Social Fiction

'Social Fiction' by Chantal Montellier

New York Review Comics, July 2023

So, coincident with the demise of Heavy Metal magazine, we get the publication of some of the more memorable comics to be serialized in that magazine in the late 70s.

Chantal Montellier (b. 1947) is a French artist who began contributing to bandes dessinees in 1978 with the comic '1996' for Metal Hurlant. A year later, Heavy Metal began publishing the English translation.

'Social Fiction' (191 pp.) provides English translations of the complete '1996', as well as two other stories Montellier did for Metal Hurlant in the early 1980s, 'Wonder City' and 'Shelter'. 

'Social Fiction' is published by New York Review Comics, an imprint of the New York Review of Books, so it's being marketed to those with a Highbrow pedigree, as opposed to aging Baby Boomers and Stoners like myself. The dimensions of 'Social Fiction' are 7 x 9 inches, which I consider too small to do justice to the artwork and gives many of the panels a cramped appearance which makes the text difficult to read:

While 'Wonder City' is printed with a garish pink tone, 'Shelter' and '1996' stay with reassuring black-and-white.

In his Translator's Note, Geoffrey Brock makes clear something that I always had suspected; namely, that Heavy Metal editors Sean Kelly and Valerie Marchant took some of the '1996' episodes and replaced the French text with contrived, phonetic English, presumably in an effort to show how hip they were. In 'Social Fiction', all the '1996' entries thankfully are given a straight English translation:

Despite being reproduced in a smaller dimension, '1996' retains its impact as an offbeat, darkly humorous take on society.

'Wonder City' and 'Shelter' also are interesting reads, melding the satirical attitude of '1996' with a nihilistic, pro-feminist political advocacy.

Who will want a copy of 'Social Fiction' ? Well, if you are a fan of Heavy Metal and its early years then you'll likely find the book provides an easy, nostalgic trip back to that era, when '1996' was an effective contrast to the T & A sensibility that governed much of the magazine's content. 

I'm not so sure of its appeal to younger readers, as its satire is grounded very much in dissecting European / American society as it was more than 40 years ago. Indie comics hipsters may find the book interesting as a vehicle for enhancing their hipness, but they should take this path with the understanding that 'Social Fiction' is very.... French. 

More Album Cover Art by Brad Johannsen

More Album Cover Art by Brad Johannsen

Here are scans / photos of two album covers for the 'Michael Quatro Jam Band', done by artist Brad Johannsen. Paintings was released in 1972 by Evolution / Stereo Dimension records, and Look Deeply into the Mirror in 1973, also on Evolution.

More Johannsen art is available here, here, here, and here.

These are jpeg files of about 1.5 MB each; while I can capture the covers as tiffs, those files are > 16 MB and I can't post them to this website without taking a long, long time for them to load. But hopefully these jpeg scans give a sense of Johanssen's approach to incorporating psychedelic themes into commercial artwork.

As for Michael Quatro, he was born in 1943 in Detroit; his younger sister is the singer Suzi Quatro ('Stumblin' In', 1978). As a composer and keyboardist, Quatro has released 11 albums, starting in 1972 with Paintings. Some of his songs and albums are available on Youtube.  

Book Review: The Fortunes of Brak

Book Review: 'The Fortunes of Brak' by John Jakes

5 / 5 Stars

John Jakes, who passed away at age 90 on March 11, 2023, was a familiar author to me and many other Baby Boomers. While I never read his 'Kent Family Chronicles', I was aware of his science fiction and fantasy writing, and picked up his 'Brak the Barbarian' titles from Pocket Books. 

I always liked the Brak stories, for as Conan pastiches, they were as good as, if not better than, Lin Carter's 'Thongor' franchise.

Brak is a bit more intelligent than Conan, and more vulnerable to the blades and spells of adversaries. Often, Brak must use improvisation and more than a little bit of luck to escape what appears to be certain doom at the hands of his enemies. And of course, the beautiful women Brak encounters in his adventures frequently have ulterior motives, motives that our barbarian hero can be slow to ferret out - to his peril.

'The Fortunes of Brak' (255 pp.) was published by Dell in January 1980, and features cover art by George Bush. It's a compilation of previously published Brak tales, some of them from Lin Carter's Flashing Swords ! anthologies. The book features quite a few interior illustrations by Douglas Beekman, and these are of high quality.

