Paperback 1089: Fashions for Carol / Nell Marr Dean // Barbara Ames, Private Secretary / Jeanne Judson (Ace Double F-112)

 Paperback 1089: Ace F-112 (1st ptg / PBO, 1961)

Title: Fashions for Carol / Barbara Ames, Private Secretary

Author: Nell Marr Dean / Jeanne Judson

Cover artist: [Rudy Nappi] / Uncredited

Condition: 7/10

Value: $10

Best things about this cover: 

• See, the cover *wants* you to believe she's sizing him up as a romantic prospect, but I know she's really plotting how to take his job, or kill him. Or both. Enjoy your three-martini lunch, Steve. It may be your last.
• I love how Rudy Nappi was like "OK, if I you're not gonna let me do full-body art, I'm giving Everything I Got to this girl's hair!" The results are astonishing. Massive, swirling, architecturally impeccable.
• Again, I say, to no one in particular, that there's No Way she can actually see him from this angle. Artists get away with this physics-defying over-the-shoulder glance All The Time and I hate that it works. Even my brain is like "yes, she is giving him a sly sidelong glance" when I know that it is Physically Impossible unless there is a mirror somewhere off-screen. Stupid gullible brain.
• Steve's mad that he has to work somewhere so pink. "It's not manly is all I'm sayin'..." he mumbled

Best things about this back cover: 

• "'Just a small town girl ... living in a big time job' —nah, that doesn't rhyme. How 'bout "Just a small town girl ... brunette hair refused to curl'? No. '... runnin' from some guy named Earl'? Dammit, words are hard!" [Steve Perry writing "Don't Stop Believin'," probably]
• The art is much worse on this side of the book, but I want to live in this blue world of mid-century office furniture.
• I like Barbara. She's like "I refuse to pose sexy for you or the undertaker behind me or anyone. Now if you're quite through ogling me, I have work to do." Respect.
• What is that guy doing with his hand!? Flashing gang signs? Holding a sack of potatoes to his sternum? I wouldn't look at him either, Barbara.

Page 123~ (from Fashions for Carol]

    He pretended toughness. "But when we're married, you've got to come to every game. And you've got to be a good Texas Democrat."

    She quivered with a happiness she had never known before.

Wow, the orgasmic power of the phrase "Texas Democrat," who knew? 

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and BlueSky]

Paperback 841: The Bombshell / Carter Brown (Signet 1767)

Paperback 841: Signet 1767 (1st ptg, 1960)

Title: The Bombshell
Author: Carter Brown
Cover artist: Barye Phillips

Estimated value: $8-10


Best things about this cover:

• One of the few crime novels to take place entirely inside a circus tent.
• Either that is a letter-perfect come-hither look or the rabid dog on her head has burrowed deep into her skull and now has full mind-control capabilities.
• That is one hell of a negligee. So … negligible.
• You can tell police dude is confused. "Shoot the thing on her head … or ask her out? Damn it, this job's hard!"
• Title font victory! Total A+.

Best things about this back cover:

• I think I found my new look for 2015. I am only 1/4 kidding. (The 1/4 that contains the cigarette)
• Anagrams to LIE TALLY, which I'm sure is high, 'cause she's a blonde dame, know what I'm sayin'? Also LIT ALLEY, where she buys all her books, and TILE ALLY, as she's known in the bathroom flooring industry.
• carter brown sold 25.5 million books without capital letters in his name so he's not about to start now.

Page 123~

 "Al!" She jumped up and down gleefully. "That thing's a microphone, isn't it?"

"It's whatever you want it to be, baby."

~RP

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Paperback 817: Hero's Lust / Kermit Jaediker (Lion 156)

Paperback 817: Lion Books 156 (PBO, 1953)

Title: Hero's Lust
Author: Kermit Jaediker
Cover artist: Lou Marchetti

Yours for: $17


Best things about this cover:

• "The Quick Brown Fox wants you should shaddup!"
• That tie has a mind of its own.
• I like the puffy letters.
• Miss Axilla, 1953
• Seriously, though, she's pretty damned hot and I enjoy what she is wearing.  I can't recall seeing a top quite like that on paperback covers before. Spaghetti straps!

