Comic Cuts - 26 August 2011

I've had a bit of a slow week and there isn't much to report. I haven't managed to get much else done beyond the regular daily chores, bar a little cover cleaning for some future galleries.

With that being the case, I'll head straight into a couple of bits of news.

It's good to hear of a comic creator of the golden age who is still active. Charles Chilton, now aged 94, has been promoting his autobiography, Auntie's Charlie, at the Comedy Club on Chiswick High Street. He was interviewed on stage and answered questions from the audience before signing copies of his book and the first volume of Journey Into Space - Operation Luna - which has been reprinted in hardcover. The other two novels - The Red Planet and The World in Peril - are due to be published in November and February 2012 respectively.

The autobiography is available from Fantom Books, who have produced it as a limited edition of 200 numbered and signed hardback copies. Ordering information for the novels can be found here.

I notice that the BBC have repackaged the three original Journey Into Space radio serials, which can be ordered via Amazon for with an up to 50% discount: Operation Luna, The Red Planet, The World in Peril. And they also have the revived stories that were broadcast in 2008 and 2009 going cheap: Frozen in Time, The Host.

Bob Edmands alerted me to an eBay sale of a rather nondescript copy of Sun #324 from 1955. Normally you would expect copies to sell for around a fiver, maybe £5 to £10 on a good day, but for some reason this issue soared, with fifteen bids pushing the price up to £71.00.  But that wasn't the end of it. I notice that a couple of days earlier another copy of Sun (#320) from the same seller sold for an astonishing £102.00 and a third copy (#270) for £70.88, with 22 bids registered, while other issues being sold were in the expected price range. Seems like Billy the Kid has a following.

So here are today's random scans. What spare time I've had I've spent cleaning up a lot of science fiction covers of late, so, for a change of pace, here are a couple of Digits by William Ard from 1960. Cry Scandal and The Naked and the Innocent (originally published as Hell is a City). The latter has a cover reprinted from the USA; I have the artist listed as Kalin in my notes but on closer inspection (and the signature is partly hidden) it looks more like Katy L----. Can anyone help?

The second batch are a pair of Fontana covers by our old friend John L. Baker, who has featured here many times, but not recently.

Next week: more from The Man Who Searched for Fear and whatever else I can dream up over the next couple of days. One bit of good news is that I have been sent another Paul Temple yarn, so that will be appearing at some point, probably early next month as the tail end of next week will see our regular Recent and Upcoming Releases columns.

Chris Carlsen's Berskerker

The Berserker series was written by Robert Holdstock under the pen-name Chris Carlsen. It was noted on the covers that these books were "From the publishers of Conan", as if that was somehow any more recommendation than if I was to note that Bear Alley is "Published on the internet, like the Pottermore website".

The Berserker series was about Norse warrior Harold Swiftaxe, a violent occult fantasy that has more in common with 2000AD's Slaine than Conan.

Berserker: Shadow of the Wolf
Sphere 0722-14631-0, 1977, 160pp, 65p. Cover by Melvyn Grant

Berserker: The Bull Chief
Sphere 0722-14632-9, 1977, 175pp, 85p. Cover by Melvyn Grant

Berserker: The Horned Warrior
Sphere 0722-14633-7, 1978, 172pp, 95p. Cover by Melvyn Grant

Jimmy Sangster (1927-2011)

Jimmy Sangster, screenwriter for Hammer Films, died on Friday, 19 August, at the age of 83.

James Henry Kinmel Sangster was born in Kinmel Bay, North Wales, on 2 December 1927 and began working in the film industry at the age of 16. He was working as a production manager at Hammer Films when he wrote his first film script, X The Unknown (1956), for which he received £200. His other films included The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), Dracula (1958), The Mummy (1959), The Siege of Sidney Street (1960), The Scream of Fear (1963) and Paranoiac (1963).In the 1970s, Sangster began writing for American television, including episodes of The Six Million Dollar Man, McCloud, Ironside, Kolchak: The Night Stalker and Wonder Woman. You can find an extensive list of his credits on the Internet Movie Database.

Sangster also wrote a number of novels, beginning with Private I (1967). His autobiography, Do You Want It Good or Tuesday was published in 1997. He was survived by his wife, actress Mary Peach, and son Mark James Sangster.

Obituaries: New York Times (21 August), The Guardian (22 August), The Independent (29 August).

