Night Shade

Night Shade by Dorothy Daniels
cover art by Hector Garrido
published by Pocket Books
Copyright 1976

Alsion, a lovely, young clinical psychologies, was
called to investigate the possible suicide of a cor-
porate giant, Clifford Dalton. She knew of the
dead man's harsh reputation, his last bitter words,
and his recorded threat to return and ruin all his
enemies. At the request of Dalton's relatives, a
medium was brought to a seance, and contact with
Dalton's spirit was made. From then on, his shade
haunted the household, and his maniacal laugh
resounded in the halls. Suddenly, two people asso-
ciated with the investigation were murdered.

As Alsion zeroed in on the truth, she realized that
she was marked as the next victim!

Sounds to me like Clifford Dalton is someone I could really relate to. I'm not talking about the whole corporate giant thing, or even the harsh reputation bit but, while I can't say I've ever partaken of a "sumptuous banquet", eating at Hometown Buffet ALWAYS makes me want to commit suicide.

Now if I was Alison, the lovely (and young) clinical psychologist, sent in to investigate this mysterious dinner time death, I'd say that with Hometown Buffet it is probably better to rule out food poisoning before bothering with the suicide thing.

We have a Hector Garrido cover here. Sadly I was unable to find much information regarding this artists himself but I did manage to find several additional samples of his work. The art sampling includes an absolutely fantastic cover for the Gothic romance novel Lodge Sinister and a cover for a GI Joe - Choose Your Own Adventure book. (When I was in 3rd grade I thought Choose Your Own Adventure books totally rocked!)

You can see more of Hector Garrido's cover work Nancy Drew Mysteries and The Hardy Boys series of books.

Whistle for the Crows

Whistle for the Crows by Dorothy Eden
published by Ace Books
Copyright 1962

The job had seemed a godsend to Cath-
leen Lamb, alone, friendless, and in need of
a home. It has been fascinating at first,
tracing the O'Riordan family tree. But the
past, she soon discovered, was intricately
and diabolically woven into the present, and
its strong, slender threads were even now
involving her with

• The tyrannical spinster who controlled lives and purse-strings
• The younger heir who might - but did he? - kill to get what he wanted
• The girl who married the wrong man
• The baby who was born to the wrong woman
• The brother who weren't bothers
• The two drownings - and the accidents that weren't accidents

In the gloomy castle on the edge of a moor,
a spirited girl pokes among the moldering
bones of a family skeleton and stirs up the
dust of malice and murder.

You know that is exactly the kind of Craigslist job ad that inevitably turns out to be too good to be true. It will assuredly end with something like "Please send topless photo and measurements to help selection process." Damn! Burned again.

Okay, so this is driving me crazy. We have a signature but I just can't make it out. I would also swear on the Necronomicon that I have another book with a cover illustrated by this same artist but I can not locate it. I have scanned the books I have already posted and I even sorted through the books waiting in the wings but no luck. If you know who it is, put me out of my misery, please let me know.

The Silent Place

The Silent Place by Rachel Cosgrove Payes
Cover Art by George Gross
published by: Ace Books
Copyright 1969

There was just one more year to wait
before Rome Barclay would be officially a
widower and free to remarry. Though
his wife Suzanne had drowned six years
before, her body had never been recovered.
His secretary, Paulette, was waiting out
the time with eagerness. But then so
was lovely Fiona, his little girl's governess.

But then Suzanne came back to Cliffhouse,
not remembering her past, her identity a
mystery to herself but to no one else. Everyone
in the isolated coastal estate had a reason
for wishing her gone again - permanently.

But whose reason was the most desperate?

And how many women would have to die
in the Silent Place before Cliffhouse could
be at peace again?

Hooray! We have a signed cover here. George Gross was born in 1909 Brooklyn to Jewish immigrant parents from Szeged, Hungary. Art ran in the family. His father attended Pratt and became a successful artist in the fashion industry, running his own art studio - Fashion Paper.

After graduating high school, George also attended Pratt, graduating in 1931 even while working within his father's studio. Later he moved on to Fiction House where he soon became a top illustrator, painting hundreds of pulp covers for Action Stories, Detective Book Magazine, North West Romances and many more.

