Recycling visual motifs

Recycling Visual Motifs

 

So, I was poking through my archive of paperback book cover scans and I selected 'Serpent's Reach,' a 1980 DAW Book by C. J. Cherryh, for my sidebar Image Gadget. After posting it, something about the cover art, by David Mattingly, tugged at the back of my brain. Where had I previously seen that visual motif of the background image of the big, bug eyes ?

 

 

The answer ? On the cover of 'Mad Eyes,' Doc Savage novel No. 34, from 1969. The cover art is of course by the incomparable James Bama. Looks like Mattingly consciously evoked it for his DAW cover, 11 years later. I guess if you're going to recycle a visual motif, one from Bama is as good as anything you'll find.........

Book Review: War is Heaven

Book Review: 'War is Heaven' by D. Keith Mano

1 / 5 Stars

 

David Keith Mano (1942 - 2016) wrote a number of novels in the 1970s, most of which received critical acclaim. Mano was a religious man and his novels often featured religious themes, particularly in regard to Christianity (Mano was an Episcopalian).

 

His 1973 novel 'The Bridge' is frank science fiction. My review of that novel is here.

 

'War is Heaven' first was published in hardcover in 1970. This mass market paperback edition (254 pp.) was published by Avon Books in July, 1971. 

I picked up 'War is Heaven' thinking it was an allegorical treatment of the Vietnam war, which by 1970 was very unpopular in the US. But 'War is Heaven' is not an allegorical treatment of the Vietnam war, but in fact, an examination of morality and Christianity in the context of the sort of 'dirty war' that Vietnam exemplified.

 

The novel takes place in the near future, in a fictional Central American country called Camaguay. A Marxist rebellion, led by so-called 'Riffs,' has broken out in Camaguay, threatening the rule of right-wing dictator General Amayo, and the welfare of the American corporations that operate plantations in the countryside. The American government has dispatched Green Beret-style troops, known as the Irregular Command (IC), to lead teams of Camaguayan soldiers in a counterinsurgency campaign against the Riffs.

Corpsman Andrew Jones, a young black man, has just joined the IC team. A Navy corpsman, Jones had no intention of serving in the ground war, but drawing a short straw has led him to his assignment with the IC. Filled with self-pity and bitterness over his bad luck, Jones loathes the terrain and the assignment.

 

Also members of the IC are Lieutenant Storch, who essentially has abdicated command to his Sergeant, Clarence Hook. 

 

A man with the appearance and demeanor of an Old Testament prophet, Hook has acquired something of a legendary aura in the eyes of the Camaguayan infantry accompanying the Americans. Hook has seemingly miraculous luck; bullet miss him, while his own fire is lethal. Hook has an uncanny ability to evade booby traps and ambushes and even the pestilential insects of the jungle are unable to prey on him.

 

Then there are the enlisted men: the diminutive, but intense, former minor league pitcher, Horace Baxter; the repulsive Joe Garbini; Tom Hall, who increasingly is mentally unbalanced due to the knowledge that back in the states, his wife is cheating on him; and Lancelot Falk, who has joined the IC in an effort to live up to the example set by his brother Clay, a hero who died in Vietnam. 

 

Early in the novel the IC and their Camaguayan charges set off on a lengthy walk into the interior of the country; at the journey's completion lies a rendezvous with an allied force.

 

Save for some too-brief moments of combat action, the narrative is occupied with depicting, in labored fashion, the various psychological, moral, and emotional travails of the American participants. There is much 'telling,' and limited 'showing.' Sergeant Hook, being a devout Christian, serves as a conduit through which the author can address the conundrum of how a military man can reconcile the moral dilemma of killing other men, with adhering to a religion that espouses peace and nonviolence. 

 

In a manner similar to that of Priest, the protagonist of 'The Bridge,' Hook's journey through the violent, but colorful, landscape of Central America is a kind of extreme pilgrimage, designed to test a man's ability to maintain his moral compass when pitted against amoral antagonists.

 

The closing chapters of the novel revolve around the themes of physical pain and whether this is to be embraced in holiness, as in emulating Jesus Christ's torment on the cross. A putative war novel is an awkward vehicle for addressing these issues: I finished 'War is Heaven' thinking it a misfire both as a antiwar novel, and as an exegesis on religious belief in wartime. This novel is for Mano completists only.