My capsule summaries of the contents:

Devils in the Walls (1963): captured by slavers, at an auction Brak is sold to the alluring and mysterious Mirande. The price of his freedom: looting the ruins of Hamur's palace, where, it is rumored, famished panthers and murderous ghosts await any trespasser.

 

Ghoul's Garden (1973): Traveling through the woodlands, Brak befriends the shifty-eyed priest Hektor, and the red-haired actress Shana. The latter is welcome company.......but, as Brak is to discover, Shana is a woman coveted by a malevolent wizard, a wizard who has little tolerance for romantic rivals..............

The Girl in the Gem (1965): Brak gets coerced into yet another perilous venture. The opening segment of this story has an imaginative, offbeat quality, after which it becomes a conventional sword-and-sorcery tale.

Brak in Chains (1977): this story first was published as 'Storm in a Bottle' in Lin Carter's Flashing Swords ! No.4. Our hero is held captive in the Kingdom of Lord Magnus the Worldbreaker, where a severe drought has led to widespread unrest, and predictions of doom. The villain of this piece is one of the creepiest to be featured in the 'Brak' franchise. This is the best entrant in the anthology.

The Mirror of Wizardry (1968): Brak is making his way up the hazardous pass through the Mountains of Smoke, when, amid the swirling snow, he comes upon a horrifying sight.........and a forthcoming encounter with the evil mage Valonicus.

Summing up, 'The Fortunes of Brak' is a worthy showcase of Brak tales, and fans of old school sword-and-sorcery storytelling will find it rewarding.

Penthouse August 1976

Penthouse magazine
August 1976

It's August, 1976, and the number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 is 'Don't Go Breaking My Heart' by Elton John and Kiki Dee.

Let's take a look at the latest issue of Penthouse magazine. 

At this time, the CB craze was in full swing, so along with the usual advertisements for cigarettes, we have ads for CB radios (including a 'pocket CB' that seems more than a little contrived), along with a feature profiling available brands of radios. The article also informed readers of the lingo of the CB culture, if you didn't already know from C. W. McCall's 1975 hit 'Convoy'.

(I don't know how many Americans under 60 years of age realize this, but in 1974, the federal government implemented the Emergency Highway Energy Conservation Act, which mandated a maximum speed of 55 mph on interstate highways. A major factor in the advent of the CB radio era was its ability to allow truckers to communicate information about highway speed traps set up by state police.) 

A portfolio features 20 year-old Colleen Carney, who has a fetching streak of gray hair in her tousled mane.

An article about Ed Hanna, the mayor of Utica, New York, celebrates his maverick approach to politics. Sadly, contemporary Utica is a Rust Belt wasteland. So it all was for naught, back in '76.

The Interview in this issue is with Princeton physicist Gerald K. O'Neill, who was well-known as an advocate for installing space stations at the 'L5' position in the combined orbits of the Earth and Moon. O'Neill's interview is a perfect example of how the most impractical ideas could be communicated with a Messianic fervor.

A short story by one D. G. Bredes features a brilliant illustration, but the artist is uncredited.

Terry Pastor is credited, for this great illustration for an article by 'Maggie M'.

The Pet of the Month is a lithe redhead named Victoria Lynn Johnson, who had a role in the 1976 B-movie Grizzly.

Only in the 70s could you not only sell Penthouse and Viva tee shirts in kids sizes, you could include kids in an advertisement for said tee shirts ! 

The 'erotic' pictorial in this issue eschews the usual lesbian theme in favor of heterosexuality. Perhaps it originally was intended for Viva.....?!

And there you have it, a trip back into an era of simpler times, when a CB radio was the height of consumer electronics and the federal government's National Maximum Speed Law dictated a maximum of 55 mph on interstate highways (the Law was repealed in 1995).

The Best Science Fiction Novels of the Seventies

The  Top 10  Science  Fiction  Novels  of the  Seventies

I've been writing this blog for nearly 15 years, and so I think I've accumulated sufficient experience with the literature to display my egomania, and stand forth with my top 10 science fiction novels of the decade from 1970 to 1979. 

I am quite comfortable with ignoring novels that were awarded Nebula and Hugo awards during that time, as most of those novels are mediocre: 'The Gods Themselves', 'Inferno', 'The Fountains of Paradise', 'Rendezvous with Rama', 'The Forbidden Tower'. Best-seller status, and acclaim from professional critics, have no impact on my decision-making. 

