Book Review: My Father, the Pornographer: A Memoir

'My Father, the Pornographer: A Memoir'

by Chris Offutt

Washington Square Press, April 2017

5 / 5 Stars

As a teenager and sci-fi reader during the 1970s, I was aware of Andrew J. Offutt (who often used the lower-case spellings of his first name and surname as a 'gimmick') as an author and editor of sci-fi and fantasy books. 

He and his contemporary, Karl Edward Wagner, represented a younger generation of fantasy writers who were inheriting the legacy of people like Lin Carter and L. Sprague de Camp. In large part, this inheritance consisted of writing new content, for the paperback publishers of the 1970s and 1980s, for Robert E. Howard properties like Conan, Cormac Mac Art, and Bran Mak Morn.

I thought that Offutt was superior to Wagner as both an editor of fantasy anthologies, and as a novelist. 

As the 70s gave way to the 80s, Offutt's profile gradually became less noticeable, maintained in large part by his contributions to the Robert Lynn Aspen shared-world series Thieves' World. By the end of the 80s, Offutt had pretty much disappeared from the sci-fi publishing landscape.

What I didn't know was that from 1982 to 1985 Offutt, under the pseudonym 'John Cleve', was the author / co-author of all 19 books in a softcore porn sci-fi series from Playboy Press called 'Spaceways'. 

I also didn't know that during the 60s and 70s, Offutt had published around 130 sleaze paperbacks under the pseudonym 'John Cleve'. Additional titles were published using any one of another 17 pseudonyms.

When the sleaze paperback market evaporated in the mid-1980s, the indefatigable Offutt began his own line of mail-order chapbooks, 'Winter Books'. Up until 2011 he issued over 250 porn novels under the Winter Books imprint, using the pseudonym 'Turk Winter'. 

Some of these Winter Books were written in conjunction with the famous fetish artist Ernest Stanzoni, Jr., better known as 'Eric Stanton'. While most Winter Books sold for $60 each, titles 'customized' for a client's particular sadomasochistic fantasies could sell for as much as $2600.

Indeed, as his son Chris Offutt makes clear in this memoir, Andrew Offutt was a pornographer who wrote science fiction and fantasy, rather than a science fiction writer who wrote pornography. The scope of his father's dedication to writing porn only became apparent to Chris Offut when, in 2013, the year his father died of cirrhosis, Chris inherited 1800 pounds of books, letters, manuscripts, comic books, and other media.

And, as is apparent from the earliest chapters of 'My Father', Andrew Offut was not a pleasant or likeable man. Andrew Offutt was an arrogant, self-centered martinet who considered his wife and children to be annoyances, a man who would erupt into anger over a perceived slight and bear a grudge for the rest of his life (the book describes how the UK writer Piers Anthony Jacob, aka 'Piers Anthony', mentored Offutt's first forays into sleaze paperbacks. But when Jacobs angered Offutt, one day the latter nailed one of Jacobs's books onto a log in the backyard of the Offutt family home in Haldeman, Kentucky).

left to right: Mary Jo McCabe Offutt, Andrew Offutt, unknown man and woman, 'Dead Dog' party, 1969 St. Louiscon. Jay Kay Klein archive, Calisphere

Rusty Hevelin, left, and Andrew J. Offutt, right, at Midwestcon 57, June 2006. MidAmerican Fan Photo Archive 

'My Father, the Pornographer' is a very readable memoir, one that will appeal to any fan of sci-fi and fantasy fiction published during the 60s and 70s (Chris Offutt's account of attending science fiction conventions during that era are laugh-out-loud funny, but also creepy). 

Baby Boomers will find the book an interesting account of growing up in that era; for example, when Chris Offutt writes about how his father took him to see Billy Jack in 1971, it's sure to evoke memories of a time and a place for any Boomer.

Chris Offutt posing with his father's media collection......and firearm. From The New York Times, February 15, 2015

My one complaint about 'My Father' is that it doesn't include any photographs. Including pictures of Offutt, his family, his Kentucky home and office, and period photographs of the town of Haldeman, would have helped flesh out the people and places mentioned in the memoir. 

