Paperback 1109: To Tell Your Love / Mary Stolz (Scholastic Books T124)

 Paperback 1109: Scholastic Book Services T-124 (3rd ptg, 1961)

Title: To Tell Your Love

Author: Mary Stolz

Cover artist: Uncredited (but the book is "Illustrated by Artur Marokvia" so maybe the cover is him too—hard to tell since there's only one shitty illustration in the whole dang book for comparison)

Condition: 8/10

Value: $6-8

Best things about this cover: 

• To tell your love what? That you've developed Giraffe Neck? That an anvil fell on your head and now your head is flat like an anvil? That you see the world entire in greenscale? That you still use a landline? From the 1930s? What are you going to tell him, Anne!?
• Man, her hands are fucked up. I know it's hard to draw hands, but ... is it that hard? Poor Anne. She can barely clutch her pearls properly.
• "... and so I stared directly at the eclipse and now I only see green. Annnnyway. What about you, my love? What's weird about you? ... Hello? Hello?!"

Best things about this back cover: 

• Kitty! I love this book now.
• I hope this book is about the kitty. Is the kitty her love? Tell the kitty he's good, Anne! Scritch Him!
• Wow, that blurb is ... not exciting. Or even coherent. What do I care about Anne's sister? Or Nora, for that matter? This book should've been titled "To Tell Doug He's Boring." That, or "Kitty's Grand Sleeping Adventures!"

Page 123~

    "What sort of pet is Cooper taking?"

    "That rooster of his," Johnny replied, shaking his head.

    "Does Mr. Maloney approve of that?"

    "Sure," Johnny laughed. "Mr. Maloney says it'll do the rooster good to get away from home and the hens for a while."

Mr. Maloney's crude rooster jokes would constitute the entirety of Johnny's sex education, and for that, Johnny's mother was grateful.

~RP

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Paperback 1055: In Comes Death / Paul Whelton (Graphic 49)

Paperback 1055: Graphic 49 (1st ptg, 1952)

Title: In Comes Death
Author: Paul Whelton
Cover artist: Uncredited

Condition: 7/10
Estimated value: $15

Best things about this cover:

• Death looks kinda down-at-the-heels. Reduced to doing cheap hits. Must need the money.
• I'm obsessed with whatever she's wearing. Is that a ... housecoat? It looks too dressy for a nightgown, but too slovenly for outdoor wear. Lack of undergarments also suggests an indoors-only context, but ... yeah, what is this?
• She is very pretty and beautifully painted and I hate when there are no artist credits!
• Love the way she's wound the cord around her right hand. Nice touch. Fear hand (variation)!
• This scene looks very (Very) familiar ... 

... which is weird, since the movie came out two years *after* this book

and now the back cover:

Best things about this back cover:

• There is nothing intriguing, compelling, or even interesting about this description. Ooh, a "mysterious death." Aah, a "deadly game of wits." How ... specific and not-at-all boiler-plate.
• I want it to be Lonely Frog Lane, named after an actual lonely frog who lived there all alone, froggily
• This "describe the plot in complete but annoying vague sentences" really is bottom-of-the-barrel cover copy.

Page 123~

"Peace!" I intoned, making an exit.

Very slangy! Just like the kids intone it.

~RP

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Paperback 740: Your Own Party Book / Gertrude Crampton (Comet Books 23)

Paperback 740: Comet Books 23 (PBO, 1949)

Title: Your Own Party Book
Author: Gertrude Crampton
Cover artist: Abbi Damerow (illus.)

Yours for: $10


Best things about this cover:

• That. Record. Player.
• Pink! Honestly, this is a super-delightful cover. Makes the '40s seem like fun. Super-white, but still fun.
• And nothing says "fun" like "Gertrude Crampton."
• P.S. "Gay"

Best things about this back cover:

• Everyone's so skinny and happy and gay! Look at the adorable short pants and pigtails. Weenie roast! Let's all go back! Civil rights, shmivil rights, the '40s were fun!
• Holy crap, did phones still look like that in '49?! Is your date gonna pick you up in his surrey?
• Jane's glue-sniffing addiction got totally out-of-control at the Valentine's Day dance…

Page 123~

[A recipe for "English Monkey"] [Yes, seriously]

English Monkey
2 cups stale bread crumbs
2 cups milk
2 cups cheese in small pieces
2 tablespoons butter
2 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
A little pepper
1/4 teaspoon dry mustard
1 teaspoon thin bottled meat sauce

"Sprinkle with paprika to look stylish."

