Krause's paperback cover art collections
Dames, Dolls & Delinquents

Bad Girls Need Love Too

Antique Trader Collectible Paperback Price Guide [BELOW THE LINE]
(2009 / 2010 / 2008 - Krause Publications)

Dames, Dolls & Delinquents (2009) (by Gary Lovisi) Subtitled A COLLECTORS GUIDE TO SEXY PULP FICTION PAPERBACKS, this is a 11-by-8-inch volume. 224 pages in all, using 52 of them to feature large paperback cover reproductions and then displaying another four images on each of 146 more pages. After the introductory materials, the covers are grouped together into chapters entitled Sexy Pin-Up Dolls, Sultry Streetwalkers, Bad Girl Delinquents, Deadly Femme Fatales, Women In Peril, Women And Violence, Luscious Lesbians, Fetish Covers, and Heated Embraces. Out of so many femme fatales, one would expect to find some salaciousness, but nothing seems to actually cross the line to suggest adult themes, though some may disagree with me. All the displays are each captioned with the book's title, author, cover artist (if known), publisher, release year, and the occasional brief comment. That information is accompanied each time by a value-range attempting to give some guidance in that collecting realm. The art does branch out from purely paperbacks to include publications from other countries, as well as some examples from American pulps & "Men's Magazines". Those artists getting 'well-presented' treatment are: James Avati*, Rudolph Belarski (2), Gene Bilbrew (2), Robert Bonfils, Lucille Cali, Rafael DeSoto (2)**, Bill Edwards (2), Gil Fullington, Sergio Giovine, Reginald Heade (6), Warren King, Robert Maguire (2)**, Robert McGinnis (2)***, James Meese, Rudy Nappi (2), H.W. Perl, J. Pollack, Al Rossi, Bernard Safran, Vibart, Doug Weaver, and UNKNOWN (15). Take care not to confuse this book with the similarly titled DAMES, DOLLS & GUN MOLLS (which is all Maguire art . . .).

* - Note that the 'well-presented' piece here by Avati is better presented in his own collection further up on The List.

** - Note that the 'well-presented' pieces here by DeSoto, and Maguire, cannot additionaly be found so in their own collections on The List.

*** - Note that regarding the 'well-presented' pieces here by McGinnis, some, but not all, can additionally be found so in his own collections on The List.

Bad Girls Need Love Too (2010) (by Gary Lovisi) Not appropriate for children or adolescents. Because of a couple of mis-steps, this smaller 192-page book doesn't score near as well as what the above book did, but it is still a lot of fun. First, 28 pages were lost to taking 14 of the paperback covers, turning them sideways, and spreading them across the central gutter. Then another 59 were used for pithy excerpts taken from the books' back covers or interior story text. So, excluding the interstitial & ad pages as well, you wind up with 93 large cover reproductions presented, with all the trade dress, against unique full-bleed backgrounds of seemingly every hue & texture *other* than white. Note that the volume's dimensions are 6-by-8-inches. Smaller than usual, but then allowing the reproductions to be about the size of the original paperbacks. The art subjects are the bad girls from the collection's title, giving their prey every visible warning that they should not be approached, but irresistible all the same. Nudity notwithstanding, a few of the images do cross over the salacious line and were indeed meant for the adults-only market, so there is good reason not to leave it lying around for minors to pick up. The captions are unfortunately run up sideways along the edge of the image, but they provide each paperback's title, author (& real name if it's a known pseudonym), publisher, release number & year, and finally the cover artist if discernible (which is not even half the time). The artist's getting 'well-presented' here are: Harry Barton (2), Gene Bilbrew, Robert Bonfils (10), Mel Crair, John Duillo, Bill Edwards (2), Gida, R. Gifford, George Gross, Reginald Heade, Ray Johnson, Saul Levine, Robert Maguire**, Robert McGinnis**, Victor Olson (2), Paul Rader (6), Jean Claude Rodewald, Bernard Safran (2), Harry Schaare, Frank Uppwall, Bill Ward, and UNKNOWN (54).

** - Note that the 'well-presented' pieces here by McGinnis, and Maguire, cannot additionally be found so in their own collections on The List.

Antique Trader Collectible Paperback Price Guide (2008) [-BELOW THE LINE-] (by Gary Lovisi) Hundreds & hundreds of paperback cover reproductions, but a majority of them are as small as 1-by-1.75-inches and only 114 of the book's 304 pages could be said to be dominated by the art. It's a 9-by-6-inch book whose main thrust is an introduction to collecting collectible paperbacks and price-guide to their 2008 status. Unlike many such illustrated book or comic price-guides, all the reproductions are in color. The entries, that include title, author, publisher, identifying characteristics and, many times, cover artist, are gathered into groupings entitled: Fantastic Literature, Mysteries, Westerns, Sports, Media Related, Social Issues, and Miscellaneous. Know that while the author has published a long-running newsletter devoted to collectible paperbacks, the association with Antique Trader allowed this tome to join the series of similar introductory books about other collectables. To be clear, not every entry is accompanied by its cover and sometimes a cover may be a couple of pages away from its entry. With only one or two exceptions, the dedicated collections of paperback cover art that there are are almost always focused on a particular prolific artist, so, many fun art pieces are appearing only in books that are studies of something else, like the book genres themselves. This book would be another example of those, which might partially fill the void, but I would imagine seeming unsatisfying in the final analysis. Only 4 book covers happen to get a larger and, for-the-most-part, uncluttered presentation. The artists are: Ken Riley, Tom Ryan and UNKNOWN (2).