Paperback 959: Fools Die on Friday / A.A. Fair (Erle Stanley Gardner)

Paperback 959: Dell R105 (1st thus, 1961)

Title: Fools Die on Friday
Author: A.A. Fair (Erle Stanley Gardner)
Cover artist: Bob McGinnis

Estimated value: $10-15
Condition: 9+/10

Best things about this cover:

• It appears that either I hit some perfectly preserved AA Fair / Erle Stanley Gardner motherlode at some point in my collecting journeys, or someone sent me box of same. These books are exceedingly common, but no less glorious, art-wise. And in this condition, mwah!
• I love McGinnis's work, though I don't always share his, uh, aesthetic. There's often an icy, angular quality to his women, and the hair, dear lord, the hair. There be dragons.
• The shoes, though. The shoes. Gotta be the shoes.
• All covers are improved by martini.

Best things about this back cover:

• Math!
• Crazy calligraphic math!
• This back cover does nothing to convey how charming the Lam/Cool mysteries are.

Page 123~

She pushed back her stenographic chair, walked over to a shelf, whipped out a map, and placed it on the counter.

OK, I don't know who she is, but I'm in love.

~RP

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Paperback 612: Martinis, Manhattans or Me? / Barbara O'Brien (Zebra 0013)

Paperback 612: Zebra Books 8468-0013 (PBO, 1974)

Title: Martinis, Manhattans or Me? 
Author: Barbara O'Brien
Cover artist: Boobshot McGee [photo cover]

Yours for: $75


Best things about this cover:

• Um, I'm gonna have to try them all and see...
• What's truly awesome about this cover is how normal-pretty she is. She's not all fakely sexed-up, the way you might expect on a cover of this nature. Cleavage, sure, but that's practically modest by today's standards. 
• I really want to hear what's being said in that background conversation between Cap'n Blue Tracksuit and Missy Surprised Drunkface.
• Font! Those dots on the Is are the best I-dots ever—martini-shaped!
• This book is apparently pretty rare. It's also in wicked good condition. Hence the $$$ it would take it to pry it from my hands.

Best things about this back cover.

• I'm pretty sure I will guess, and I'm pretty sure I'll at least be in the ballpark.
• Prince should write a song called "Lady Bartender."
• You can tell "how much man you're getting" by the drink he orders??? Is this on the Zima-WhiskeyNeat scale?
• If this website ever hosts some kind of Mid-Century Paperback Insanity-type party, I promise to make drinks from this book.
• I opened to a random page just now and the first line I saw was "Sounds kind of groovy." Also, quick thumbing through revealed words such as "sumbitch" and phrases such as "withdrew his cock," so ... literati, take note.

Page 125~ (much better than 123, trust me)

Karen was a really bigger-than-life Great Fuck. Another reason for her immense popularity with customers was her agreeable attitude toward sex. Karen simply adored going to bed. She dug fucking. She liked it, enjoyed, desired, and gave her single-minded concentration to the act of fucking.

"She was indifferent to many things; fucking was not one of them. No fuck-hater, she. Etc."

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Tumblr]