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Sep 08

This is how big my skull should be, I suffer from tiny headitis.Click for full image

Sonya’s Art Direction: Instead of two views of wonder, how about a riot of color and image? Perhaps a plant for every short story in the collection? Oh, and throw in a Frida Kahlo lookalike holding a skull ala Hamlet to show that these are serious stories…
Published 1974

Many thanks to Sonya!

Actually, that cover IS a classical work of art!I would touch it without protective gloves.I've seen worse. Far, far, worse.Interesting, but I would still read it in public.Middlng: Neither awful nor awfully goodWould not like to be seen reading that!Awful... just awful...That belongs in a gold-lame picture frame!Gah... my eyes are burning! Feels so good!Good Show Sir! (Average: 5.58 out of 10)
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18 Responses to “Two Views of Wonder”

  1. Deborah Says:

    okay, I’m not reading any particular meaning into the disproportionately small head atop the torso with big boobs.

  2. SI Says:

    It’s not really the worst cover but the proportions are… a little off.

    I thought she’d look a bit happier after receiving all the flowers. Maybe it was the skull that came with them all that put her off.

  3. Pat Says:

    Or the cactus she is leaning against.

  4. Brian B Says:

    I kinda dig this cover actually! Well other than the funky head size. If this was a collection of latino authors it would be particularly cool. However I’m not sure how many latino scifi authors were being pubished in English in 1974.

  5. Tom Noir Says:

    Only the alien skull could save the maiden from being consumed by the hideous Flower Thing!

  6. Evad Says:

    The cover is what I’ve come to expect. But showing the not-quite subliminal HP color ink cartridge is a cheap attempt at viral marketing.

  7. A.R.Yngve Says:

    “At long last, the Lost Skull of Picasso is mine! MINE!”

  8. Tom Noir Says:

    The only thing I see two of on this cover are… well…

    I don’t know that I would go so far as to call them ‘wonderful’.

  9. A.R.Yngve Says:

    At the other end of the publisher’s office, the Homes & Gardens editor cried out:
    “Who the hell put a picture of a spaceship on the cover of The Psychedelic Gardening Handbook??”

  10. Stevie T Says:

    Obviously the artist was going through his “millifiore” period. The editor probably had to glue a cut-out of “girl with skull” onto it, at which point the artist started trying to paint flowers all over her to “fix” it, but was stopped after one.

  11. Anna T. Says:

    “So we decided to use a literal mountain of flowers for our Day of the Dead decorations, but now we have nowhere to put this skull.”

  12. Tor Mented Says:

    I’ve been reading a lot of Clark Ashton Smith lately. How is this not on the cover of a Clark Ashton Smith book?

  13. Ryan Says:

    A cover that would have been suitable for a William Morris novel if he had written after the world was no longer in black and white, “The Microcephalic at the Garden’s End”.

  14. GSS ex-noob Says:

    I’m thinking it could be 3 views of wonder, if you count Frida, the skull and the floating head at the very top. And we know what the skull is looking at.

    @ARY (9): GSS!

  15. Tat Wood Says:

    “Lift-Off With Ayshea – the Novel”

    (@Ryan: a glance at William Morris’s work, and the whole Pre-Raphaelite mob’s, shows that their world was never black and white. If he could have sweet-talked someone else into paying for it, he would undoubtedly have printed all his books in parti-coloured inks to appeal to The Working Man. Then Disraeli would have countered this with primrose-coloured text. Look at the Mauve Frenzy when chemical dyes came in.)

  16. fred Says:

    That’s the kind of flower arrangement you usually saw at old time mob funerals that was sent by the killer to show faux sympathy.

  17. Bruce A Munro Says:

    @Tor Mented: the Garden of Don, Adompha’s [1] Cousin?

    [1] https://th.bing.com/th/id/R.b93956976b4e5549eaef3b4b1242da2f?rik=bKgEAA9%2fpKp4PQ&riu=http%3a%2f%2fhowardworks.com%2fpopularfictionpublishingcompany-weird_tales_193804.jpg&ehk=rh3E4RfAg2BpFAMuLLS6XF8EweBEqnkUhJcNe%2bw0efE%3d&risl=&pid=ImgRaw&r=0

  18. Tor Mented Says:

    @Bruce. Exactly! Good find! The cover on Two Views of Wonder looks like it’s straight out of a CAS story.
    One of my introductions to Smith was the Ballantine Adult Fantasy paperback collection “Xiccarph.” You can see the cover in the Wikipedia entry.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiccarph

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