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Post by dem bones on Feb 1, 2009 16:11:35 GMT
Everest Books: Attempted Bibliography I've not researched them and hopefully someone more clued in might be able to expand on this, but Everest (did they have something to do with Ensign ?) seem to have been another of those short-lived 'seventies UK imprints who made a small but much appreciated contribution to horror fiction, not least in bringing three of Peter Haining's early anthologies for Leslie Frewin back into print. According to Justin, the cover illustrations were the work of John Holmes ( Fontana Horror, Michel Parry's Rivals Of Dracula, Rivals of Frankenstein, etc.) The Karloff anthology is another reprint, this time of a Souvenir Press hardcover but the Richard Davis appears to be an Everest original. It seems that might be it as far as the macabre material goes, but they weren't done yet! Anticipating that there'd by a huge demand for this kind of stuff from the Vault's Phwoar corps thirty years later, Everest hit us with novelisations of two top British sex comedies! Sadly, i've yet to get my hands on either, but it seems they both contain photo-inserts so added perve points for that! Perhaps not quite so unmissable, at least four Crossroads tie-ins by Malcolm Dr. Who Hulke starting with Crossroads A New Beginning (1974) The HorrorsPeter Haining - The Midnight People (Everest, 1975) "The Dracula Syndrome - from Bram Stoker to Ray Bradbury" Peter Haining - The Unspeakable People (Everest, 1975) "Twenty of the world's most horrible horror stories"Peter Haining - The Evil People (Everest, 1975) "Strange and terrible tales of Witchcraft & Voodoo ...."The Boris Karloff Horror Anthology (Everest, 1975) Richard Davis (ed.) - Vincent Price Presents ... The Price Of Fear (Everest, 1976) Praiseworthy Cheap SmutJohn Sealey - The Ups And Downs Of A Handyman (Everest, 1976) "Poor Bob. All he wanted was a quiet life as the local handyman. But the village ladies had other ideas." Elton Hawke - Keep It Downstairs (Everest, 1976) Meg Richardson MafiaMalcolm Hulke - Crossroads A New Beginning (1974) Malcolm Hulke - Crossroads: A Warm Breeze (1975) Malcolm Hulke - Crossroads: A Time For Living (1976) And then .... it was over ?
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Post by allthingshorror on Feb 1, 2009 16:29:32 GMT
The Price of Fear is a Les Edwards painting isn't it?
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Post by carolinec on Feb 1, 2009 19:19:56 GMT
Malcolm Hulke? Crossroads? He did a few Doctor Who Target novels too I think.
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Post by justin on Feb 1, 2009 20:13:18 GMT
A couple of additions Dem.
None are to hand right now so you'll have to rely on my memory. But without exception they are truly amongst the worst of all publishers. NEL at their most tight-fisted still wouldn't have touched most of this stuff with a barge-pole!
Queen Kong by James Moffatt (banned King Kong rip-off starring Robin Askwith! penned by everyone's fave reactionary, alcoholic hack) Sin City- a non-fiction Rough Guide which plunged headfirst into the seamier side of Bangok and so on Crime Commandoes by Peter Cave Sleep Murdeers by Leslie Watkins- sure it had a John Holmes cover and was a true-crime account of murders commited whilst sleep-walking. Shark Attack by David Baldridge- classic mondo account of maneaters with black and white photo insert On the smut-front three collectible books by glamour model Flannagan- Intimate Secrets of an Actress, Escort Girl and Magazine Writer. (I've only got the first two) How can you forget Zoltan Hound of Dracula film tie-in by ken Johnson. How?!?? Eagle Six by Patrick Long- truly crap cover of an emblem of an eagle's head. Some sort of Firefox rip-off I think. I think they did a lot opf pop culture tie-ins on Abba, Bay City Rollers and Warren Beatty to name but a few. Ken Follett may well have been something to do with the set-up.
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Post by dem bones on Feb 1, 2009 20:54:34 GMT
But without exception they are truly amongst the worst of all publishers. NEL at their most tight-fisted still wouldn't have touched most of this stuff with a barge-pole! knew I was onto something. Purely on the strength of that endorsement, Everest are clearly worth further investigation. Did they survive beyond 1977? When are you gonna have a retrospective in Paperback Fanatic? Thanks for fleshing out the list, Justin. Trust me to forget bloody Zoltan Hound Of Dracula - probably called it a "masterpiece" somewhere else, as I usually do with about 9 in ever 10 books read, no matter how rubbish they are. And yes, Caroline, it's the v. same Malcolm Hulke who had lots of Dr. Who tie-ins to his name plus a number of TV credits. He seems to have followed his Crossroads books with something called The Siege (Everest, 1977) based on a Roger Moore series, The Crime-Fighters?