Novels (series: James Reed; John Smith; Katy Touchfeather)
Private i (Smith). London, Triton Books, 1967; New York, Norton, 1967.
Foreign Exchange (Smith). London, Triton Books, 1968; New York, Norton, 1968.
Touchfeather (Touchfeather). London, Triton Books, 1968; New York, Norton, 1968.
Touchfeather, Too (Touchfeather). London, Triton Books, 1970; New York, Norton, 1970.
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Death Pedlar. London, Triton Books, 1971; New York, Dodd, 1972.
Snowball (Reed). New York, Holt, 1986; London, Robert Hale, 1989.
Blackball (Reed). New York, Holt, 1987; London, Robert Hale, 1989.
Hardball (Reed). New York, Holt, 1988; London, Robert Hale, 1990.

Novels as John Sansom
The Man Who Could Cheat Death, based on the screenplay by Jimmy Sangster & Barré Lyndon. London, Ace Books, 1959; as by Jimmy Sangster & Barré Lyndon, New York, Avon, 1959. 

Non-fiction
Do You Want it Good or Tuesday?. Midnight Marquee Press, 1997.
Inside Hammer: Behind the scenes at the legendary film studio. London, Reynolds & Hearn, 2001.
Screenwriting: Techniques for Success. London, Reynolds & Hearn, 2003.

Related Publications
The Revenge of Frankenstein, based on a screenplay by Jimmy Sangster, with additional dialogue by Hurford Janes. London, Panther Books, 1958.
The Siege of Sidney Street by Frederick Oughton, based on the screenplay by Jimmy Sangster. London, Pan Books, 1960.
Jack the Ripper by Stuart James, based on the screenplay by Jimmy Sangster. Derby, CT, Monarch Books, 1960.
The Terror of the Tongs, based on the screenplay by Jimmy Sangster. London, Digit Books, 1962.
Deadlier Than the Male by Henry Reymond, from an original story by Jimmy Sangster based on the novels of "Sapper". London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1966.
The Legacy by John Coyne, based on the story by Jimmy Sangster. New York, Berkley, 1979

Raven: Swordsmistress of Chaos

From out of the bonds of slavery there arose a warrior... a warrior feared across all lands, a warrior whose blade was stained with the blood of thousands - man and beast - who smiled as she killed, with hair as gold as summer sun, eyes as blue as the heavens, and a body which invited only love yet dealt bloody, merciless death to her enemies.
__And so she was chosen; a simple girl plucked from the slavepens of Lyand by the sorcerer-priests and schooled in every art of weaponry until no mere man could defeat her - in any form of physical combat.
__Together with her mysterious companion, Spellbinder, and the great black bird which watched over them, Raven set forth to meet her destiny.

Raven was a short-lived fantasy series published by Corgi in 1978-79, around the time that a new series of Conan novels were appearing from Sphere. The paperback boom that had been running since the early 1970s was starting to run out of steam with Westerns in particular starting to glut the market; publishers were looking around for new areas to exploit with original novels and sword and sorcery had been relatively untouched.

Richard Kirk was the pen-name of Robert Holdstock and Angus Wells, the two collaborating on the first novel and continuing to share the name, although writing further novels solo. I'm not a huge fan of sword and sorcery, but these I kept just for the Chris Achilleos covers. Mind you, I also kept a second set of Robert Holdstock novels that will be the subject of another gallery later in the week.

Raven Swordsmistress of Chaos [by Robert Holdstock & Angus Wells]
Corgi 0552-10694-1, 1978, 174pp, 70p. Cover by Chris Achilleos

Raven II: A Time of Ghosts [by Robert Holdstock]
Corgi 0552-10861-8, 1978, 203pp, 80p. Cover by Chris Achilleos

Raven III: The Frozen God [by Angus Wells]
Corgi 0552-10905-3, 1978, 174pp, 85p. Cover by Chris Achilleos

Raven IV: Lords of the Shadows [by Robert Holdstock]
Corgi 0552-11029-9, 1979, 204pp, 95p. Cover by Chris Achilleos

Raven 5: A Time of Dying [by Angus Wells]
Corgi 0552-11131-7, 1979, 190pp, 95p. Cover by Chris Achilleos

Clifford D Simak: Cover Gallery

Clifford D. Simak was a multiple-award-winning author whose career as a science fiction writer lasted almost sixty years, his first story appearing in Wonder Stories in 1931 and his last novel 55 years later. Simak published 27 novels ranging from the galaxy-spanning Cosmic Engineers (originally serialised in Astounding in 1939) to more pastoral works, often set in the Wisconsin farmlands which proved his favourite milieu and the setting for many of his best novels and stories.

