Paperback 1037: Send Another Hearse / Harold Q. Masur (Dell 7737)

Paperback 1037: Dell 7737 (1st ptg, 1965)

Title: Send Another Hearse
Author: Harold Q. Masur
Cover artist: Greene (so he's just Greene, now? like Prince?) (see artist credit on back)

Condition: 10/10
Estimated value: $12
Best things about this cover:

• "I have other creative talents," whispered the brunette. Throatily, she added, "I hang wallpaper."
• I love Scott Jordan's expression. "Just gonna light this cigarette and settle in to watch this wallpaper-hanger lady take her clothes off and ... [ding dong] ... what the!? Goddammit, why did I even bother getting a No Solicitors sign if no one's gonna ****ing RESPECT it!?"
• I also love how jaded the title is. "Yep ... yeah ... I don't know, someone else died, I guess ... no we can't put 'em in the same hearse, you moron. SEND ANOTHER HEARSE!"

Best things about this back cover:

• That is not a martini glass. That is the Holy Grail.
• "Scott"? Come on. P.I.s go by last names. You switch to "Jordan" eventually, so your dumb first-name gambit actually makes everything weirdly unclear. Nevermind that both "Scott" and "Jordan" can be both first and last names. It's a mess. Just stick with last names, and you're good, man.
• What kind of chump just *opens* the hotel room door? No "Who is it?" or anything?

Page 123~

And, quite irrelevantly, I thought how various parts of the human anatomy behave differently under stress.

I think he's saying his penis is irrelevant, but who can be sure?

~RP

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Paperback 362: Bury Me Deep / Harold Q. Masur (Pocket Books 558)

Paperback 362: Pocket Books 558 (1st ptg, 1948)

Title: Bury Me Deep
Author: Harold Q. Masur
Cover artist: William Wirts

Yours for: $20


Best things about this cover:

• A quintessential keyhole cover (yes, it's a thing) — and an early one. Turns reader into an implied voyeur / peeping tom.
• 1948 (or thereabouts) seems to be a turning point in cover art — covers start to become more sensational, more sexual, more lurid ... If you click on "1947" or earlier in the tags for this site (sidebar), you'll see what I mean. Not sure why 1948 should be that year [the year of the first Kinsey Report!] ... but by the '50s, lurid and sensational will be the norm.
• I wish I could hear her undoubtedly learned disquisition on the merits of half-naked whisky-drinking.
• That underwear looks painted on, like she was drawn naked but then repurposed for this cover.
• Something about her face is off-kilter and strange, and her thumbless whisky-claw is mega-disturbing.

Best things about this back cover:

• Even the tagline is sensational. Sweet.
• "The lawyer in him" has the better cliché—hey, "inner man," who looks at a sexy woman in her underwear and thinks "gift horse!?"
• "Newest detective sensation," HA ha. How did that turn out, Scott Jordan?

Page 123~

Another shot exploded. I saw a spurt of flame from the muzzle spit luridly into the darkness beside a tree not fifty yards away. I arched my back, screamed like a frightened horse, threw out my arms and tumbled drunkenly to the ground.

Mmm, manly.

~RP

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