Welcome back to Cover Snark! This is where we stumble across some very striking book covers and proceed to snark on them.
Amanda: I thought it said “sun.” I could go for a flight into the sun sometimes. Not gonna lie.
Also…is her dress just hanging on by her nipples?
Elyse: I don’t know what’s more upsetting, the fact that her dress is glued to her nipples, that we clearly see her labia or that it dissolves into mist behind her.
Oh and she’s missing an arm.
Amanda: I hope to god this is a parody and not real.
Aarya: The tag line!!!
Carrie: This cover is glorious. No one touch it – with the exception that it needs more unicorn.
AJ: Seconded! But other than the lack of unicorn, I think Andrea is living her best life. She has a nice garden, an active social life, and a keen appreciation for fashion tape. What more do you need?
Sneezy: Nipples: the New Hanger
Lara: AJ, you’ve given a perfect summary of this FANTASTIC cover. I’d only add…that facial expression has to be the dictionary definition of DGAF.
CharlotteB: I unabashedly love this.
From Lils: I saw this and had to go look closer. Fonts, a Giant looming over a city and overloading with energy swirls? The cat in the bottom left is cute.
Sarah: That cat looks VERY unimpressed to be included on this cover. I do appreciate the very subtle building boner.
Amanda: I saw that today and was going to link it. Great minds think alike.
But man, I wish someone looked at me the way that dude looks at buildings.
Aarya: Is he wearing eyeliner? Am I imagining that?
Amanda: Nope, I don’t think so. There’s definitely a smokey eye scenario going on.
Sarah: That is some eye cosmetic artistry there. Hats (and possibly shirts) off to the makeup artist.
AJ: Not just eyes, the cheekbone contouring is impressive too. I bet he has a YouTube channel.
“Hey guys, it’s Roman, welcome back to Roman’s Gold and Glam. Today we’re going to do an everyday look to wear while you loom over the city like a loving shirtless god. As you know, sometimes I turn into a puma, so it’s important for me to use a good primer!”
…okay actually this sounds hilarious, somebody please write me a book about a shapeshifter beauty guru immediately.
Sneezy: I’d read it, too!
Lara: What other videos do you think he has on his YouTube channel?
CarrieS: Roman liked his new set of legos – but how he wished for someone to share them with. The comforts of staring at his Lego creations while consuming large amounts of psychedelic mushrooms seemed more hollow every day. If only he could find a lover – someone who shared his love of cats, legos, and recreational drugs.
Amanda: What are the symptoms of a man flu?
Sarah:
“Poor widdle bunny”
Carrie: There’s nothing sexy about man flu.
Aarya: That cover does not scream “romantic comedy” like the tag line states.
Amanda: He looks…dead. Gray and sickly, and we haven’t even talked about his tattoo.
AJ: Yes, please let’s talk about the tattoo. Is his arm supposed to be a baseball? Because I’m no sports expert but I’m pretty sure that’s… not what baseballs look like.
Sneezy: Maybe it’s not a tattoo, but an arm he stole and stuck onto himself.
Lara: Why is “Flu” in a violent green? Are we looking at a romantic mucus situation?
CharlotteB: I think the intent was baseball but the effect is cheap Frankenstein’s monster makeup from a pop-up Halloween store.
AJ: “Romantic Mucus Situation” is the name of my new band. Our debut album “Constant Nipple Vigilance” will be out next month.
Amanda: Giant man or miniature woman?
I’m also hearing the Jaws theme in my head.
Carrie: It’s like the person did part of the cover and then dropped some acid before finishing it up.
Elyse: Isn’t that what they teach you in art school?
Sarah: Is she a jellyfish shifter?
Carrie: There’s a jellyfish shifter erotica book but I don’t think it’s this one.
Lara: What are those dark circles above her head? A portal to another world?
“You know what would be a clever design idea? Putting white text over the whitest part of the image without any kind of effect to create contrast!”
Everything about that last cover is confusing. Everything.
Andrea was a fun, sex-positive gal…just born before her time (the book’s copyright is 1962).
What is that gold circle sitting on Roman’s left shoulder? Did his halo slip? Or is that a mirror so he can see what his hair looks like in the back?
Due to the funky font, I thought that the title was “Roman’s Cold” (so I guess he should turn up the heat? /rimshot)
He thought it was only a cold, but it turned out to be Man Flu.
Are “Air” and “Water” in different fonts? That’s a whole new level of font abuse.
@Escapeologist: You’re right, “Air and W” is definitely a more formal script than the rest. Maybe it’s for the best the title is barely visible!
I don’t care what anyone says, that first cover is pure joy. Andrea, girl, run into sun– I mean SIN — in your flimsy gauze napkin dress thingy! This is the pansexual sexual energy we should all aspire to!
On the last cover: I think he elbowed her in the chin.
@Escapologist
The r’s are also different in Air and Water.
“There’s a jellyfish shifter erotica book but I don’t think it’s this one.”
