| Vintage Pulp | Sep 18 2023 |
Horwitz Publications perfectly red the paperback market.
For a while we were tracking the possibly unlicensed usage by Australian imprint Horwitz Publications of celebrities on its paperback covers. We fell down on the job a bit. The last one we looked at was two years ago.The red-haired model used above on Carter Brown's thriller No Halo for Hedy is Playboy centerfold and nightclub performer Colleen Farrington, who was the mother of actress Diane Lane. The book originally appeared in 1956, and the above reprint came in 1959. This photo used for the cover is rare. We've seen no other shot of Farrington in these capri pants. Presumably, at one point multiple frames from the session existed, but time disposes of such items. However, it can't diminish the beauty of this cover. You can see all of our Horwitz celeb covers by clicking here.
AustraliaHorwitz PublicationsPlayboyCarter BrownAlan G. YatesColleen FarringtonDiane Lanecover artliterature
| Vintage Pulp | Apr 1 2023 |
Mid-century paperback artists were in tune with the times.
There are numerous jazz themed mid-century paperback covers. The jazz milieu—with its smoky clubs, passionate personalities, and idiosyncratic ways—fascinated readers. Above you see a small collection of fronts that visually reference the uniquely American (black American) art of jazz. We've also added a couple of the many torch singer and crooner covers out there that seem jazzy enough to fit. The artists are Barye Phillips, Stanley Zuckerberg, Harry Barton, Mitchell Hooks, Julian Paul, and others. We've previously posted quite a few jazz covers, and we have a few jazz themed books still to read, so in both cases you won't see those pieces here. We don't keyword for jazz, which means a search for those we've already posted would bring up a welter of books, movies, tabloids, and album covers. Therefore, in order to save you the trouble of wading through all that, here are some links. We'll limit ourselves to ten: here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
Louis ArmstrongGrady JohnsonCarson KaninWilliam GwinnMarguerite SteenJack BairdRobert NovakDouglass WallopR. C. DicksonDorothy BakerAndrew ShawKeith ViningBruce CassidayEvan HunterCarter BrownWilliam ArnoldPat BunyanEric WestKenneth Millarcover artliteraturecover collection
| Vintage Pulp | Jul 21 2022 |
For a fulfilling killing nothing beats a blade.
Today we have for your pleasure a collection of vintage paperback covers featuring characters on both the giving and receiving ends of knives—or knifelike tools such as icepicks. Above you see Harry Bennett art of a poor fella getting a knife from nowhere. Maybe Damocles did it. It's a funny cover because we don't think we'd grab our throats if we got stabbed in the spine, but let's hope we never find out. Below, in addition to numerous U.S. and British offerings, you'll see covers from France, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands. There are many, many paperback fronts featuring knives—we mean hundreds—but we decided to stop ourselves at thirty-two today. These do not represent the best (as if we could decide something like that), or our favorites, but merely some interesting ones we've come across of late. If you're super interested in this particular motif we have plenty more examples in the archives. They'd be hard to find, because we don't keyword for knives, so here are some links to get you there: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.
Robert Caine FrazerKenneth FearingJean FonroyGeoffrey HomesJerry CraytonLeslie CharterisGeoffrey HomesHelen ReillyFletcher BennettPaul I. WellmanBob McKnightMatthew HeadStuart JamesIan FlemingCarter BrownWilliam R. CoxJohn Dickson CarrTony TowersLynton Wright BrentJohn ShepherdS.S. Van DineJean NormandSam Merwin Jr.Roger DelvartJohn RhodeJack KelsoAdam KnightDashiell HammettM.M. KayeFletcher BennettAndre CaroffHelen ReillyMickey SpillaneJean Le RusseVan Wyck MasonRichard S. PratherEllery Queencover artcover collectionliterature
| Vintage Pulp | Dec 16 2021 |
Hi, this is Elke calling from Down Under. Can I speak to my agent? There's been a trademark infringement.
As usual the Aussie publishing company Horwitz has used a film star on one of its book covers—this time German goddess Elke Sommer on the front of 1959's Terror Comes Creeping. She was a favorite of theirs—we've seen her on four covers, including this one, and we've speculated that they're all unlicensed, for reasons discussed here.