Best things about this back cover:

• OK, +1million points for the juxtaposition of "the City stank" with her armpit.
• Aw, I was sad to see the writer give up on the alliteration there in the first paragraph. I can think of at least one double-hard-C phrase that could substitute for "harlot's smile"...
• "Damnfool" is a first-rate adjective.

Page 123~

"No prostitute walks our streets."

The whole page is a delightfully delusional newspaper editorial.

~RP

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Paperback 742: The Quick Brown Fox / Lawrence Schoonover (Bantam 1178)

Paperback 742: Bantam 1178 (1st ptg, 1953)

Title: The Quick Brown Fox
Author: Lawrence Schoonover
Cover artist: Harry Schaare

Yours for: $16


Best things about this cover:

• "Hey, baby, I'm just a quick brown fox looking for a lazy dog … wait, let me rephrase that … oh, man, I shouldn't have drunk All That Alcohol."
• I count five bottles. I assume other people were there, earlier.
• I love this cover so much. So many details. Wreaths! Charts! Rolodexes! Typewriters! 
• I also love her I-could-take-you-or-leave-you expression. Seriously sexy.

Best things about this back cover:

• Gah. Horrible.
• You'll pardon me if I don't think "dry Gibsons, quick seductions and eccentric clients" sound "dreary."
• There is a hole-punch in the shape of an apostrophe at the bottom left of this back cover. I have no idea why.

Page 123~

But lately, Betty said, while Don was drinking so much and getting all these weird and twisted notions about her, the banks had been uncooperative with some of his loans and the finance company had been pressing them about payments on the car. 

Let me get this straight: it's a book about mid-century Madison Avenue and two of the main characters are a couple named "Don" and "Betty"? And "Don was drinking…" Huh. Interesting. Sounds familiar.

~RP

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Paperback 735: The Wanton / Carter Brown (Signet 1713)

Paperback 735: Signet 1713 (1st ptg, 1959)

Title: The Wanton

Author: Carter Brown

Cover artist: Barye Phillips

Yours for: $8

Best things about this cover:

• "Emerging from the giant green space womb on her ornate hovercraft, Suzie began putting her magnetic hands to work..."
• Spangle tights!
• Wantons sure sit funny.

Best things about this back cover:

• Carter Brown, Private Accountant
• "Mom says I'm not supposed to smoke around the typewriter, but … I'm kind of a rebel."
• "…with death" — just add it to anything you happen to be saying for more drama.
• Who is Mavis Seidlitz and how do I get my hands on one of her (her?) mysteries?

Page 123~

Late the following afternoon, I sat in the visitor's chair—the one with springs—and watched the beaming smile on the Sheriff's face.

Because visitors like to *bounce* *bounce* *bounce* ….

~RP

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Paperback 471: Model for Murder / Stephen Marlowe (Graphic 94)

Paperback 471: Graphic 94 (PBO, 1955)

Title: Model for Murder
Author: Stephen Marlowe
Cover artist: Walter Popp

Yours for: $16

Best things about this cover:

• I have no idea what these people are up to, but that cigarette and that cigar are getting it on.
• Finally, a taut thriller about the exciting, dangerous world of copyediting.
• Steve is puzzled to find that his meticulously researched paper, "Broads: Stacked vs. Unstacked," merits only a B-. "I don't think I understand this whole 'Women's Studies' thing, Bernie."

Best things about this back cover:

• Kinsey!
• Out-Kinseyed Kinsey! "Screw this survey stuff, let's just install hidden cameras."
• Lady wrestlers! Be still my heart.
• Talk about ... Pop Grujdzak. Talk about ... Pop Grujdzak.
• If I had to invent a stupid-sounding last name, and had several days to do it, I still couldn't beat Wompler.

Page 123~

The clothing was Ken's naturally, and as I dressed and tested the stiffness in my left arm, I began to wonder. The arm couldn't have punched its way through a wet Kleenex tissue.

So ... he dresses up like Barbie's boyfriend and he has a lot of experience testing the tensile strength of wet Kleenex. He sounds dreamy.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]