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Post by justin on Feb 25, 2009 12:29:54 GMT
A few more Everests were discovered mouldering on the shelves whilst looking for Arrow horrors the other night but have mysteriously disappeared again....
The Big Needle by Simon Myles, a hard-boiled men's adventure title Heil Britannia by Patrick Long, looks like a rip-off of SS/GB by Len Deighton Adam and Eve 2100 AD, SF cack with a cover even Five Star would have dismissed as amateurish.
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Post by Steve on Feb 26, 2009 0:39:40 GMT
A few more Everests were discovered mouldering on the shelves whilst looking for Arrow horrors the other night but have mysteriously disappeared again.... The Big Needle by Simon Myles, a hard-boiled men's adventure title As you mentioned a while back, Justin, Ken Follett was one of the people behind Everest. He started working for them after they published his first novel and ended up as the Deputy Managing Director. And that first novel? None other than The Big Needle - the first of 3 books Follett did for Everest c.1974 as 'Simon Myles' about some character called Apples Carstairs. Perhaps not all together surprisingly, they never really caught on.
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Post by Steve on Feb 27, 2009 2:34:13 GMT
Don't miss these other great titles from Everest! One Day I'll Forget My Trousers by Pete Murray, 1975 The hilarious life story of Pete Murray, disc jockey and radio celebrity. 289 pages. How the Planets Rule the Superstars by Robert Leach, 1975 So You Want to Be in the Music Business by Tony Hatch, 1976 Warren Beatty: Lovemaker Extraordinary by Suzanne L. Munshower, 1976 (One seller on Abebooks mentions "a small amount of rubbing to the edges" - not sure if it refers to the condition of the book or one of Warren's special moves.) Abba: The Lovers Whose Music Conquered the World by Harry Edgington & Peter Himmelstrand, 1977 "ABBA - when did it start? Was it when Bjorn heard seventeen-year-old Anna sining (sic) on the radio? Or when he met Benny and they spent a night writing songs in an empty office block? Was it when Annifrid decided to leave her husband and two children and devote her life to music? Or when two young songwriters fell in love with two beautiful girl singers? Since they won the Eurovision Song Contest, Abba have gone on to conquer the world, with every record a No.1 hit. Behind their phenomenal success is a fantastic story of talent, luck - and love." (Great blurb but am I the only one sensing some hostility towards Annifrid?) Are You Being Served? The Book of the Film by Jeremy Lloyd & David Croft, 1977 Everest: The Mark of Quality, I'm sure you'll agree. Alongside Malcolm Hulke's The Siege there were at least 5 more books about Roger Moore and the Crimefighters, in which "three young friends of Roger Moore become the crime fighters and get into all sorts of adventures". Roger Moore and the Crimefighters in: The Secrets Man by Deben Holt One Thousand and One Shoplifters by Robin Smyth The Anchor Trick by Anthony Wall Crook Ahoy! by Fielden Hughes and perhaps most enticing of all... Death In Denims, by none other than Dulcie Gray. All 1977. Some of these were also published in hardback by Alpine Books. Not sure of the precise nature of the relationship between Alpine and Everest but there surely was one. Sleep Murders by Leslie Watkins - sure it had a John Holmes cover and was a true-crime account of murders commited whilst sleep-walking. The Sleep Walk Killers by Leslie Watkins, 1976 "...In Covington, Kentucky, teenager Jo Ann Kiger fought a running gun-battle with a burglar. Her father and brother died of bullet wounds. Twenty-four hours later she was arrested and charged with double murder. The intruder had existed only in her nightmare - and her own shots had killed the two men. Millions of people walk in their sleep. For a few of them, nightmare and reality became confused, and the result is tragedy. They are the Sleepwalk Killers." Also in Everest from Leslie Watkins, The Killing of Idi Amin. The Burglar's Bedside Companion by Jago Stone, 1975 "There's a monk on the run... His name is Jago Stone. But to Fleet Street headline writers he became The Silver King... an outrageously audacious scoundrel who relieved churches all over England of £150,000 worth of treasures in a series of bare-faced robberies. Dressed in a monk's cassock, Jago sweet-talked unsuspecting clergymen into displaying the church silver - then returned to help himself. Once he hid under the alter for nine hours before letting himself out the front door at midnight. With his swag of silver, of course. On another unlawful outing his convincing disguise nearly rebounded on him. He so impressed one church that the vicar asked him to give the sermon. Britain's burglar extraordinary politely obliged - and made a carefully-timed return after dark to collect his "reward". Now, in an uproariously funny book, Jago recounts his daring escapades... If they were not all true, the irrepressible Mr. Stone's adventures, in bed as well as up a drainpipe, would sound like the over-zealous work of an imaginative fiction writer." (Any book sporting a blurb with the line, "Mr. Stone's adventures, in bed as well as up a drainpipe" has to be a candidate for induction into the Vault Hall of Shame, surely?) And how about this indispensible guidebook for all followers of the Left-hand Path; A to Z of the Occult by Graham Weaver, 1975 This one's "Illustrated with diagrams", which is always nice. I trust Justin will be interviewing Mr Follett about The Everest Years at his earliest opportunity?
