SO....what's a PorPor Book ?
'PorPor' is a derogatory term my brother used, to refer to the SF and Fantasy paperbacks and comic books I eagerly read from the late 60s to the late 80s.
This blog is devoted to those paperbacks and comics you can find on the shelves of second-hand bookstores...from the New Wave era and 'Dangerous Visions', to the advent of the cyberpunks and 'Neuromancer'. And with a leavening of pop culture detritus, too !
Book Review: 'Heroes of Atlantis & Lemuria'edited by D. M. Ritzlin4 / 5 Stars 'Heroes of Atlantis & Lemuria' (232 pp.) is a trade paperback published by DMR Books in 2019, and features cover art by Pan-Spec. I was interested in this anthology because it contains five 'Kardios' stories by Manly Wade Wellman. These first were published in the 1970s in the sword and sorcery anthology series 'Swords Against Darkness,' edited by Andrew J. Offutt. With the 'Swords' books being long out of print and fetching very steep prices, 'Heroes' is an affordable way to access the Kardios tales. Wellman brought something new to the rather well-traveled sword and sorcery genre with his Kardios franchise. Kardios is the lone survivor of the sinking of Atlantis, obliged to wander the prelapsarian world in search of adventure, and receptive audiences for his harp-playing. Provided those he meets are friendly, the last Atlantean always is willing to do a good turn and address one menace of another, be they space monsters, vampires, oversized bugs, or something known only as the 'Flying Fear.' Kardios is an engaging character; he approaches his encounters with humor and self-confidence. He's something of a smarter, and more urbane, Conan. Rounding out the entries in 'Heroes' are three tales authored by Frederick Arnold Kummer, Jr., that first were published in various pulp magazines from 1939-1940. These stories feature Kirk Bradley, a square-jawed, athletic American who through some strange agency finds himself transported back in time to ancient Mu. Kummer is a more capable author than might be expected and the Kirk Bradley stories are reasonably entertaining ventures into the sword and sorcery genre. The final entry in 'Heroes' is a Leigh Brackett piece from the June, 1941 issue of the pulp magazine Science Fiction. It involves modern-day Americans Coh Langham and Simon Krim, whose submarine voyage under the waves of the Pacific takes them back in time and space to Mu. Langham and Krim must defeat the tyrant Xacul if they are to find a way back to their own realm. It's not a particularly good story, with too-frenetic pacing, and probably best serves to indicate how much Brackett matured as a fiction writer en route to her 'Skaith' novels of the 1970s. Sometimes small-press and P.O.D. books can have multiple typographical and grammatical errors, but it's noteworthy that I found only one misspelling in 'Heroes' (page 39, '....was hung was....'). Some attention and care went into the preparation of 'Heroes,' which was true of another DMR Books release I read, this one, Ramsey Campbell's 'Ryre' stories collected in the 2021 volume, 'Far Away and Never.' Summing up, if you are fond of the shorter fiction of Manly Wade Wellman, then 'Heroes of Atlantis & Lemuria' is as good a way as any to acquire his sword and sorcery adventures.
PlayboyMay 1974 May, 1974.........and number one on the Top 40 singles chart of May 18, is Ray Stevens with 'The Streak,' a humorous examination of the streaking phenomenon then sweeping America. An instrumental, 'The Entertainer,' by Marvin Hamlisch, is enjoying success due to the hit movie The Sting. Old School R & B and Soul are well accounted for, at the hands of the Jackson 5 and the Stylistics.
The May issue of Playboy is out on the stands, and well worth the $1 cover price. As is the case with these 1970s issues, the magazine is thick with content and advertising.
In keeping with the spirit of the pop culture at the time, there is a portfolio, titled 'The Devil and the Flesh,' on the occult. The portfolio's introduction, presumably penned by photographers Alexas Urba and Marilyn Grabowski, references Rosemary's Baby, The Devil in Miss Jones, and The Exorcist. Of course - !
These photos are ultimate 70s Cheese, but it is important to remember that in the decades before Photoshop and digital composition, capturing and modifying these images was a time-consuming and laborious undertaking.
Needless to say, any middle-aged man reading this issue of Playboy could make the conclusion that getting into the 'occult' landscape is a valid way to enjoy the favors of nubile young women.......... Elsewhere in the magazine, we have three personalities 'On the Scene,' all of them comedians. Meet Steve Martin, Martin Mull, and Freddie Prinze. Martin and Mull would go on to achieve considerable success in the remaining years of the decade, and well into the 1980s and 1990s. Tragically, Prinze would commit suicide in 1977, ending what could have been a career path as promising as that of Martin and Mull.This May issue sees the first appearance of the amazing, petite Marilyn Lange (b. 1952), a Hawaii resident who would go on to appear in Playboy multiple times (in 1975 she was Playmate of the Year). Her boyfriend is a musician named 'Kip'...........the portfolio borrows heavily from the style used by Bob Guccione in Penthouse, and I must say, copying styles can be rewarding: Marilyn looks very good here.The portfolio on 'Sheer Delights,' devoted to lingerie, stands out as yet another calculated evocation of the Penthouse sensibility. Lots of soft focus, Warm Tones, gauzy fabrics and bed linens, as well as models displaying 'private' behaviors...........very 'Guccione-esque.'And so we end our trip back to 1974, 51 (!) years ago, when that 70s Style was front and center.............
Book Review: 'The Sword of Shannara' by Terry Brooks 5 / 5 Stars The story goes that after spending 7 years writing 'The Sword of Shannara,' Terry Brooks (b. 1944) submitted the manuscript to Lester Del Rey, who was the head of fantasy publishing at Ballantine Books. In November 1974 Ballantine accepted the novel and in 1977, both hardcover and trade paperback editions were published. The novel was illustrated by the Brother Hildebrandt, at that time the foremost fantasy illustrators in the world.I picked up the mass market paperback edition of the book shortly after its release in May, 1978. How does the book hold up after the passage of 47 years ? Quite well. In fact, it's a Five Star novel. I should state at the outset that 'Sword' is a pastiche of the Lord of the Rings (LOTR). As a pastiche, it was (and is) very successful, being one of the bestselling fantasy novels of the 1970s. Brooks is unapologetic about relying on LOTR for inspiration. Lin Carter, who was a prominent editor and author in the fantasy field in the 1970s, was incensed by 'Sword,' devoting a chapter in his 1978 anthology 'The Year's Best Fantasy Stories: 4' to criticizing Brooks for writing 'a complete rip-off' of Tolkein. I believe Carter was angry more because Del Rey had not approached him to produce a 700-page pastiche of LOTR, choosing instead to showcase a novice author......... In the 726 pp. comprising 'Sword,' Brooks reprises the storyline of LOTR: A Dark Lord (designated the 'Warlock Lord') threatens the free world, and elves, dwarves, and men must unite to combat the menace. Under the direction of the mysterious druid Allanon, a multi-racial party is assembled to embark on a quest to recover a mythical talisman, the Sword of Shannara. Playing the role of Frodo Baggins is the Valeman Shea Ohmsford, whose half-human, half-elf heritage makes him the only person in the world capable of wielding the sword, which expressly has been designed to be effective against the Warlock Lord. The initial third of the novel sees the party jointly encountering all manner of dangers, be they gnomes, Skull Bearers, or monsters. Thereafter 'Sword' settles into the narrative of LOTR in which tribulations of one sort or another sunder the party, and the storyline alternates between groups of characters. The closing chapters of 'Sword' focus on the siege of the fortress city of Tyrsis (the counterpart to Minas Tirith) and this account of a desperate struggle to hold off the armies of the Warlock Lord is well done by author Brooks. 'Sword' is written for 'all ages' (12 years old and up), and the narrative stays comparatively tame in terms of describing the mayhem between good and evil factions; even the climactic dispatching of one particularly odious character is done 'off-screen.' But it must be said that for a first-time author Brooks displays skill in keeping the plot moving through all 700+ pages, a feat many authors of lengthy fantasy novels (and here Richard Adams's 'Shardik' comes to mind) have problems executing. I confess that after finishing 'Sword' I was not overly motivated to take up some of the other 40+ novels and short story collections that make up the franchise. However, younger readers may be more motivated to do so than I. The verdict ? 'The Sword of Shannara' is one of the most successful epic fantasy novels of the 1970s, and thus, a good starting place for anyone who wants to get the sensibility of the genre in that era.
Action Bags / Action Packaging of Woodstock, Illinois, continues to sell plastic bags in a variety of sizes and styles. In my experience, their SKU: E6B5.75x8.625 (pictured above) is ideal for almost all mass market paperbacks, including thicker (i.e., 500+ pp) paperbacks. This size can be purchased in lots of 100, 500, 1,000, and even 2,000.
For thinner (i.e., up to about 225 pp) mass market paperbacks, BCW 5 x 7 3/8 inch bags continue to be available at amazon. With these you have to tape the edge (they aren't self-sealing).
So, you have some good, affordable options for protecting those precious paperbacks !
'The City Machine' (143 pp.) was published by DAW in 1972 and features cover art by Kelly Freas. This is among the very first books in the DAW catalog, standing at No. 24.
Louis Trimble (1917 - 1988) published novels in a variety of genres, including detective / crime, westerns, and science fiction. Along with 'The City Machine,' his sci-fi novels for DAW included 'The Wandering Variables' (1972) and 'The Bodelan Way' (1974).
