Vintage Pulp | Oct 16 2016 |
Love Me Sailor was originally published in 1945 by the Australian imprint Georgian House and what a bombshell it was. After much legal wrangling it was banned in 1948 and author Robert S. Close was tossed in prison. His sentence was three months but he served only ten days. He's the only Australian ever jailed for writing a book. After his release he left in disgust for France and didn't return for twenty-five years. Even then he stayed only briefly before leaving again and living the rest of his life on Mallorca.
Vintage Pulp | Mar 7 2016 |
Above, the cover of Penal Colony, written for Ace Books by Robert S. Close, 1957. The story was inspired by real life Irish convict Elizabeth Callaghan, who in the 1820s was sentenced to the incredibly harsh sentence of death for forgery, then had the sentence commuted and was shipped off to colonize Australia along with one hundred other criminals. She stayed in trouble most of her life and was finally stomped to death in a barroom brawl in 1852 in Geelong. This “lusty” novel is, of course, only loosely based on fact, which is good, because what a downer her real life was. Cover art by uncredited.