Color Me Surprised

Six years ago, I posted on this page a selection of Robert McGinnis’ “One Shoe Off” covers. That is, McGinnis paperback illustrations showing an attractive woman sporting only a single article of footwear. According to Art Scott, co-author of The Art of Robert E. McGinnis, this is a surprisingly frequent motif for the artist. “There are at least 24 One Shoe paperback covers,” he says, “and it turns up in his magazine pieces, posters, and gallery nudes as well.”

At the time, I figured all of McGinnis’ half-shod lovelies had already been found. But, recently, while searching through Chris Ogle’s John D. MacDonald Covers blog, I stumbled across yet one more use of that gimmick on a 1974-1975 Fawcett Gold Medal edition of The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper, MacDonald’s 10th Travis McGee novel. Because I couldn’t find McGinnis’ signature anywhere on the painting, I double-checked the credit with Scott. “Yes indeed, it’s McGinnis,” he wrote in answer to my query. “Never tumbled to it as a one-shoe cover, though. Sharp eye.”

What’s distinguishes this One Shoe front from others in McGinnis’ line, of course, is that the woman we see in a lone high heel appears unconscious or dead, and is mostly hidden beneath a cloth of some sort. Aside from her tootsies, only her red hair is showing.

McGinnis contributed a very different painting to a 1981 edition of The Girl in the Plain Brown Wrapper, which you will find here.

My Kind of Book: “Alias James Bond”

Alias James Bond—The Life of Ian Fleming, by James Pearson (Bantam, 1967). Only the 1967 American version of this book bore that title; the original, 1966 edition was called just The Life of Ian Fleming. According to Wikipedia, author Pearson was Fleming’s assistant at the London Sunday Times when he penned this biography. It adds: “Pearson later wrote the official, fictional-biography James Bond: The Authorized Biography of 007 in 1973. The Life of Ian Fleming was one of the first biographies of Ian Fleming and is considered a collectible book by many James Bond fans, since Pearson would become the third, official James Bond author. … In 1989 the biography was turned into a movie, Goldeneye.” Cover art by James Bama.

Chance Encounters

(Above) The DADA Caper, by Ross H. Spencer (Avon, 1978)

Whole decades have passed since I last read one of Ross H. Spencer’s novels. But I thought those paperback-only private-eye spoofs were a heap of fun back when I was looking for that kind of fun. His best-known protagonist was Chance Purdue, a “tough, tight-lipped, incompetent” Chicago gumshoe who undertook five “beer-soaked adventures and screwball cases” during the 1970s and ’80s, beginning with The DADA Caper (1978). Those books comprised brief chapters, all written in a one-sentence-per-paragraph style. Example:

Chance Purdue.
That is my name.
Private Detective.
That was my occupation.
I handle anything.
That was my slogan.
Room 506 Braddock Building.
That was my address.
One-year lease.
Three hundred a month.
That was my mistake.

Punctuation was pretty much non-existent, save for periods and question marks. The books abounded with outrageous male characters and callipygous female ones (not the least of whom was Betsy, Purdue’s call-girl girlfriend (sorry, she prefers the term “whore“). And, as The Complete Review observed, in its review of The DADA Caper, each chapter “comes with an epigraph, all ascribed to (the fictitious) Monroe D. Underwood—pithy, humorous (or would-be, anyway ...), worldly-wise but down to earth (as evidenced by the loose grammar and spelling) observations such as: ‘ … you show me a man what strikes while the iron is hot and I’ll show you a man with a whole mess of third degree burns ...”

As Kevin Burton Smith remarks in his Thrilling Detective Blog,

Some people think they’re a real hoot.

Some don’t.

According to Wikipedia, Ross H. Spencer was born in Hughart, West Virginia, in 1921 and reared in Youngstown, Ohio. He served with an army infantry division during World War II, fighting in the Pacific campaign, settled in Chicago after his combat responsibilities ended, but subsequently enlisted in the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War. His friend and fellow author Jim Fisher recalled last year in his blog that “After working in Chicago as a railroader, landscape contractor and chain-link fence salesman and installer for forty-two years, the cigar-smoking, beer-drinking writer returned to Youngstown with his wife, Shirley.”