'City' is set on an un-named Earth-like planet where, some centuries after the arrival of the initial exploration ship, most of the population resides in an arcology known simply as the City. The upper caste of inhabitants, known as the Highs, enjoy lives of leisure and privilege in the apex floors of the arcology, while below them, but still comparatively affluent, reside the Uppers.
The Lowers, as the name implies, are the unfortunates condemned to life in the arcology's dim and dirty lower floors. To them falls the task of maintaining the City and the comfortable lifestyle of the Highs. Life in the lower levels is bleak and devoid of hope, with the populace kept in check by gangs of malevolent 'Bully Boys.'
Protagonist Ryne once was a Lower, but through smarts and initiative, he has worked his way into a slot as an Upper. As the novel opens Ryne is recruited by the City's overseer, a man known only as the Coordinator, for a clandestine mission.
It seems that a cabal of Uppers are intent on acquiring a quasi-mythical 'City Machine,' a device brought by the initial colonization ship, used to build the City, and then somehow lost. The Machine is remarkable, capable of erecting an entire city within a day or two. Acquisition of the City Machine could allow for construction of a new City, one with sufficient room and resources for all to thrive. The rebels envision opening this new city to the downtrodden Lowers.
For the Coordinator, acquisition of the City Machine by a rebel action will mean the end of the City, for without the Lowers, the City cannot be maintained. As Ryne is the only City resident who can understand the language used in operating the City Machine, the rebels are sure to try and co-opt him into their scheme.
As Ryne joins the rebel faction as a covert operative, will he stay true to his allegiance to the Coordinator and the class system of the City, or will Ryne side with the cause of freedom and an end to the oppression of the Lowers ? Does the City Machine even exist, or is the rebel cause simply a fantasy ? Ryne will find himself forced to choose sides, and his choice will be be fateful one for every Terran on the planet.....
'The City Machine' is a competent sci-fi adventure novel, written in clear and straightforward prose at a time when the New Wave movement made such things seem passe. Where it falters is in the final chapters, where the double-crosses and shifting alliances get a little too elaborate and make for confusion. This strains the narrative's credulity, and left me comfortable with assigning a Three Star, as opposed to a Four Star, Rating.
PlayboyMay 1973May, 1973, and atop the radio's Top 10, we have Stevie Wonder, followed by Tony Orlando and Dawn, Sweet, Elton John, Paul McCartney, and, at number 10, the psychedelic soul groove of 'Wildflower,' by the Canadian band Skylark.The Nostalgia Craze of the 1970s is in full force in that spring of 1973, and the cover of the May issue of Playboy pays homage to the concept with a photo designed to recall those precious memories of 'back seat' action in the car. For a fiction piece, this May issue features a short story, titled 'No Comebacks,' by Frederick Forsyth. While it's slow to get underway and has a rather overly refined prose style, it turns out to be a great little tale of crime and punishment.
Our Playmate of the Month is the petite, Polish Anulka Dziubinska (b. 1950). When Playboy wanted to showcase blue-eyed blondes, it showcased them, all right...........and Anulka is an authentic blonde.
The subject of the Personality Profile is the elderly coal baron William Purviance Tams, Jr. (1883 - 1977), who established a profitable mine, and the eponymous mining town, in Raleigh County, West Virginia in the early 20th century. Author Laurence Leamer avoids being overly judgmental about Tams, which is good.Nat Hentoff's article, 'If You Liked '1984,' You'll Love 1973' dives into early 70s paranoia in its overview of federal and private databases collected on American citizens. Think The Conversation,The Parallax View, and 'Fingerprint File' by the Rolling Stones.Clashing decidedly with the T & A sensibility of the magazine is an article by Gerald Astor, 'What A Waste.' Featuring a great illustration by an artist whose name is too small and too low-res to make out, the article covers Astor's time spent with Detective Ed Sherry of the Boston Police Department's homicide unit. The catalogue of violence that the homicide unit must deal with is grim and disturbing: Lieutenant Jerry McCallum: "The only thing that shocks me, and I've been to hundreds of autopsies, is the battered child. I can't take it. It's so unbelievable; they're almost all colored [i.e., black]. The people upstairs could hear the body of the child going thump, thump, thump against the wall, swung by its hand. And in the wall, indentations where the body, the skull hit the wall." Let's close on a more salutary note, with a portfolio starring actress Barbara Leigh (b. 1946). In those politically incorrect days of 1973, not only was it cool to refer to her as 'Indian,' in recognition of Leigh's Cherokee background, but posing Leigh in 'Indian' apparel enhances the messaging. And that's how they did it, 53 years ago.....
Ten Novels About a Dystopian UK So.....after spending some years reading and reviewing novels about a dystopian UK, I've come up with ten such novels that treat the subject. Of these ten, I'd select 'Pendulum,' 'Albion, Albion !,' 'Noah's Castle,' 'Tracer,' and 'Whole Wide World,' as the best. Pendulum (1968), by John Christopher: in a late 1960s / early 1970s alternate UK, prosperous, middle-aged businessman Rod Gawfrey finds his comfortable existence turned upside-down when the nation’s youth overthrow the government. Gawfrey and his fellow citizens struggle to survive in a society where confrontations with truculent youngsters can have immediate, and quite violent, consequences. Scotch on the Rocks (1968) by Douglas Hurd and Andrew Osmond: it’s the early 1970s, and the Scotts are greatly displeased to see North Sea oil fueling prosperity in England while their own country struggles. The Scottish Liberation Party (SLP) is willing to use violence in an effort to spark a people’s uprising and a chance for independence. Can an undercover operative working for British Intelligence reveal the SLP’s commander in time to prevent bloodshed ? The ‘F’ Certificate (1970), by David Gurney: in an early 70s UK, ever-growing packs of young people who call themselves ‘Drummers’ are wandering the landscape, riding primordial Segways. Even when stoned on a heroin-like drug, the Drummers have an unnerving propensity for sudden violence. Film producer John Breen is aghast to find the Drummers trespassing on his country estate, but the UK government is too hesitant and befuddled to offer much in the way of assistance. If You Believe the Soldiers (1973), by Alexander Cordell: this novel is set in the UK in the early 1980s. The economic travails of the 1970s have resulted in a coup, carried out by a right-wing Army officer named Colonel 'Bull' Brander. The UK is under authoritarian rule, but the protagonist, a man named Mark Seaton, mounts a quiet defiance in his role as a contracting agent for the government. However, as the country descends into outright fascism, Seaton finds himself committed to more overt actions, and this can be quite dangerous to one’s health. Albion ! Albion ! (1974) by Dick Moreland (aka Reginald Hill): it’s the early 1990s and the UK has descended into anarchy. Most of the cities are trash-strewn wastelands where no one ventures out after dark, save those with a penchant for mayhem. The country is divided into four ‘quadrants,’ with each quadrant ruled by ‘football’ (i.e., soccer) clubs, whose commands are enforced by squads of hooligans. Journalist Whitey Singleton finds himself stranded in this dystopian Britain, and obliged to form alliances with people for whom savagery is a way of life. Noah’s Castle (1975) by John Rowe Townsend: Norman Mortimer, a former Army quartermaster, foresees the economic collapse of the UK and sets his family up in a sturdy, defensible home with a well-stocked basement. When the collapse comes, it awakens the political consciousness of teenager Barry Mortimer and forces him to decide between the welfare of his family, and the ‘greater good.’ Author Townsend is skilled at depicting the slow infiltration of deprivation, hunger, and political violence into a disbelieving society. Survivors (1975) by Terry Nation: this is a novelization of the 1975 – 1977 BBC TV show. The premise: a global pandemic wipes out most of the planet’s population, and civilization collapses. Brits of various classes converge on The Grange, an estate in the country, there to try and rebuild their lives as best they can. Author Nation focuses on the nuts and bolts of living in a post-apocalyptic society, with Modern Man obliged to tackle - often at a disadvantage - the realities of weeds, mud, vermin, and weather. Quatermass (1979) by Nigel Kneale: this is a novelization of a 1979 ITV show. It’s set in a 1980s UK, where London is a wasteland ruled by vicious street gangs who vie with South African mercenaries for whatever food and goods remain in the destroyed shops. In the countryside, life has regressed to a subsistence level. A hippie cult called the ‘Planet People’ is channeling an End Times religion, one that may be invoking deadly, and otherworldly, forces. Quatermass, now a man in his 80s, embarks on a dangerous search for his granddaughter Hettie; his journeys across a dystopian UK showcase a civilization in collapse. Tracer (1990), by Stuart Jackson: in 1990, mass sickness and death caused by the AIDS epidemic has led to the imposition of a totalitarian government, which requires all infected individuals to report to ‘Special Care Centres’ for indefinite quarantine. Protagonist Nick Gorman is a ‘Tracer,’ assigned to locate and apprehend anyone trying to evade the mandate. The novel’s opening third does a good job of presenting a near-future UK in the grip of fear and loathing over a deadly communicable disease, and brings (uncomfortably) to mind the real-world government policies operating in the initial years of the covid-19 epidemic. Whole Wide World (2001), by Paul McAuley: this novel is set in a UK of the mid-2010s, several years after the 'InfoWar', a mass riot perpetrated by antifas, nearly eliminated the nation's telecommunications grid. An authoritarian government now uses cyber-police agencies to monitor content on the Web and suppress dissent. Protagonist John is a middle-aged policeman whose investigation into the murder of a young woman leads to unpleasant revelations about the bureaucrats who are intent on turning the country into a surveillance state. *** And there you have it. I'm aware that there are other novels out there that could qualify for this list (such as Wilfred Greatorex's '1990'), but getting ahold of some of those is not easy. If anyone wants to nominate some additional entries for this category, drop a Comment !