At the library sale April 2025

At the Library Sale

April 2025

On a mild Spring day earlier this month, I made my biannual pilgrimage to the weeklong library book sale. As always, it was very well-attended, with folks coming in not just for books, but for large displays of puzzles, board games, CDs, and LPs. The children's book selection is a particular draw, as they have a large number of tables set out, piled over with books. 

For my own part, I was able to get a set of 'Hellboy and the BPRD' graphic novels for a very reasonable price. I also go some sci-fi novels, and a Young Adult drama, 'Run Softly, Go Fast,' from 1970 with (I believe) James Bama cover art.

 

 

 

Rounding things out, I got some 'Able Team' men's adventure novels, for a buck each. I am not familiar with these novels, but over at the 'Glorious Trash' blog, these seem to be well regarded.......

 

 

 

You never know what you'll find, at the Library Sale !

Re-read: Starhammer

Re-Read: 'Starhammer' by Christopher Rowley

5 / 5 Stars

 

From within the tent appeared a heavyset mutant. His skin was knobbed and warted and a deep brown. His head was shaved and yellow tusks curved from his mouth. He was a head taller than Jon and considerably wider. His genital pouch had been made from a human skull and he wore little else but shaggy desert boots. In one hand he held a whip made from braided human leather.

 

"What do you do talking to my meat ?"

 

"Who are you ?" said Jon, rising to his feet.

 

I am Gnush Two Tusks. That is my meat. You will be my meat too unless you go away....."

 

"You will be my meat feast. I will force-feed you for six weeks and then we will bake you in your own juices. I can almost taste it now, hot, bubbling with fat. It will be good."

 

It is nearly 15 years since I first read 'Starhammer. At the time I gave it a Five Star Rating. I later listed it and the accompanying two volumes in the 'Vang' trilogy as one of the top ten sci-fi novels of the 1980s.

 

Recently I sat down with Starhammer (this time with the UK edition, published in 1987 by Arrow Books, with a cover illustration by Tim White). Upon the re-read I concluded that Starhammer was just as good as I remembered and a legitimate Five Star novel.

 

As space operas go, author Rowley does everything right with this novel. He keeps the action flowing, his chapters short, and the locales varied and engrossing. The plot moves from one star system to another, from deep space to planetary space, before, in the final third of the novel, the narrative settles onto the desert planet Baraf. Baraf is a kind of Tatooine from Hell, populated by all manner of loathsome beings, such as Gnush, excerpted above. The action on Baraf is fast and furious and the outcome by no means guaranteed.

 

'Starhammer' also presents with periodic little episodes of graphic violence, lending an edge to the struggle of protagonist Jon Irehard to overcome the tyrannical rule of the blue-skinned laowon and their empire of cruelty, the Imperiom.

 

Sadly, the Vang trilogy is long out of print and those copies of the trilogy that come up for sale are expensive. An ebook edition has yet to be issued. All I can say is that it is very much worth your while to keep an eye out for this book on the shelves of used bookstores and to snap it up if you do indeed see it !

'Heavy Metal' movie soundtrack album

'Heavy Metal' movie soundtrack album

For quite some time now I've been toying with the idea of getting the soundtrack, as an LP, to the 1981 film 'Heavy Metal.' 

 

I have noticed that the prices for copies of the vinyl edition are getting up there, into the $30 and over range for copies in 'Very Good' condition, or better. So I recently shelled out $27 for a VG copy. 

You can of course listen to the album in its entirety on Spotify and on YouTube, among other portals. But playing vinyl on a stereo system brings with it an enhanced appreciation for the sound, and takes me back to 1981, which is what it's all about, I think. 

 

Anyways, if you've been pondering whether or not to grab the LP, you may want to do so sooner rather than later.......

Playboy April 1974

Playboy

April, 1974

April, 1974, and atop the Billboard Hot 100 chart is a disco instrumental, 'MFSB,' by TSOP (the Sound of Philadelphia, the studio operated by Kenneth Gable and Leon Huff). Also on the charts is the awful 'Hooked On A Feeling,' by Blue Swede. But 'Come and Get Your Love,' by Redbone, at the number 5 spot, is a genuine 1970s classic.

The April issue of Playboy is out on the stands. At 250 pages, it's chock-full of ads for clothing, cars, liquor, cigarettes, and consumer electronics. It also shows a desire to mimic Penthouse magazine, which at that time has overtaken Playboy as the number one men's magazine, much to Hugh Hefner's displeasure. But however much Hef may have detested Bob Guccione, he was more than willing to adopt Guccione's visual sense, as is the case with the cover of this April issue, which, with its soft-focus photography and carefully staged 'boudoir' background of furniture, accessories, and flowers, looks like it would have been completely at home on the cover of Penthouse. 

