Paperback 920: Frankenstein / Mary Shelley (Collier)

Paperback 920: Collier (unnumbered) (6th ptg, 1973)

Title: Frankenstein
Author: Mary Shelley
Cover artist: Milton Glaser

Estimated value: $5-10

Best things about this cover:

• Milton Glaser rules. So cool to see his '60s psychedelic style brought to bear on Frankie's monster.
• I love how this painting makes the monster soft, serene, beautiful, human.
• I should really reread this. It's been forever.

Best things about this back cover:

• Blah, text. Next.

Page 123~

"I am malicious because I am miserable. Am I not shunned and hated by all mankind? You, my creator, would tear me to pieces, and triumph; remember that, and tell me why I should pity man more than he pities me. You would not call it murder if you could precipitate me into one of those ice-rifts, and destroy my frame, the work of your own hands. Shall I respect man when he contemns me? Let him live with me in the interchange of kindness; and, instead of injury, I would bestow every benefit upon him with tears of gratitude at his acceptance. But that cannot be; the human senses are insurmountable barriers to our union. Yet mine shall not be the submission of abject slavery. I will revenge my injuries: if I cannot inspire love, I will cause fear; and chiefly towards you my arch-enemy, because my creator, do I swear inextinguishable hatred. Have a care: I will work at your destruction, nor finish until I desolate your heart, so that you shall curse the hour of your birth."

God I love this. One of literature's great break-up speeches.

~RP

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Paperback 919: The Ugly American / William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick (Crest d365)

Paperback 919: Crest d365 (12th ptg, 1963)

Title: The Ugly American
Authors: William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick
Cover artist: Uncredited

Estimated value: $8-10

Best things about this cover:

• Aw, c'mon. Brando's not so bad to look at.
• "My prosthetic chin, she should come out to ... here, I think."
• Ooh, Screenplay by Stewart Stern! You sold me, book!

Best things about this back cover:

• But it is a free country, so ... this is like saying "If Gravity Did Not Exist..." and then showing the book floating off into space.
• I tend not to ignore slashing, Time Magazine, but thanks for the heads-up.
• This book is devastating, blunt, forceful, persuasive, urgent, fascinating, powerful, searching, and slashing, but it's not frank, so fuck it.

Page 123~

A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They're loud and ostentatious. Perhaps they're frightened and defensive; or maybe they're not properly trained and make mistakes out of ignorance.

I'm just gonna leave that one there.

~RP

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Paperback 918: Call for the Saint / Leslie Charteris (Avon 526)

Paperback 918: Avon 526 (1st ptg, 1953)

Title: Call for the Saint
Author: Leslie Charteris
Cover artist: Uncredited

Estimated value: $10-15

Best things about this cover:

• Tied-up lady's expression: "So, uh, are we gonna do this or aren't we? .... guys?"
• This looks more like ballet than a legit needle take-away. What is that showoff one-handed bullshit? With that dramatic right hand? WTF, Saint?
• Would-be assailant is both racially and genderly ambiguous. I'm going with Philippine woman, but that's a (needle) stab in the dark.
• This cover has needle *and* bondage, so it's priceless, no matter what the market dictates.

Best things about this back cover:

• She's got quadrilateral eyes!
• Needle me once, needle me twice!
• No shapely rags for you, missy!
• "Almost screamed"? Not sure if her voice didn't quite there, or if she thought better of it, and went for demure statement instead.

Page 123~

"Killed? De Champ? Why, he'll moider de bum!"

Had to read this a few times to get it. I figured De Champ was a French dude.

~RP

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Paperback 917: The Fall of the Dream Machine / Dean R. Koontz // The Star Venturers / Kenneth Bulmer (Ace Double 22600)

Paperback 917: Ace Double 22600 (PBO / PBO, 1969)

Title: The Fall of the Dream Machine / The Star Venturers
Author: Dean R. Koontz / Kenneth Bulmer
Cover artists: Jack Gaughan / John Schoenherr

Estimated value: $20

Best things about this cover:

• That water slide needs cleaning. Badly.
• I love the incongruous whimsy of the polka dots. It's like the ghoul faces are all angrily thinking "What Is This Silliness!?!?!"
• Q: What do you get when you cross Edgar Winter with a blow-up doll?