Simak won the Hugo Award for his novel Way Station and stories 'The Big Front Yard' (novelette, 1959) and 'Grotto of the Dancing Dear' (short story, 1981), the latter also winning the Nebula Award. He also received the International Fantasy Award for City, a collection of linked stories and my favourite of all Simak's works.

Simak was given the Science Fiction Writer's of America Grand Master Award in 1977. He died in 1988 but, thankfully, his short stories in particular have continued to appear since in collections. There is an ongoing series from Darkside Press that will gather together all of his short stories, including his almost impossible to find non-SF work.

NOVELS

The Creator (Los Angeles, CA, Crawford, 1946; expanded, Oakland, CA, Locus Press, 1981)
(no UK paperback edition)

Cosmic Engineers (New York, Gnome Press, 1950; London, Magnum, 1982)
Magnum 0417-05730-X, 1982, 159pp, £2.95. Cover by Chris Moore
----, [2nd imp.] (Oct) 1988, 159pp, £2.95.

Time and Again (New York, Simon and Schuster, 1951; London, Heinemann, 1956 ; as First He Died, New York, Dell, 1953)
Penguin 2596, 1967, 235pp, 5/-. Cover by Alan Aldridge
Magnum 0413-37580-X, 1977, 255pp, 75p. Cover by Tony Roberts
Methuen 0413-59980-9, (Dec) 1985, 255pp, £2.50.

Empire (New York, Galaxy, 1951)
(no UK paperback edition)

Ring Around the Sun (Simon and Schuster, 1953; London, World Distributors, 1960)
World Distributors 881, 1960, 190pp, 2/6.
Four Square Books 1971, Aug 1967, 192pp, 4/-. Cover by unknown
New English Library 0450-03367-8, 1979, 205pp. [with an introduction by Harry Harrison]
Mandarin 0749-30353-0, (Jul) 1990, 205pp, £3.50. Cover by Alex Pang

Time Is the Simplest Thing (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1961; London, Gollancz, 1962)
Pan Books X340, 1964, 205pp, 3/6. Cover by unknown
Methuen Paperbacks 0413-36950-1, 1977, 191pp, 70p. Cover by Chris Moore
Magnum 0417-05630-3, 1980, 191pp.
Methuen 0413-42420-0, (Dec) 1986, 191pp, £1.95.

The Trouble with Tycho (New York, Ace, 1961)
(no UK paperback edition; the Ace edition was, however, distributed in the UK)

They Walked like Men (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1962; London, Gollancz, 1963)
Pan Books X425, 1965, 219pp, 3/6.

Way Station (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1963; London, Gollancz, 1964)
Pan Books X572, 1966, 207pp.
----, [xth imp.] 1973.
Methuen Paperbacks 0413-36900-5, 1976, 189pp, 65p. Cover by Chris Moore
Oxford University Press/Alpha Books 0194-24237-4, 1979, 95pp. [adapted by  Rosemary Wagner]
Methuen, c.1982, 189pp, £1.95. Cover by Chris Moore
Victor Gollancz 0575-07138-9, (Oct) 2000, 188pp, £9.99. Cover: design

All Flesh Is Grass (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1965; London, Gollancz, 1966)
Pan Books 0330-02042-0, 1968, 255pp. Cover: photo
Magnum 0417-02170-4, 1979, 255pp, 95p. Cover by Chris Moore
Methuen 0413-59990-6, (Dec) 1985, 254pp, £2.50.

Why Call Them Back from Heaven? (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1967; London, Gollancz, 1967)
Pan Books 0330-02515-5, 1970, 191pp, 5/-.
----, [2nd imp.] 1977, 191pp, 60p. Cover by Gino d'Achile
Methuen 0413-55600-X, 1985, 191pp, £1.95.

The Werewolf Principle (New York, Putnam, 1967; London, Gollancz, 1968)
Pan Books 0330-02617-8, 1971, 190pp, 5/-.
Methuen 0413-55590-9, 1985, 192pp, £1.95.

