A few years ago we shared eight Fred Fixler covers he had painted for Brandon House. Today we thought we’d fill out the collection a bit with another group of Fixlers, above. Some of these you can see elsewhere online, whereas others you can’t, but they all fall into that our-website-is-not-complete-without-them category we’ve mentioned before. Problem solved. Over time Fixler has become one of our favorite paperback illustrators, and these pieces show why. In fact, they’re probably way too good for an imprint like Brandon House, which published books like The Rape Machine and Sex on Welfare. It’s proof that even excellent artists often barely manage to make a living in this crazy world of totally upside down values. You can see the other Fixler collection at this link.
1978—Giorgi Markov Assassinated
Bulgarian dissident Giorgi Markov is assassinated in a scene right out of a spy novel. As he’s waiting at a bus stop near Waterloo Bridge in London, he’s jabbed in the calf with an umbrella. The man holding the umbrella apologizes and walks away, but he is in reality a Bulgarian hired killer who has just injected a ricin pellet into Markov, who develops a high fever and dies three days later.