Paperback 1033: The Black Mass of Brother Springer / Charles Willeford (Black Lizard nn)

Paperback 1033: Black Lizard (no number) (1st ptg, 1989)

Title: The Black Mass of Brother Springer
Author: Charles Willeford
Cover artist: Kirwan

Condition: 9/10
Estimated value: $35-40

Best things about this cover:

• An interesting variation on the "Killer's POV" cover. Hands that would normally be coming to strangle her are instead filled with Bible.
• Those thumbs get creepier the longer you stare at them.
• Willeford is a master. I have read stuff where he has written really interestingly and provocatively about race (and racism). I have no idea what kind of territory this book gets into, though...

Best things about this back cover:

• He was white. She was ... ? So much white male gaze here. No idea if the book critiques or revels in this whole way of seeing blackness. I'd guess the former. I really should read it.
• Jim Thompson is the author that got me into vintage paperback collecting (long story I'll tell some other time, when one of his books comes up ... or maybe I've told it already—I've been at this blog a long long time and there's lots I've forgotten about what stories I have and haven't told). Anyway, the irony here is that I don't care for Jim Thompson any more. He was the gateway ... but now the gateway has dissolved, or become irrelevant, or something. Weird how these things happen.
• I think my next collecting effort will involve these '80s Black Lizards, before the imprint was bought out by Vintage (those early Vintage/Black Lizards were part of the whole Jim Thompson Gateway To Paperbackville...)

Page 123~

The shadow I stared at was not a part of the regular inventory I saw every day.
      And then the shadow stretched.

~RP

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Paperback 727: Lie Down, Killer / Richard S. Prather (Crest 255)

Paperback 727: Crest Books 255 (3rd ptg, 1958)

Title: Lie Down, Killer
Author: Richard S. Prather
Cover artist: Darcy

Yours for: Not for sale (donation to the collection from S. Jacob)


Best things about this cover:

• "I said 'Lie *Down*'!"
• Despite the deplorable violence, like this cover. There's an interesting dynamic quality. I like motion. This is why James Avati leaves me Cold.
• I thought he was beating a woman, but then I looked at the neck region and realized he's merely defending the world against some horrible alien with pincer-claw-face. Seriously, no way those are earrings. They're claws. It's like a skeleton baby is trying to escape from her neck.

Best things about this back cover:

• I assume that last line of dialogue is supposed to be accompanied by ominous music, 'cause on its own it's pretty anti-climactic.
• "That woman gag," also the name of the BDSM supply store down the street.
• Love hate and murder—Prather's got you covered.

Page 123~

Steve straightened and looked around at them. Margo was looking at Gross, but Gross kept his eyes—and the .45—steadily on Steve. Steve pulled himself to the divan and sat on it ,his mind beginning to function.

Steve was always happiest when his mind began to function. A rare, fleeting pleasure for Steve.

~RP

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Paperback 665: Patterns of Sin / Dave Patrick (Saber Tropic 922)

Paperback 665: Saber Tropic 922 (PBO, 1966)

Title: Patterns of Sin
Author: Dave Patrick
Cover artist: Uncredited [Bill Edwards]

Yours for: $26


Best things about this cover:

• How is this book *not* titled "They Cloned Castro!"?
• I think her underwear is pretty. 
• Is it just me, or is it less fun to admire the half-naked lady when she's being gang-raped?

Best things about this back cover:

• Ouch. I have sleaze whiplash. Going from Cuban gang rape to brother/sister incest will do that to you.
• "May I?" Ha ha. So polite, and such proper grammar.
• "Since there were no degrees of sin in her mind..."—the implications of this are staggering. "Oh, well, I already stole a $5 from the till, so I may as well carjack that lady and start running people over."
• "Roddy." Again, HA ha.

Page 123~

"What's going on here?" he demanded, his eyes taking in the Major's body. 

Wow, this book is bound and determined to hit *all* the major "sins" (at least I assume this passage is a prelude to gay sex in the military). Too bad I don't do Page 144—it has a lengthy, clumsy, hilariously clinical description of lesbian 69. "... Estelle knew what the next step was to be, and she was reluctant to take it, until Gizelle's mouth reached its destination and moved on to her partner's thighs in a manner that said the act was to be a reciprocal, if it was performed." Mmm ... tell me less ...

~RP

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Paperback 655: A House in Naples / Peter Rabe (Gold Medal k1337)

Paperback 655: Gold Medal k1337 (2nd ptg, 1963)

Title: A House in Naples
Author: Peter Rabe
Cover artist: Lu Kimmel

Yours for: $9


Best things about this cover: 

• "Heh, I like to watch, heh heh."
• She's like a soap actress looking off-stage to read her next line.
• She appears to be kneeling on a twin bed that is in the middle of the room, dressed in some kind of summery get-up. None of this makes any sense. 
• And here I always thought the "Spillane vein" was a euphemism for "penis."

Best things about this back cover:

• Jeez, stamp more shit on it, why don't you? I didn't wanna read the text anyway.
• First sentence of that fourth paragraph ("She was leaning...") was written by someone who should not be allowed anywhere near words.
• Actually, I think an Italian-to-English translator-bot did this copy. It's just tin-eared and awful.  

Page 123~

Charley watched the yawl heel and take a close, steady course. He was sure the guy at the wheel was a Sardinian. They can handle a ship when they're half dead. 

Chapter-closing line. I quite like it.

~RP

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