Summing up, whether you're an Andrew Offutt fan, a fan of 70s sci-fi, a fan of sleaze paperbacks, or simply someone who enjoys a well-written memoir, then 'My Father the Pornographer' is worth searching out.

Gypsy omnibus

Gypsy Omnibus
Insight Comics

2018

‘Gipsy’ started as a bande dessinee (BD; Franco-Belgian comic) in January 1993, published by industry juggernaut Dargaud. Six volumes eventually were issued, concluding in May 2002 with the publication of ‘Aztec Laughter’.

An English translation of the first Gipsy BD (L'étoile du gitan), titled ‘Gypsy: The Wandering Star’, was published in the May,1995 issue of Heavy Metal magazine. According to PorPor blog reader Fred, five additional Gypsy stories later saw print as English translations in Heavy Metal.

After reading ‘The Wandering Star’ I thought that Gipsy was an entertaining, but not pathbreaking, Eurocomic. The writing, by Thierry Smolderen, was intelligent, and the art, by Enrico Marini, was in keeping with the more ‘cartoony’ style that was the norm for BD during that era. 

I would not have thought that the Gipsy franchise was deserving of a deluxe, slipcase, English-translation omnibus, but apparently the folks at Insight Comics did, and so we have a lavish ‘Gypsy Omnibus’, with a retail price of $60.

[ Insight publishes English translations of BD, as well as deluxe volumes devoted to overviews of Marvel properties like the Black Panther and the Black Widow. ]

I was able to pick the ‘Gypsy Omnibus’ up from a ‘bargain’ outlet for considerably less than its cover price.

This is definitely a well-produced hardcover book, with quality paper stock, sewn pages, and crisp, colorful reproductions of the art. Along with English translations of all six of the BDs, there is an appendix featuring biographical profiles of Smolderen and Marini, and a brief section of sketches by the latter.

Is the Gypsy Omnibus for you ? Depends on whether you're a big fan of the franchise, or 1990s BDs. If you are that type of person, then spending $60 for the omnibus may be worth your while. If you are less of a fan, but can find it for substantially lower price, then picking it up certainly is recommended, as it is at heart a fun comic with lots of sarcastic humor, pretty girls, T and A, and violent action. In short, the quintessential Heavy Metal comic !

Paperback covers by Steranko

 Paperback covers by Jim Steranko

Courtesy of 'The Drawings of Steranko' website, a nice, three-page gallery of Jim Sternako's illustrations for sci-fi, western, adventure, and fantasy paperbacks published in the 1970s and 1980s is available at this link.

The  website has lots of additional media done by Sternako, and is well worth checking out.

Skorpio magazine Argentina

Skorpio magazine

Argentina

Skorpio was a monthly Argentinian comic book magazine (revista) published by 'Ediciones Record' from July 1974 to January 1996 (No. 235). 

Its subtitle, el mundo de la gran historieta (literally, 'the world of the big cartoon') indicated that Skorpio had a wide scope in terms of the genres of comics that appeared in its pages.

(An Italian edition of Skorpio debuted in 1977; I don't know if it's still being published as of 2021.)

Among the serialized comics appearing in Skorpio in its early years (i.e., during the 1970s) were western strips, like 'Loco' Sexton; sci-fi, such as 'Yo, Ciborg'; the police thriller 'Precinto 56'; the occult adventure 'Nekrodamus'; and the imaginative 'Hor', about a barbarian warrior who adventured across time and space (often accompanied by nubile young women dressed in leather bikinis).

'Skorpio', a detective / secret agent character, himself was a recurring feature in the magazine.

Skorpio also ran some comics set in World War 2. Particularly impressive was as de pique ('Ace of Spades'), about the crew of an American B-17 'Flying Fortress' bomber in action during World War 2.

Most of the content published during the 70s was in black and white, with the occasional color section.

The artists who supplied comics for Skorpio were some of the most talented in South America (and, arguably, the world) and included such familiar names as Alberto Breccia, Hugo Pratt, Horacio Altuna, and Juan Antonio Giménez (whose work on as de pique is amazing), among others. Their draftsmanship is impressive and equal to that of the best of the illustrations in the Warren and Skywald magazines of the same era.