After barely missing serving WW2 due to a life long vision impairment in his right eye. he began to sell freelance illustration to paperback books for publishers such as Dell, Bantam and Ace Books.

His work can be seen on hundreds of fiction book covers and men's magazines. If you are interested in learning more about George Gross take a look at the "Guide to the Wild American Pulp Artist" listed in my Artist Resource Links.

Below are just a few examples of his other illustrations.

Chateau Chaumand

Chateau Chaumand by Andrea Delmonico
published by: Ace Books
Copyright 1968

Chateau Chaumand

An ominous storm was brewing the night Geraldine (Really? Geraldine?)
arrived at Chateau Chaumand as bride of Charles Chau-
mand. After a whirlwind courtship Charles had swept
her away with him to his gracious but intimidating home,
a vast resort on a lake in Wisconsin.

Vaguely apprehensive before meeting his family,
Geraldine too soon became aware of real, definite fear.
Someone at the chateau resented her sudden marriage
to Charles. Was it the Indian girl, Fawn, who had loved
Charles? Or her husband's handsome cousin, Matt, who
rivaled Charles for mastery over the estate ... and cov-
eted Charles' new bride?

Whoever it was, Geraldine was certain the "acci-
dents" pursuing her was the intentional acts of a
murderer ...

You might be asking yourself why I would shell out cash for a book with such a large tear in the cover. Well there are, in fact, three reasons:

Firstly, it is a "EASY TO READ - LARGE TYPE" and one never knows when a dreadful tragedy might strike that would leave you with a Vincent Price "Fall of the House of Usher" sensitivity to light. A sensitivity that would force me to read only by the barest amount of candle light, therefore making large type books quite useful.

Secondly, my husband and I once drove 10 hours to attend a Halloween Party in Wisconsin were we happened upon a very cheap haunted house that had actually stolen nearly all of dialogue from Disney World's Haunted Mansion and used it in ways that made no sense.

And thirdly, and most importantly, the publisher actually thought this book was so packed with sexual tension that it was wagering we readers would need a smoke somewhere between pages 64 and 65.

Newport, your "Alive with pleasure" ad is dated and oh so cheesy but Kent, as always you are a class act.

The Jackal's Head

The Jackal's Head by Elizabeth Peters
published by Dell Books
Copyright 1970

The Curse of the Dead and
the Treachery of the Living ...

Young and lovely Althea Tomlinson had
hoped never to return to the Valley of the
Kings. Here her father was disgraced and de-
stroyed amid the ancient tombs and treasures
that had been his life's work. From here Al-
thea fled to New York, to start life anew.

But now a strange message from a dying fam-
ily servant and a bizarrely marked newspaper
on her doorstep had brought her back ...
back to face the brilliant, ruthless man who
had brought her father to ruin ... back to un-
earth a secret from beyond the grave ... back
to find herself trapped in a labyrinth of sus-
picion and fear, with a corpse at every turn
and the jackal-like laughter of a murderer
echoing everywhere ...

I would like to say that I have had more than my share of experience with the "Treachery of the Living" but you don't see me running from place to place. Althea flees to New York and now seems to be fleeing the Valley of the Kings. It wouldn't surprise me if she fled to Egypt originally to begin with. Althea's father looks to have been an archaeologist and if he wasn't able to "unearth a secret from beyond the grave" I don't see how how our little Miss nomad plans to do it.

I was excited when I got to pick this one up a few weekends back. The cover is a great twist on our theme but just a deserving of swift escape.

The Family at Tammerton

The Family at Tammerton by Margaret Erskine
published by Ace Books
Copyright 1965

THE FAMILY AT
TAMMERTON

"MRS. CRANE IS DEAD. DO NOT SEND NURSE."

At best the telegram was a cruel joke; at
worst a cryptic message warning Louise
Morton to stay away from her new job at
Tammerton Hall.

When Inspector Finch was called to the
sinister old mansion to investigate a
murder, he was not surprised, for he re-
membered the telegram Louise had shown
him on the train to Tammerton, Finch had
an instinct for spotting the first trail shoots of
an evil growth. Now instinct plus
experience were telling him that LOUISE
MORTON WAS NEXT ON THE KILLER'S LIST!

