A thoughtful TMHF reader has sent me some scans of his old horror paperback collection, graciously allowing me to post some of them here. Had to post this one immediately. I don't know who author
Bob Veder is, nor have I ever seen his
1980 novel Playing with Fire (Pocket Books/May 1983) before. But that cover art...
that cover art. Truly some of the most absurd I've ever witnessed. So specific I have to wonder if actual cookies are a story element. Delicious!
10 comments:
Wow. That cover's so far to the "bad" on the wheel o' suck it swung back around to "amazing."
Precisely!
Yes yes yes! And for the record, my favorite nuance of this fine artwork is that the Cookie Victim is wearing a...an...NBA-style athletic headband? At least that's what I insist it is. Because Nobody Knows Where the Madness Ends!
I *love* the headband! Actually it made me think of jogging, which was so hot in the early '80s, something the horror genre was not above exploiting no matter how silly:
http://tinyurl.com/zod6ug2
Well, there's another one I've gotta get. And while I love Graham Masterton and want to take him at his word on the cover blurb, why does the phrase "experience of unmitigated terror" not quite spring to mind when I think of J.N. Williamson?
That cover art put into words: Charlie Villanueva traded in time to the '80s Houston Rockets, rendered into a cookie, and condemned to a fiery exile for playing bad.
According to Kirkus, there really *is* a cookie connection: "Heinz the baker is an unrepentant Nazi who bakes Gingerbread Jews and does disgusting things with his bread dough." Uh...okay. Review (a longer one that I suspect the book deserves) is here: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/bob-veder/playing-with-fire-5/
Ha I linked to that review but apparently didn't read it!
Reading that review it actually sounds pretty interesting, more like a misanthropic black comedy than an actual horror novel, I guess the ridiculous covert art is fitting then.
That font looks like the same font used on V.C. Andrews', maybe they were hoping to capitalize on her success???
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