'Survivors' first appeared as a BBC TV series, airing for 38 episodes from April 1975 to June 1977. I first learned of it from the pages of Stephen Brotherstone's 'Scarred for Life,' as the series didn't make it to U.S. television.
(A reboot, airing in 2008, suffered from Wokeness and was not well received.)
Terry Nation (1930 - 1997) was a UK screenwriter and producer who, during the 1960s and 1970s, worked on a number of science fiction TV series, including Dr. Who and Blake's 7. In 1980 he moved to Los Angeles and wrote scripts for American series such as MacGyver.
In 1976 Futura released Nation's novelization of the series as a paperback. In 2008, to coincide with the reboot, UK publisher Orion released a trade paperback version and this is the one I read and am reviewing.
'Survivors' starts off with a plague depleting the population of the entire world, including the UK. In short order, civilization breaks down, and the few survivors wander the empty landscape scavenging for supplies. Lead character Abby Grant is obliged to abandon her life of upper-class comfort and privilege, but she holds on to the hope that her son Peter may have survived the plague and is alive and well somewhere in the countryside. Jenny Richards, a younger woman from a working-class background, and Greg, an engineer, eventually meet up with Abby and decide to set up camp in a rural household called The Grange. Other survivors join up and assist with establishing a farm, and a foraging system to secure supplies in the wider area. There is tension in this post-apocalyptic UK in the form of a classic 'survivalist' encampment, the 'National Unity Force,' formed by a trade union president named Arthur Wormley (it's very British to have the villain arise from unionism, as opposed to the American practice of having these characters derive from 'survivalist' / right wing origins). The NUF have a habit of seizing things by force from those unwilling to defend themselves. Other, less organized bands of marauders also pose a threat to the welfare of the Grange colony. In relating the adventures of Abby, Jenny, and Greg, Nation takes pains to portray how poorly equipped modern society and its denizens are for a collapse. Early on in the novel, Abby has a conversation with the headmaster of her son's boarding school: He moved quickly to a workbench and picked up a glass test tube. "Look at that. We've been making things of glass for thousands of years. But could you make it ? It's silica, potash, high temperature and a great deal of skill. Don't you see, our civilization has the benefit of knowledge that has been accumulated since the beginning of time, and yet most of us are less practical than Iron Age man." The struggle to grow enough food to support the Grange, and the battle with the elements and the native flora and fauna who quickly assert themselves in the absence of civilization, is a major theme in 'Survivors.' With only 254 pages to work with in his paperback, Nation obviously could not present all of the storyline from the 38-episode television run. But his narrative is crisp and declarative, and devoid of much in the way of psychological angst; the people in 'Survivors' are too consumed with simply staying warm, and having enough to eat, to indulge much in PTSD. As I indicate above, 'Survivors' adopts a 'British' tone to its post-apocalyptic story. There is limited gunplay and assistant casualties, thus, readers hoping for the gleeful violence of American 'Radioactive Rambo' novels will be disappointed. 'Survivors' also is devoid of the facetious humor that marks the American franchise Fallout. In Nation's novel, the post-plague world is marked by unrelenting bleakness. And it's done well enough for me to grant the novel a Five Star Rating. For another, rather frenetic, take on 'Survivors,' readers are directed to 'The Diesel-Electric Elephant Company blog.
Centerfold: The Secret Archives of Bob GuccioneStudio 96 Publishing2024Here at the PorPor Books Blog, as part of my dedication to showcasing pop culture artifacts from the interval from the late 1960s to the late 1980s, I occasionally post excerpts from various issues of Penthouse magazine. Startling as it may seem, these Penthouse posts are among the most-frequently Viewed pages of my blog..... It was in that spirit of documentation, for both aging Boomers and a younger generation unfamiliar with the 'men's magazine' landscape of those long-ago decades, that I purchased a copy of 'Centerfold: The Secret Archives of Bob Guccione,' issued by Studio 96 publishing in June, 2024. The text is by Martha Ball, and the editing is by Erica Wagner.It's a little surprising to realize that a 'coffee table' book on the founder of Penthouse and Omni magazines has not previously appeared. But then again, the last days of Penthouse circa 2003-2004 were chaotic, and in the last 20+ years, one owner of the franchise after another has wound up declaring bankruptcy. The current owners of Penthouse are the siblings and French porn magnates Stéphane and Malorie Pacaud, from their base of operations- WebGroup Czech Republic, aka WGCZ Ltd. - in Czechia. In their hands, the magazine solely is digital.'Centerfold' is a well-made hardcover book of 248 pages, measuring 12 x 9 1/4 inches.Studio 96 publishing was founded by entrepreneur Aya Abitbul and is owned by New York City firm Creatd, Inc. 'Centerfold' features an 'interactive' component marketed by Studio 96: Similar to how one would scan a QR code, readers use the S96 app to scan images throughout our books. Unfortunately, my innate software paranoia prevents me from downloading and using the S96 app, so I can't say anything constructive about the whole 'image interaction' component of the book. It's unclear to what (if any) extent the Pacauds and WebGroup Czech Republic extended permission to include scans of past issues of Penthouse. Indeed, in all of 'Centerfold' there are only scans / reproductions of three or four magazine covers, and few scans of any of the interior contents (editorial masthead, the Forum, interviews, portfolios, illustrations, cartoons, etc.). According to Creatd co-founder Jeremy Frommer, most (if not all) of the content in 'Centerfold' was the result of a Storage Wars-type, serendipitous 2012 purchase of a storage unit, within which Frommer found "...magazines, Kodachrome slides, and gold chain necklaces. Together these items represented the forgotten life of Bob Guccione, the publishing magnate and cultural changemaker, and a new opportunity to shine a light on history." Talk about a find ! This discovery led Frommer to seek out other depositions of Guccione ephemera, and ultimately a consultation with Jane Homlish, Guccione's secretary of over 30 years.The chapters in 'Centerfold' are arranged chronologically and cover the Guccione publishing empire from its early days in the UK in the mid-1960s, to the launch of the magazine in the US with the September, 1969 issue, and after. Reflecting the nature of the content in the storage locker(s), the emphasis is on material from the 60s, 70s, and 80s.
'Centerfold' takes a somewhat reverential view in its reporting on Guccione, which perhaps is not unexpected for a book of this type. It also provides a more flattering portrait of Kathy Keeton than was given in the 2023 A & E channel documentary, Secrets of Penthouse.
About a third of 'Centerfold' is taken up with Omni magazine, but as is the case with Penthouse, excerpts of actual pages from the magazine are limited (Omni also is owned by WebGroup Czech Republic). Who will want a copy of 'Centerfold' ? Well, at $99 from Studio 96, it is pricey, and aimed at Baby Boomers and vintage adult content aficionados with the disposable income to indulge in coffee table books. If you have good memories of Penthouse and Omni then you may want to take a look at 'Centerfold.' But I suspect that younger people unaccustomed to the print media of long long ago, may not be overly interested in the the story of Guccione and his magazines.
APRIL is MORE 'Dystopian Britain Novels' Month Scarred for Life Volume One: the 1970sby Stephen Brotherstone and Dave Lawrence5 / 5 Stars Here's some pop culture exotica from the UK: 'Scarred for Life,' published in 2017 by LuLu, a print-on-demand publisher. It's one of three 'Scarred for Life' volumes from Brotherstone and Lawrence, with Volume Two and Volume Three devoted to 1980s TV and pop culture, respectively. All three 'Scarred' books can be ordered online from Lulu, either as print books or ebooks. It took about two weeks from the placement of my order until the book shipped, and then another few days before it arrived in my mailbox.'Scarred' is, at 740 pages, a thick chunk of a trade paperback. The contents are printed in black and white, and (older people be warned) the font is 5 point, so I needed to use reading glasses when sitting down with this book. Britons Brotherstone and Lawrence were kids in the 1970s, so the essays collected in the book are observations of UK popular as perceived by children. Affection and nostalgia suffuse their observations, one example being Brotherstone's reminiscences of reading the first issues of 2000 AD comics when these were published in March of 1977. The references to 'scarring' are an acknowledgement that some of the media consumed by Brit Kids in the 1970s was transgressive enough to leave a mark on those youthful psyches. I'm sure anyone can relate to this; for me, watching Monster Movie Matinee as a kid in the mid-1960s left me with plenty of enduring nightmares.........The first half of the book is devoted to TV and film, while the second half turns its attention to other media: books, comics, board games, and novelties like trading cards.I should state that many of the essays on the TV shows and Public Information Films (PIF) covered in 'Scarred' are inscrutable for Americans, even if you - like me - had some familiarity with Brit TV from the airings of The Goodies and Monty Python and Dr. Who on PBS in the 1970s and early 1980s (I never, ever watched Upstairs, Downstairs). There is sufficient crossover in some of these categories with what was present in the US at the time, and thus, while some of the content in 'Scarred' is a bit obscure, there is much that will resonate with American readers. Paperback Fanatics certainly will enjoy the coverage of the 'Pan Book of Horror Stories,' while the chapters on Action and 2000 AD franchises will appeal to the comic book readership.Much like John Szpunar's own weighty tome, 'Xerox Ferox,' 'Scarred' strikes the right notes of affection and nostalgia for the material in its pages. The authors were gradeschool kids during the 70s, so their memories and perceptions are colored by that child's point of view. Tendentious excursions into 'critical analysis,' and Woke thinking, are gratifyingly thin in the pages of 'Scarred.' The book has sociological value. In his essay on the rather depressing sitcom Romany Jones, Brotherstone reminisces that his family, who lived in Liverpool, were hardworking and of modest means. As such, not until the late 1970s / early 1980s did they purchase a refrigerator (prior to that time food was stored in the 'outside lavatory') and also, a phone. They never got a microwave oven, and the family car was something called a 'Reliant Robin,' a tiny three-wheeled vehicle that was driven into the ground, as a more comfortable car was simply too expensive. These revelations from Brotherstone remind us modern-day readers how much the consumer society has advanced since the 1970s, and how many things are taken for granted in this year of 2026. And, last but not least, 'Scarred' reminds us how so many UK families made do with the economic limitations attendant to life in the second half of the 20th century; they had no sense of entitlement or grievance, and did not complain, but simply 'got on' with it............ At the end of the day, 'Scarred' is a must-have for Brits who grew up in the sci-fi and horror pop culture of the 1970s, and curious Americans also will find things of interest in the book. And for those who want to get really, really deep into the 'Scarred' mythology, there is a podcast available at Spotify.
