Vintage Pulp | Feb 22 2022 |
The decline and incineration of Western civilization.
These covers for Pat Frank's acclaimed post apocalypse drama Alas, Babylon can be considered additions to our collection of nuclear explosion book covers. In the story, a missile from a fighter jet causes an explosion in Syria that the Soviets mistake for a full scale NATO nuclear strike. They retaliate with a full strike, the U.S. retaliates with a full strike, and that's all she wrote. Actually, not really. That's the first act. Frank wrote plenty more, none of it fun. The novel first appeared in 1959, with these not-quite-identical Bantam editions coming later. We may have missed them in our initial searches for nuke covers because they're pretty subtle, combing the idea of a red sun with an atomic blast, but we're sure these are supposed to be explosions—or at least evoke them. There's also a very cool Spanish cover we posted way back in 2009. No explosion on that one, but it's exceedingly interesting.
Vintage Pulp | Mar 18 2009 |
The bomb and the fall of Babylon.
American author Pat Frank’s novel of nuclear aftermath, Alas, Babylon, appeared in 1959, with this Spanish edition entitled Ay, Babilonia following in 1965. The sexed-up cover was by painted by Sholler—no first name known. It seems to have been one of his only contributions to mid-century paperback art, but a nice contribution it is.