Why not lead off with the major feature of this issue: a pictorial starring one of the most prominent Adult Film actress of the decade, Marilyn Chambers. Unfortunately, the pictorial is too underexposed and too dark, wasting what looks like some great images of Chambers playing up to her past as a model for Ivory Snow detergent. Again, Chambers posing with an ecstatic expression on her face, lost in her private moments, calls to mind what Guccione was doing with his pictorials in Penthouse.

 

 

 

 

 

The outstanding fiction piece in this April issue is Roald Dahl's story 'The Great Switcheroo,' ably served with a fine illustration by Philip Castle.

 

The nonfiction article of note is 'The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,' by Larry King (no relation to the broadcast host). King tells the story of the legendary 'Chicken Ranch,' a brothel located near La Grange, Texas. Following reportage by Houston television news reporter Marvin Zindler, the Ranch was forced to close in 1973. It would become immortalized by the ZZ Top song 'La Grange,' and the 1982 musical starring Dolly Parton and Burt Reynolds.

Another nonfiction piece, 'Fathers Playing Catch with Sons,' is one of those mawkish, sentimental essays about baseball and growing up and the loss of childhood. These treacly articles and books, exemplified by Roger Kahn's 1972 book 'The Boys of Summer,' never registered with me because I thought baseball sucked !

In the Playboy Advisor column, a tragic letter from a young man who has everything, but chest hair. Don't laugh ! In 1974, this was a serious problem. You had to have something to show when you undid those top buttons on your disco shirt. A gold or platinum facsimile razor blade never looked better than when nestled in a mat of chest hair !

And finally, we have another of those super cringe moments that crop up frequently in these vintage issues of Playboy. In the April 1974 issue, it's a photo feature dubbed 'Fourplay: A Comedy in Three Acts,' and it features three New York City-based actors, posing alongside young nubile women. It's the perfect sort of elderly-man-fantasy that resonated with the Playboy readership.

 

Modern-day people may recognize the Jerry Orbach participating in the photo feature as the same Jerry Orbach who played Detective Lennie Brisco on the TV show Law and Order..............!

 

 

 

 

Then you have actor Samuel 'Zero' Mostel with his corpulent bulk situated in a bathtube, covered in spaghetti, with a nude woman sharing the tub........

 

Perhaps it's best to turn away now, and recall that back in the day, they did things differently in the pages of Playboy magazine...........

Book Review: Prison Ship (M. Caidin)

Book Review: 'Prison Ship' by Martin Caidin

3 / 5 Stars

 

Martin Caidin (1927 – 1997) was a prolific author of nonfiction books (mainly about military aviation) and fiction (mainly SF, thrillers, and aviation-related topics). Growing up in the 60s and 70s I read several of his military history books, as well as his novel ‘Cyborg’, which became the basis for the TV series The Six Million Dollar Man. Caidin’s fiction was serviceable, if not considered by the sci-fi literati to be noteworthy (he never was invited to contribute to the major anthologies of the 60s and 70s). But his books sold well enough for him to release them on a continuous basis from the late 50s to the mid 90s. 

‘Prison Ship’ (596 pp.) is a thick chunk of a paperback, and features cover art by David Mattingly. It was published by Tor Books in April 1989. 

 

This novel is a very clear effort by Caidin to be provocative, to shock bourgeoisie sensibilities, to offend blacks, Hispanics, Moslems, Hindus, and most of all, people who liked their aliens lovable and cuddly, like ‘E.T.’ and the Ewoks. 

 

It’s difficult to see what Caidin hoped to gain career-wise by assembling a 596-page SF ‘splatterpunk’ novel, other than the ability to direct an upraised literary middle finger to the SF publishing community. Or perhaps he simply wanted to show just how ‘macho’ a writer he could be.

‘Prison Ship’ features three main characters; two human, and one alien. The main human character is Jake Marden, a sort of secular Jewish version of Doc Savage, but with a fondness for committing crimes, not deterring them. The other character is a Bad Azz Mofo black man named Jube Bailey. Jake and Jube meet up in Old Millford Prison, a state penitentiary located in Florida. Jake and Jube, by virtue of their physical size, ferociousness, and intelligence, take command of the prison and turn it into their own unique criminal enterprise.