A free online repository of Skorpio issues from the 1970s, which can be downloaded as pdf files, is available at this link. If you are fluent in Spanish, it's worth your while to check out those old issues.

For those whose main language is English, well, it's perhaps unrealistic to expect that any of the comics from Skorpio ever will be reprinted in translated versions for the U.S. market. 

But then, the success of the English-language version of the Argentinian comic strip 'The Eternaut' (El Eternauta), which was published in 2015 by Fantagraphics (and quickly went out of print), certainly indicates that there is an audience out there for Argentinian comics of the postwar era..........so 'never say never' ?!

Book Review: Islands in the Net

Book Review: 'Islands in the Net' by Bruce Sterling

3 / 5 Stars

‘Islands in the Net’ first was published in 1988 by Arbor House. This Ace Books paperback (396 pp.) was issued in March 1989.

The cover illustration is by Jose Royo; as PorPor Blog reader Fred points out, this same illustration was used as the cover for the Winter 1989 issue of Heavy Metal magazine:

For 'Islands in the Net', Royo's illustration gives the impression that the novel is about a multitalented Danger Girl who is involved with intrigue and adventure in a cyberpunk setting. 

In fact, ‘Islands in the Net’ really is more along the lines of ‘Hi and Lois Meet Cyberpunk’……….

The novel is set in 2023. The Cold War has ended, nuclear weapons have been outlawed, and corporations – along with multinational bodies, such as the Vienna Convention - are the de facto rulers of the planet. Tying all these polities together, and serving as the medium for global commerce and communication, is the internet (the ‘Net’ of the book's title).

In the opening chapters we are introduced to the heroine, Laura Webster, who, along with her husband David, runs a beachfront lodge in Galveston. The Websters work for an enlightened international conglomerate called Rizome. Along with their infant daughter Loretta, the Websters are the perfect representatives of the 21st century All-American family: photogenic, and unselfconsciously banal.

The only fly in the ointment of this idealized New World is the presence of the data pirates: states that harbor, and nurture, hacker infrastructures designed to steal and sell corporate data. In an effort to co-opt, and ultimately de-fang, the data pirates, Rizome has scheduled a conference with representatives from the pirate states of Grenada, Singapore, and Benelux. Laura and David are nervous, but also energized, to host the conference at their Galveston lodge.

However, when an untoward event disrupts the conference, the fragile amity among the parties begins to fray. Desperate to salvage a deal, Rizome arranges for Laura to be its official liaison to the mistrustful data pirates, reasoning that her blonde wholesomeness and naivety will go further than that of a professional interlocutor.

As ‘Islands’ unfolds the reader joins Laura, David, and Loretta as they journey to the lands of the data pirates, and in so doing, become aware that their comfortable existence has shielded them from a clandestine conflict……one that threatens to bring a new era of destruction to the nations and peoples of the world. 

And it will be up to Laura, the unassuming housewife, to undergo all manner of trials and tribulations if she is to reveal the true identity of the cabal that is winning the conflict………….

I found ‘Islands’ to be a middling example of first-generation cyberpunk. While the idea of having a housewife be the lead character certainly has novelty, the passivity of the character of Laura Webster prevents the narrative from gaining much momentum; the reader, along with Laura, is in continuous reactive, rather than proactive, mode.

The final 80 pages of the book take place amidst Third World misery, and by so doing lend a much-needed tone of grimness and grittiness to the plot, although in these pages author Sterling tends to use lengthy dialogue passages as a vehicle for pontificating on First World’s neglect of the Third World. The denouement takes an optimistic path that wraps things up a bit too neatly for my tastes, but then, as I stated at the outset, this is not a novel where the lead character salvages the world through her intrepidness. 

Summing up, perhaps the best thing about ‘Islands in the Net’ is its segments dealing with the decaying landscape of the Third World as it struggles to cope with the economic and environmental derangements imposed by the advent of the New World Order. These prefigure the more impactful stylings of newer cyberpunk practitioners like Paul McAuley (‘White Devils’, 2004), Paolo Bacigalupi (‘The Windup Girl’, 2009), as well as Sterling’s own 2009 novel, ‘The Caryatids’. 