At the Library SaleApril, 2026A couple of weeks ago, it was time once again for the bi-annual Friends of the Library Sale, down route 29 in Charlottesville. As always, the opening evening - 5 o'clock on Friday - came with a large number of attendees, and the warm Spring weather meant that it was quite hot and airless in the room. The staff overseeing the sale regularly were calling out "We've got water up front for anyone who needs it ! Water up front !"By now I have a routine down when it comes to the sci-fi table, so I made my way to one end and slowly shuffled along it, moving in between and around other bibliophiles, looking for paperbacks. And I found them ! Someone had dropped off a large number of first-printing Doc Savage paperbacks, many of these in Good to Very Good condition, and for just a buck each. I grabbed a bunch:Also there on the tablewere other vintage paperbacks from the 1960s and early 1970s. I found some treasures, here......some (the Vance novels) were in Acceptable condition, and some were Good condition. With regard to larger books, I grabbed a vintage hardbound 'England Swings SF,' a black-and-white 'Solomon Kane' comics compilation, and a vintage Alfred Hitchcock anthology aimed at the Young Adult readership. The sale lasts for over a week, so I came one more time mid-week, to look at the vinyl / LPs, and paperbacks in genres other than sci-fi. I was able to get some more vintage paperbacks, including two 'Mod Squad' entries. All in all, some nice stuff. And as I always say, you never know just what you'll find, at the Library Sale..........
APRIL is MORE 'Dystopian Britain Novels' MonthBook Review: 'Scotch on the Rocks' by Douglas Hurd and Andrew Osmond2 / 5 Stars 'Scotch on the Rocks' first was published in the UK in 1968. This Warner Books UK paperback edition (224 pp.) was issued in 2001. A five-episode BBC Scotland TV series based on the novel aired in the spring of 1973. A source of some controversy back then, the series never was re-run. According to a 2023 BBC article, apparently the reels for two episodes are lost, making a present-day re-airing difficult, if not impossible. Author Hurd (b. 1930) is a UK politician, and former Foreign Secretary (1989 - 1995). He has published 8 fiction works (some of these with Osmond as a co-author) in the political thriller genre, as well as a number of nonfiction works on foreign policy, and biographies of prominent Britons. 'Scotch' is set in the 1970s, in an alternate UK where conditions for many Scots are grim, as the authors make clear in a vignette about an urban renewal project in Glasgow's Gorbals district that has gone awry: ...The sandstone tenements, blackened by a century of smog, still stood - though some barely, their facades slipping and crumbling into asymmetry, and others not at all, demolished before they collapsed, leaving an impression of a recent bombing raid: patches of exposed wallpaper, fireplaces hanging four floors up, jettisoned furniture and piles of rubble in the empty spaces....All but a few of the shops were boarded up, their clients evacuated to the suburbs.But people still lived here, pensioners and Pakistanis, huddled together in the half-empty buildings. Here and there a touch of paint or a lace curtain was evidence of human survival. Some of these curtains twitched aside as the car drew up and shadowy faces watched the two men go into an abandoned laundry. It was assumed they came from Housing Department....They stood without speaking for another five minutes. Rennie was straining to catch the roar from Ibrox which would mean a goal for Rangers. Hart's eyes followed a girl across the clinker, unshaven legs lurching in ill-fitting shoes, face pop-eyed and knobby with deprivation. Oxfam would have thrown her clothes away. Angry over Britain's enrichment from North Sea oil revenues while their own country gets little from said resource, Scots have embraced the Scottish National Party (SNP) and its platform of independence. Also in the mix is the clandestine Scottish Liberation Party (SLP) which is partial to Marxist doctrine. The head of the SNP, a profoundly uncharismatic but crafty politician named James Henderson, takes care to disavow the SLP, preferring to use politics (as opposed to a Liberation Struggle) to chart a path to independence. Henderson's stance is not reassuring to the British, who have ordered an intelligence operative named Graham Hart to team up with Chief Inspector Rennie of the Glasgow police to insert a double agent into the ranks of the SLP. A 'hard man' and former Royal Army sapper named MacNair proves able to the task. The novel's first 60 pages are occupied with introducing the large cast of characters and laying out the political machinations deployed by the Prime Minister, Patrick Harvey, and Henderson, prior to a spring general election. However, when the SNP fails to capture a majority, this catalyzes plans by the SLP to reject further negotiations and stage an insurrection. The goal: force both Harvey and Henderson to accept independence as a consequence of a popular uprising, rather than backroom wheeling and dealing. And because their cause is just, naturally, the SLP leadership isn't averse to sponsoring martyrs whose deaths will be a source of inspiration to the Struggle...... 'Scotch' is not an easy read. Perhaps as a consequence of being co-written, the narrative has an abrupt, choppy quality. I often was forced to re-read sentences and sometime entire paragraphs to figure out what was happening to who, because of the terse nature of the prose. Readers hoping for depictions of bloody street battles between Royal Army forces and wild-eyed Scots, with RAF bombing runs on border towns, fields strewn with corpses, and Saracen armored cars set afire by Molotovs tossed by beret-wearing college students chanting in Gaelic, will be disappointed in 'Scotch.' The novel revolves around political dramas, with most action sequences (including sabotage of bridges) taking place off-screen. It's only in the novel's closing chapters that any sort of violence ensues, but this is subordinate to discussions and arguments between bureaucrats clustered in board rooms. Summing up, 'Scotch on the Rocks' has the restrained quality common in literature about near-future British dystopias. Maybe it's the restrictions imposed by the UK on personal firearms ownership, or perhaps the erratic psychologies induced by intergenerational vitamin D deficiency*, but the manic energy of American dystopias is quite absent in British treatments of the theme. If gun battles and mayhem are your 'cuppa,' then 'Scotch' likely will disappoint. *According to a 2022 journal paper, a survey of 351,320 UK ‘Biobank’ blood samples taken from individuals aged 40 to 70 indicated that 53.75% of these individuals had serum vitamin D levels in the ‘insufficient’ and ‘deficient’ categories (i.e., < 50 nM / L). Vitamin D deficiency is linked to delirium. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7902418/
PenthouseApril, 1976April, 1976, and atop the Top 40 singles chart is 'Disco Lady,' by Johnnie Taylor. I remember 'Let Your Love Flow,' by the Bellamy Brothers, also getting quite a bit of airplay on the Top 40 AM channels. And of course, 'Show Me the Way,' by Frampton, would come to dominate the AOR airplay that spring.Let's look through the pages of the April 1976 issue of Penthouse magazine, shall we ? Among the major contributors to this issue is Nick Tosches, a writer of numerous fiction and nonfiction books and articles during the 1970s, on into the 1990s. Tosches deployed a hardboiled style of prose that regularly approached (unwitting) self-parody. In this regard, his 1992 'biography' of Dean Martin: 'Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams,' is a great novel, but questionable as a work of nonfiction.......In this issue of Penthouse, Tosches has this to say of the hapless Bay City Rollers: Those five silly, meatless bodies ringed in Tartan Fauntleroys and smile buttons. Those five hideously bland faces with their frozen pasteboard grins and wide idiot eyes. And you've heard them. Those thin, autistic, sissy-voices singing 'Saturday Night,' a geld pasteurized vision of teen-age fun-fun-fun. Elsewhere in the media reviews pages, Karen Thorsen has good things to say about one of the first mainstream compilations of underground comix: 'The Apex Treasury of Underground Comix,' which I reviewed here.