Best things about this other cover:

• When Car Grilles Attack.
• Tentacled floating beast ripping apart stupid flimsy human ... Now *that's* a scifi cover!
• Galactic Haystack had some minor psychedelic rock hits in the late '60s. Then they joined a cult. I hear the lead singer's a hedge fund manager now.

Page 123~ (from "The Fall of the Dream Machine")

The man's face disappeared in a spray of unmentionable things.

This conjures up either terrible carnage or a man being assaulted by lingerie.

~RP

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Paperback 916: In a Lonely Place / Dorothy B. Hughes (Carroll & Graf nn)

Paperback 916: Carroll & Graf (unnumbered) (1st thus, 1984)

Title: In a Lonely Place
Author: Dorothy B. Hughes
Cover artist: [movie stills] [colorized!]

Estimated value: $25 (prices All over map on this ... up to $136???!)

Best things about this cover:

• Not really in my main collection. More ... collection-adjacent. But it's Dorothy Hughes and it's got film noir stills on the cover and its *immaculate*, so I'm throwing it in.
• Library Sale FTW!
• If you ever thought Bogie would be sexier with cobalt contacts and pink lip gloss: here you go!

Best things about this back cover:

• Nothing to see here, except the comically phallic name of DIX STEELE.
• I do like the font on the title, actually. Monumental.

Page 123~

She hadn't been to bed!

Egads!

~RP

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Paperback 915: Murder in Room 13 / Albert Conroy (Gold Medal 806)

Paperback 915: Gold Medal 806 (PBO, 1958)

Title: Murder in Room 13
Author: Albert Conroy
Cover artist: Uncredited

Estimated value: $6-8

Best things about this cover:

• Women Falling Backwards Over Beds Or Couches should really be a "Tag" on this blog. Happens all the time, or at least, let's say, six times.
• This looks like Barye Phillips, but there's no art credit, so ... Uncredited.
• I think the figure departing via the door is supposed to look sinister, but instead he looks cartoonishly cornball. Like some combination of Peter Lorre and Boris Badinov and a badger.
• I think the giant "13" is where it is because the artist kind of screwed up her middle section. Foreshortening of the body is all wrong and her boobs are just ... odd ... somehow.

Best things about this back cover:

• The evidence! Now in dramatic yellow!
• This reads like the most generic crime story pitch of all time. It's got all the elements. Ex-pug. Alcoholic haze. Motel. Raincoat. I mean, I'd be *in* if you gave me even the *slightest* reason to care.
• Murderer! Now in dramatic italics!

Page 123~

"What the hell do you want?" She sounded surly-drunk.

This novel probably sucks, but I'd say this guy's compound adjective skills are at least promising.

~RP

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Paperback 914: Enter the Saint / Leslie Charteris (Pocket Books 257)

Paperback 914: Pocket Books 257 (1st ptg, 1944)

Title: Enter the Saint
Author: Leslie Charteris
Cover artist: Uncredited

Estimated value: $8-12

Best things about this cover:

• Strike a pose.
• The Pocket Books logo went through a lot of versions in the early years. This is one of the more adorable variants.
• I know remarkably little about the Saint, except he was played by Roger Moore on television. There were reruns in syndication on TV when I was a kid. I don't remember a damn thing about them. I had no idea he was known as "The Robin Hood of Modern Crime." I just thought he was a charming cut-rate Bond.

Best things about this back cover.

• It's weird how (relatively) quickly "gay" lost its non-sexual connotation. I was reading "Cotton Comes to Harlem" this week, and Cotton Ed and Grave Digger talk about wanting to get gay, i.e. go out, drink, have fun ... you know: have a gay old time. I wonder when that meaning essentially died, because it has died hard.
• Meet Snake Ganning ... Jane, his wife!
• Piratical!
• This is a war-time book (1944). Pocket Books' whole "Send this book to a boy in the armed forces" thing was a genius marketing strategy. Together with the Armed Services Editions of cheap books, Pocket Books was helping cultivate a huge paperback-buying market for the post-war era.

Page 123~

The removal of the "dope bird" to a quiet cellar where a ruthless interrogation could proceed without interruption.

A sentence ominous in its incompleteness as well as its all-too-common anti-avian rhetoric.

~RP

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