Note that they didn't have *kinds* of cheese in the '40s. Just "cheese." Also, I am unaccountably imagining a teamster grabbing his crotch and going "I got yer thin bottled meat sauce right here!"

I will straight-up *give* this book to someone if he/she promises to a. throw a party directly out of this book, and b. provide multiple photos.

~RP

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Paperback 419: The Doctor and the Dike / Jason Hytes (Midwood Y176)

Paperback 419: Midwood Y176 (PBO, 1962)

Title: The Doctor & the Dike
Author: Jason Hytes
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: $21


Best things about this cover:

• If that is his receptionist's regular office behavior, I'd say she has a bigger problem than (capital L!) Lesbianism.
• Love the expression on his face: "Hmmm, that's odd. My comically large diploma didn't prepare me for this eventuality..."
• Garters are sexy.
• I don't quite understand what she's supposed to be doing. Is that a dress she has just removed? Silk cloth with which she's performing some kind of dance? A space alien that has bitten her hand and won't let go?

Best things about this back cover:

• "Gwenn's breasts were too small" — I'm not sure that qualifies as "interesting"; "Gwenn's breasts spoke to her at night"—that would be interesting.
• I will give this back cover one thing: I *do* want to know what "his own problem" is now. Although if it's something as simple and predictable as "he keeps nailing his patients," I'll be at least a little disappointed.
• "Ow, my core!"

Page 123~

Reed wet his lips (1), suddenly parched, his mind aflame with thoughts of Patricia and her strange behavior (2). "This girl," he rasped drily (3), "what did she look like?" He balled his hands into tight fists as he awaited her reply.

1. First, gross. Second, when I played clarinet, I often used my lips to wet my reed.
2. Come on, just tell us! Between the back cover and this sentence, I've had just about enough of your ambiguity, mister.
3. I really wish I could post an audio file of me trying to recreate what this sounds like. I sound like an aging smoker picking someone out of a line-up ("This girl... [cough]").

~RP

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Paperback 365: Drawn to Evil / Harry Whittington & The Scarlet Spade / Eaton K. Goldthwaite (Ace D-5)

Paperback 365: Ace Double D-5 (PBO / 1st ptg)

Title: Drawn to Evil / The Scarlet Spade
Author: Harry Whittington / Eaton K. Goldthwaite
Cover artist: Norman Saunders / Norman Saunders??? (Uncredited)

Yours for: $65


Best things about this cover:

• "Hey, tiger, whaddya think of this cami-" "Aw, shut yer yap, you loony dame!"
• Hazel was afraid to tell Bill that his Vulcan salute still needed a lot of practice.
• "Hey, babe, I just found a buyer for this stolen VHS tape I've got in my coat pocket! Gimme a high five! ... Up top? ... Aw, c'mon, don't leave me hangin', babe!"
• "I will karate chop your ass, so help me God, woman!"
• Norman Saunders was a cover painter in the great days of pulp fiction. His flair for the sensational and overdramatic is strongly in evidence here.

Best things about this back cover:

• In my head, she is making the worst, whiniest, most horrible noise in her throat.
• "Can someone please inflate the blow-up doll the rest of the way! Tom's gonna be here any second ..."
• Are those gigantic ice cubes in the background?
• "Nope, the spade's still black, sweetheart. Try again."

Page 123 (from The Scarlet Spade)~

Denver Calhoun's eyes smoldered in his broad, white face as he watched the full progress of O'Moriarty's exit.

So, some fat-faced white guy named Denver has the hots for some super-Irish guy. So what's new?