This one stars Carter Brown's, aka Alan G. Yates's franchise sleuth Danny Boyd, who's hired by a woman named Martha Hazelton who thinks her father is killing off his children—with her next in line—in order to avoid losing his dead wife's inheritance. The father, when confronted by Boyd, says that insanity runs in the family and his daughter is paranoid and probably nuts. It certainly seems that way when Boyd meets his client's loopy, danger obsessed little sister, but of course matters soon begin to look far more complicated than they seemed at first.
On one level it's amazing Carter Brown sold something like 120,000,000 books, because his work is not special. But on the other hand it's fast, sometimes funny, and hits the right notes for detective novels. So maybe his success isn't so strange after all. We'll probably read another, because we have a few.
| Vintage Pulp | Nov 12 2021 |
What happens next could be great or terrible, depending on how well you distinguish subtle shades of color.
Since we just saw Cleo Moore why not bring her right back? Here she is on the front of Carter Brown's Slaughter in Satin, 1954, from the Australian publisher Horwitz. We've long documented this publisher's usage of minor celebrities on its covers, and pondered whether it was copyright infringement. What caught our eye about this example, besides Moore, was the typesetting. Notice how the “s” in the title disappears into Moore's red jammies, so at first glance it reads as, “Laughter in Satin,” which is almost an opposite outcome from slaughter, like the difference between being lain or slain. Probably when the book was first printed the two shades of red stood out from each other more. Or maybe this visual trick was intentional. Or maybe it was a miscalculation that couldn't be repaired. We'll never know. See the other Moore here, and see the celeb Horwitz covers by clicking here and scrolling.
| Vintage Pulp | May 18 2021 |
What is it with men? Why can't I find one who likes cats?
Like clockwork we return to master illustrator Robert McGinnis, as any paperback art site must. Here you see a cover for The Hellcat by Australian author Carter Brown, aka Alan Yates, for Signet Books, 1962. We showed you a Dutch cover for this years ago, which you can see here.
| Vintage Pulp | Dec 18 2020 |
I'm going to kill myself because I can't have you! You always ignored me, but you can't ignore this! Ahhhhhhhh....!
Above, a fun cover for Carter Brown Long Story Magazine. And long story short, when you make an epic gesture to your object of unrequited love, be sure she's actually watching. 1960 on this, with art by Grant Roberts.
| Vintage Pulp | Mar 16 2019 |
She was so good Horwitz had a second helping.
Senta Berger makes a second appearance on a Horwitz Publications paperback cover, this time for Carter Brown's Murder Is My Mistress. We showed you the Horwitz cover for Brown's Swan Song for a Siren a while back. That actually came second of the pair and was numbered 34 in the company's Reprint by Demand series. The above is number 19 and was published in 1960. We found it on the Nick Carter & Carter Brown blog, which is a stop you should make if you want to know everything about Brown. Anyway, we've been discussing these Horwitz paperbacks for a while because of their celebrity covers. In using Berger twice the publisher chose well.
| Vintage Pulp | Mar 6 2019 |
A flavorful stew of mid-century paperback covers.
This post was long overdue. Most pulp oriented websites do a collection of covers that have the word wanton in the title, so we're following suit. Basically because we couldn't think of anything else to do today. Numerous examples below. Enjoy.
Lon WilliamsIan GordonKermit WellesR. Wilkes HunterDave KingLester LakeJohn B. ThompsonGeorge CassidyJames ClayfordMichael GillianJudson GreyAl JamesArnold MarmorJ.C. PerlmanLawrence TreatMartin A. LarsonHenry KlingerCarter BrownJames RubelLewis ClayCurt AldrichRichard S. PratherDrew PalmerPeter CheyneyBrett HallidayMark Danielscover artliteraturecover collection
| Vintage Pulp | Dec 15 2018 |
American singer gets booked for special engagement Down Under.
We love documenting the appropriations of celebrities by Horwitz Publications. This time the company snares U.S. nightingale Abbe Lane for its 1955 edition of Carter Brown's Swan Song for a Siren. You see the original photo they worked with below, which also features Lane's husband Xavier Cugat in the left background, erased by Horwitz's graphics guru and replaced by a man with a gun. The company would reprint this title in 1958 with Senta Berger on the cover, because once you get a taste for kidnapping celebrities you never stop. You can see that edition here. And if you want to see more examples of celebrity theft click the Horwitz keywords below.