These being the mid-70s, disillusionment over America and its place in the World Order is a major topic of analysis. 'The End of the American Dream,' by Jeff Greenfield, is typical of these treatments. It does have a great illustration from 'Cosimo.'
Reflecting Bob Guccione's and Kathy Keeton's interest in the future, 'Beyond 2001,' by Stephen Rosen, predicts all kinds of cool stuff awaiting us in the 21st century, including a 'people washer' egg-shaped chamber for personal hygiene; a nuclear-powered artificial heart; and 'eye movement command machines.'
The interview in this April issue is with Patti Smith, who in '76 was riding high as an object of worship by the New York City hipsterdom. I always regarded Smith as heavily over-rated, but it must be said that she was quite shrewd in her self-promotion. Smith recognized the value in contrasting her appearance and behavior with the wholesome female pop and rock stars of the mid-70s, like Carly Simon, Judy Collins, Olivia Newton-John, and Toni Tennille.
In her interview, conducted with Tosches, she has this to say:
I got along better with the niggers, but they didn't wanna fuck me either.
I wrote a poem where this guy comes in this girl's window and she's sitting there and she has this real dense mind, so he simply takes a pistol and shoves it her mouth and shoots it. That's what I think of sperm - it's the shell that bursts brains, y'know ? I mean, women need their brains burst out.
I mean, to me Erica Jong ain't a woman; she's just some spoiled Jewish girl who'd rather whine than go out of her brain.
When I write I may be a Brando creep, or a girl laying on the floor, or a Japanese tourist, or a slob like Richard Speck.
A word like Ms. is really bullshit. Vowels are the most illuminated letters in the alphabet. Vowels are the colors and souls of poetry and speech. And these assholes take the only fuckin' vowel out of the word Miss. So what do they have left ? Ms. It sounds like a sick bumblebee. It sounds frigid. I mean, who the hell would ever want to stick his hand up the dress of somebody who goes around calling herself something like Ms. ? It's all so stupid.
That's our Patti; quite the punk, back in those days......! She remains alive and well in this year 2026, fifty years after that interview appeared on the newsstands.
Thankfully, our April Penthouse Pet, the lovely, dark-eyed, nineteen year-old Sandy Bernadou, is a more....... relatable......... young woman. We're told she likes to be outdoors, she goes swimming without a bathing suit, and once, she had sex atop a boulder overlooking a river. And her favorite drink is a Tequila Sunrise........that's the Seventies, for you !
APRIL is MORE 'Dystopian Britain Novels' Month Book Review: 'Noah's Castle' by John Rowe Townsend
4 / 5 Stars
'Noah's Castle' first was published in 1975 in the UK by Oxford University Press. Various paperback editions were released, including a Puffin Books edition in 1980. The older editions are difficult to find and expensive. Both trade paperback and ebook editions from October Mist Publishing are available at amazon; I found the ebook to be well formatted and free of errors.
Author John Rowe Townsend (1922 - 2014) published a number of dramas and science fiction novels for young adults and children during the 1970s and 1980s. These novels were deliberate in their political framing; Townsend was an admirer of left-wing ideologies (as evidenced by his obituary in The Guardian).
'Noah's Castle' is set in the 1980s in an un-named city in the Midlands. First-person narrator Barry Mortimer is a teenager; he has an older sister, Nessie, a younger brother, Geoff, and a little sister named Ellen. Norman Mortimer, the family's patriarch, is the stereotypical postwar British male; something of a 'prig' (as the Brits put it), fussy, but also single-mindedly dedicated to the welfare of his family.
As the novel opens, it's September, and Norman has decided to purchase a 'white elephant' of a house, the eponymous Castle. The family are unimpressed with the house and its solid, but unattractive, construction, and its retiring, even discreet, location. Barry is unhappy with having to leave the modest but comfortable middle-class home the family has been occupying. But it turns out that Norman is a forward-thinking man: there are signs that the UK economy is collapsing. For the Mortimer family, the new home is a redoubt.
As the novel progresses, the family are bemused participants in Norman's plans to stock the cellar with 'survivalist' goods:
We went towards the nearest loaded shelf. The black polyethylene sheeting was tucked in at the edges under heavy, bulky objects. I drew it back unwillingly, apprehensively. There were cans on this shelf. Great big cans—cans of coffee, cans of drinking-chocolate, cans of peas and tomatoes, cans of stock essence—cans with familiar labels that I’d seen again and again in the shops, but bigger, giving a curious and alarming impression that they’d grown and might still be growing.
However, with the arrival of Winter, it becomes clear that Norman's foresight is of value. Author Townsend is skilled at depicting the liminal but ominous collapse of the British economy:
Mid-January. It was a cold, gray, iron-bound January—the kind of midwinter month when sidewalks and lawns and gravel alike seem jarringly hard underfoot and there’s no give in anything. But it was dry: no snow and not much rain. Talk among the grown-ups was the usual kind of talk but much more anxious. Prices were still soaring. (“It’s no lark,” said our witty English teacher.) Everything was now five times what it had been the previous summer, and the tickets in the shop windows seemed to change almost weekly. It seems odd now, but for a long time, the realities behind the talk and the figures didn’t sink in.
While the Mortimers are shielded from the worst of the privation accompanying the economic collapse, it's only a matter of time before knowledge of their secret larder seeps out into the increasingly lawless society beyond the driveway of Noah's Castle. And when that knowledge is loosed, there will be consequences......
I should make clear that 'Noah's Castle' is very much a 'British' novel, and one intended for a young adult readership. It's subdued, and devoid of the sort of violent action and gunplay that marks American treatments of societal collapse and the survivalist ethos (such as Andrew J. Offutt's 'The Castle Keeps'). In this, it is much like John Christopher's novel 'Pendulum' (1968), also about a middle-class family's response to a UK Gone Bad.
'Noah's Castle' is at heart a political allegory; as the narrative progresses, the reader observes Barry's burgeoning humanism, and his awareness of the widening gap between the haves and have-nots. Will Barry succumb to the security of his father's 'family first' version of capitalism, or embrace socialism and the wisdom of the Collective, as exemplified by his friends in the 'Share Alike' community program ? I won't disclose spoilers, but Townsend provides an ending that is a little too 'safe,' one that side-steps the sharper edges of any discourse about political ideologies.
Readers comfortable with a contemplative treatment of societal collapse will find 'Noah's Castle' engaging, but it likely will disappoint if you're looking for a more action-centered examination of the topic.
Back in January of 2019 I devoted the month to reviewing novels about a near-future, dystopian Britain. In the ensuing 7 years I've come across some additional novels to read and review, being alerted to some of these by the Stephen Brotherstone and Dave Lawrence tome 'Scarred for Life,' which is a sort of 'Whole Earth Catalog' overview of UK pop culture in the 1970s.
So, stand by for reviews and commentary on novels where it's an alternate UK, sometime in the 1970s, and things aren't going well. Plagues, economic collapse, dour Scots insisting on forming their own country (we all know what a catastrophe that would be !) will force our doughty Brits into confronting lives of privation and desperation.
And remember: in the UK, it's extraordinarily difficult to acquire firearms. If you live on a rural estate you might have inherited an ancient shotgun, for Birding, from your great-great-grandfather Lord Argyll, but that's pretty much it. So Radioactive Rambos are noticeably absent from postapocalyptic Britain. Ingenuity and edged weapons, that's the trick....!
Planet of the Apes Adventures:The Original Marvel Years Marvel Comics, 2022
During the 1960s and 1970s, few sci-fi franchises held the imagination of the popular culture as did the Planet of the Apes movies, which led to five feature films, a TV show, toys, merchandising, and lineages of comic books that persist till this day.
The first Apes comic book was the one-shot Beneath the Planet of the Apes, issued in 1970 by Western Publishing / Gold Key.
In 1974 Marvel comics acquired the rights to publish comic books based on the Planet of the Apes movies, Gold Key having given up its licensing with 20th Century Fox. Marvel began with a black-and-white magazine, titled Planet of the Apes, but in October 1975, the company released an 11-issue color comic book series: Adventures on the Planet of the Apes.
Adventures on the Planet of the Apes recapitulated the storylines of the initial two films in the Apes franchise. The script was by Doug Moench, the artwork by George Tuska (the first six issues) and Alfredo Alcala (the final five issues). George Roussos is credited with the colors, but there is no letterer credited.
Unlike the case with Gold Key, Marvel's licensing deal with 20th Century Fox apparently did not include the rights to the features of the actors, so in the comics, we are given 'generic' appearances for the lead characters.
Planet of the Apes Adventures: The Original Marvel Years (PotAA: TOMY) compiles all 11 issues of the 1975-1976 series in a larger, 'deluxe' hardbound edition. Aside from the 11 issues there's not much else: no draft art pages, draft script pages, promotional materials, letters to the editor, etc.
Moench's script sticks closely to that of the films, so there are no real surprises plot-wise. Tuska's artwork was mediocre to begin with, and this compilation doesn't do much to improve it, save making the colors more intense.
PotAA: TOMY has a cover price of $100, which is ludicrous for a 224-page, 'oversize' hardbound edition of comics that weren't all that special when they first appeared in 1975. I don't know if the pricing was something dictated by 20th Century Fox or not, but I only purchased this volume when I saw it at a Bargain Outlet for $25. And even that seems a little steep.........In my opinion, PotAA: TOMY solely is for those fanatics who have to have every single comic or graphic art manifestation installment of the Apes franchise. if this doesn't pertain to you, then you are better off passing on this 'deluxe' edition.