~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 309: Yesterday's Love / James T. Farrell (Avon 260)

Paperback 309: Avon 260 (2nd ptg / 1st thus, 1950)

Title: Yesterday's Love
Author: James T. Farrell
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: $17


Best things about this cover:

• You know what they say: "Yesterday's Love, Today's Floating Head"
• Marion celebrates her victory in the "Ornamented Boobs" contest by ordering up a pizza for her and the floating head of her recently deceased boyfriend: "Oh, and get extra anchovies. I can't taste for shit since I became incorporeal."
• "Yes, hello, Home Depot? My wallpaper seems to have grown a head. Also, it's astonishingly ugly. Can you help?"
• "Studs Lonigan" always struck me as a great porn name. "Long Studsigan" might be better, though perhaps too spot-on.

Best things about this back cover:

• Yes, I knew it. "Frankness!" I was just perusing this back cover going "come on, some form of the word 'frank.'" — "These stories will sear you with their frankness!" Then they will put you in the oven of "brutal awareness" and gently roast you until you are cooked through.
• Is James T. Farrell the reason so many writers and hipster affect a scroungey "I could give a fuck" look. This guy's got it down pat. He's like the original. "Hair-combing's for squares! Fuck ties! Where are my cigarettes?"

Page 123~

She went to Sonny. Harry looked at her with utter contempt. His eyes were full of hatred. He got up and turned on the radio. He could hear the child babbling and gaily talking to its mother as she washed him. He turned off the radio and sat there waiting until they would take their walk. Then they would eat their supper, see another moving picture, and come back to the hotel. [final paragraph of "The Sport of Kings"]

~RP

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57 Books from the University Book Sale: Books 35 and 36

Last two non-fiction (-ish) books from my library sale haul. They make a nice pair, I think.

Title: Jefferson: A Great American's Life and Ideas (Mentor 70 — 2nd ptg, Dec. 1952)
Author: Saul K. Padover
Cover artist: Jonas

Yours for: $5

• Love the way "Abridged" is used as a major selling point — "Finally, our most important Founding Father, in a dose you can manage!"
• Floating Head of Thomas Jefferson backed by the Floating Declaration of Independence. My Most Powerful, Floatingest cover ever.
• "This planting season, why not outfit your team with Dr. E. J. Samuelson's newly patented Invisible Oxen Rigging! Amaze your friends as your oxen appear to pull your plow by sheer force of mind alone ..."

• "Living Words ... written on dead sheep."

Page 123~

For Aaron Burr was not famous for virtue or steadfastness of character, and the idea of such a man's occupying the presidential chair was disturbing to responsible men.

Title: Masters of Deceit (Pocket Books 75099 — 22nd ptg!?!?!, 1966)
Author: J. Edgar Hoover
Cover artist: Ben Feder (designer)

Yours for: $10

• "The Communists Will Spray Our Most Precious Documents with Ketchup, Make No Mistake!"

• "Hello, Frederick's of Hollywood? This is, uh, Edwina Hooverston ..."
• Blurbed his own book. Clever.

Page 123~

Five minutes later, a fourth person, a woman in a dark coat, arrives. Everything is quiet: no loud voices, no cars parked in front, no reason for the neighbors to suspect that a Communist Party meeting is in progress.

This book is really a fantastic window into Cold War paranoia. I might actually read it.

~RP

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57 books from the University Book Sale: Book 1

Title: The Confession + Sight Unseen
Author: Mary Roberts Rinehart
Cover artist: Victor Kalin

Yours for: best offer

"Mrrowr"
"Hello?"
"Meow?"
"Uh, I'm calling about the antique phone you advertised in the paper?"
"[purrrr]"
"Is this Rinehart?"

[My wife thought this was a book about a cat named "Rinehart," by a woman named Mary Roberts — a reasonable inference, I say]

Page 123~ (from "Sight Unseen")

Of Elinor Wells I have only my wife's verdict, and I have found that, as is the way with many good women, her judgments of her own sex are rather merciless.

~RP

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Glick!

