Eclipse Books strips buyer motivations bare.
We just talked about Bruno Fischer's The Lustful Ape, but we're circling back to it to highlight this cover from Eclipse Books because it's an example of a brief trend in crime and adventure paperbacks of nude models on covers. We shared a few French examples seven years ago, and we have more we may compile into post later. Obviously, the classic painted GGA covers sold sex too, but subtle like. Here Eclipse has stripped away the fig leaf of artfulness—along with everything else. Still, it's a nice bit of erotic photography.
He definitely isn't one of the great apes.
Bruno Fischer's 1950 novel The Lustful Ape has a strange title, which comes from an even stranger character, Ape Jones, so nicknamed not only because of his appearance, but due to his behavior. The protagonist, though, is a detective named Dirk Hart, whose amoral estranged wife is murdered. Explicit photos of a high society woman point to the killing being revenge for blackmail, but subplots abound as Dirk tries to solve the crime. He lives with a sister who's mixed up with the local crime lord's top henchman, has a best friend who knew his dead wife far better than he ever admitted, employs a secretary who's in love with him, and is hired by a client who commits suicide under suspicious circumstances. It's all in a day's existence for a mid-century private eye. Fischer weaves the threads together adequately and makes a readable mystery of it all, surprisingly punctuated by an extended sequence of cruel and somewhat sexualized torture. The episode makes sense, in terms of the narrative, but you don't usually come across stuff so uncompromising in tales from 1950. Our edition is from 1958 for Red Seal Books.
Never leave a blonde on hold.
This is one tasty photo cover. It was was made for Bruno Fischer's A Bela Assassina, which is a Portuguese translation of The Lady Kills, put out in 1951 by the Brazilian publisher Edições de Ouro, and is number five in its series Seleção Criminal. We've little doubt the cover star is a known actress, by the way, but we can't place her. Feel free to clue us in. It took us a while to figure out where this came from, but we finally traced it to a Facebook page dedicated to Brazilian vintage paperbacks. There's some nice stuff over there calling your name, so it's certainly worth a look. You can also see another Bruno Fischer book from Brazil here.
Oh, there you are. Can you stop screwing around and take out the garbage like I asked? Above, cover art by Barye Phillips for Bruno Fischer’s mystery The Flesh Was Cold, originally The Angels Fell. Fischer, who also wrote as Russell Gray and Harrison Storm, published this under its initial title in 1950, with Signet’s paperback edition hitting shelves in 1951.
For better or worse, in sickness and health, women in pulp don’t have a heck of a lot of choice about it. Pulp is a place where the men are decisive and the women are as light as feathers. We’ve gotten together a collection of paperback covers featuring women being spirited away to places unknown, usually unconscious, by men and things that are less than men. You have art from Harry Schaare, Saul Levine, Harry Barton, Alain Gourdon, aka Aslan, and others.
Non-stop to Brazil. Above is a Brazilian cover for German-born author Bruno Fischer’s Os Túmulos Não Falam, which would translate as something like “Graves Don’t Speak”. However, Fischer never wrote a book with that name, so this is one of those occasions where the original title was scrapped, which means we can’t tell you which English language release this corresponds to. We do know it’s a Ben Helm mystery, and that it involves a hypothetical perfect murder. It also involves perfect cover art, though sadly it goes uncredited. Fischer was a popular author, thus he deserves a more detailed treatment, which we’ll give him a little ways down the line.
|
|
The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1923—Yankee Stadium Opens
In New York City, Yankee Stadium, home of Major League Baseball's New York Yankees, opens with the Yankees beating their eternal rivals the Boston Red Sox 4 to 1. The stadium, which is nicknamed The House that Ruth Built, sees the Yankees become the most successful franchise in baseball history. It is eventually replaced by a new Yankee Stadium and closes in September 2008. 1961—Bay of Pigs Invasion Is Launched
A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in southern Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro. However, the invasion fails badly and the result is embarrassment for U.S. president John F. Kennedy and a major boost in popularity for Fidel Castro, and also has the effect of pushing him toward the Soviet Union for protection. 1943—First LSD Trip Takes Place
Swiss scientist Albert Hofmann, while working at Sandoz Laboratories in Basel, accidentally absorbs lysergic acid diethylamide, better known as LSD, and thus discovers its psychedelic properties. He had first synthesized the substance five years earlier but hadn't been aware of its effects. He goes on to write scores of articles and books about his creation.
|
|
|
It's easy. We have an uploader that makes it a snap. Use it to submit your art, text, header, and subhead. Your post can be funny, serious, or anything in between, as long as it's vintage pulp. You'll get a byline and experience the fleeting pride of free authorship. We'll edit your post for typos, but the rest is up to you. Click here to give us your best shot.
|
|