Paperback 1009: Pyramid G622 (PBO, 1961)

Title: Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
Author: Theodore Sturgeon
Cover artist: Jim Mitchell (credited, back cover)

Condition: 8/10
Estimated value: $10-15

Best things about this cover:

• I guess if your name's Sturgeon, writing about sea creatures is probably inevitable
• Love the design on the dragon-eel, and the sub, and the font. Peak midcentury fantasy design
• This was a movie, apparently. It was also a television show, which is streaming via Amazon Prime, which I discovered because who wouldn't be curious after seeing this book
• The writing in this book is superior. Sparkling and witty in a way I do not associate with novelizations of B movies. But that's what happens, I guess, when you get a legend to do the work, I guess. Sturgeon is something else

Best things about this back cover:

• AFIRE is a word I don't see that often, except in crosswords
• I really, really want Destiny to be the name of some aquatic femme fatale
• Here's the movie, free on youtube. The format is completely jacked, so I don't think I can bear watching it. Maybe if I ever get super-bored. I'm almost certain this book is infinitely superior to the movie

Page 123~

It was Emery, too, who wondered what had killed the whale. Even the ripped, tattered evidence of the 'cudas at work could not conceal that the whale had been riven, blasted, crushed. Someone aboard might certainly have thought of an answer if it had not been for the murder of O'Brien.

Normal reader: "Whoa, what a vivid image of a mangled whale being feasted on by barracudas." Me: "Hmmm .... CUDAS ... I wonder if I should add that to my crossword wordlist ..."

~RP

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Paperbacks 780 & 781: Pyramid R-851 & R-962 (PBO, 1963 & 1964)

Titles: The Unknown and The Unknown 5
Editor: D.R. Bensen (both)
Cover artist: John Schoenherr (both) / Illus. by Edd Cartier (both)

Yours for: $12


Best things about these front covers:

• Two for one today, as these appeared back to back on my bookshelf and seemed to go together.
• The adorableness of Winky Peek-a-Boo Demon is considerably undermined by his unholy thumbnail.
• I'm classifying that bony limb on The Unknown 5 as "Fear Hand," though honestly, it's more like "Hey. 'Sup? Hand."
• Can't tell if that bird has no head, or if it's just set completely within its squat little torso.
• I don't know what became of The Unknowns 2-4, but I fear the worst.

Best things about this back cover:

• Weird that 3/5 of the names on The Unknown 5 are legendary and 2/5 I never ever saw before just now.
• Everybody must name something "Cleve," the next opportunity you get. I insist.
• I like that the back cover of The Unknown 5 believes there is such a category as "Fine Paperbacks." Adorable.

Page 123~ (from "Hell Is Forever" by Alfred Bester)

"Ego—" mused the voice. "That is something which, alas, none of us can understand. Nowhere in all the knowable cosmos is it to be found but on your planet, Mr. Braugh. It is a frightening thing and convinces me at times that yours is the race that will—" The voice broke off abruptly.

Don't tase me, Braugh.

~RP

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Paperback 768: Ballantine Books (2nd ptg, 1962) (isfdb entry)

Title: Star Science Fiction Stories No. 2
Editor: Frederik Pohl
Cover artist: [Richard Powers]

Yours for: $10


Best things about this cover:

• Beard.
• Seriously, beard. How often do you see beard? Not too often.
• I'm disturbed by his lack of hands. I guess they're inside those little spheres, but it looks like they've replace one of his hand with a giant hypodermic.
• Not the most scintillating cover art, but I do love Powers's fever-dream space shapes and colors.

Best things about this back cover:

• Rocket! Or jet gull! Probably rocket!
• Again, I love when books explain the basics of publishing to you. "We find good stories … and then we publish them!"
• Weird to brag about being an "original publication" and claim that the stories "appear here for the first time" when this is a reprint of the real original, published in 1953.

Page 123~ (from "Conquest" by Anthony Boucher)

"I fly with my synapses, if that's the word I want, and sometimes I guess they don't apse."

I see APSE a lot in crosswords. Never quite like that, though.

