This Strange Adventurepublished by Dell Books
Copyright 1971
Young and beautiful Missie Colfax was
willing to keep her bargain with Wesley
Dexter when she married this worldly
older man and came to live in his magnifi-
cent mansion. She would do anything to
escape the poverty and want of her youth -
even be a wife to a man she barely knew.
Missie could not suspect the twisted
torment behind the icy arrogance of her
bridegroom ... nor realize until too late the
horror that awaited her in the hands of a
man bent on making her the victim of
a strange and terrible vengeance ...
MARY ROBERTS
RINEHART
whose bestseller novels have thrilled
millions the world over, has in This Strange
Adventure created a truly haunting story
of romance and danger.
Hate to break it to you Missie, but I'm not hearing anything all that out of the norm here. I mean aren't Wedded and Terror synonymous with one another?
Every wife must play her part in her husband's strange and terrible vengeance, it's in the job description. Sure, you marry yourself an older man he's bound to have more baggage, but that is the price you pay for that sweet situation. Remember, a lot of ladies would put up with a lot of shit to have themselves digs like that.
And if your husband isn't caressing you with the hands of a man bent on vengeance, you're just not doing your job right.
Maybe I need to rethink this whole "loving, caring partner who can cook" thing I've been trying--apparently you get a lot further with the chicks being a madman bent on vengeance.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to try it out on my gf for a week and I'll get back to you with the results.
Rob!: I think that sounds like a fine idea. Just remember, when your girlfriend feigns disapproval, it is all part of the game.
ReplyDeleteThe artist for this one is George Zeil (see also "The Deadly Travellers" by Dorothy Eden, and another Rinehart title, "Alibi For Isabel", here on your blog). He did at least a dozen Rinehart re-issues in the '70s that I know of, plus a bunch of Ngaio Marsh mysteries too.
ReplyDeleteI love his stuff, been collecting his covers for decades, and just discovered his name a year or so ago (on the dust-jacket endflap of Kirby McCauley's anthology, "Frights"). I've searched and searched for info about him on the internets, but so far, zilch.
He was in the paperback biz since the mid-50s at least -- did the art for a bunch of Chester Himes' Coffin Ed/Gravedigger Jones books, among others.
Also, check out his horror stuff -- not quite WRFH, but similar in mood: the afore-mentioned "Frights", 3 titles by R. Chetwynd- Hayes, "Dracula Began" by Gail Kimberley, and "Gwen In Green" by Hugh Zachary. The Vault of Evil website has decent scans of most of these.
Oh, and Zeil even did a cover for one of DC's short-lived Gothic comics, SINISTER HOUSE OF SECRET LOVE #3. He's not credited by name on any of of the online comics databases, nor even in the recent DC SHOWCASE collection, but his style is pretty unmistakeable -- I'm 99% sure it's him.
ReplyDelete