The Goblin Reservation (New York, Putnam, 1968; London, Rapp & Whiting, 1969)
Corgi Books 0552-08610-X, 1971, 160pp, 20p. Cover by Bruce Pennington
Methuen 0413-14530-1, (Mar) 1987, 192pp, £2.50. Cover by Melvyn Grant (Peter Jones?)

Out of Their Minds (New York, Putnam, 1970; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1972)
Sidgwick & Jackson 0283-98125-3, 1973, 175pp, 40p. Cover by Bruce Pennington
Methuen 0413-15320-7, (Sep) 1987, 174pp, £2.50.

Destiny Doll (New York, Putnam, 1971; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1972)
Sidgwick & Jackson 0283-98126-1, 1973, 189pp. Cover by Bruce Pennington?

A Choice of Gods (New York, Putnam, 1971; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1973)
Magnum 0417-01710, 1977, 158pp, 70p. Cover by Chris Moore

Cemetery World (New York, Putnam, 1973; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1975)
Magnum 0417-02040-6, 1977, 191pp.
Methuen 0413-41990-8, (Mar) 1987, 190pp, £2.50.

Our Children's Children (New York, Putnam, 1974; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1975)
Methuen 0413-54770-1, 1984, 186pp.
Mandarin 0749-30592-4, (Jan) 1991, 185pp, £3.99.

Enchanted Pilgrimage (New York, Berkley, 1975; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1976)
Fontana 0006-14827-1, 1977, 218pp, 75p. Cover by Colin Hay
Methuen 0413-57690-6, 1985, 224pp.
Mandarin 0749-30078-7, (Dec) 1990, 218pp, £3.99. Cover by Peter Elson

Shakespeare's Planet (New York, Berkley, 1976; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1977)
Magnum 0417-01960-2, 1978, 188pp, 75p. Cover by Chris Moore
Methuen 0413-41980-0, (Sep) 1986, 187pp, £2.50.

A Heritage of Stars (New York, Berkley, 1977; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1978)
Magnum 0417-02840-7, 1979, 219pp, 95p. Cover by Chris Moore
Methuen 0413-58800-9, (May) 1986, 219pp, £2.50.Cover by Chris Moore

The Fellowship of the Talisman (New York, Ballantine, 1978; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1980)
(no UK paperback edition?)

Mastodonia (New York, Ballantine, 1978; as Catface, London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1978)
Magnum-0417-05060-7, (Aug) 1980, 251pp, £1.25. Cover by Chris Moore
----, [2nd imp.], (Jun) 1982, 251pp, £1.50.
Mandarin 0749-30599-1, (Mar) 1991, 251pp, £3.99.

The Visitors (New York, Ballantine, 1980; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1981)
Methuen 0417-05630-2, 1982, 282pp, £1.75.

Project Pope (New York, Ballantine, 1981; London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1981)
New English Library in association with Sidgwick & Jackson 0283-98881-9, 1982, 287pp, £1.75.

Special Deliverance (New York, Ballantine, 1982; London, Severn House, 1983)
Methuen 0413-53560-6, 1984, 217pp, £1.95. Cover by Chris Moore

Where the Evil Dwells (New York, Ballantine, 1982; London, Severn House, 1984)
Methuen 0413-58640-5, 1985, 249pp, £2.50.
Mandarin 0749-30079-5, (Aug) 1989, 249pp, £3.50.

Highway of Eternity (New York, Ballantine, 1986; as Highway to Eternity, London, Severn House, 1987)
Mandarin 0749-30038-8, (Jun) 1989, 289pp, £2.99. Cover by unknown

COLLECTIONS

City (New York, Gnome Press, 1952; London, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1954; expanded edition, New York, Ace, 1981; London, Methuen, 1988)
Four Square Books 1250, 1965, 188pp, 3/6. Cover by unknown
Sphere 0722-17857-3, 1971, 248pp., 30p. Cover by Eddie Jones
Magnum 0417-06540-X, 1982, 248pp, £1.50. Cover by Chris Moore
Methuen 0413-14630-8, (Aug) 1988, 254pp, £3.50. Cover by Nick Rogers
Mandarin 0749-30589-4, (Feb) 1991, 254pp, £3.99.

