Won't Forget to Put Roses on Your Grave: The Gloomy Gothics of Victor Banis

The esteemed Jeffrey Catherine Jones painted this, one of my favorite-ever covers, of a delightfully ghoulish lass writhing upon a coffin attended to by fluttering batwings. I mean, I think it is just spectacular. My expectations weren't high for the actual novel, but even so they were dashed as I began to read, for The Vampire Women (Popular Library, 1973) is a dreary rip-off of the original opening chapters of Dracula, right down to its epistolary narrative. Victor Samuels—or should I say "Victor Samuels" for reasons that will become clear in a moment—has produced a work of pure pulp hackery. Updated to 1969, it's the tale of a man, a woman, and her younger sister traveling to Castle Drakula. Yes, Drakula, so see, as their guide through the Carpathians informs them, it's not the same Dracula as from the books and movies! Whew, glad we cleared that up.

I tried to approach the story as a cheap Dracula flick, a lesser Hammer or a Naschy or something, but even that didn't work thanks to "Samuels"'s simplistic prose and bone-headed journal entries:

What was the name of the castle again?
Drakula. Do you know of it?
I recognize that name. It's been used in books and movies. Not very pleasant ones.... He was a werewolf or something like that.

It is those silly legends about that Wallachian—Drakula, I think the name was. I gather he was the subject of some books and movies. I never had time for things like that.

We can't afford to get mixed up with Count Drakula and his government or his politics.

Carolyn giggled. "I'm going to marry Count Drakula," she chirped. She looked cocky and defiant.

1976 German edition

Of course I trudged and skimmed most of the way through to the obvious climax—"Get back, Drakula!" I warned as I snatched up the stake at my feet—groaning the whole way. Then I looked up the author and quickly found it is the pseudonym of a writer named Victor J. Banis, and o my friends, lots of fun stuff came my way. Born in 1937 in Pennsylvania, Banis is considered the father of gay pulp fiction. That's a pretty big deal, and as I read about Banis and his illustrious history in the pulp trade, I learned he also wrote many Gothic romances of the late '60s and early '70s under other various pen names (he even wrote some of the perennial Executioner men's adventure series!). In interviews Banis has no illusions about the quality of some of his output—he was simply a working writer, but his subject matter had never been explored in mass market before. Fascinating! I live for these jaunts down forgotten paperback history...

Banis, 1973

I've found a handful of glorious paperback covers for his books from that long-ago era; I think you'll recognize a Hector Garrido cover down there too...

And Never Really Die

 

Cover art by Mark & Stephanie Gerber

What I Don't Know Can't Hurt Me As Much As What's Behind the Mask

Can't You Hear Her Knocking

Spirit in the Night

That's Unpossible!

 

 

When the Dying Calls: The Cover Art of Tom Hallman

Recently a TMHF reader hipped me to Tom Hallman, an artist I was unfamiliar with by name but several of whose books I've featured here before. Really effective artwork on a lot of these - the old lady's blank orbs and jutting cheekbones on The Dying (1987), a two-faced headphoned horror on Beyond (1980), superb serpent shock on Fangs (1980), a vintage James Herbert Shrine...

Blood Child, Judgment Day (both 1982), and Limbo (1988), not much to say about 'em except they're '80s through and through, scary baby carriage, boobs, creepy kid, and... uh, menacing music box?

A Personal Demon (1985): dark fantasy dorkery? Maybe so, but I kinda dig the flaming pentagram.

Winter Wolves (1989): Hmm... reminds of that Twilight Zone rabbit.

Paperback perennial Robert McCammon's first Pocket Books hardcover was Mine (1990); Hallman's art was used for this 1991 mass market edition as well. Hallman has been very prolific and still produces book covers today, both in and out of genre fiction.

I Love That Stuff: Thomas F. Monteleone Paperbacks

I can never get enough!

Author and editor Thomas F. Monteleone wrote many science fiction novels through the 1970s, switching over to horror in the 1980s. He's probably best known as the editor of the spectacular Borderlands anthology series, which stands as one of the finest, strangest, and most accomplished of the 1990s (and available in ebook format for you nontraditionalists). Night Train (Pocket 1984) has a perfectly '80s lady oblivious to horror (thanks to artist Lisa Falkenstern); Lyrica (Berkley 1987) sounds and looks kinda terrific; Fantasma (1989)and The Magnificent Gallery (1987) get the full classic Tor cover art treatment, and I'm honestly not sure what's on the cover of Night Things (Popular Library 1980). A bird mask?! I haven't read any of these - although I've enjoyed his short fiction - so I wonder if any TMHF readers have...

With Just a Touch of Her Burning Hand: The Cover Art of Rowena Morrill

With her very first paperback cover illustration - for Isobel (below, Jove Books, 1977) - artist Rowena Morrill showed an innate talent for depicting the lurid, the fantastical, the unimaginable, with bold eye-catching color and strikingly detailed monsters, heroines, wizards, and other genre-specific characters. Morrill rose to prominence throughout the late 1970s and onward, one of the few female artists to contribute greatly to the SF&F/horror paperback boom. Her cover art is unmistakably of its time, original and painstaking work readers don't often see today - which makes it so wondrously special and worth celebrating.

At top is Burning (Jove, May 1978), and it is easily one of my top 10 paperback horror covers: I love the blood-red title, the terrified women screaming, the house ablaze, all within a half-cube. And add that tagline - "A love that defied the grave"! Man I can't resist. Maybe one day I'll read it!

These two collections of Lovecraft, both Jove 1978, were some of her earliest work, and I must say that besides the famous Michael Whelan covers for Ballantine/Del Rey a few years later, they're simply the best HPL paperback covers. The orange and blue text, sure, but the bizarre creatures could only be painted by an artist who actually read the stories. Same goes for that Frank Belknap Long collection, as it depicts the title tale in all its muck and madness.

It wasn't till just the other day that I came across this Charles L. Grant title, Night Songs (Pocket, June 1984), and it got me started really looking for Morrill covers I hadn't seen before. Haven't read it but I'm gonna assume there's a mermaid involved....

Most of Morrill's covers were for the science fiction and fantasy genres, but we know how that line can blur. Below are just a few examples of her Timescape covers, a 1980s imprint of Pocket Books. Have you read George R.R. Martin's 1979 novella "Sandkings"? Holy shit, it truly is one of the great horror/SF tales of the '80s! The cover is perfect. And of course we all love our Clark Ashton Smith paperbacks, even though personally I have no time for reading about wizards or muscular shirtless heroes.

Perhaps Morrill's most iconic horror paintings were done for Pocket's Robert R. McCammon line. I can't imagine '80s horror without this imagery and vanishing point perspective. Swan Song (June 1987) is a staple of the era, and They Thirst (Oct 1988) is a particular fave cover of mine, Hollywood vampires oh yeah!

Another stunner is this motley crew of bloodthirsty night creatures, folks whose faces we all recognize. Wish I'd seen this when I was a kid, it's from '78 also and I would've killed for it. I was crazy for monsters in castles back then, just crazy.

And then there's The Haunt (Popular Library, April 1990), another book I'd never heard of till researching Morrill's covers. She loves her bats!

So much thanks to you, Ms. Morrill, for some of my favorite horror paperback covers ever.

The artist herself, c. 1970s one presumes