One thing that stands out with my selections: many are short, under 250 pages as mass-market paperbacks (with some even under 200 pages). As compared to the modern era and its ponderous, 600-page tomes, this says something about the ability of authors in the 1970s to world-build, and get a plot up and running, with economy and skill.

These aren't presented in any particular order, but simply represent a 'Top 10' compendium of 5-Star novels.

Here we go:

'The Cloud Walker', by Edmund Cooper (1973): Cooper wrote for a living, and more than a few of his novels were perfunctory in nature. However, ‘The Cloud Walker’ deserves accolades as one of the best sci-fi novels of the 70s. It’s the tale of a postapocalyptic United Kingdom where the Luddite Church holds sway, and a young man risks death in his efforts to revive old technologies. ‘The Cloud Walker’ does much in its 216 pages to provide a gripping, impactful narrative.

‘Stolen Faces’, by Michael Bishop (1977): a disgraced starship pilot named Lucian Yeardance is assigned to be the chief administrator at Sancorage, the headquarters for the leprosarium on the planet Tezcatl. Yeardance’s charges are hardly the saintly folk of Father Damian’s mission at Molokai, Hawaii; in fact, they are violent, self-centered, unpleasant people. As the novel progresses, Yeardance learns the underlying truth about Sancorage and its lepers. This novel, while a slow read at times, best displays the advances in the genre’s treatment of characterization, mood, and setting bestowed by the New Wave movement.

'The Pastel City', by M. John Harrison (1971): in a far-future, depleted Earth, Queen Jane’s realm struggles to retain the remnants of technology, and prevent civilization from further decay. A crisis arises when barbarian hordes, wielding powerful weapons from older times, descend upon the Southlands. It will be up to Lord tegeus-Cromis, a swordsman and poet, to defend the realm and solve the mystery behind the revival of ancient knowledge. This was Michael John Harrison’s second novel, and in its 157 pages it fulfills the promise of the New Wave era by delivering a fast-moving plot; a memorable setting; and a vividly crafted cast of characters who subvert the traditional depiction of science fiction protagonists. 

'The Deep', by John Crowley (1975): In a strange, self-enclosed world, a medieval society composed of Red and Black factions is engaged in perpetual conflict. Then a mysterious being known as the Visitor arrives, and the Reds and the Blacks find their world forever changed. This was author Crowley's first novel and it adopts an understated, oblique approach to storytelling. There are strong overtones of entropy and futility to the antics of the Red and Black factions, and this invokes favorable comparisons with M. John Harrison's novel 'The Pastel City'.

'Jack of Shadows', by Roger Zelazny (1971): the eponymous Jack is a thief, seeking riches and power on a fantasy version of Earth where one side of the planet is perpetually in shadow, and the other side, perpetually is in daylight. As Jack is to learn, the lords of the dark and light realms do not take kindly to thieves. While many of Zelazny’s novels from the New Wave era could be self-indulgent exercises in avant-garde prose, ‘Jack’ features an imaginative mix of sci-fi and fantasy themes, inventive settings, and a lead character who is the antithesis of the traditional square-jawed, obstreperous hero.

'The Bladerunner', by Alan Nourse (1974): in a near-future, dystopian New York City, those suffering from illness risk sterilization under the mandates of the Eugenics Laws. A boy named Billy Gimp serves as a ‘bladerunner’, a courier of surgical equipment used by doctors to perform clandestine procedures on those who don’t want to be sterilized. But the advent of the mysterious ‘Shanghai Flu’ places all of the city’s residents, both rich and poor, in danger. 'Bladerunner' is a progenitor of Cyberpunk, presenting many of themes that later would come to define the genre.  

'The Warlord of the Air', by Michael Moorcock (1971): after falling asleep in a mysterious temple in the Himalayas, a British Army officer named Oswald Bastable wakes to find himself in 1973….a 1973 where the British Empire is intact, and travels by airship commonplace. But political ferment is growing, and with it, a threat to the empire. A fast and engaging read, in its 175 pages, 'Warlord' packs a lot of imaginative concepts, including alternate universes, proto-Steampunk, the liberation of people of color from their colonialist oppressors, and even a cameo from Mick Jagger (?!). 