(Right) Author Ross H. Spencer

He was a late-blooming fictionist. “Spence read a lot, a couple of books a week or more,” writes another pal, former newspaper reporter and mystery writer Dick Stodghill, “so one day Shirley came home with a mystery for him, a book about a character named Spenser. Spelled differently, pronounced the same. Spence read it and decided he could write one just as good as Robert Parker’s. Over the years a lot of people came to agree with him.”

“As a self-taught writer without a high school degree (he was kicked out of eleventh grade for smoking), Spence started writing at age 58,” Fisher explains. “During his relatively short but intense writing career, he published thirteen novels.” In addition to the Purdue yarns, Spencer penned three books starring Lacey Lockington, “a hard-drinkin’, two-fisted, no-nonsense straight-shootin’” Windy City shamus, the first of those being 1989’s The Fifth Script. He also produced one-off tales about “low-rent, hard-drinking stumblebum Chicago private eyes” Buzz Deckard, Birch Kirby, and Luke Lassiter.

Spencer died in 1998.

Someone must know the cause of his demise.

I don’t.

I’ve embedded the fronts from all five of his Chance Purdue “capers” in this post. I was probably drawn to these books, initially, by their quirky, sexy, type-prominent covers, and only later came to appreciate the stories inside. It is only too bad that no credit is given to the series illustrator anywhere in these paperbacks.

(Left to right) The Reggis Arms Caper (Avon, 1979); The Abu Wahab Caper (Avon, 1980)

(Left to right) The Stranger City Caper (Avon, 1980); The Radish River Caper (Avon, 1981)

Sixteen years after the publication of Spencer’s final Purdue story, all five novels in that series were gathered into a single volume by a publisher called Alexander Books. Like the other Purdue editions, 1997’s The Compleat Chance Purdue is out of print, but can still be acquired via online sources.

Another Look: “Stain of Suspicion”

Warning: Artistic inspiration drawn from book titles may vary.



Left: Stain of Suspicion, by Charles Williams (Pan, 1961). Right: Stain of Suspicion, by Charles Williams (Pocket, 1973). As Paperback Warrior explains, “Before Cosmopolitan was a women’s magazine dedicated to unlocking the mysteries of the female orgasm, it was a publication for the whole family featuring short fiction across several genres. In April 1958, Cosmopolitan ran a short story by crime-noir author Charles Williams titled ‘Stain of Suspicion.’ The story was later expanded into a full novel as Talk of the Town. Subsequent editions of the paperback reverted back to the original title.” Sadly, I don’t know who illustrated either of these beautiful covers.

Because I Needed a Crane Fix …

Murder on the Purple Water, by Frances Crane (Bantam, 1951). Published originally in 1947, this novel, says The Thrilling Detective Web Site, is part of Crane’s colorful and long-running series starring “dapper San Francisco gumshoe” Pat Abbott and his “not-quite-bubbleheaded little wifey,” Jean. Cover art by Denver Gillen (see more on him here, here, and here).

The Young, the Restless, the Available

(Above) Turn Me On, by Jack W. Thomas (Bantam, 1969)

I spent a good deal of my early writing career banging away on typewriters, discarding heaping piles of crumpled draft pages as I went, and then seeing my work cemented into print publications, whether they be books, magazines, or newspapers.

While most of that process was satisfying, even rewarding, there is one thing about composing for print vehicles that gives me nightmares: If I accidentally make a mistake—and I’ve made a few in my time—it’s permanently recorded. I can’t go back into a printed magazine or newspaper and quietly correct a misspelled name, a misstated date, or a particularly egregious typo. In a book, I can at least try to revise any error in a second edition (if there is one). But otherwise, my minor editorial blunders on paper are recorded for perpetuity, even if I’m the only one who notices them.

Thankfully, such frustrating obstacles don’t exist when one is writing for blogs or other Web-based periodicals. Small fixes can easily be made, and there’s no need to draw reader attention to them (though some sites do post classic-style “corrections” at the end of amended pieces). Many have been the times I’ve gone back into older posts in either Killer Covers or The Rap Sheet, and rectified erroneous spellings of author names or other tidbits of information.

