Vintage Pulp | Jan 18 2017 |
Actually, this book has nothing to do with cousins, but the art spoke to us that way. Guess we've read too many Midwood sleaze novels. Ace Books is generally a bit more highbrow. The main character in 1957's Desire in the Ozarks is Shoog Dawkins, a happy-go-lucky hillbilly stereotype who, after some years of matrimony to his sweetheart Docey and the birth of a son, has his head turned by a girl named Genevy Trone. He's constitutionally unable to resist the basic pleasures of life, so trouble soon results. This was marketed as an authentic slice of rural life in the vein of Erskine Caldwell—unsuccessfully it seems, because though Steger authored numerous short stories, this seems to have been his/her only novel. Turning to the art, it's uncredited. We did a little digging and found that the original painting for this recently went up for auction and the sellers confirmed that it's unsigned. We figure if they can't identify the artist, nobody can, so this one will likely remain unattributed.