FUNDAMENTALLY SOUND

Frankly, I've learned that the best therapy is to make a lot of money. That's why I'm a psychiatrist.

Yes, we’ve found yet another therapy cover, Sim Albert’s 1954 sleazer Woman-Crazy Doctor, for Croydon Books with Lou Marchetti art. These covers are so fun to riff on. We’ve done it multiple times, and you can see those posts by going to this link, and following the subsequent links in that entry. This is the second book from Albert we’ve read, after 1953’s so-so Confessions of a B-Girl. Here he tells the story of a psychiatrist named Horton Foote who, in his desire to bed his beautiful patient Norma Strothman, hires her as his secretary. Surely that’s against the Hippocratic oath. Do psychiatrists take the Hippocratic oath? *checking internet* Yes, they do. But oaths were made to be broken.

Horton has other women he sees—hence “woman-crazy”—but Norma remains his overriding pursuit, and of course it wouldn’t be a sleaze novel if he didn’t succeed. Actually, the book could be called “Man-Crazy Patient,” because it’s Norma’s suddenly awakened sexual desires that drive the plot. She just can’t get enough lovin’. Into this scenario Albert mixes manslaughter, concealment of a corpse, and attempted suicide, making the tale crime novel-adjacent. He even manages to occasionally interject genuinely affecting emotion. In short, we were surprised at his competence. So surprised, in fact, that if we can find another effort from him, he’s earned another go-round.

Croydon Books, Sim Albert, Albert Simmons, Lou Marchetti, cover art, literature

Vintage Pulp

September 27 2022

B-SEXUAL TENDENCIES

It's getting late, fellas. I really should be in bed with someone by now.

Sim Albert’s 1953 Croydon Books novel Confessions of a B-Girl, which features cover art by Lou Marchetti, tells the story of a New Orleans stripper named Peg Christy who wants to get out of the racket before it turns her into a prostitute. She takes in a naive nineteen-year-old who’s arrived in town penniless, and when the girl’s hot uncle shows up Peg suddenly develops the courage to take a stab at reform and romance. Of course, she sort of forgets to tell uncle hunk she’s a nightclub dancer, and that, along with the club owner’s homicidal streak and her young roomie’s assorted problems, provide the drama in the tale. Sleaze digests generally give you sex, misunderstanding, sex with the wrong guy, heartbreak, sex, and redemption, and Confessions of a B-Girl does basically that, but with less sex, and a dose of surrogate motherhood thrown in. It’s no better than average quality for the genre, but we’re glad we bought it because we’re suckers for novels about burlesque dancers. Marchetti’s art, by the way, fits nicely into our collection of bar covers, which you can see here.

New Orleans, Croydon Books, Sim Albert, Albert Simmons, Lou Marchetti, cover art, literature, burlesque

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

December 1

1955—Rosa Parks Sparks Bus Boycott

In the U.S., in Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city’s racial segregation laws, an incident which leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott resulted in a crippling financial deficit for the Montgomery public transit system, because the city’s African-American population were the bulk of the system’s ridership.

November 30

1936—Crystal Palace Gutted by Fire

In London, the landmark structure Crystal Palace, a 900,000 square foot glass and steel exhibition hall erected in 1851, is destroyed by fire. The Palace had been moved once and fallen into disrepair, and at the time of the fire was not in use. Two water towers survived the blaze, but these were later demolished, leaving no remnants of the original structure.

November 29

1963—Warren Commission Formed

U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson establishes the Warren Commission to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. However the long report that is finally issued does little to settle questions about the assassination, and today surveys show that only a small minority of Americans agree with the Commission’s conclusions.

November 28

1942—Nightclub Fire Kills Hundreds

In Boston, Massachusetts, a fire in the fashionable Cocoanut Grove nightclub kills 492 people. Patrons were unable to escape when the fire began because the exits immediately became blocked with panicked people, and other possible exits were welded shut or boarded up. The fire led to a reform of fire codes and safety standards across the country, and the club’s owner, Barney Welansky, who had boasted of his ties to the Mafia and to Boston Mayor Maurice J. Tobin, was eventually found guilty of involuntary manslaughter.