Just recently I righted a different sort of wrong.

Almost two months ago, I presented on this page a gallery of 13 Mitchell Hooks paintings that fronted “teenager-in-torment” novels. However, I later learned that one of those images—the cover from the 1968 Bantam Books edition of Please Don’t Talk to Me, I’m in Training, by novelist and screenwriter Robert Kaufman (1931-1991)—wasn’t done by Hooks at all. Instead, it represented the work of his fellow artist, James Bama. (You can see his signature, below, in the illustration’s lower right-hand corner.)

(Left) A young James Bama

I quickly—and surreptitiously—replaced Kaufman’s swinging love story in that lineup with the 1962 Gold Medal release For the Asking, by Harold P. Daniels, which sources agree was a Hook creation. Only then did I realize that Bama, too, had contributed artwork to a variety of paperback novels about mid-20th-century teenagers either causing trouble or trying to find their own way in a confusing new world of sex, drugs, and yes, rock ’n’ roll. Nine examples of his efforts along that line are showcased here. They include his front for a 1967 Bantam release of Robert H. Rimmer’s The Harrad Experiment, a controversial yarn (originally published in 1966, and made into a 1973 film) about sexual experimentation at a made-up college; and his painting for Groupie (Bantam, 1970), a fictionalized account of London’s 1960s “underground music scene,” by Jenny Fabian and Johnny Byrne.

Several of these paperbacks come from what books historian Lynn Monroe calls Bama’s “White Bantam” series, meaning they feature human figures on white backgrounds. And almost half of them suggest the New York-born artist appreciated the bare-midriff look popular with young women in the 1960s and early ’70s.

FOLLOW-UP: Not long after I posted this cover gallery, Robert Deis, who writes the wonderful Men’s Pulp Mags blog, and who has interviewed artist Bama in the past, sent me this message: “The model Jim Bama used for some of his best-known ‘troubled youth’ covers was Andrea Dromm. She was also an actress, who is probably best known for a part on [the original] Star Trek.” Deis attached a set of photos—see below—showing Dromm in poses that later inspired Bama’s paintings for Tomboy (1965) and The Heller (1970).



Click on the image for an enlargement.

Welcome to Summer 2020!

Summer’s advent is always a joyous occasion here at Killer Covers. But it’s especially welcome this year, after we have all been cooped up inside for months as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though the virus continues to spread, and prudence as well as health guidelines counsel against large outdoor parties or spending time on crowded beaches, we can still enjoy—if only by ourselves or with immediate family members—the arrival of sunnier mornings in the garden and balmier evenings spent on back patios.

With today being the start of summer 2020, I’ve pulled out a paperback front that I have been saving just for this occasion. It comes from the 1960 Popular Library edition of Tell Me, Stranger, by Kentucky author Charles Bracelen Flood. Its cover illustration was painted by Mitchell Hooks, whose artistry we celebrated at length earlier this year—just as the pandemic began, in fact.

Over the years Killer Covers has posted numerous other summer-related book fronts. Click here to enjoy them all.

Because I Needed a Household Fix …

Arabesque, by Geoffrey Household (Pyramid, 1964).
Cover illustration by Robert Maguire.

READ MORE: “The Book You Have to Read: Watchers in the Shadows, by Geoffrey Household,” by Mike Ripley (The Rap Sheet).

Another Look: “Naked Canvas”

Warning: Artistic inspiration drawn from book titles may vary.



Left: Naked Canvas, by Warwick Scott (Popular Library, 1955); cover artist unidentified. Right: Naked Canvas, by Elleston Trevor (Mayflower Dell, 1965); cover illustration by Roger Hall. “Warwick Scott” was of course one of several noms de plume employed by British novelist-playwright Trevor. His most famous pseudonym, however, was “Adam Hall,” under which he penned 19 acclaimed Cold War-era thrillers starring a spy known only as Quiller.

Hooks Hits: All Good Things …

Part of a series saluting artist-illustrator Mitchell Hooks.