The third character is an alien named Arbok; once a hotshot interstellar pilot, Arbok has been convicted of murder and is sentenced, along with five other aliens, to certain death as a slave laborer on a prison planet in a galaxy far, far away. Arbok leads an insurrection aboard the Frarsk, the prison ship of the book’s title, and commandeers the vessel to a distant galaxy and one of its few habitable planets: Earth.

Arbok and Jake establish a quasi-telepathic link and soon the Frarsk touches down on the grounds of Old Millford. What happens when six homicidal aliens team up with a small army of homicidal earthmen ? Nothing good, that’s clear. There will be VERY little singing of ‘Kumbaya’ around the fire and heartfelt messages about Peace, Love, and Multicultural Understanding. There WILL be plenty of violence and atrocities.

As an action novel, ‘Prison Ship’ starts off with plenty of velocity; the first 38 pages contain more mayhem and intrigue than entire novels by other thriller writers. But after that, the book begins to lose steam. It’s too long by at least 200 pages (if not more) and suffers from uneven pacing, too many filler passages, utterly contrived plotting, and pulp-worthy dialogue. I finished the book wondering if the Baen editor assigned to handle it actually did anything more than simply sign off on the publishing contract.

‘Prison Ship’’s splatterpunk content is liberal. These semi-pornographic passages are offset by star / asterisk symbols so that squeamish readers can skip them. In my mind these passages could have been deleted without harming the novel all that much. But again, Caidin seems to have been adamant about being Transgressive, so the splatterpunk stuff crops up at regular intervals. 

 

One section towards the book’s end, supposedly representing a ‘shock’ revelation about the aliens, is so contrived, and so clumsily enthusiastic about piling on the gore, that it’s hard to come away from ‘Prison Ship’ with any attitude other than one that recognizes that Caidin knew he was putting out some major schlock. 

If you’re a fan of splatterpunk, and you can tolerate a meandering, plodding narrative if it delivers plenty of sarcastic, gruesome humor, then ‘Prison Ship’ will be your cup of tea. 

 

If you’re expecting a carefully crafted novel that uses SF tropes and graphic violence to say something unpleasant (but true) about the Human Condition (like Norman Spinrad does in ‘The Men in the Jungle’), I don’t think 'Prison Ship' will appeal to you. 

Heavy Metal Spring 1988

Heavy Metal

Spring 1988

Spring, 1988. Atop the Billboard 200 LP chart is the soundtrack to the film Dirty Dancing. To add insult to injury, a second collection - titled More Dirty Dancing - of tunes from the movie, sits at the number 5 spot - !

At the offices of the National Lampoon, Inc. (formerly Twenty-First Century Communications), the home of the National Lampoon and Heavy Metal magazines, there is uncertainty in the air. 

 

As he relates in his 1994 book 'If You Don't Buy this Book, We'll Kill this Dog,' circulation and advertising in the Lampoon had taken a steep dive in 1984, but Matty Simmons, the publisher, had implemented a hands-on decision making policy, dismissing staff and instituting what he called 'austerity.' Simmons brought the magazine back into the black by 1988. 

 

Simmons was less heartened to learnt that John Hughes, the writer and director of the  Vacation movies, was insisting on producing the latest installment of the franchise, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. Simmons, who had produced the previous films in the franchise, was given the choice of letting Hughes have his way and being relegated to the role of 'executive producer,' or not having the film made at all. Simmons acquiesced, but remembers:

I have never quite been able to figure out the reason for Hughes's animosity to me. This was surely a slap in the face. I had brought him into the film business by the hand.....I had never been an executive producer before. Usually that title goes to the guy who puts the money together or the star's manager or the director's girlfriend......Now we were discussing my 'visiting' for the second sequel to a picture that I had nurtured from the beginning, brought to the studio, and produced in every conceivable way.

 

Twenty-First Century Communications co-founder Leonard Mogel had retired in 1986, but Heavy Metal, which had been his main assignment, continued, albeit as a quarterly, rather than monthly, publication. Simmons' daughter Julie remained as editor, but gone were the columns dedicated to reviewing books, comics, and 'rok' music.

 

The main entrant in this Spring issue is a complete presentation of Paolo Eleuteri Serpieri's comic 'Druuna: Morbus Gravis.' First issued in 1985 as a bande dessinee (Franco-Belgian comic book), Morbus Gravis was followed by 11 additional installments, many of these also published as English-language translations in Heavy Metal. 

