Thursday, October 4, 2007

Paperback 22: Graphic 87

Paperback 22: Graphic 87 (PBO, 1954)

Title: Homicidal Lady
Author: Day Keene
Cover artist: Unknown

Yours for: $12


Best things about this cover:

  • More terrible cover art from Graphic. Her face is fantastic, but everything else is a complete mess. Smeary, indistinct, off-model. Plus, she has man hands. Homicidal ... Lady?
  • Why is there an old cheeseburger wrapper just inside her overcoat?
  • What is that arc by her face that kind of looks like a cross between a smudge and a dust bunny? Smoke?
  • The lettering on the title - again, it's subprofessional. Like an apprentice, or an apprentice's monkey, did the lettering
  • Lady on the cover looks just like Rita Hayworth in Gilda

RP

2 comments:

Michael5000 said...

This is one of the cases I was talking about where the author seems to have a little more contemporary presence than you would maybe guess. Our library doesn't have "Homocidal Lady," but the Day Keene ouvre is handsomely represented by "Passion Murders," "Framed in Guilt," and "My Flesh is Sweet," all in 2004 or 2005 reprints. Who'd a thunk?

Victoria said...

My first thought was not Rita Hayworth. It was Katharine Hepburn. Dead ringer.