Angel’s Flight, by Lou Cameron (Gold Medal, 1960)

Today ends a full month of Killer Covers’ tribute to Detroit, Michigan-born artist Mitchell Hooks (1923-2013)—twice as long as I had originally intended to let it run.

The series began on Wednesday, March 18, which—in addition to being the seventh anniversary of Hooks’ demise, at age 89—also happened to be the day that Washington Governor Jay Inslee required all “non-essential businesses” in my hometown of Seattle to be shuttered because of the COVID-19 crisis. I extended this series because there were just so many excellent examples of Hooks’ work to consider. Through yesterday, 57 paperback fronts painted by Hooks had been displayed as part of this venture, plus a couple of movie posters. That’s in addition to dozens of Hooks creations Killer Covers has showcased before, including his 1970s line of covers for Ross Macdonald’s Lew Archer novels and the façades he crafted during that same decade for Paperback Library’s Superspade novels by “B.B. Johnson,” aka songwriter-composer Joseph Perkins Greene.

(Right) Artist Mitchell Hooks, photo by Tom Halloway

Although the novel coronavirus is still with us (and will likely remain a long-term cause for social isolation, despite Donald Trump’s pixie-dust wishes to the contrary), it’s finally time to call this project done. But not before I share another 40 of my favorite Hooks works. Below you will find covers from mainstream novels as well as entries in a wide variety of genres, from crime fiction and science fiction to westerns and tales of espionage. Especially notable among this bunch: Ugo Pirro’s The Camp Followers (Dell, 1959), which was made into a 1965 film of that same name; two thrillers by Georgette Heyer, Death in the Stocks (Bantam, 1971) and Duplicate Death (Bantam, 1970); the haunting 1956 Gold Medal cover from Geoffrey Homes’ Build My Gallows High; That Darn Cat (Bantam, 1965) and its sequel, Undercover Cat Prowls Again (Bantam, 1967), by Gordon and Mildred Gordon, which enjoyed popularity because of a Disney adaptation of the former comedy-thriller; the 1961 Gold Medal edition of Fredric Brown’s carnival-themed mystery, Madball; the hilariously named Lionel White novel, Death Takes the Bus (Gold Medal, 1957); and The Dark Arena, the 1956 Dell release of Mario Puzo’s debut novel, originally published in 1955.

Click on any paperback cover here for an enlargement.

Although Hooks’ art is occasionally confused with that of Ernest Chiriacka or Robert McGinnis, there are signature elements to it that make clear who was holding the paintbrush.

Throughout much of the late 20th century, Hooks perfected a sketch-like linear style. “It was looser, more spontaneous, more designy, a slightly impressionistic way of working,” as the artist told Gary Lovisi of Gryphon Books during an interview in 1988. “It was what I felt good doing then.” Hooks’ women—and there were lots of them in his images; paperback publishers wanted them emphasized on covers—tended to be sensuous, but “not cheap or sleazy at all, they have class and elegance,” as Lovisi put it.

Some early illustrations show how much Hooks’ style evolved. Glancing over the half-dozen books below, all released between 1950 and 1953, you can see he was using a more realistic, painterly approach, similar to what many others offered at the time.

He would eventually return to a more realistic style of painting, as he worked increasingly with oils and as the market changed.

Finally, let’s gaze fondly at one of Hooks’ few wraparound covers, for the 1951 Lion Books release The Ranch Cat, by William Hopson.

As the Vintage Paperback & Book Covers Facebook page explains, Hopson “wrote westerns for the pulps, contributing to West, Exciting [Western], Popular [Western], and Mammoth Western, but he did do some work for Thrilling [Detective], Popular [Detective], and Mammoth Detective as well. He managed to leverage his pulp career into paperback success postwar.” Most of Hopson’s books (Trouble Rides Tall, Yucca City Outlaw, etc.) were issued in the ’50s.

Needless to say, there are dozens more Mitchell Hooks covers in my computer files. I’ll try to find uses for others in the future. Meanwhile, check out the collections in The Rap Sheet and Flickr.