'The Pyx' (127 pp.) was published by Popular Library in 1959. The cover artist is uncredited.
Canadian John Buell (1927 - 2013) was a university professor. He published 5 novels in his lifetime, one of these, 'The Shewsdale Exit' (1972), I read and found underwhelming. So I was hoping 'The Pyx' would be more engaging........
The novel is set in Montreal, in the summer. A cabbie driving through an affluent neighborhood sees a dreadful sight: a woman falling to her death onto the sidewalk in front of his car. A world-weary detective named Henderson arrives on the scene and identifies the dead woman as one Elizabeth Lacy: young, beautiful, and not disposed to suicide. Henderson investigates the penthouse suite of the apartment building from which Lacy fell and judges that it was the site of some illicit activities.
'The Pyx' is a crime novel, and the reader travels alongside Henderson as he conducts his investigation. It's no spoiler to say that Lacy was a higher-quality call girl, and her clients lodged on the kinkier side of the moral ledger. As the plot progresses there are additional deaths, and these are unambiguous.
The novel culminates in revealing Whodunit, along with some mild allusions to the supernatural and / or occult; not enough to declare 'The Pyx' as a murder mystery crossed with (say) 'Rosemary's Baby.'
Much like 'The Shewsdale Exit,' 'The Pyx' heavily is padded with psychological passages; these are overwritten, and made me feel as if the novel was twice as long as its page count:
....She couldn't afford that: the thoughts she had demanded oblivion or complete alertness. In an in-between state they would possess her and grow more inconsistent and stay in the mind like a frenzied cosmos excluding everything else and feeding on her own cerebral energy until mere exhaustion brought her back to the real world and the ever-present causes of it all. When breakdown comes, she thought, it will be something like that. But then they say some people attain a sort of peace that way: the exhausted juggler is no longer a juggler.
Encrusting what is a simple and unadorned mystery narrative with this stuff is not productive, and I bestow upon 'The Pyx' a One Star Rating. I finished the novel thinking that postwar noir writers like John D. MacDonald or Lawrence Block could have taken the premise and done something memorable with it. But unless you've a high patience threshold, this novel can be left on the shelf.
Book Review: 'The Traveler in Black' by John Brunner1 / 5 Stars 'The Traveler in Black' is a fixup novel constructed from four novellas and short stories first published in various science fiction and fantasy magazines over the interval from 1960 to 1971. Multiple editions of the novel have been issued, some of these retitled 'The Compleat Traveler in Black', which is available in print, and as an ebook. In 1979 Brunner published a fifth Traveler tale, 'The Things That Are Gods,' which is included in The Compleat Traveler in Black. The Ace Books edition (222 pp.) reviewed here was published in 1971, and features cover art by Leo and Diane Dillon. The eponymous Traveler is a small man, cloaked in black and wielding a magic staff with the power to grant wishes; 'he has many names, but one nature.' His adventures take place in quasi-medieval settings, in a past (or perhaps future) era where the forces of Chaos gradually are giving way to those of Law. The Traveler apparently has been tasked by the Creator to serve as a Change Agent for this process. The Traveler makes his way to cities like Acromel, Ryovora, Barbizond, Teq, and Ys, whose rulers greatly are troubled by the recession of Chaos, as this recession voids the power of the gods and deities which historically have governed the welfare of said cities. Deprived of the ability to truck with the supernatural, the rulers are beset with anomie and despair. The Traveler offers counsel, but the rulers tend to scorn his assistance. Likewise, the people residing in these cities often are as self-centered, and as dismissive of the Traveler, as their rulers. A plot device used regularly in the novel is for the selfish, corrupt, and malevolent persons in the abovementioned cities to wish for something to improve their station in life; by striking his staff on the ground and announcing "As you wish, so be it," the Traveler grants the wish, but always in a manner that is the opposite (in a bad way) of what the wisher expected. In the past, I've tried several times to read the entirety of The Traveler in Black and given up, mainly because the novel has the self-consciously 'artistic' sensibility of the New Wave era and a prose style that is wordy and obtuse: Yet the rule bound him, and the traveler's nature was not such that he should complain. Forth he went on paths grown unfamiliar, and spoke with many people in many places, as for example in Wocrahin, where once-Memory ! Memory ! He had never foreseen that that intangible, binding the fluid nature of eternity into the sequential tidiness of Time, would also hamper the will like age itself ! Almost, he began to envy those who could die..... The novel is filled with these empty phrasings, which obviously Brunner hoped would come across and Enigmatic and Profound, but they are a chore to wade through. This time I completed my reading of the novel, and I was underwhelmed. While the reviews of 'Traveler' posted online are quite laudatory, I am comfortable with giving the novel a One Star Rating. 'Traveler' belongs to the fables / fabulations sub-genre of Speculative Fiction, and if that sub-genre appeals to you, you'll find the novel rewarding. All others should pass.
National LampoonMarch, 1981March, 1981, and Blondie has the top single in the USA, with 'Rapture.' The latest issue of National Lampoon is out on the stands, and it's clear that the magazine has taken a hit in terms of faring in this new decade. As compared to the mid- and late- seventies, the volume of advertising has thinned, with no comedy LP promotions to be found. Under editor P. J. O'Rourke, the text features in this issue are lame, and show fatigue. The momentum generated by the success of Animal House, now three years in the past, well has receded. By mid-decade circulation would drop, and in 1986 the magazine would reduce its publication schedule to bi-monthly. In this March issue, 'Foto Funnies' perseveres, in its own corny way...... The comics are worth scanning and presenting, so here they are: And that's what you got for your $2, back in that long-ago March of 45 years ago.........
Book Review: 'High Sorcery' by Andre Norton3 / 5 Stars 'High Sorcery' (156 pp.) was published by Ace Books in March 1970, with cover art by Jack Gaughan. Two of the five stories and novelettes in this anthology are seeing print for the first time. A Kindle edition of 'High Sorcery' is available from amazon (be warned, there are many typos and, apparently, missing pages). My capsule summaries of the contents: 'Wizard's World' (1967): a
novelette about an 'esper' named Craik, who involuntarily teleports himself
to a stereotypical 'barbarian' world called Sampur, where his powers are amplified. Unfortunately, the dreaded Black Hoods also wield considerable psy powers. In
his confrontation with the Hoods, Craik will have to rely on aid
profferred by a barbarian girl named Takya, who has her own ideas as to
who will rule the roost in Sampur......... This
story is mediocre. Stilted dialogue and prose, and perfunctory story
beats that come across as something borrowed from comic books. Norton
plainly was on autopilot with 'Wizard's World.' 'Through the Needle's Eye' (1970): it's
the South, a residential neighborhood, the 1950s, and Ernestine
Williams, a little girl crippled by polio ("In those days, before
Salk....") meets the spinster in the house next door. There are
supernatural events. A well-composed story, with tones of Southern
Gothic. Had it been published two or three years after
1970, this tale likely would have made it into 'The Pan Book of Horror Stories,'
or perhaps a volume of 'The Year's Best Horror Stories.' 'By a Hair' (1958): in the aftermath of World War Two, in a remote Baltic village, the evils of a Communist regime provoke resistance. The dark arts of the area's pre-Christian beliefs come to the fore. Another tale with supernatural elements; it would have been right at home in the 'Alfred Hitchcock' magazines and anthologies of the late 1950s and early 1960s. 'Ully the Piper': an engaging fable about a crippled man named Ully, who does a good turn to the rustic inhabitants of the Witch World. 'Toys of Tamisan' (1969): another novelette, this one about the planet Ty-Kry and a young woman named Tamisan who, via the use of special headgear and connecting cables, can invite others to enter into, and participate in, her dreams. As a 'professional' dreamer, Tamisen provides dreaming service to an aristocrat named Starrex. When a dream, set in the older times of Ty-Kry's history, goes badly awry, there is melodrama. 'Toys' is a solid dud: badly overwritten, in stilted prose, no less. The premise is contrived and Norton's handling of the concept of sharing dreams less than skilled. A touchstone in the early history of cyberpunk and virtual reality ? No, this is not. Summing up, it's the three shorter tales in 'High Sorcery' that best present Norton's storytelling skills and serve as attractions for those readers who are not dedicated fans of her fiction.
