Why Book Sales are Like Crack Dens To Me, Part 2

Welcome back to further tales of my addiction.

Dondie is back with me once again to help me comment on the paperback carnage. And we're off:

Title: The Man with the Heart in the Highlands and Other Stories
Author: William Saroyan
Cover artist: Cassler

• And thus "Riverdance" was born ...
• "Dance, Timmy, dance, or I'll cut off your other arm!"
• This book was later retitled "The Child Predator with the Heart in the Highlands." (Subtitle: "Queerscarf!")
• Dondie says: "Ballet for the geriatric pedophile in all of us!"
• Dondie and I cannot agree on whether that is a cornet or a flugelhorn.

Title: The Age of Analysis
Editor: Morton White
Cover artist: Uncredited

• "Shh, I'm contemplating."
• "My bicep is HUGE! And astonishingly truncated!"
• Spirograph! - "Mom, look what I made in Arts & Crafts today!"
• Dondie says: "P.S., my hand looks like a buttox!"
• If you cover up "YSIS," this title is funny.

[Interloper book - not from Book Sale, but from Salvation Army]

Title: Satan's Rock
Author: Marilyn Ross
Cover artist: [George Ziel]

• Lucy Ashton says: "Pax vobiscum"
• "We finally saved up enuff to get that castle addition on the old barn - uh oh, Bessie, it done caught fire already!"
• Rex says: "This castle is pooping out the moon ... onto a boat."
  
• Satan's architectural abomination - how does that monstrosity not crush the outcropping it's built on top of?
• Dondie says: "I want that shade of lipstick. I think it's called 'Coral.' I haven't seen that shade in some time."

Title: Echo Round His Bones
Author: Thomas M. Disch
Cover artist: Uncredited

• Jewfro Sanderson and His Posse of Floating Vitamins!
• "I've come back from the future to get a refund for this awful haircut. You are getting sleepy ..."
• Is he coming through the rainbow pastel portal on his knees?
• Most highly decorated general ever: "I came back to get my forty-third star, biatch!"

"The year is 1990" is the funniest sentence ever.

"The year is 1990. The universe has witnessed the ultimate invention: The Chunnel!" (also "The Simpsons" and Windows 3.0)

Title: The Dark Frontier
Author: Eric Ambler
Cover artist: Oliver [...]

• Apparently, her bra is only 50% operational.
• Pencil Mustache liked to grip his gun with just two fingers - Euro-style.
• Her pendant weirdly matches the emblem on Pencil Mustache's gigantic cap.
• Dondie says: "I'm quite sure he is doing something to her ass."
• Are they in a ghost lab? What is that syringe / baster / bunsen burner on her left?

Title: Daybreak
Author: Frank G. Slaughter
Cover artist: James Meese

• First thing you must do - click on "Daybreak" (above) for background music while you read this entry and clap your hands like a doofus with your fingers drastically outstretched.
• Next thing you must do - read the back cover. Since you can't, we'll tell you what it says. It begins:

"The operation is simple. It is called a frontal lobotomy and its purpose is to pacify the violently insane."

OK, that's pretty much all you need to know. And now, the one-act play that is ... Daybreak:

Lynn: "Hello, my name is Lynn. Will you be removing my frontal lobes this morning? I put on this yellow dress for you. Let's go play tennis. I want to kill you with my teeth and bare hands."
Jim: "Your eyebrows are far too black for us to proceed. Do you like my neck whistle? I just came back from coaching a soccer game."
Lynn: "Your hands feel manly."
Jim: "Your shoulders are small. Say 'aaah.'"
Lynn: "Jim, I don't want to be rude, but ... you have a giant dollop of toothpaste on your head."
Jim: "No, Lynn. That's my yarmulke. You are just being violently insane. Now, I repeat, Say 'Aaah!'"
Lynn: "But Jim, my mouth only opens this far."
Jim: "Well then, we have our work cut out for us, and I do mean 'cut out'"
[both characters chuckle amiably]
Jim: "Here, take two of these gigantic Mexican aspirin and take off that dress."
Lynn, reading: "'Aspirina...' Is that safe?"
Jim: "For the violently insane, yes. It helps numb your lobes. P.S. your slip is showing."

FIN

Title: Angélique
Author: Anne Golon
Cover artist: photo cover

• "RO RO RO your boat..."
• The casting of "Ginger" on "Gilligan's Island" was a long and arduous process, and involved many a gland check.
• Dondie says: here is a one-scene play I have written about this cover:

Ginger: "Don't hate me just because I'm wrapped in a curtain!"
The Count: "But my cuffs are so satiny and superfluous, I must strangle!"
Ginger: "Perhaps if I expose my teeth in a feral grimace, I can convince you to leave me alone and shave your sideburns."

FIN

Title: Dance of Love
Author: Arthur Schnitzler
Illustrations: Rene Gockinga
Cover artist: Uncredited

• Dondie says: "Those are pretty nice boobs ... If I had those boobs, I'd probably have a lot more money."
• Why is her right boob so much longer than her left one?
• Her hair is patriotic.
• She has a face that says one or more of the following:

A. "My boyfriend is a douche."
B. "Thanks for the heroin."
C. "My left breast casts an impressive shadow."
D. "Are you looking at ... this nipple?"
E. "Get me a beer, put the money on the dresser, and get out."

Join us next week for Further Tales from the Book Sale.

RP (with Dondie)