R.I.P. Budd Schulberg (1914-2009)

Here's a British paperback of Schulberg's best-known (and probably best) novel:

[A hot cover of a hot book, sent to me by a reader with a good eye and good taste]

Click here to see Budd Schulberg's The Disenchanted ("Pop Sensation" Paperback 246)

~RP

Paperback 237: Call for Michael Shayne / Brett Halliday (Dell D269)

Paperback 237: Dell D269 (1st thus, 1959)

Title: Call for Michael Shayne
Author: Brett Halliday
Cover artist: Robert McGinnis

Yours for: $12


Best things about this cover:

• "I'm holding for Mike Shayne, so you can just wait your damned turn for the phone. Here, stare at the side of my left boob while you wait."
• One of the oddest cover poses I've seen for a McGinnis girl — casual gun play + casual, inexplicable semi-nudity. Yet the net effect is still smoking hot.
• For my birthday, I would really love it if one of you could PhotoShop this baby and make it say "Call For Michael Sharp" (my "real" name)
• I love the floating head of Mike Shayne. Quintessential tough dick.

Best things about this back cover:

• The fact that I have left the store's ID tag tucked into the back cover all these years. I love when stores are fastidious about labeling their shit.
• "The night of June 8" is tomorrow, fyi.
• We didn't need the first set of parentheses, let alone the second. What, are you whipsering?

Page 123~

Knowing Masters's reputation as a domineering bully, it seemed reasonable to expect his secretary to be a weak-kneed yes-man, a sycophant.

~RP

P.S. just hours after I posted this write-up, reader "Tulse" gave me this:


I should ask for stuff more often. Now I want it on a T-shirt. You're the best, Tulse. I'm truly grateful.

Paperback 115: 'K' / Leslie Waller (Gold Medal k1319)

Paperback 115: Gold Medal k1319 (PBO, 1963)
Title: 'K'
Author: Leslie Waller
Cover artist: uncredited

Yours for: $15


Best things about this cover:

• The "K", obviously - my favorite letter of the alphabet, by far.
  
• Easily the shortest title in my collection
• They've made Khrushchev look gregarious, drunk, lecherous, all at once. It's a nasty combo.
  
• I do not believe anyone would get up from a chair and leave it in exactly that condition
• The rifle appears to be floating. At that angle it couldn't possibly be propped up by the chair arm.
• Is that "K" supposed to look ... Sovietish? It's certainly Red.

Best things about this back cover:

• "Yes, hello! It's me, Nikita! I am watching you, you naughty minx..."
• In case you forgot that Khrushchev is communist, they have made him red to remind you.
• There's a fine art to near-murder now?
• Are those circles supposed to be bullet holes? Views through a rifle scope? Pips on a defective domino?

Page 123~

Lying at his feet, Ryder saw one meaty finger whiten at the knuckle as Ponamarenko started to squeeze the trigger.

I think that sentence opens with a misplaced modifier. Sounds like Ryder is lying at some other guy's feet, when I think the meaty finger is actually lying at Ryder's feet. These are the kinds of things I spend my life obsessing over. It's sad, really.

~RP

Paperback 39: Ace D-478

Paperback 39: Ace D-478 (PBO, 1960)

Title: Spacehive
Author: Jeff Sutton
Cover artist: Uncredited

"Hi honey, it's me. Yeah, can you tell me how to hold these compass thingies again? I'm pinching it between my thumb and forefinger while holding it in midair, but nothing seems to be happening. Uh oh, I gotta go. A miniature Soviet fighter just threw a gigantic numbered spider web over me. I'll see you tonight." [click]

Mmmm, Space Race anxiety. Thank you, Sputnik!

RP

Paperback 19: Cardinal C-362

Paperback 19: Cardinal C-362 (1st ptg, 1959)

Title: A Murder Is Announced
Author: Agatha Christie
Cover artist: Harry Bennett

Yours for: $7


Best things about this cover:

Not much, except the fact that this woman can apparently make the phone magically float up to her face. Otherwise, this is a pretty generic late 50s cover.

RP

Paperback 9 - Brandon House 705

Paperback 9: Brandon House 705 (PBO, 1964)

Title: Lesbian Starlet
Author: Tony Trelos
Cover artist: Unknown (there might be the faintest trace of a signature in the very lower left corner, but I can't make it out)

PRICE: SOLD! (4-12-08)


Best things about this cover:

• The title
• The world's least sexy office
• The mannish, silver-haired executive with the vacant stare who looks like a blow-up sex doll - is she taking her own temperature or pointing to some dental problem she's having, because whatever she's doing, she sure as hell isn't smoking
• "I paid for a lap dance, not a desk dance"
• "And thus concludes part 1 of my bra-removal seminar..."