Together

'Together' by Tierra

February 1981

As February turns into March in 1981, the single 'Together', by the group Tierra, peaks at Number 18 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

'Together' is a track off the group's 1980 album 'City Nights'. The song first was done in 1967 by The Intruders, the Philadelphia soul / R & B band. 

Tierra, an East Los Angeles-based band that started in the early 1970s, gave their cover a catchy Chicano / Low Rider styling.

Tierra continues to perform; here's a video of them doing 'Together' at a concert in 2019. 

American Comic Book Chronicles: The 1950s

American Comic Book Chronicles
The 1950s: 1950 - 1959
by Bill Schelly
TooMorrows Publishing, August 2013

My review of the volume for 1965-1969 is here.

My review for the volume for the 1970s is here.

My review for the volume for the 1980s is here.

My review for the volume for the 1990s is here.

'American Comic Book Chronicles: The 1950s' was published in August 2013 by TooMorrows Publishing. The 'Comic Book Chronicles' series, as of March 2021, now covers the entirety of the period from 1940 - 1999. Hopefully the volume dedicated to the 2000s will be forthcoming.

Speculators / bookjackers at amazon.com are asking for over $400 for a 'like new' copy of this book, which is ridiculous. You can find it for $46.95 at the TooMorrows website.

As with the other volumes in the series, the 239 pages of 'The 1950s' are divided into chapters for each of the 10 years under consideration. Each year is provided with a timeline for important events in American history and comic book history. Callout sections are devoted to ancillary topics, such as black artists and writers; woman artists and writers; the birth of the Sgt. Rock character; wash tone covers; etc.

Bill Schelly is a prolific writer on the topic of comic books and pop culture, and in this volume he ably manages the task of being informative, but also entertaining. Rather than a checklist of issues, this book is a narrative designed to provide anecdotes and observations on the publishers, writers, artists, and readers of the world of comic books during the 1950s. 

You don't have to be a collector or archivist of the comic books of the 1950s to find lots of revelations in the pages of 'The 1950s'. I, for one, had no real understanding of the collapse of the Atlas / Marvel comics publishing business in 1957, when a bad business decision on Martin Goodman's part left his books without a distributor. Goodman secured a punitive distribution deal with Independent News, who also distributed DC's comics. 

Atlas went from issuing 30 - 40 titles a month to only 8, an arrangement that stayed in force until mid-1969. Stan Lee, who edited Atlas's comics line, was forced to curtail job assignments for many writers and artists. That Lee and Marvel were able to overcome the limitations of the distribution chokepoint and bring Marvel into popularity in the 1960s is one of the more remarkable comebacks in comic book history.

Needless to say, the story of the rise and fall of EC Comics gets considerable attention in 'The 1950s', as does the April, 1954 Senate hearings on the evils of comic books. Schelly makes clear the economic costs of the decision, in the wake of the hearings, to adopt the Comics Code Authority and abandon comics that appealed to older readers. In 1952, 3,150 titles were published; in 1955, about 2,350; and in 1959, around 1,500. 

One observation that readily emerges from the pages of 'The 1950s' is the prominent role of TV franchises, kiddy comics, and teen humor titles ('Archie') in leading sales throughout the decade. In today's comic book world superhero titles continue to get the greatest attention, because of their impact on movie and TV revenues, but in the 50s, it was 'Lil Audrey, Donald Duck, Dennis the Menace, and Sugar n' Spice that best weathered the downfall of the horror and crime comics in the wake of the Senate hearings.

The closing chapters of 'The 1950s' cover the advent of the Silver Age with the Summer 1956 release of Showcase No. 4 and its updating of the classic character The Flash. No one really knew it at the time, but the team of writers Robert Kanigher and John Broome and artist Carmine Infantino were remaking the genre. Schelly makes clear how the innovations in plot and art in this early Flash tale laid the foundation for the revolution in superhero comics that took place in the early 60s.

Summing up, like the other volumes in the series, 'American Comic Book Chronicles: The 1950s' will be of interest not only to those intrigued by comic books, but to anyone interested in the popular culture of the United States. 