I have no doubt this is a wedding dress. Which tells me that somewhere between the best and the worst cases scenario of that telegram is that the family at Tammerton got wind that their new nurse was off her nut.

Now I'm no stranger to confrontation but even I hate having to fire an employee. So, if it were me, and I found out that my new hire was some sort of Miss Havisham crazy, I might also try and "head her off at the pass" as they say.

The Pretty Ones

The Pretty Ones by Dorothy Eden
published by Ace Books
Copyright 1957

The
Pretty Ones

SHADOWS BEHIND SHADOWS; WHEELS
WITHIN WHEELS. THIS WAS
COURTLANDS, EMMA'S NEW HOME... (what
on earth are they talking about?)

It seemed that nothing would ever
upset the joys of marriage for Emma and
her husband Barnaby, even though she
knew little about the man she had met
and married in a matter of weeks. (so what
exactly are you basing this eternal optimism on?)

Then the unpleasant rumors started
-that Barnaby's first wife disappeared
under sinister circumstances; that no one
really knew what happened to the two
pretty young governesses who simply
ran off without cause or explanation.

Emma trusted Barnaby; there were
no questions she could or would ask him.
But when a pathetic, lonely grave turned
up in the field, her loyalty to her brood-
ing, secretive husband gave way to cold,
hard fear ...

Okay, I knew my husband (Aaron Bias - See Silver Age Gold) pretty well when we got married. In fact, I could, with all confidence say I trusted him completely. (Oh to be 21 and naive again) but I would have to say, I would not have had any hesitation is suspecting that he was responsible for a mass grave in my backyard even without all the suspicious circumstances surrounding this guy.

I mean really. Mysterious disappearances, brooding, secretiveness? Emma, that ugly shirt isn't going to save you from having your neck broken.

Two Faces of Fear

Two Faces of Fear by Julie Wellsley
published by Magnum Books
Copyright 1971

Blood in the night ...

Seacliff House was ancient, a crumbling ruin
threatened to fall into the sea. The locals avoided it,
claiming that at best it was a house of evil and
at worst - they shuddered, and quickly changed the
subject. But Mary James could not change her
mind so readily. She had accepted the job as nurse to
Gerald Winchley in a desperate attempt to
escape from London and she could not let the fears
of superstitious natives drive her back to the city.
Then the first murder was committed, and the
blood ran free in the night. Was it a harbinger of
things to come - or was it intended as a special
warning to Mary? For the murderer - or murderers -
would not be content to stop now ... and Mary
seemed marked to be their next victim!

London must really suck for someone to prefer possible death to being there. I've never been to London but obviously I should avoid it in the future. AAA should start handing this one out as a travel brochure. Sure it wouldn't be good for their tourist industry but maybe London will think twice before being worse then being murdered.

This cover totally reminds me of a Nancy Drew cover. It could be the the upturned eyes, the clean cut look of Mary James or the face that looks to be piecing together clues but it's probably just Nancy Drew's rampant hatred of London.

Castle Cloud

Castle Cloud ( originally titled The Laird and The Lady) by Joan Grant

published by Ace Books
Copyright 1949

"A sleek, well-groomed novel, moving fast
all the time ... well written and enter-
taining."

CASTLE CLOUD-
Mysterious, Shadowy, and Evil...

Traveling alone to France from her native
America, Marylda meets and falls in love with
Rowan Cairdrie, handsome young laird of an-
cient Castle Cloud. After their whirlwind court-
ship and marriage, Rowan takes his bride to his
ancestral home on the lonely Scottish highlands.

Isolated in the ghost-ridden castle with her
husband's enigmatic grandmother, MaryIda,
driven by forces she cannot explain, (my bet is boredom) finds herself
prying into an ancient family mystery shrouded
in a suffocating atmosphere of evil.

Suddenly aware of how little she really knows
about her husband, MaryIda discovers that she
holds the key to a Pandora's box brimming over
with hate, greed, and murder - as the ghosts of a
violent past clutch at her with icy fingers.

CASTLE CLOUD - a distinguished novel of
Gothic Romance and Suspense, now published
by ACE BOOKS for the first time in America.

The art for this cover is signed by Allan Kass. There is a fabulous group on Facebook dedicated to his work where you can view a vast number of his cover illustration. Click here to see their gallery of nearly 600 Kass covers.