~RP

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Paperback 686: Ballantine Books U2220 (PBO, 1964)

Title: No Limits
Editor: Joseph W. Ferman
Cover artist: Uncredited

Yours for: $8


Best things about this cover:

• OK, it's not scintillating or sexy, but it's got a preposterous, "Jetsons"-like quality to it that I like.
• Remember when the future was going to be Awesome!? This cover does.
• I like how some of these bridges make sense (with arched, actual bridge-like structure) and others look like loopy whimsical structures that would snap in a strong wind.
• I used to have a Leigh Brackett obsession. I may have it again. She wrote a lot, in a lot of genres, and a lot of it very, very good.  But, with apologies to Asimov fans, Sturgeon is the greatest name on this list.

Best things about this back cover:

• "Acidulous"! Be still my heart.
• I wish I were named "Robert Conquest." I feel as if, with that name, I could do anything.
• The decorative band in the middle of this back cover is odd and pretty.

Page 123~

from "And Then She Found Him" by Algis Budrys

"I'm sorry, Frank," Deerbush said. He stepped back, holding one of Vi's wrists now, and with the other hand he hit Stannard hard on the jaw. As Stannard fell down, Vi began to scream.

~RP

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Paperback 609: Avon T-439 (PBO, 1960)

Title: Beyond
Author: Theodore Sturgeon
Cover artist: [Sussman?]

Yours for: $11


Best things about this cover:

• It's pretty cool, in an abstract kind of way, even if it does look like the ultrasound of a zebra pregnant with human child.
• That dude is either dead or in utero. Or he's fallen on a mountain of red velvet cake and is gorging himself, presumably to death.
• I am in love this title font. The 60s paradoxically brought us the degeneration of cover art and the awesome-ing of fonts.
• In case you didn't know: Sturgeon rules.

Best things about this back cover:

• Hierarchy of intelligent worms! I already work for that particular org. (just kidding, employers!)
• I like how they've highlighted STURGEON. Otherwise, I like pretty much nothing about this back cover.

Page 123~ (from "Largo")

The only thing that detracted from that symphony of lines on the interior wall was a heavy concrete block that jutted out over a stone chair—high over it. On the other side of the chamber was another such chair, but the wall over it was like all the others. At the exact center of the building was a tiny red tile, set into the floor, and this was the only indication of a stage, a place from which to perform. It was certainly a strange creation; but then, it had been built for a strange purpose.

Must. Know. Purpose. Off to read ...

~RP

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Paperback 604: Pocket Books 77928 (PBO, 1974)

Title: Alien Horizons
Author: William F. Nolan
Cover artist: Vincent DiFate

Yours for: $8


Best things about this cover:

• "Yo ... little help?"
• I'd like to humbly request a reverse-angle version of this painting, thank you.
• "This book will ram your brain like a runaway shopping cart"—Ray Bradbury

Best things about this back cover:

• "Where's the 'z' key on this thing? ... oh, well, I'll just use '2' ... looks fine."
• Rod Serling liked to SCREAM his blurbs.
• There are a suspicious number of ellipses in these blurbs ...

Page 123~

Fred Baxter stared at the cat, who stared back at him from the damp yard, its head raised, the yellow of the night moon now brimming in the creature's eyes. The cat's mouth opened.

"It's sucking up the moonlight," Fred whispered.

Fred's wife nodded slowly and turned toward the bed, despair filling her heart as she realized Fred would fail his veterinary board exam yet again.

~RP

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Paperback 148: Dell 1512 (1st ptg, 1968)

Title: The Cosmic Rape
Author: Theodore Sturgeon
Cover artist : Lehr (Just Lehr, like Cher, only less famous) [damn, he has a first name after all - it's Paul]

Yours for: $6


Best things about this cover:

• It's like a horrid disease, all red and inflamed, with pustules and what not. Yuck.
• I'm guessing (i.e. hoping) that the "rape" is metaphorical.
• I should read this. Sturgeon is a fantastic, inventive author whose work I keep meaning to read more of.
• This appears to be a picture of some kind of Mad Max-ish tractor pull. Only the tractors have tails and are being orbited by small aircraft.
• I just put actress IONE Skye in a crossword puzzle that I co-wrote, so I keep reading "lone" as "IONE." Not sure what an "IONE man" would be.

Best things about this back cover:

• Wow. That's a lot of ... text.
• Apparently I paid $3.50 for this (?!)

Page 123~

Screw that. I just read the opening paragraph and that's what I'm going with...

Page 5~

"I'll bus' your face, Al," said Gurlick. [memo to self - steal that name] "I gon' break your back. I gon' blow up your place, an' you with it, an' all your rotgut licker, who wants it? You hear me, Al?"

If I were Al, I would run. Far.

~RP