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Post by pulphack on Feb 27, 2009 9:42:55 GMT
what a splendid array of tat, and indeed much more to be said for this than for mr Follet's involvement with a certain T. Blair of this Parish...
just a couple of things to add - did Everest implode at some point during '77, as i used to have that Are You Being Served tie-in (cough - it wasn't bad as these things go - cough), but that was a Mayflower. a swift sideways move, perhaps?
i'd love to know more about Harry Edgington, who was behind the Abba book. he did a couple of others, and was a journalist in Fleet Street, i think - i know of him because he was in Spike Milligan's battery during WWII, and features heavily in the first half of the war memoirs series! he was involved in a book about the Goons that i had years ago - a biography of their evolution, though it was so long ago i can't recall if he was interviewed or was a co-writer.
surely not THE dulcie gray?
The Burglar's Bedside Companion sounds like true tat - confessions meets true confessions, as such. the 'super crook' tag has to relate to a book Futura had out at the time, which was about these two whacko NYPD detectives who has incredible track records. i had it when i was a kid, and had read about them in the likes of Weekend - there was also a film, i believe - and the book was simply called The Supercops.
Ups And Downs Of A Handyman - i know it's been up ages (missus) but i was just wondering how crap it is? or did the writer get bored and add a few bits of his own. 'cause i've go the movie on a dvd double (from a dodgy fair) with The Amorous Milkman, and it's been ripped from the vhs release - which means some surreal and inexplicable cuts when the sex is about to start, which makes him seem the most innocent sex film hero of all time. there's not much else in the way of plot, to be honest (no, really?). according to simon sheridan's 'keeping the british end up' (an a-z of cheap tat smut and all the better for it) it's actually quite near the knuckle for a sex comedy in the original.
sterling work, chaps. i have not a single Everest on the shelves so keep it up!
btw - justin knows sheridan, i believe...
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Post by pulphack on Feb 27, 2009 9:47:49 GMT
bugger! i knew i'd missed something out!
Queen Kong - never got a release because of Dino DeLaurentiis suing, or so i've read. not sure if it was that or just because it was crap. certainly the book is - typical of Moffatt at his worst (think Etienne St Aubin goes sex comedy), and a real struggle to wade through. BUT... it did have photos in the middle, which is about all i've ever seen of the movie (are their copies out there? did it get a release or a dodgy collector's version?), and to be honest it actually looks like it might be very stupid fun. reminiscent of Carry On Kong/Up The Jungle, with Askwith as Terry Scott. i should imagine that's what gives it the scarcity value it has.
which might be why mine went walkabout years ago. and i think i know who...
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Post by carolinec on Feb 27, 2009 11:57:53 GMT
Warren Beatty: Lovemaker Extraordinary by Suzanne L. Munshower, 1976 (One seller on Abebooks mentions "a small amount of rubbing to the edges" - not sure if it refers to the condition of the book or one of Warren's special moves.) Steve, you nearly made me choke to death on my coffee through laughing so much then!