Phantom Stranger: GerontionVertigo / DC, 1993Phantom Stranger: Gerontion is one of six titles in the 'Vertigo Visions' imprint, all released from 1993 - 1998.The writing chore is handled by Alisa Kwitney, with artwork by Guy Davis, letters by Clem Robbins, and colors by Robbie Busch. I've always considered the Phantom Stranger to be one of the lamer superheroes in the DC inventory, a true Z-lister along with The Question and Aquaman. He doesn't really do much other than passively observe things, making Enigmatic Comments, before stepping in at some crux point to propel things to a conclusion. In 'Gerontion,' lead character and Woman of Color Naomi Walker arrives at the Paradise Gardens care home, there to start her job as desk manager. It's quite obvious that the home is in a state of decay, and its residents and staff are a tad......eccentric.Eventually, the Phantom Stranger makes his appearance, albeit in a confusing way; there is a man sitting in an upstairs room in the home, pondering things and making.........Enigmatic Remarks, and then there is a Phantom Stranger 'apparition,' that loiters outside the grounds of the home.I won't give away spoilers, but I will say that as the narrative progresses we learn that Paradise Gardens is in fact a sort of portal to Hell, and more than a few demons and devils have sought to escape that wonderful place by relocating to the Gardens. This disturbs the Phantom Stranger, but he's unable to send the demons back unless he can convince Walker to aid him. Guy Davis's artwork is better than much of that presented in Vertigo titles in the 1990s, but still inferior to what you'd see in many non-Vertigo titles from Marvel, DC, Valiant, Image, etc. of the same era. The colors use the 'Dogshit Palette' peculiar to Vertigo. Whether use of the Dogshit Palette was something imposed by Vertigo's editorial policy, or something voluntarily applied by the colorist, is unclear. Also unclear is whether this comic used the Flexographic printing process. But the palette works poorly in 'Phantom Stranger.' I found 'Gerontion' to be a dull and plodding read. Given 56 pages, writer Kwitney errs in having all of the action take place inside the Gardens, which hamstrings the narrative by restricting it to one location, and one set of characters. There is a lot of dialogue, and lots of gimmicks that pad the storyline: monsters materializing in rooms and corridors, arms reaching out from the walls, malevolent phantasms and spirits making threats, etc., etc. These never amount to much but distractions, and can't compensate for the talky, too-slow unfolding of the narrative.As for our hero, the Phantom Stranger, he, true to nature, doesn't do much of anything, but simply looks on as Walker grapples with the otherworldly denizens of the Gardens. Once in a while he makes some remark or suggestion, but overall, he easily could be interchanged with The Question, or Dr. Occult, or Deadman, or any other of DC's 'supernatural' heroes.Again, not giving away spoilers, I'll say that the conclusion of 'Gerontion' makes sense, but doesn't do all that much to make me a devotee of the Phantom Stranger.
This comic solely is for fans of the Phantom Stranger, and those who are intent on collecting as many Vertigo titles as they can.
The Permanent Playboy science fiction fantasy and horror stories
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'The Permanent Playboy': Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror stories edited by Ray Russell 3 / 5 Stars 'The Permanent Playboy' was published in hardcover by Crown in 1959. It's a slipcased, 503-page book, and a reminder that as the 1950s drew to a close, Playboy magazine was a powerful entity in American popular culture. The top fiction writers and essayists of that day would submit to the magazine, as it was one of the best-selling periodicals in the country. The stories compiled in this anthology first saw print in Playboy from 1953 to 1959. They range in subject matter from romantic comedy, to crime / suspense, to urban satire, to horror, fantasy, and science fiction. Editor Russell is quite clear about the editorial policy in place at Playboy: Fiction readers of marked avant-garde persuasion are hereby warned that they may find the majority of the stories in this book somewhat unstylish. They are, with few exceptions, stories.If construction skill, firm plotting, the creation of suspense and the knack for satisfying and entertaining the reader are currently among the lost and unfashionable arts, PLAYBOY has had the guts to fly in the face of fashion, to start a counterrevolution, to seek and find those writers who persist in using the classic tools of storytelling. Happily, quite a few were and still are being found. It took me come time to read each entry in TPP. Rather than summarize the contents in one long long post, I thought it best to deal with the 49 entries in separate posts, as catalogued by genre. As far as sci-fi goes, George Langelan's 'The Fly' remains a standout, nearly 70 years after it first was published. Also good is Charles Beaumont's 'The Crooked Man,' about a future where homosexuality is legal, but heterosexuality is not. The eponymous Man is looking for girl love, which makes him a pervert. Beaumont's description of the gay lounge (where the Man has gone for an assignation) is greasy and disturbing. This story was quite provocative for its time, but likely would not be well-tolerated in today's popular culture. Another Beaumont composition, 'Black Country,' is about a black jazz band whose leader, Spoof, is a combination of Magical Negro, and Doomed Black Bluesman. Using overheated prose intended to mimic the rhythms of jazz, Beaumont relates how Sonny, a young white boy, learns from Spoof how to bring that big sound. I hate jazz, and worshipful stories about jazz, so this entry did nothing for me............ 'Victory Parade,' by Henry Slesar, takes a trenchant look at patriotism in the age of nuclear warfare. Ray Bradbury contributes 'In A Season of Calm Weather,' about an American tourist who encounters Pablo Picasso, on a beach in Biarritz. This encounter is transcendental. It's also rather boring.Robert Bloch's 'The Traveling Salesman,' a fable about a man doomed to immorality, is unremarkable. Indeed, the February, 1957 Playmate, Sally Todd, is much more appealing......Robert Sheckley's 'Love, Incorporated' is about Alfred Simon, a young man living on the backwater planet of Kazanga IV. Seeking true love and excitement, Simon travels to Earth, and to the 42nd street district of New York City. It's a 'rube meets the city' tale, and while I am not a big fan of comedic sf, this story is readable.In 'The Noise,' by Ken Purdy, Barnaby Hackett, a telepath going insane from receiving a continuous barrage of human thoughts, seeks aid from the psychiatrist Dr. Kabat. The fate of humanity might be at stake - ! A good treatment of the telepathy theme, and one of the better entries in the anthology. Richard Mattheson's 'The Distributor' is about a man who moves onto Sylmar Street in a majority-white, middle-class, suburban neighborhood. Bad things begin to happen; could it be due to the fact that on Sylmar Street, everyone internally is seething with suppressed bigotry, hostility, and sexual desire ? But then again, isn't that the trope mined for racy excitement by almost every Sleaze paperback ever printed ?! image from the 'Killer Covers' blog Overall, the sci-fi and horror entries in 'The Permanent Playboy' are, with the exception of 'Fly' and 'Crooked Man,' are not that special. That said, there is other content, in other genres, in the volume that make it more appealing, so I'll address that content in future blog posts.
Book Review: 'K-9 Corps' by Kenneth Von Gunden2 / 5 Stars 'K-9 Corps' (229 pp.) was published by Ace Books in February, 1991, and features cover art by Jim Thiesen. This is the first of four titles in the 'K-9 Corps' series, the others being 'Under Fire' (1991), 'Cry Wolf' (1992), and 'The Last Resort' (1993).
Author Von Gunden published a number of sci-fi novels with Ace during the 1990s. He also authored two nonfiction books, 'Twenty All-Time Great Science Fiction Films' (1982), and 'Flights of Fancy: The Great Fantasy Films' (1989).
The K-9 Corps are nine dogs that have been genetically engineered to have high intelligence, and the ability to speak (albeit broken) English. They are scout dogs, trained to follow the commands of their master, a young man named Ray Larkin. Larkin and his Corps earn their livelihood by contracting to provide security and protection to colonization efforts on distant planets.
As the novel opens, Larkin and the Corps have a contract on the newly discovered world of Chiron, a hospitable planet considered extremely important to the aims of the Triumvirate that governs Earth. For reasons that are not disclosed to Larkin and his colleagues, Chiron is vital to the Triumvirate's goal of expanding to other regions of the galaxy.
Along with his 'throuple' partners Mary and Taylor (don't get excited anyone, this is presented in a very chaste manner), Larkin is responsible for the welfare of the gigantic, genetically modified earthworms, known as cholos, that chew up the Chiron grasslands in preparation for seeding said lands with Earth flora.
The terraforming is proceeding well when trouble arises. The indigenous 'centaurs,' a cross between reptiles and the centaurs of ancient Greek mythology, are displeased at the thought of their lands being dispossessed by two-legged aliens. When Ray discovers that the centaurs are sentient, the conflict takes an unexpected turn, one that will cause Larkin to question his allegiance to his mission..........
I was confident with assigning 'K-9 Corps' a Two-Star Rating. While the initial chapters hold interest as framing devices, the middle section of the novel badly loses momentum, as Von Gunden decides to turn the narrative into a 'first contact' storyline.
There is invented anthropology, with the centaurs representing counterparts to the Sioux Indians of the great plains. The reader must gird for stilted Injun-speak, vision quest ceremonies, burial ceremonies, medicine men, Great Spirit allusions, buffalo hunts, bad blank verse poetry intended to mimic Native American fireside songs, etc. The K-9 dogs essentially are sent backstage, and there is some melodrama between Taylor and Mary that doesn't contribute all that much to the novel.
In the final chapters author Von Gunden tries to reseat the plot, and there are some action sequences, but these couldn't prevent me from finishing 'K-9 Corps' with the feeling that other authors could have brought more imagination, and excitement, to the concept.
[I was queasy to learn that the K-9 series is endorsed by the so-called 'Furry' or 'anthro' communities, but it turns out that this is true of many sci-fi and fantasy books involving talking animals.............]
So, unless you're a Furry, or you've a keen interest in the mingling of talking dogs with standard-issue sci-fi tropes, you're probably not going to find this novel to be very engrossing.