Book Review: The Chronicles of the Deryni

Book Review: The Chronicles of the Deryni
Deryni Rising
Deryni Checkmate
High Deryni
by Katherine Kurtz

4 / 5 Stars

'The Chronicles of the Deryni' omnibus was published in April 1985 by Nelson Doubelday. It contains the first three novels in the 'Deryni' saga: Deryni Rising (1970), Deryni Checkmate (1972), and High Deryni (1973). The cover art is by Daniel Horne.

The role of the Deryni novels in the advent of fantasy literature as a commercial juggernaut should not be underestimated. Back in 1970 when Deryni Rising was issued by Bantam Books under Lin Carter's 'Adult Fantasy' imprint, it was one of the few contemporary novels in the imprint's catalog. The success of the Deryni trilogy - along with Richard Adams's 1974 tome Shardik -  showed that newer fantasy novels were capable of acquiring a considerable audience, and that the fantasy genre had potential beyond the recycling of the Tolkein and Conan properties. 

If not for Deryni, one could argue, there would not have been Stephen R. Donaldson's 'Thomas Covenant' series, which encouraged the growth of the genre during the late 1970s and early 1980s and paved the way for its present-day prosperity.

As a peruser of bookstore shelves during the 1970s I was aware of the Deryni novels (which now consist of sixteen novels and at least 10 short stories and poems), but it was only recently that I picked up an omnibus edition, and sat down to read.......no trivial task, as the omnibus is 753 pages long (it took me six weeks to finish it).

The central concept of the novels, which are set in a landscape reminiscent of medieval Britain, is that a race of mutants - the Deryni - have been gifted with various extrasensory powers, including the ability to teleport from one locale to another via 'portals'; to instantly heal life-threatening wounds; to control others against their will; and to conjure demons, call down lightning, and other feats of spellcasting. 

Needless to say the ability to wield magic has, through the ages, engendered hostility towards the Deryni, and led to their persecution. As the trilogy commences, suspicion towards the Deryni is a major factor in the lives of the three main protagonists: Duke Alaric Morgan; his cousin, the priest Damon McLain; and Kelson Haldane, the young King of the nation of Gwynedd.

'Deryni Rising', the opening novel of the trilogy, is very much a character- and setting-driven story; save for the first chapter, the entire narrative takes place within the grounds of the regal compound in Gwynedd. There is an emphasis on political intrigue and personal melodramas involving King Kelson and his advisors. The novel's rather slow pacing is redeemed somewhat by the closing chapters, which recount a lengthy, Dr. Strange-style arcane combat that brings the plot to a reasonably sound conclusion. 

With 'Deryni Checkmate', the plots and settings become more expansive in scope, as Kelson, Morgan, and Duncan strive to confront uprisings that threaten Gwynedd. Their efforts are handicapped by a conspiracy among the clergy, a conspiracy driven by hatred for the Deryni.

The conspiracies and conflicts come to a head in 'High Deryni', but in my opinion, this third volume suffers from over-plotting. Most of the narrative builds towards a decisive confrontation between rival armies, with author Kurtz using unexpectedly intense passages of violence and grue to impart an apocalyptic edge to the conflict. However, not only is the long-awaited final contest routinely delayed by the insertion of minor plot developments, but the denouement relies on the perfectly-timed exposure of various subterfuges, which undermines all of the effort devoted to setting up the showdown in the first place.

One thing that led me to award a four-star rating is the fact that Kurtz uses a clear, direct prose style that avoids the excess of early 70s fantasy writing (no one is 'ensorcelled' or 'mazed'; Olde English-style dialects are notably absent; and italicized ballads, lays, and poems are in mercifully short supply). That said, Kurtz's absorption with some of the more esoteric aspects of medieval life are on full display throughout the trilogy: readers will need to prepare for extended descriptions of priestly vestments; interior decor and lighting; the wardrobes and grooming habits of the nobility; heraldric symbology; and the particulars of ecclesiastical ceremonies.

Summing up, readers interested in fantasy novels that feature character-driven narratives will find the Deryni trilogy rewarding, provided they have the patience for an approach to world-building that can be highly intricate at times.