Finally had to admit to myself the other day that, let loose in a charity shop, I will buy just about anything in paperback that's no more than a couple of hundred pages and costs less than a quid.
Star, 1986 "...a single mother whose life is threatened by a psychopath; an innocent girl kidnapped by a gang of thugs. They're all ordinary people with extraordinary problems and nowhere else to turn - until they meet the Equalizer."
I don't think I've ever even watched an episode of The Equalizer. Not all the way through. I bet nobody even gets shot.
So, anyway, I needed to get out and get some fresh air so my girlfriend very kindly drove me out into the dales and allowed me to drag her round charity shops all afternoon. Best one by far was a local Christian charity who had easily the trashiest selection of paperbacks I've seen on offer for a long time - all priced at 80p and when I went to pay for my shameful selection the lady there said, "I'll only charge you 50p for these, they're thin ones". Tried to explain to her that the 'thin ones' are the best ones but she was having none of it. Then she tried to sell us a telly.
You know those glitzy novels which promise to expose all the sordid and tawdry goings on in the glamourous world of international sport; "The stunning blockbuster about the glittering jet-set world of international tennis" or what have you? Well, how about this one?
Arrow, 1983 Don't know if it really comes across in the scan but the title,
Breaks, has that silver metallic embossed thing going on just to lend it that extra touch of class and sophistication.
'At first, it was a poor man's game, played in clubs and pubs and backstreet halls. Then the money came, the television cameras, the lights, and the glamour. And with them came the corruption, the fixes and the violence...
For Glyn Edwards snooker was more than a hobby; it was a religion - and a road out of the backstreets to a new way of life...'
Actually, I've dipped into this and it has more in common with the likes of
Soccer Thug than 'the poor man's Jilly Cooper' you might expect from the cover;
"There's madheads in every sport," McKenna continued. "Look at the soccer hooligans. If their team loses, they go on the rampage."
"But this is
snooker, Mac!"
"We've got our share of loonies, I'm afraid. I once had a fella pour a pint of beer over me simply because I beat his mate in straight frames!"
Obviously I felt duty bound to Google Keith Miles and it seems that, following a stint teaching drama in Winson Green maximum security prison, he started his freelance career writing scripts for
Z Cars and
Space 1999. Since
Breaks he's gone on to do quite well for himself, somewhat in the manner of Vault fave Peter Tremayne, writing historical mysteries.
Oh yeah, I bought this horror book.
Panther, 1984. Cover illustration by Terry Oakes. 'An Occult Novel of Astonishing Power
From the sulphurous bowels of the earth erupted unmentionable horror.
Deep down beneath the Appalachian Mountains, Bethel's miners encountered something incredible - something utterly evil.
And all the demons and monsters of Hell burst into Bethel's streets and houses. No one was spared the nightmare...'
Jere Cunningham is an American author who now works in Hollywood I'm told - back in the day though he gave us
The Visitor (Coronet, 1980) and
The Legacy (Sphere, also 1980).
For the 1981 Ballantine edition of this book Stephen King provided an unusually understated endorsement, "
The Abyss is very close to being great".
But not really
that great then...
And a couple of Simon Ravens - couldn't resist these covers (apologies if either has been posted before);
Panther, 1967 (reprinted 1972) '...we find Raven's upper-class rogues pursuing with undiminished brio their sordid, frolicsome paths to power, pleasure and final damnation...
lascivious Angela Tuck... bumbling Lord Canteloupe, founding culture-camps for Fitness, Family & Faith. Motto: Strength through Self-Indulgence... saturnine Gregory Stern, publisher of England's Bright Young Things, all wired teeth and fiddling fingers... golden-hearted Maisie, always ready to pander to a customer's special requirements... all interested in a highly confidential and very compromising letter'
Love this cover - I think it's the handbag that makes it.
Panther, 1975 'A thousand pounds a week...
Are you interested?
Fielding Gray, battered, one-eyed ex-officer and novelist, is definitely interested - especially since it means 14 weeks on Corfu with a bunch of feisty starlets making a film epic of
The Odyssey. And even more so when he reckons he can salt off a lot more cash into a Zurich numbered account by a devious and nasty little spot of blackmail...
Unfortunately, Foxy Galahead, one of the horniest producers in the history of cinema, takes a dim view of Gray's ungentlemanly tactics...'
First chapter introduces us to one Tessie Buttock;
"I'm interested in film biz... I get a film book called
Titty Bits every week, but there's nothing like hearing it personal."
Well, quite.
Weirdest place we found though was this little book shop right at the top of a hill out in darkest Derbyshire. I swear it was run by Satanists. I'll tell you about it another time.