Prez: Smells Like Teen SpiritVertigo / DC, September 1995Prez: Smells Like Teen Spirit is one of six one-shot comics issued by DC's Vertigo imprint from 1993 to 1998. Presumably, these titles were designed to attract 'traditional' comic book readers to Vertigo. They were priced a little higher than 'regular' Vertigo comics, and were lengthier (Prez is 56 pages long). The advertisements will take you back to those early Nineties days: 'Prez' first appeared in 1973 in a brief, four-issue series about 'the first teen president.' The
1995 incarnation of the character necessarily involved a postmodern
reboot, as the original, 'Archies' sensibility of Prez clearly was
unsuitable for the Vertigo aesthetic. Ed Brubaker was a sensible choice for scripting the one-shot, but it's Eric Shanower who really makes this comic stand out. Ninety percent of Vertigo titles issued in the 1990s had crude, 'figurative' artwork, the intent being that Vertigo needed to distinguish itself from those puerile 'superhero' comics elsewhere on the shelving. But Shanower was the rare Vertigo artist with impressive draftsmanship skills, and his line art is ideal for a one-shot with lots of conventional scenes and characters (and lots of speech balloons and text boxes.....)
Prez also benefits from great colors from Robbie Bisch. Almost all Vertigo comics had 'dogshit' palettes, so Prez really shines here:
The premise of our tale is that it's 1998, and P.J. (his surname never is disclosed), a slacker in his early twenties, has been told by his mom that he is the progeny of a one-night stand in the early Seventies between his mom........and none other than Prez Rickard, himself ! P.J. has been through a bad patch lately, taking up drugs and a dissipated, self-destructive lifestyle. But so does every clinically depressed 1990s latchkey kid, right ?! Anyways, by chance, P.J. sees a tabloid with a story about Rickard, who is something of a mystery, having gone into seclusion following his term as President back in the Seventies. In the hopes that finding and connecting with good ole Dad will bring salvation, P.J. persuades his buds Jason and George to set out on a protracted road trip, from San Francisco to Willowfield, Kansas, where it seems Prez emerged to have a meal in at a local diner.
Of course, the journey proves to be a long one, with lots of revelations along the way.
For his plot, Brubaker ably taps into the Nineties zeitgeist. For example, P.J., Jason, and George wear Grunge fashion and listen to the Lemonheads. And in Kansas, our heroes encounter a young woman with a David Lynchian aura about her - very Nineties:
There are 'Americana' segments, one of which takes place in Rickard's hometown in Maine. Shanower shows us his illustration skills with a streetscape rendering; few Vertigo artists would go into this much care in their compositions:As he journeys, Prez learns that his alleged father was, from a very young age, an idealist who labored to learn the ways and means of being a genuine Man of the People:There is an encounter with an elderly hippy, a man who 'knew' (wink-wink) Prez Rickard. There is an imparting of knowledge to our naive P.J.......... This in turn leads to some 'Don Juan Matus' -style phantasmagorical experiences for P.J. I won't give any secrets away, but the denouement of Prez: Smells LIke Teen Spirit is something of a letdown; it takes a predictable route. Brubaker gets on a soapbox and pontificates about how humanism can overcome the innate cynicism of politics. In terms of plotting, the chance to do something offbeat is evaded. And, given that P.J. is an unlikable character (he is whiny, consumed with self-pity, and, at times, a real asshole) any personality turn-around seems pat and unconvincing.In the end, Prez: Smells Like Teen Spirit is best approached as an excursion into Nineties nostalgia, one brought to life through Shanower's great artwork. If remembering the Nineties is your thing, then Prez is a rewarding cultural artifact.
Zardoz portfoliofrom Playboy, March 1974Directed by John Boorman, Zardoz is one of the weirdest sci-fi movies of the 1970s. My review of the film's novelization is here.To coincide with the film's February, 1974 release, the March issue of Playboy magazine featured a brief portfolio of stills and staged shots from the movie. I have to say that Charlotte Rampling looks amazing, while Sean Connery.....well......he looks rather foolish. But then again, things were different in the 1970s. And in my mind, it's a better portfolio than what you would get in those old issues of Starlog and Famous Monsters and Fangoria..........
Book Review: 'The Oxygen Barons' by Gregory Feeley 2 / 5 Stars ‘The Oxygen Barons” (264 pp., Ace Books, July 1990; cover art by Dave Archer) is one of the last books in the Ace ‘Science Fiction Specials Series 3,’ which was edited by Terry Carr. Following Carr’s demise in 1987, Damon Knight took over the editing duties. It is unclear whether Carr or Knight was responsible for handling this novel. ‘Barons’ is set several centuries in the future, at which time the bodies of the inner Solar System have been colonized or exploited for raw materials, which are delivered via mass drivers from one outpost to another. The Moon has been terraformed and possesses a stable, breathable atmosphere and a network of rivers and large bodies of water. Its government is divided between two feuding factions, the Nearside and the Farside. These polities loosely are confederated with a variety of offworld corporations and trading blocs, who are competing for power among themselves. A particular bone of contention is the extravagant amount of oxygen needed to sustain the operation of the Moon. Some of the offworld corporations are lobbying to divert this oxygen for use in sustaining other colonies elsewhere in the system. As the novel opens, a Nearside engineer named Galvanix is attempting to prevent an opposing faction from driving an asteroid into the Moon, a decidedly unfriendly action. He finds unexpected assistance in his task from Beryl Taggart, a cybernetically enhanced super-soldier. The first half of the book is one extended chase sequence, as Taggart and Galvanix find themselves stranded on the Farside, fleeing hostile authorities in an effort to retrieve an important database. The novel then moves to a large space station orbiting the Earth, and from there, to the Earth itself and an entire floating city anchored off the coast of India, as the various entities referred to as the ‘Oxygen Barons’ engage a series of maneuvers designed to bring a hapless Galvanix under their control. ‘Barons’ does have its positives; every few pages another ‘gee whiz’ moment rears its head, and the physics of living and working in low-gravity environments accurately are represented. But overall the novel is a labored read, and needed better editing. Feeley’s prose is very dense and overly descriptive. For example, in one segment of the narrative, Galvanix has to ascend a narrow shaft embedded belowground in a lunar installation. Most authors would deal with this segment within several paragraphs, perhaps, but Feeley spends nearly two pages on the event, turning it into a sort of prolonged mini-epic. The novel is clogged with too many of these instances of over-writing. The backstory involving the political and economic conflict surrounding the Moon never is adequately communicated to the reader. Indeed, whatever plot underlies the events in the narrative is so poorly outlined that I finished the book with no real idea of why Galvanix was such a pursued character in the first place. Things aren’t helped by the author’s tendency to use some of the more stilted dialogue I’ve encountered in a recent hard SF novel: Beryl answered these questions with alacrity. “Cognitive modification is negligible, since it cannot be accomplished without jeopardizing sophic integrity. If your memories and expertise were readily separable from your sense of self, they would have been decanted alone.” A steady diet of such awkward phrasing tends to wear on the reader, and makes ‘Barons’ a too-hard slog. I only can recommend this novel to those readers with a particular affectation for hard science fiction narratives.
4 / 5 Stars
4 / 5 Stars
'Survivors' starts off with a plague depleting the population of the entire world, including the UK. In short order, civilization breaks down, and the few survivors wander the empty landscape scavenging for supplies. Lead character Abby Grant is obliged to abandon her life of upper-class comfort and privilege, but she holds on to the hope that her son Peter may have survived the plague and is alive and well somewhere in the countryside. Jenny Richards, a younger woman from a working-class background, and Greg, an engineer, eventually meet up with Abby and decide to set up camp in a rural household called The Grange. Other survivors join up and assist with establishing a farm, and a foraging system to secure supplies in the wider area. There is tension in this post-apocalyptic UK in the form of a classic 'survivalist' encampment, the 'National Unity Force,' formed by a trade union president named Arthur Wormley (it's very British to have the villain arise from unionism, as opposed to the American practice of having these characters derive from 'survivalist' / right wing origins). The NUF have a habit of seizing things by force from those unwilling to defend themselves. Other, less organized bands of marauders also pose a threat to the welfare of the Grange colony. In relating the adventures of Abby, Jenny, and Greg, Nation takes pains to portray how poorly equipped modern society and its denizens are for a collapse. Early on in the novel, Abby has a conversation with the headmaster of her son's boarding school: He moved quickly to a workbench and picked up a glass test tube. "Look at that. We've been making things of glass for thousands of years. But could you make it ? It's silica, potash, high temperature and a great deal of skill. Don't you see, our civilization has the benefit of knowledge that has been accumulated since the beginning of time, and yet most of us are less practical than Iron Age man." The struggle to grow enough food to support the Grange, and the battle with the elements and the native flora and fauna who quickly assert themselves in the absence of civilization, is a major theme in 'Survivors.' With only 254 pages to work with in his paperback, Nation obviously could not present all of the storyline from the 38-episode television run. But his narrative is crisp and declarative, and devoid of much in the way of psychological angst; the people in 'Survivors' are too consumed with simply staying warm, and having enough to eat, to indulge much in PTSD. As I indicate above, 'Survivors' adopts a 'British' tone to its post-apocalyptic story. There is limited gunplay and assistant casualties, thus, readers hoping for the gleeful violence of American 'Radioactive Rambo' novels will be disappointed. 'Survivors' also is devoid of the facetious humor that marks the American franchise Fallout. In Nation's novel, the post-plague world is marked by unrelenting bleakness. And it's done well enough for me to grant the novel a Five Star Rating. For another, rather frenetic, take on 'Survivors,' readers are directed to 'The Diesel-Electric Elephant Company 
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