A lot of people have to deal with addiction in their lives. Some are a prisoner to alcohol, to drugs or to some other, just as destructive compulsion. I’m not any different, and have suffered from a nearly uncontrollable urge — a need — that I’ve never really been able to resist. I am weak, and for almost my entire life I’ve thrown time, money and sometimes my personal well-being into this monster’s bottomless maw.
Of course, I’m talking about used paperbacks.
And my addiction has a certain flavor; the more genre-ey, the better. Especially if it has a ridiculously awesome cover. Oh, man, the covers! Horror and science-fiction books have the best, hands downs, and I will gladly leave a used books store with an armful of paperbacks chosen just because the covers gave me a hit of giddy euphoria. Aaahhh — that’s the good stuff.
With that in mind, I thought I’d share some of the most beautiful, most creative or just plain nuttiest covers in my stacks in what will be a new, ongoing feature. And just to be sure you get the full dose of art and promo copy (an art in itself), we’ll be taking a look at both the front and back covers.
First up: Starman Jones!
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Starman Jones
Cover art: Lee Rosenblatt
1975 edition (Ballantine Books)
Like most right-thinking people, I’m sure you’ve found yourself asking, “So who is this mysterious Kalimán, anyway?”
Hey, I hear ya. Kalimán is mysterious. Terribly mysterious. He is such a cypher, in fact, he barely has any origin at all. But in spite of that (or maybe because of it), the peace-loving warrior who fights evil with equal parts mysticism and knuckle-sandwiches is one of the biggest comic book heroes to ever come out of Mexico. Imagine a more centered, less psychotic Shadow mixed in with Mandrake the Magician and Indiana Jones and you’ve got a little bit of an idea where Kalimán is coming from. (He shares something else with The Shadow — Kalimán also started out in radio before moving on to comics and eventually a couple of movies.)
“Serenity, Yulma. Your worst enemy may be fear.”
As created by Rafael Navarro Cuthbert and Modesto Vazquez Gonzalez, Kalimán is the apex of human potential, and while he isn’t superhuman he has unlocked the vast power of the mind, allowing him to do all kinds of crazy shit. Among his brainy abilities are telepathy; telekinesis; levitation; remote viewing; astral projection; hypnosis; self-healing; and — most famously — “actus mortis,” the power to control the involuntary functions of his body to the point that he can put himself into a death-like state.
(When I was talking to my Mexican wife about Kalimán’s mystical bad-assery, she actually shouted out, “Actus mortis!” before I even had a chance to finish my sentence. Seriously, he’s big in Latin America.)
And of course, when you’re the sum of human potential, you’re probably going to be pretty damn manly. Which Kalimán is, displaying a marble-like physique under his tight, white, vaguely Arabic uniform. Which he mostly manages to keep on.
Except when he doesn’t. Bam!
While Kalimán the comic ran weekly for an amazing 26 years (that’s 1,348 issues, if you’re counting), all printed in that iconic sepia tone that is a hallmark of Mexican comics, the only thing readers know about Kalimán is whatever’s happened in his various adventures. Basically, there is no “Kalimán – Year One.” In the first published story, “Los Profanadores de Tumbas” (“The Tomb Defilers” or, less dramatically, “The Grave Robbers”) our boy shows up fully formed, calmly using superstition to scare off a gang of Bedouin raiders. Then he hypnotizes a cobra and goes to a cocktail party. That’s just how he do, y’all.
Here’s what we do know about Kalimán: He’s a light-skinned, blue-eyed orphan adopted by Prince Abul Pasha, ruler of one of the kingdoms in the valley of Kalimantan. He’s the seventh man in a dynasty dedicated to preserving justice in the world, having sworn an oath to the goddess Kali to wander the world fighting for justice, a vow he must return to India to renew every seven years. He carries a ceremonial dagger, but he never uses it in a fight and doesn’t use weapons, with the occasional exception of a blowpipe and tranquilizer darts. Kalimán is also a master of the martial arts, science and and the fine arts. He also has a young companion named Solîn, who has been the Short Round to his Indy ever since he saved him from kidnappers/muggers in a back-alley in Egypt.
Kalimán saving SolÃn while asking that eternal question, “What do you think of this?”
But why did the prince adopt Kalimán? Who were his real parents? How did he join this Kali dynasty anyway? And how does Solîn manage to fall into every pit of quicksand in a three-mile radius? Nobody knows.
Honestly, it doesn’t really matter — Kalimán just kicks a lot of ass, which is why I’m making him a regular feature starting … now. Every Monday Kalimán will be here dropping wisdom like, “There is no force on Earth greater than the human mind; he who masters the mind, masters everything” and “Serenity and patience, lots of patience.” While punching out vampires and hypnotizing aliens from outer space.
This is how this post was going to happen: I was going to apologize to all six of you for the spottiness of this blog over the past year-plus and give a cagey explanation for it, talk about how discouraging writing in a vacuum can be, and then promise to do better. But after some thought, I realized all that could be summarized pretty easily:
Wah, wah, wah.
Instead I’ll just say that I’ve been busy with personal stuff that is, by definition, none of your business. And yes, writing without feedback can get frustrating, but not as frustrating as the cliquishness of the comic book blogging community (imagine the high school hierarchy of the cool and uncool; now imagine everyone is still a nerd and you’re halfway there). Ultimately, though, that’s all bullshit. I write because I want to — because I have to — so I should really just relax about it.
Pheeew. Aaaahhh.
I do promise to be better about updating and writing more actual “content,” though. That’s a promise to myself as much as it is to you. I’ll still be writing about comics, but I’ll also be writing about a lot of other, mostly geeky things I enjoy or find interesting. If you’d like to stick around, that would be great — from the beginning the purpose of this blog has been to connect, to discuss and to participate in a like-minded community.
So to all six of you — thanks for reading. Talk to you soon.
Fun fact: The original site of the house where The Texas Chainsaw Massacre was shot is about a 15 minute drive from where I live in Austin, unrecognizable now tucked under a toll road fly-over. I try to give Leatherface a rev of my mental chainsaw whenever I drive by in honor of one of the purest horror movies ever put to film.
I know I have a tendency to throw the word “favorite” around a lot, but in the case of 1963’s The Haunting there is no other word that fits. The Haunting — and the book it was based on, Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House — is a movie I’ll watch whenever I happen to get the chance, and one I want to watch whenever I happen to think about it. It is simply one of the best, if not the best, haunted house story put to film or paper and if you haven’t already, I’d recommend you give both a try.
The Haunting does an excellent job of capturing the mood and growing terror that gives the book so much of its atmosphere, and its dreadful sense of inevitability is perfectly relayed by the film’s small cast of characters. It’s an example of an old idea that’s been lost in a lot of modern horror movies; sometimes, what’s scariest is what you can’t see.
Speaking of legendary horror movies, it’d be hard to argue with calling A Nightmare on Elm Street a modern classic of the genre.
The Exorcist is an undisputed heavyweight in the world of horror, and it sure as hell earns its rank with terrifying and tension-filled scenes that make even hardcore atheists wonder if they should start crossing themselves.
One aspect that gets overlooked in the middle of all the head-twisting and pea soup-spewing, though, is the truly great performance of Linda Blair as Regan. It’s true that possessed-Regan’s voice was dubbed by Mercedes McCambridge, but this clip of Blair giving her undubbed performance shows the 13-year-old was pretty good in her own right.
None of this explains what the deal was with everything she made after The Exorcist, but that’s Pazuzu for you.
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Starman Jones
Cover art: Lee Rosenblatt
1975 edition (Ballantine Books)
