inside Monica" — I might be inclined to read it.

~RP

Paperback 138: One-Way Ticket / Bert and Dolores Hitchens (Perma Books M-3100)

Paperback 138: Perma Book M-3100 (1st ptg, 1957)
Title: One-Way Ticket
Author: Bert and Dolores Hitchens
Cover artist: James Meese



Yours for: $7

Best things about this cover:

• "Railroad detective" - my favorite kind!
• The swirling green vortex of nausea and despair
• The distractingly child-like drawing of the upper half of a candle
• Cool stenciled font on the title
• That furniture - the proportions seem off and there are legs that appear to come from / go to nowhere, but in general, it's cool; spare, stark, mid-century modern in the very best way
• If only she hadn't cut her hair by herself in the dark with a bread knife, she would easily be one of the hottest women in my collection - understated yet stunning black dress (that's a dress, right, not a negligee?), fierce black slip-ons, and a perversely casual way with money. What's not to love?
  

Best things about this back cover:

• I love when back covers function like movie teasers: " ... MURDER! Featuring ... Boots! David Bryant! Some other B movie character actors whose names you don't know. And starring Jerry Mathers, as The Beav"
• Which of these names doesn't belong? A: "David Bryant" - what a dud. That last name really ruins the whole vibe of the back cover. Everyone else gets one colorful name, and he gets the full name of some guy from middle management.
• Wait, Rock dies? Uh, SPOILER ALERT!
• This all makes sense except for Boots. I mean, I could write the plot of this book, but I would have no idea what to do with Boots. David Bryant already has two women. Is Boots a cat?

Page 123~

This was a joke on Boots by Boots. They were all expected to enjoy it. They chuckled in chorus and Vic felt a fool.

I'm guessing it was a familiar feeling.

~RP