Strangers in the Universe (New York, Simon and Schuster, 1956; abridged, New York, Berkley, 1957; different abridgement, London, Faber & Faber, 1958)
Panther Books 1332, 1962, 191pp, 2/6. [abridged as per Faber edition]

The Worlds of Clifford Simak (New York, Simon and Schuster, 1960; in two vols. as The Worlds of Clifford Simak and Other Worlds of Clifford Simak, New York, Avon, 1961-62; abridged edition, as Aliens for Neighbours, London, Faber & Faber, 1961)
Four Square Books 929, 1963, 159pp, 2/6. Cover by unknown

All the Traps of Earth and Other Stories (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1962; in two vols., as All the Traps of Earth and The Night of the Puudly [see below]; abridged, New York, Macfadden, 1963)
Four Square Books 993, 1964, 143pp, 2/6. Cover by Curtis
----, [2nd imp.] Apr 1965.
New English Library, [3rd imp.] Aug 1968, 143pp, 3/6. Cover photo

The Night of the Puudly
Four Square Boks 1040, 1964, 143pp
----, [2nd imp.] 1965, 143pp, 3/6. Cover by unknown
NEL 1040, [3rd imp.] 1968, 143pp, 3/6.

Worlds Without End (New York, Belmont, 1964; London, Herbert Jenkins, 1965)
(no UK paperback edition?)

Best Science Fiction Stories of Clifford Simak (London, Faber & Faber, 1967)
(no UK paperback edition?)

So Bright the Vision (New York, Ace Books, 1968; London, Magnum, 1978)
Magnum 0417-02360-X, 1978, 159pp, 70p. Cover by Chris Moore
Methuen 0417-02360-X, 1985, 159pp, £1.95. Cover by Chris Moore

The Best of Clifford D. Simak, edited by Angus Wells (London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1975)
Sphere 0722-18936-0, 1975, 253pp, 60p. Cover by Eddie Jones

Skirmish: The Great Short Fiction of Clifford D. Simak (New York, Putnam, 1977)
(no UK paperback edition)

The Marathon Photograph and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall (London, Severn House, 1986)
Methuen 0413-59060-7, (Jun) 1987, 171pp, £2.50. Cover by Chris Moore

Brother and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall (London, Severn House, 1986)
Methuen 0413-17760-2, (Dec) 1988, 176pp, £2.95.

Off-Planet, edited by Francis Lyall (London, Methuen, 1988)
Mandarin 0749-30099-X, (Sep) 1989, 224pp, £3.50. Cover by Chris Moore

The Autumn Land and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall
Mandarin 0749-30185-6, (Feb) 1990, 172pp, £3.50.

Immigrant and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall
Mandarin 0749-30644-0, (Aug) 1991, 189pp, £3.99.

The Creator and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall (Sutton, Surrey, Severn House, 1993)
Severn House 0727-89004-2, 1994, 288pp, £8.99.

Over the River & Through the Woods (San Francisco, CA, Tachyon Publications/Dark Regions Press, 1996)
(no UK paperback edition)

The Civilisation Game and Other Stories, edited by Francis Lyall (Sutton, Surrey, Severn House, 1997)
(no UK paperback edition)

Eternity Lost, edited by Philip Stephensen-Payne (Seattle, Washington, Darkside Press, 2005)
(no UK paperback edition)

Physician to the Universe, edited by Philip Stephensen-Payne (Seattle, Washington, Darkside Press, 2006)
(no UK paperback edition)

Hellhounds of the Cosmos and Other Tales from the Fourth Dimension (Holicong, Pennsylvania, Wildside Pulp Classics, 2011)
(no UK paperback edition)

NON-FICTION

The Solar System: Our New Front Yard (for children) (New York, St. Martin's Press, 1962)
(no UK paperback edition)

Trilobite, Dinosaur, and Man: The Earth's Story (New York, St. Martin's Press, 1966; London, Macmillan, 1967)
(no UK paperback edition)

Wonder and Glory: The Story of the Universe (New York, St. Martin's Press, 1969)
(no UK paperabck edition)

Prehistoric Man (New York, St. Martin's Press, 1971)
(no UK paperback edition)

ANTHOLOGIES EDITED BY SIMAK

From Atoms to Infinity: Readings in Modern Science (New York, Harper & Row, 1965)
(no UK paperback edition)

The March of Science: 37 Articles on Modern Science (New York, Harper & Row, 1969)
(no UK paperback edition)

Nebula Award Stories 6 (Garden City, New York, Doubleday, 1971; London, Gollancz, 1971)
Panther Books 0586-03797-7, 1973, 190pp, 35p. Cover by Chris Foss