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Post by dem bones on Feb 27, 2009 12:45:26 GMT
Erm .... about that "clearly worthy of further investigation". Perhaps I was a little hasty .... Bollocks was I! Not for the first time, from the direst of beginnings a mighty thread grows, and I'm proper grateful to you for lifting the shutters on these, gents! it's like blundering into an unpromising cave and finding a treasure trove. I am beyond impressed. I trust Justin will be interviewing Mr Follett about The Everest Years at his earliest opportunity? It really has to be done, an entire PF devoted to this true visionary among men if needs be. bugger! i knew i'd missed something out! think Etienne St Aubin goes sex comedy... That is just too terrifying for the human mind to comprehend. I've copies of neither novel nor film, but, as mentioned, the Ups & Downs Of A Handyman tie-in carried a photo inset, so tread carefully. Surviving copies are likely to be not merely "slightly soiled" but missing a few pages into the bargain. Perhaps even this one. Allegedly, very allegedly, the Bob Todd character, Squire Bullsworthy, was inspired by the exploits of some spanking colonel or others whose amorous exploits had recently been exposed in the News Of The World, Sunday People et al (the nudie witches and Kinky vicars were on strike that week). Sadly, the proposed, should-have-been-huge sequel The Ups and Downs of a Soccer Star failed to make it out of the tunnel. But I digress. What are the chances that someone out there has quietly acquired a complete Everest collection? If you are that person, then you are my hero, simple as that.
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Post by justin on Feb 27, 2009 21:32:50 GMT
More to add to the growing mountain of Everest paperbacks...
The rear of The Ups and Downs contains a plug for The Swapping Game by Peter Roberts. "Interviews with swinging couples!"
Adam and Eve 2020AD by Peter Blackden also listed- How The Hell Did That Happen? by John Tarrant, a political thriller sweet and Sour by Ralph Shaw set in pre-Communist China Cry For Tomorrow by Bob Aylott IRA thriller The Peroni Experiment by Dennis Laxton- Confessions of a Cabbie meets psychological thriller
Who would dare to claim to have a complete run of such dreck? The board will have found its deity should such an individual come forward!
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Post by dem bones on Mar 1, 2009 9:32:20 GMT
Don't miss these other great titles from Everest! One Day I'll Forget My Trousers by Pete Murray, 1975 The hilarious life story of Pete Murray, disc jockey and radio celebrity. 289 pages. For the girls and boys who grumble they don't see enough leggy men on here (best not trust this one to ph*t*b*cket) ... Then there's: Arthur Mullard - Oh, Yus, It's Arthur Mullard (1977). "His own moving, funny life story" according to the cover. Alwyn at Trash Fiction - should've known he'd be on the case - is rather less than complimentary, although his kiss off certainly raises your hopes. "Arthur Mullard .... worked with the likes of Tony Hancock and Arthur Askey, before ITV decided that all sitcoms should be set amongst the working-class and gave him his own series, the truly appalling Yus, M'Dear. In fact that was a spin-off from the marginally better, but still atrocious, Romany Jones, which has been almost completely forgotten. So intensely horrendous was Yus, M'Dear, however, that it lives on in an undead kind of way: many of those who saw it still has the occasional flashback, waking in the middle of the night in a cold sweat amidst fears that UK Gold is about to repeat the bloody thing.
The book's no good either. Recommended only for horror fans." From the world of pop, Alwyn name-checks Emperor Rosko - The DJ Book (1976) and Tam Paton & Michael Wale The Bay City Rollers (1975). The latter promises "Tam Paton's sensational inside story of Britain's No. 1 pop group" which, if that were to be the case, would make for interesting reading, but the music mogul was still peddling the sanitized, nice boys next door version of the tartan teenybopper idols just then and sordid revelations are likely to be not so much at a premium as non-existent. Oh, and for fans of the series: Alfred Draper, John Austin & Harry Edgington - The Story Of The Goons (1976)
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Post by Johnlprobert on Mar 1, 2009 10:55:56 GMT
Ok so I can cross One Day I'll Forget My Trousers off my list of potential titles for my autobiography (which is just as well seeing as it wouldn't stricly be true anyway). But the real reason I'm reeling this morning is....
I remember Yus M'Dear! Oh God even the theme song (sung by Mr Mullard himself!) came back as I read that post! Ahggghhhhh!
And I also remember his costar was Queenie Watts, who got a knitting needle through the back of the skull in Pete Walker's Schizo, which makes things a little better. But not much.
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