I really don’t want my Google browser history to show “‘ jellyfish shifter erotica’ site:https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com” if it doesn’t have to, but…
Y’all made me spit out my coffee. I’m leaving. LOL
Last book: Why is the spacing so weird? Does it say ‘a novel’ in the top right corner, or ‘a no vel’? What IS the truth about lies? I thought for sure the first book in the series would reference Fire and Earth but it sadly did not.
Lady Gaga could totally pull of the Flight into Sin look.
One medic was Inspector Mason in North and South (2004).
I googled Flight Into Sin because I have so many questions, starting with: Does the text of the book make her flimsy leaf dress thing make any sense in context? In my 2 second search, I did not find any reviews, only copies of it for sale for exhoribitant prices. Amazon had it for $70, eBay for $49 and $89 respectively. Who knew there was a collector’s market for 60’s era erotica…
Also that weirdly placed bicep bulge is not caused by the flu, maybe parasites?
@Yota Armai: I suspect the book is priced so high because (based on its reference to the heroine going “from women to men and back again”) it is considered a “lesbian pulp novel” and those are both rare and sought after by collectors:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lesbian_pulp_fiction
Oh, I thought Andrea was wearing some sort of Spiderman goo mishap.
Roman’s other nipple seems oddly displaced.
Flight into Sin: I started typing before reading the comments thread. OK, so I’m not the first person to say it’s not a parody, it’s a very, very old pulp-fiction cover. I would have guessed 1957, but WorldCat tells me I’m off by five years; it was 1962. WorldCat further offers subject headers of “Man-woman relationships — Fiction.” “Lesbians — Fiction.” and “Erotica.” Even without the author’s name, that would leave little room for doubt.
Man Flu: Oh. That’s supposed to be a tattoo? I thought it was stitches from recent surgery to implant a … to implant a baseball in his upper bicep? Dear God, why?
The Truth about Air Wafers? Is this some kind of food-industry exposé? … Oh. Water. That makes a lot more s… Well, no. No, it still makes no sense whatsoever.
Why is all 1960s pulp fiction apparently set on the plains of Africa? And why do the heroine of said fiction always have nipples made of Velcro and dresses made of net curtains?
There’s too many titles on the second book. Is it Roman’s Gold, Underground Heat or Shifter Paranormal Romance? Why is there a panther, a giant, a city, gold energy swirls, silver reflections AND a squiggly logo with a letter A?
Man Flu makes me want to tuck him into bed while I make cups of tea and chicken soup. It doesn’t inspire me to romance. It inspires me to mother. but he’s dealing with his own dirty tissues.
Drowning women don’t inspire me to romance, either.
This is my new favorite Cover Snark episode.
Andrea’s dress on the first cover looks like it is made from the spectral cheesecloth used for ghostly garments in Halloween decorations.
Hey! Flight into Sin is a work of art! (In a pulpy, sixties style kind of way…)
Carrie: There’s a jellyfish shifter erotica book but I don’t think it’s this one.
Carrie! Tell me what this book is? I did try to google it. I can’t find it. I want to know!!!!
<topic drift>
Can we assume Mike Skinner is, or was, American, and that his book was published in the US? I checked two different places (Stanford and LOC) and could find no evidence that the original 1962 copyright was renewed.
Oh, the temptation…
Though I do have a “Cheesy Fiction” area, this may exceed even my limits. Besides, I recently paid through the nose for an illustrated (1894) Fanny Hill, bought for the sole purpose of putting it online, and one has one’s priorities.
</topic drift>
I don’t know of any jellyfish shifter erotica, but I did read (for giggles) Someone to Cuttle by Luna Loupe. It’s a very, very short cuttlefish shifter m/m (x4? x5? I forget) menage story. Read at your own risk.
Louise – I assume you are correct, along with the implication that the book may be out of copyright now. (I assume this primarily because searching for a Mike Skinner produces an English musician who grew up on Licence to Ill (i.e., a child) and someone whose works are not likely related.
What is related, though, is this, perhaps.
In conclusion, Paul Rader deserves his own Cover (with or without Snark) podcast.
@Ken Houghton (#27): Your link to
(SPOILER ALERT)
tons of pulp covers was a lot of fun, especially when Talking Heads unexpectedly popped up around twelve covers down on the right.
“Boom, babies; strange but not a stranger”, indeed.
@Betsydub: Based on the majority of those covers, I’d say “Girlfriend Is Better” would be the more appropriate Talking Heads song.
I don’t know wear to start. Andrea’s um…dress…looks like a curtain she stole from the plane that crashed somewhere. Now I’m getting a LOST vibe but since this IS set in the 60’s she’d be shacking up with the Dharma people, right?
Does Roman absorb gold, hence the swirls? And I just don’t know wtf the book is about by the cover.
No words on Man Flu. From the tattoo to the title. Does the Man have the Flu or was Man Fever taken and he inspires desire through illness?
The Truth about Air and Water? Is it a romance or a science lesson?
I thought maybe Mike Skinner was one of mystery writer Lawrence Block’s pseudonyms, but at least from a quick review it looks like it’s not. Too bad!
Well. Roman’s Gold is a bit more logical than Roman’s old, which I thought it was since that odd line through the G looked like a squiggly strike through line to me.