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Dec 18

Squids and Nudes: Take 7Click for larger image

Good Show Sir Comments: Haven’t we seen this couple before?

Published 1952

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: 5.56 out of 10)
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24 Responses to “Dwellers in the Mirage”

  1. THX 1139 Says:

    “No, don’t laugh – you’ll only encourage him.”

  2. Francis Boyle Says:

    Little known fact: Octopuses* provide even better exfoliation services than those tiny fish. Just make sure you chose the ones with the inexplicable scales. As recommended by Cary Grant himself.

    *Anyone attempting to start a discussion about the correct plural of ‘octopus’ will be provided with a free exfoliation treatment.

  3. fred Says:

    Can’t fool me, mirage dude is the mirage villain and mirage Squidward is the mirage hero.

  4. JuanPaul Says:

    I like the bullet-point blurb approach to explaining a book’s contents. That way you know what you’re getting:

    -nubile women
    -buff men
    -stupid monsters
    -generic alien planet

    Yup! That’s for me!

  5. B. Chiclitz Says:

    Hey, that’s Gregory Peck! I’m certain it’s no mirage.

  6. B. Chiclitz Says:

    The best thing about Otto the Octosquid’s Beauty Salon is that he can do your hair, eyes, makeup and nails—all at the same time!

  7. Lillie Awesome Says:

    But what I’d like to know is how Mr. Grant managed to get his right elbow directly underneath his left armpit like that. Mirage Squidward’s got nuthin’ on him in terms of flexibility.

  8. Ray P Says:

    So it wasn’t only the Japanese.

  9. THX 1139 Says:

    Another reason no one takes Aquaman seriously.

  10. JuanPaul Says:

    @RayP Give Cthulhu a break for doing tentacle porn. The 50’s were a down decade for him and he did what he had to to make ends meet.

  11. B. Chiclitz Says:

    The first draft of the blurb:

    Packed with all the narrative clichés that make Merritt a mediocre fantasy author: a lost land, a beautiful witch, a supernatural horror from the ends of time, a nonsensical title and bazooms galore!

  12. Anna T. Says:

    I have to say, I think this is the first time I’ve seen a giant snake serve as the convenient censor bars for a naked woman on a book cover.

  13. Tor Mented Says:

    I believe this novel holds the record for the greatest number of covers worthy of GSS.
    https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=dwellers+in+the+mirage+merritt&FORM=HDRSC2
    Also, it’s hilarious that a cover of Good Housekeeping magazine somehow came up in that search.

  14. B. Chiclitz Says:

    @Tor M—Thanks for the link at which I have now spent an unjustifiable amount of time browsing. I am guessing the Good Housekeeping cover, promising “magic makeup and personal color chart,” is there to plug Otto the Octosquid’s Beauty Salon.

  15. Tor Mented Says:

    @ Anna T.: We could call it the censor-pus, but then we’d have to censor the name, too.
    @BC: Besides writing fiction, Merritt was a Sunday newspaper magazine editor (I don’t know if they exist in the UK) so that might be how Good Housekeeping came up. Though Good Housekeeping isn’t a Sunday newspaper magazine.
    But I did notice that there are at least two GH covers in the search results, along with various and sundry bazooms.

  16. Bruce A Munro Says:

    @Tor Mented – I particularly like the cover where rather than an octosnake or snaketopus, it’s a puptopus.

  17. GSS ex-noob Says:

    Whichever UAI grad this was, he got his money’s worth from those couple models, and his jollies from the background models.

    Cary Peck or Gregory Grant there probably enjoyed his work too. Just stand there flexing while girls loll about in their scanties.

    The blurb sure shows how the field has grown up and changed. What was the highest praise possible back then from DAW provokes the modern fan to roll their eyes and pass this up as juvenile and trite.

    Wiki says it all: “Merritt’s stories typically revolve around conventional pulp magazine themes: lost civilizations, hideous monsters, etc. His heroes are gallant Irishmen or Scandinavians, his villains treacherous Germans or Russians and his heroines often virginal, mysterious and scantily clad.”

    He made his big bucks editing “The American Weekly” Sunday magazine for Hearst. Guess who the covers tended to feature.

    @Tag: “squids and nudes” must work for at least 5% of GSS. Does it apply to the Lieber book I helped re-create?

    @Tor: Egads. It may be the most GSS book of all time! Let’s all vow to look for it wherever old paperbacks are sold.

    I kinda like the “Fantastic Novels” cover, where sisters and octosquids are doin’ it for themselves. The dogtopus is… yikes. As always, the French and German versions are nakeder.
    (But, really — Bing? Bing? ISFDB has them, sans women’s magazines)

    Did Otto the Octosquid Beautician have a column in “Good Housekeeping”? He could do grooming with some tentacles, clean the house with others, and censor the “fast” young ladies. Otto is apparently… a KRAKEN!

    BTW I saw “Aquaman” and it was quite good! I thought it would be tolerable, but I was greatly entertained. The special effects and (many) action scenes are very well done, and the acting is miles better than it needs to be, with many respected names in the cast. I would recommend theatre rather than home video, and 3D if you’re one of them what enjoys that.

  18. Bibliomancer Says:

    “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.” — The Mirage Hotel

  19. GSS ex-noob Says:

    Oooh, GSS, B’mancer! This must be a very elaborate, very exclusive late-night show for the high rollers.

    That’d explain the dude just standing there. He’s got the biggest suite and with what he spends, he gets to watch whatever he wants. Then he’s gonna have them bathed and brought to his suite.

  20. Tor Mented Says:

    @ Bruce: The puptopus also caught my eye. The artist has a nice way with textures but fell down a bit on the initial design.
    @ GSSxN: Next time I’m at a used-book shop, I’m heading straight for the Abraham Merritt section.

  21. A3Kitsune Says:

    @Tor Mented: I counted 5 Good Housekeeping covers in the search.

  22. Tor Mented Says:

    @A3Kitsune: Then Merritt’s connection to Good Housekeeping is another great GSS mystery, like the definition of Fize in the Gabriel Ratchets.

  23. GSS ex-noob Says:

    I think (after Googling) there was a sentimental poem of the same title written by a woman back in the day, thus it was published in Good Housekeeping, and it comes up as a false positive when you search for this.

    Nowt to do with Merritt at all.

    @Tor: So am I. Pulpiness abounds.

  24. A.R.Yngve Says:

    A. Merritt’s
    HOLLYWOOD CONFIDENTIAL

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