Paperback 857: Jimmy Hoffa's Hot / John Bartlow Martin (Crest 340)

Paperback 857: Crest Books 340 (PBO, 1959)

Title: Jimmy Hoffa's Hot
Author: John Bartlow Martin
Cover artist: photo cover

Estimated value: $10-15


Best things about this cover:

• Lady with questionable taste says what?
• This is not a dynamic, or even a distinctive, picture. Would go equally well with book entitled, "Ohio's Best Funeral Directors."
• John Bartlow Martin also wrote Butcher's Dozen (Signet 909).

Best things about this back cover:

• Now *that* Hoffa picture — *that's* what I'm talkin' about! "The Creature Rose In Fury From The Primordial Swamp …"
• This back cover scrupulously avoids the terms "mafia" or "organized crime," opting instead only for the  shadowy term, "underworld."
• "I Will Feast On Your Pancreas, Bobby Haircut!" Priceless.

Page 123~

MR. HOFFA: To the best of my recollection, I must recall on my memory, I cannot remember.
MR. KENNEDY: "To the best of my recollection I must recall on my memory that I cannot remember," is that your answer?

MR. HOFFA: No, I'm sorry. That last part should be "I banged your mother." I'll try to enunciate more clearly. My apologies.

~RP

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Paperback 835: Butcher's Dozen / John Bartlow Martin (Signet 909)

Paperback 835: Signet 909 (1st ptg, 1952)

Title: Butcher's Dozen
Author: John Bartlow Martin
Cover artist: Harry Schaare

Estimated value: $12-$18


Best things about this cover:

• "Larry, are you… are you even trying? I feel like I'm doing all the work here. Would you lift for real, please? My calves are freezing."
• Larry's a sucker for a left boob. "She's dead, Larry. Give it a rest."
• Oooh, the *authorized* abridgment! I've been looking everywhere for this. Said no one.
• "Torso Murders!" It's about a guy who really hates Greek statuary.

Best things about this back cover:

• Never The Completely Sane Butcher. Not once. Unfair to butchers!
• Whoa, "dismembered his victims in a sadistic, sex-crazed frenzy" is pretty gruesome stuff. Lady on cover appears to have all her limbs, so maybe she's not dead after all. You're off the hook, Larry. Sort of.
• Dude looks like a lecherous psychologist.

Page 123~

On February 8 Klansmen and bootleggers clashed in the center of Herrin, and Caesar Cagle was killed. (Art Newman later claimed that one of the Shelton boys had put a pistol to Cagle's ear and, when he started to turn, said "Oops, too late," and shot him; this cannot have been quite true, since Cagle was shot in the chest.)

If by "cannot have been quite true" you mean "cannot have been true," then yes.

~RP

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