 

The plots of the Druuna stories involve science fiction, and have a loose, contrived quality. They mainly are vehicles through which Druuna can be shown in various stages of undress, undergoing erotic activities, some involving use and abuse. Whatever happens to Druuna, she always bounces back up and goes on her jiggling way......you can argue that these comics are exploitative, but there is no arguing that Serpieri's artwork is impeccable.

 

 

Other pieces in this issue are less impressive. There is a black and white comic, titled 'Hector,' from Spanish artist Daniel Torres. 'Hector' is another entrant in the so-called 'Atom Style' of comic art that Heavy Metal was particularly fond of during the 80s. I never was that big a fan of Torres and the Atom Style.

Also underwhelming is 'The Bullfighter,' by Heriberto Muela, aka 'Herikberto,' another Spanish artist.

We do get some Moebius in this Spring issue, a four-pager called 'To See Naples.' It's a neat little comic.

Also among the better comics featured in this issue is another four-pager, by Argentinian artist Fernando Rubio, titled 'All Too Human.' I've posted it in its entirety below. 

 

 

 

If you can find a copy of this Spring 1988 issue for $10 or less, I recommend getting it. 

 

And that's how Heavy Metal was, 37 years ago...........

Book Review: Berserker Man

Book Review: 'Berserker Man' by Fred Saberhagen

4 / 5 Stars

 

'Berserker Man' (220 pp.) was published by Ace Books in January, 1980, and features cover art by Boris Vallejo. 

 

For those unfamiliar with the 'Berserker' franchise, it started in 1963 with the publication of the short story 'Fortress Ship' in If magazine. Saberhagen (1930 - 2007) eventually published some 15 books in the franchise well into the mid-2000s, making it one of the more successful such properties in the genre of science fiction. 

 

The Berserkers are robotic intelligences, created eons ago as weapons in some long-forgotten interstellar war. They since have abandoned their initial programming and now seek to eliminate all life from the universe, life being regarded as something of a disease deserving eradication.

 

'Berserker Man' is set some hundreds of years after the events in the 1975 installation in the series, 'Berserker's Planet.' As 'Man' opens, we learn that (inevitably) the Federation has grown complacent, and the Berserker menace has been renewed, and this time, a victory by the robots seems more likely than ever.

 

Rather than trying to put together an enormous battle fleet for a final, catastrophic showdown with the Berserkers, Secretary Tupolev, the leader of the Federation military, has elected for a more cerebral strategy. An eleven year-old boy named Michel Geulincx (pr. Joo-links), residing on the idyllic planet Alpine, is to be drafted into Federation service. At a secret facility at Moonbase, he is to be trained in the use of a new weapon dubbed Lancelot, a weapon that has the power to transform a receptive human being into a superpowered entity, capable of defeating the Berserkers.

 

But the time available to Michel and his trainers is running short, for the human allies of the Berserkers are searching for Michel, to hand him over to the robots. The fate of all life in the galaxy rests on the thin shoulders of a boy who only is beginning to learn what he can do with the power vested in him.........

 

With 'Berserker Man,' Saberhagen clearly is trying to craft a space opera with a wider scope and intellectual heft than detailing recitations of space battles between opposing fleets (although there are some of these in the novel).

 

Central to the plot of 'Man' is the existence of that classic sci-fi archetype, the Mystical Space Object (MSO), which is (simultaneously) enormous, yet tiny; sentient, yet inscrutable; beyond human ken, but also familiar; omnipotent, but frail; etc., etc., etc. The reader learns that the fates of Michel and the MSO are intertwined, and this serves as a conduit through which Saberhagen provides considerable discourse, in the second half of the novel, about 'cosmic' events. 

 

Without disclosing spoilers, I'll simply say that these events culminate in an 'Omega Point' meeting with a vast and impersonal artifact, one capable of deciding the winner in any contest between man and machine.
 

'Berserker Man' features an Afterward essay, by Sandra Meisel, on the themes of the novel and its place in the Berserker franchise. As such things go it's a decent enough essay, although at times it is very earnest in imputing a literary and philosophical significance to Saberhagen's writings (there are illusions to Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung, the heroes of classical mythology, etc.).

 

I was at ease with giving 'Berserker Man' a Four Star Rating. It is a successful effort to bring something a little more imaginative to the franchise, and Saberhagen deserves credit for using a clear and intelligible prose style to relate his cosmic encounters. Many sci-fi novels of the New Wave era that also dealt with this theme relied, almost by rote, on overly figurative language that taxed the patience of the reader. Accordingly, fans of space opera and the Berserker stories will find this novel rewarding.