Behind the Flying Saucers

New York, 1951

Behind the Flying Saucers

London, 1955

Rocket to the Morgue

1942? > I find this cover somewhat disorientating.

Leave Cancelled

New York, 1945 > the book is about how war gets in the way of love.

Design by Paul Rand.

The Magician

London, 1956 > freaky colours, hard to categorise.

Materlialisation of the Fantastic

Soviet Union, 1927

More Insight on Blood

Sydney, 1968 > who says Australian cover design was crap up until the 1990s? Well, I do, actually. But we didn't need good cover design, we had MORE INSIGHT ON BLOOD. You would be amazed just how much insight Earle Hackett had to give on sanguine matters. A lot of insight.

Naked Lunch

London, 2001 > creepy, ingenious. Another example of the uncanny effect achieved by combining disparate images. In fact, the parallels with Great Apes on previous page run deep.

Nights in Town

London, 1917 > professional cover design really took off in the 1920s - this is one of the few British covers to show real graphic ingenuity before that decade.

Dissertazione su gli Automi

Italy, c. 1800 (?) > a scientific/philosophical pamphlet, cover printed simply but sweetly on grey-blue paper.

Problematische Naturen

Leipzig, c. 1920? > the style of this cover falls somewhere between Art Nouveau and the nationalist Germanic imagery which would follow in the 1930s (and was developed in opposition to decadent styles such as Nouveau).

Self Matters

New York, 2001 > ah, Doctor Phil. So reassuring, so strong, so 'there for you'. Just buy this book, and you will never have to think for yourself again. Let Doctor Phil do the thinking - after all, he is a doctor, and he is obviously wealthy (note gold ring and watch so subtly displayed), wise and happy. When you look up close though, he is actually wearing pretty heavy make-up. But he's still a doctor.

Bluff Your Way in Social Climbing

London, 1967 > it was London. It was the sixties. Unfortunately, no-one had told that to the authors of Bluff Your Way in Social Climbing.