Now available from Time-Life Warner and Larry Flynt

June 3, 2005 11:13 PM

Paperback books used to be a lot more entertaining(NSFW links). Vying for a market both literary and prurient (embedded tunes, NSFW), publishers found that judging the book by the cover was in many cases the best way to move their product off the shelf. James Bond and Mickey Spillane benefited. So did detectives, hillbillies, romantic fools, druggies, lesbians (NSFW) and Billy Graham. The genre has changed over the years, in no small thanks to our good friend Fabio.
posted by DeepFriedTwinkies (9 comments total)

Well, that's ANOTHER image of jesus I won't be able to get out of my head. Thanks, Billy Graham!
posted by shmegegge at 12:37 AM on June 4, 2005

Ya I've heard ziss.
posted by longsleeves at 1:05 AM on June 4, 2005

Hey, there's covers to a couple of Lovecraft stories in there, including The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath.

Apparently, it has something to do with cats.
posted by JHarris at 1:51 AM on June 4, 2005

This one is rather sublime.
posted by of strange foe at 6:47 AM on June 4, 2005

Saucy! I love words like that, that one forgets on a daily basis but which would be so useful in so many ways.
posted by ancientgower at 8:11 AM on June 4, 2005

Very cool. Another treasure trove of this stuff previously discussed here.
posted by brain_drain at 10:55 AM on June 4, 2005

Wonderful post. Thank you.
posted by LarryC at 1:15 PM on June 4, 2005

This one has a great pop-art kind of quality to my eye.
posted by Snyder at 2:05 PM on June 4, 2005

Seems like the market has gone from mainly male readers to mainly female.

which, I'm sure all of you already figured.
posted by delmoi at 7:41 PM on June 4, 2005