I like trying to imagine what kind of interaction could possibly have led to the moment depicted on the cover. The back cover is a cheap, two-tone close-up of the front cover, with some choice copy:
Brandon House publishers did a lot of lesbian and other sex-themed paperbacks. The lesbian paperback was a major, popular niche market in early paperback fiction, and lesbian paperbacks are now very, very collectible. This is the most valuable book I've featured so far from my collection. Condition and scarcity and desirability are the three main features that determine resale value. This book is scarce and desirable, but there are a few condition problems. Condition here is a VG (Very Good) - there are some scuffs, and it's a bit dingy, but it's almost perfectly square and appears to be unread (no reading crease on the cover near the spine). It's probably worth around $35-40, and I wouldn't part with it for under $50. I do love the trashy, cheap paperbacks, and there are many, many more to come...

RP

The Great Paperback Project - Paperback 1: Ace Double D-27

As some of you know, and most of you don't - why would you? - I have a fairly sizable collection of Vintage Paperbacks. They date from about 1939 (the beginning of mass-market paperbacks) to about the mid-'60s, when book design (especially the covers) started to get unimaginative and ugly. I like beautiful books. With libraries so abundant, there is little point owning books any more unless they a. are very useful to you, or b. are beautiful. Cheaply made books with stupid, generic, cooked-up-in-some-marketing-lab covers depress the hell out of me. Someday, I will share with you my theory of contemporary book design (including the ironic similarity between the cover art of "women's literature" and snuff films), but for now, I begin a much happier project - putting my beautiful books on display, web-style! A few times a week, I will post a new picture of a vintage paperback cover from my collection. At that rate, my entire collection should be on-line in about ... 12-15 years. May we all live that long.

These covers will appear in no particular order (just as the books sit on the massive shelves next to me). I pull book off shelf, I scan, up it goes. I hope to spread some wee bit of appreciation for the beauty of mid-century paperbacks. I knew nothing about them until I stumbled on pictures in Robert Polito's great Jim Thompson biography. I found out that I could Never afford any of Thompson's paperback originals (not true, I own a couple now), but when I went into one of the many local used bookstores in Ann Arbor, I found that there were lots of Thompson-era (i.e. '50s) paperbacks lying around, lots of them with sensational cover art, and often available for reasonable prices. So I started buying. And buying. And Buying. This is what I did instead of writing my dissertation. Seriously. Thank you, Mellon Foundation. I know I didn't get my dissertation done during my fellowship like I was supposed to, but I amassed a hell of a paperback collection, so your money was well spent.

Paperback 1: Ace Double D-27 (PBO / 1st ptg, 1953)

Titles: Double Take / The Fingered Man
Authors: Mel Colton / Bruno Fischer
Cover artists: [Julian Paul] / Norman Saunders

Yours for: $17

"Don't shoot him! He's doughy. Shoot me between the shoulder blades instead."

Best things about this cover:

• She is hot
• Tag line: "She Was Hard To Meet And Deadly To Know" - "Meet" and "Know" are like the least active active verbs ever ... unless "Know" is biblical, in which case I take it back
• Brightness of her clothes (and lips) against drabness of the rest of the scene
• Love the "Killer's Eye View" - you'll see a number of these in my collection
• The gun is her spine - lots and lots of interesting / disturbing juxtapositions of women and weapons in my collection
• That's the roomiest interior I've ever seen on a standard automobile

And on the Flip Side...

"OK, ma'am, first thing you're going to want to do is stop choking yourself."

Best things about this cover:

• Her insane eyes, and insaner mouth
• The haunted phone that has wrapped its tentacle around her arm and is now forcing her to choke herself
• The gigantic, unmelting blocks of ice that look like three cars trying to pull into a narrow glass tunnel
• The original title: "Quoth the Raven," HA ha. Literary!
• The artist's signature ("Saunders") nestled along the edge of the newspaper

Ace Doubles are iconic mid-century paperbacks. Almost all paperbacks cost just a quarter from 1939 well into the '50s, but Ace Doubles were a little more, for good reasons. Double the content, double the cover art. Value!

One down, a couple thousand to go.

RP