Paperbacks from Hell [N.F. - Literature, Art]

Within these constraints, Ziel stood out. He painted more than forty covers for Paperback Library gothics alone, featuring intrepid brunettes and terrified blondes, lit by the silver light of the moon, their windblown hair dissolving into the ebony sky, their diaphanous gowns disappearing into mysterious mists, their wide eyes staring back over a shoulder at the dismal real estate they were escaping.

Born in Poland in 1914, Ziel was twenty-five years old when the Nazis invaded. He was a Polish Catholic married to a Jew, and he and his wife were sent to concentration camps. His wife was forced into labor in Germany, where she died in an Allied bombing raid, while Ziel was sent to Auschwitz, then Flossenbürg, and finally Dachau during the last days of the war. Beaten so badly that he went deaf in one ear, Ziel was fortunate to have his artistic abilities discovered by the camp doctor who treated him. Risking his job, the doctor smuggled paper and charcoal to Ziel, and as word of his talent spread, the guards started using him to illustrate their Christmas and birthday cards. Ziel also drew 24 stark, haunting sketches while interned in the camps. They were published in two books in Munich immediately after the war. Today a rare copy of 24 Drawings from the Concentration Camps in Germany resides in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

After the war, Ziel wound up in New York City, working as a waiter before finding jobs as a commercial artist. His first covers appeared around 1954. Because of his limited understanding of English, Ziel’s second wife, Elsie, read him the manuscripts he was hired to paint. Eventually, the couple retired to Connecticut, where Elsie died in 1981. A few months later, in February 1982, George passed away at age sixty-seven. Art director and friend Rolf Erikson had drinks with Ziel on the last night of his life. “I really think he just gave up after Elsie died,” he said. “He was tired and he made the decision he had lived long enough.”

Artist George Ziel, who saw more than his share of real-life horrors, imbued his covers with an otherworldly, ethereal quality. Credit 124

LISA FALKENSTERN

Credit 125

Lisa Falkenstern has more covers in this book than any other artist. A student of Milton Charles, and, later, his wife, she relied on a creative process used by many cover illustrators of the time. After reading a manuscript, she’d submit three sketches for her painting to the publisher. When one was approved, she would rent a studio for a photo shoot, find props, book models, and take reference photos. For Crib she used her infant niece. For the cover of Thomas Monteleone’s Night Train she shot photos on New York City’s 7 train. For PIN, she worried about reproducing the human circulatory system on a man with no skin, so she studied anatomy books to get it right. The resulting painting was so complex, the art director took one look and said, “Make it simpler.”

As the ’80s progressed, Falkenstern lost interest in horror. “Everything was getting more and more gross and disturbing instead of funny and interesting,” she said. Eventually, she started doing romance covers, which were still selling strong, even as horror sales tanked.

Cover sketch for The Nestling by Milton Charles.

Pause and Reflect

Be they demons from hell or crabs from the sea, skeleton doctors or sensitive vampires, we’ve seen who and what bring the horror to these paperbacks. But what about the hapless man or woman who must suddenly cope with a telepathic baby or a haunted bungalow? We always learn about them in the old reliable mirror scene, a horror novel staple that’s as inevitable as death and prologues. It’s easy to put together a profile of the average horror protagonist. Because in every book, at some point, a character will gaze into a mirror and assess his or her looks for the reader.

First, the horror man. He is big but not muscular and usually comes with a deep tan, although he is in fact Anglo-Saxon. He might be Irish or Italian, and in a few weird cases even Greek, but his skin is dark because he works outside doing hard, honest labor, not because of his ethnic heritage.

The horror man is made of chisels. His profile is chiseled, his nose is chiseled, his forehead is chiseled. Sometimes even his powerful shoulders are chiseled. The only things that are not chiseled are his eyes. Those are piercing, but also surprisingly soft, and they light up when he smiles. In fact, as serious as the horror man appears, the best way for him to show his feelings is through soul-deep, passionate lovemaking, which he uses to reaffirm his commitment to marriage, or to show that he is the kind of man a woman can feel safe with.