'Hiero's Journey', by Sterling Lanier (1973): in a postapocalyptic North America, Hiero Desteen, a priest in the Metz Republic, ventures south from Kanda into the vast wilderness of what once was known as the United States. His mission ? Find and recover a lost technology that will aid the Metz Republic in its clandestine war against the Dark Brotherhood. This is the first entry in the two-volume 'Hiero Desteen' series, and it has much to recommend it: great world-building, interesting characters, a plot that never gets stagnant, and a simple, declarative prose style that well serves the novel's length of 372 pages.

'The Ginger Star', by Leigh Brackett (1974): Eric John Stark seeks the whereabouts of his mentor Simon Ashton on Skaith, a planet gripped by physical and psychological entropy. The people of Skaith resent ‘outworlders’, but then, they’ve never met anyone like Stark…….. Brackett won acclaim for her Golden Age planetary romances, and ‘The Ginger Star’ is an updated planetary romance, written by an experienced, and very underrated, author. The remaining volumes in the ‘Skaith’ trilogy, ‘The Hounds of Skaith’ and ‘The Reavers of Skaith’, are excellent novels in their own right.

'Altered States', by Paddy Chayefsky (1978): Eddie Jessup, a brilliant psychologist and faculty member at Columbia University, investigates the alternate realities that are induced by the use of psychoactive drugs. Eddie won’t abandon his obsession, even when it becomes apparent such a line of inquiry brings with it disturbing revelations about man and his place in the universe. This novel started as a screenplay before Chayefsky turned it into a novel, one of the best treatments of ‘inner space’ ever produced in the New Wave era. 'Altered' takes the self-absorption of the 'Me Decade' and lends it a 'cosmic' flavoring that makes the novel a fun read some 45 years after it first was published.

There you have it. I'm curious to see to what degree - if any - my blog readers concur.......

Bad Attitude: the Art of Spain Rodriguez

Bad Attitude: The Art of Spain Rodriguez

'Bad Attitude: The Art of Spain Rodriguez' debuted in 2021 and now is available for rental, for $2, at amazon ($10 to purchase).

Directed by Spain's wife, Susan Stern, the 1 hr., 11 minute documentary covers Spain's life and art, from his growing up in Buffalo; his move to New York City in 1966, and his involvement with the counterculture through his employment at the East Village Other; his move to San Francisco later in the 1960s; and his role as a chronicler of places and people in the Mission District.

The documentary features interviews with Spain's sister Cynthia, his daughter Nora, and comix artists Robert Crumb, Art Spiegelman, Trina Robbins, and Robert Williams, among others. 

Spain, as were his fellow comix artists, was an iconoclast and unapologetic about his material which, in this Woke day and age, is at the very 'transgressive'. 

The documentary does some mental gymnastics in terms of addressing the transgressive aspects of Spain's art, while at the same time not celebrating it with sufficient enthusiasm to give offense to liberal sensibilities. Spain's girlfriends and wife offer some interesting discourses on reconciling the contradictions of a man who admired, and enjoyed the company of, strong women, but was perfectly comfortable with presenting women in an exploitative manner in his art. 

Analyses of the uncompromising nature of Spain's 'bad attitude'  become awkward when dissecting his tale of gay-bashing, 'Dessert', which appeared in 1977 in Young Lust No. 5.

While the narrative adopts a 'this is Spain.......being real' ideology towards the subject matter, it carefully avoids mentioning the subversive last panel of the comic.

The documentary gives justifiable attention to Trashman, Spain's first 'star' character, modeled on himself and (arguably) comic's first genuine 'alternative' action hero.

Also of interest is the documentary's examination of Spain's work, starting in the 1980s, to paint murals in the Mission District. Spain was conscious of the value of 'people's art', not only as a creator of such art but also as a mentor to a younger generation of Mission artists seeking to represent themselves and their culture through art.

The documentary's coverage of Spain's final months, when he continued to work despite ill health due to prostate cancer, is affecting. 

To me, the documentary fell short in one area: how Spain actually did his art. There is footage of Spain working on pencil roughs, and other glimpses of him hunched over his drawing board, but unfortunately, there is no in-depth coverage about how he approached composing and drafting his comics, posters, studio pieces, and other graphic works. When I finished watching the documentary, I felt that it would have benefitted from a greater focus on the nuts and bolts of Spain's art, as opposed to the political and ideological stances represented by his endeavors.

Summing up. if you are a fan of underground comix, the counterculture era, and 'lowbrow' graphic art, then 'Bad Attitude' well is worth viewing.