Mar 07
Click for full imageTom Noir’s Art Direction: I want a cover that depicts the author’s existential angst and self-loathing. Just kidding! Draw a naked broad with big gazongas on it and call it a day. Ooh, and maybe have a bird squawking at her.
Published 1993
(Average: 7.85 out of 10)
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March 7th, 2012 at 9:58 am
“He may eat a lot of fish, smell a little of wet dog… and is a penguin! But he’s the best darn artist this gallery has got!”
There’s a book right there! I know what I’m writing next… or first…
March 7th, 2012 at 10:51 am
Last time I saw a penguin looking like that on TV it was regurgitating fish for its young.
That woman is about to get a nasty, and smelly, surprise.
March 7th, 2012 at 11:30 am
Let’s be fair. Suppose you were expecting an Andrew Wyeth or Jackson Pollock, and when you popped open the crate, there was…a living, breathing mammal with slashed wrists. Wouldn’t you be upset? I would be.
I’m not a big fan of the fonts. They’ve gone with a generic Olde Style font for the title, a little cliché, but acceptable. With the author’s name, tho, you’ll see that half the letters in “Tanith” are doing the shuffle, half aren’t, and none in Lee are. And why purple and yellow? To go with the madness theme, I presume. But, the different widths and lack of juxtaposition ruin the effect.
March 7th, 2012 at 11:42 am
I totally bought this book when I was maybe 13. Because of the cover art.
March 7th, 2012 at 12:03 pm
I call it “Burgess Meredith – Patron of the Arts”. Symbolic, naturally.
March 7th, 2012 at 3:05 pm
The beautiful woman on the cover (and she really is beautiful) does not help, because this cover as a whole is one big mess.
Seriously, even if the book is *about* madness and chaos, it still has to project a sense of structure and coherence.
And the use of fonts and letters is utterly incompetent. What a lousy thing to do to Tanith Lee.
March 7th, 2012 at 5:50 pm
The Secret Book Covers of Parodee – IV The One Where Rachel Took Acid and Thought She Was a Vargas Girl
March 7th, 2012 at 8:17 pm
I scanned through a few of the amazon reviews and this cover actually seems to fit. Something about a penguin being over it all and multiple realities on top of each other. I suppose symbolized by the continuing form of her leg into the painting. Terrible typography work though.
March 7th, 2012 at 9:05 pm
Gives a new meaning to the phrase “now available in Penguin paperback”.
March 11th, 2012 at 7:46 am
If I was going to have my nipples pecked by a Penguin, I’d cover up too…
March 16th, 2012 at 2:25 pm
Here’s a question: what is she wearing on her wrists? Cuff links? Presumably she had time to put on just one article of clothing before the PENGUINS ATTACKED and she chose to cover her wrists?
Okay, maybe they’re restraints. But who puts on wrists restraints and nothing else? I’ll tell you who: sexual deviants. This lady and her penguin friend are into ‘roleplay’:
“Oh no, don’t peck me Mr. Penguin!”
“Awk awk awk!”
“Ooh baby…”
And, scene.
March 27th, 2012 at 4:03 pm
“No, No, No!” screamed the Penguin Art Director. “Where are her feathers? Why is her beak tiny, misshapen and soft? Why aren’t her pectorals attached to a keel bone? What? It another of those sy fy books? Whatever… She’s still hideous.”
January 18th, 2014 at 1:42 am
This is the most horrible Ritsuko Akagi/Pen-Pen fanfic ever…not that any of them are good, at any rate…
January 18th, 2014 at 5:44 pm
Follow-up novels include,
BOOK OF THE BAD
BOOK OF THE SAD
and of course, BOOK OF THE DAD.
January 18th, 2014 at 6:45 pm
@Tom: Oh, you’ve met my father, then?
September 26th, 2014 at 2:31 pm
‘The Secret Books of Paradys – IV’. So there were three others. Yet despite probably deserving a Font Problems tag as badly as this one (ahem) and undoubtedly having goofy covers, this is the only one to make it to GSS.
They really are secret, aren’t they?