Paperback 880: Bump and Run / Marty Domres (Bantam N7253)

Paperback 880: Bantam N7253 (PBO, 1971)

Title: Bump and Run
Author: Marty Domres (w/ Robert Smith)
Cover artist: Uncredited (!@!^%&) [Bill Wenzel]

Estimated value: $15-20

Best things about this cover:

• It is criminal that the cartoonist didn't get credit here. CRIMINAL. (And yes, that *is* the first and most important comment I have about this cover) [this site credits Bill Wenzel, so … I'm going with that]
• One man's desperate quest for the Perfect Grope. He's so close! Leave him alone, you other ladies!
• I love how obliging the stewardess is. Heels *and* tiptoes *and* chest thrust. She looks more like a mermaid figurehead on an 18c. pirate ship than a human being in any kind of normal position.
• That is some classic '70s Playboy near-naked lady cartooning there.
• This book is much better written, and much more political (specifically anti-racist) than you'd expect from the cover.

Best things about this back cover:

• There is nothing I can add to improve on this.
• You cannot throw a football from that position.
• When you can cast spells like Marty, you don't need no stinkin' helmet.

Page 123~

We expect to find conditions everywhere as they are in California, where there is no craning of the neck and muttering, no indignant or unbelieving stares, no glowering visages at the sight of a black man and a white girl enjoying each other's company. Any place that sets out to bar blacks, in the manner of the unreconstructed South, might just as well put up a sign that closes the place to pro football players altogether.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]

Paperback 649: All-Pro Football Stars 1977 / Jerry Brondfield (Scholastic TK 3959)

Paperback 649: Scholastic TK 3959 (PBO? 1977)

Title: All-Pro Football Stars 1977
Author: Jerry Brondfield
Cover artist: photo cover

Yours for: $5


Best things about this cover:

• Not sure why I own this. Must've been overcome by a wave of nostalgia for my earliest days of sports awareness. 1977 was pretty much the year that pro sports entered my consciousness, and I became a big sports (and stats) fan very quickly thereafter.

Best things about this back cover:

• Nothing. I think the real reason I own this book must be the amazing interior photos—a dazzling array of mid-late''70s men's hair styles. In lieu of "Page 123," here are a few:

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]

Paperback 533: End Zone / Don DeLillo (Pocket Books 78282)

Paperback 533: Pocket Books 78282 (1st ptg, 1973)

Title: End Zone
Author: Don DeLillo
Cover artist: photo

Yours for: $8

Best things about this cover:

• Way outside my normal collection timeframe, but the cover (and author) caught my eye—seemed memorable / remarkable—like the last thing you see before you get strangled (to death, presumably).
• I like that it's a novel about football, but the cover only barely suggests this (title, font, "New Gladiators").
• That's the opposite of "Fear Hand"—most mid-century covers have a victim POV, with woman reacting to some kind of impending attack. Here, the attacker (in a context that can be only dimly imagined).

Best things about this back cover:

• Dang, high praise for a novel I've never heard of.
• "Is God a Football Fan?" is a pretty good tagline.
• So much for your Nostradamian powers, Cincinnati Enquirer.

Page 123~

"Gary Harkness. Good name. Promotable. I like it. I even love it."
"Thanks."
"Relax and call me Wally."
"Right," I said.

If anyone ever says "Relax and call me Wally," you're gonna want to end the conversation quickly and get out of there.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]