GORDON JOHNSON: The Consummate Illustrator

After five years here at the Palette I'm starting to run out of adjectives to use to when trying to describe my favorite book cover artists: fantastic, incredible, quintessential, iconic, visionary, star-spangled, major, master-- what's left to use now? Well-- how about "consummate"! It's as good an adjective as there is, and it seems to fit Gordon Johnson like fresh canvas on an easel.

Of course, any other attribute beyond the one I've used above would be mere guesswork on my part because all I've ever been able to uncover about Johnson is that he was born in 1924 and died in 1989. Almost nothing else has been written about him, online anyway. That he was a prolific paperback artist who was probably based in or near New York City is something we can all safely take for granted; the paperbacks alone with his cover art that I've been able to verify and collect would suggest that he was, unquestionably, a highly productive commercial illustrator, and back then almost everyone who worked in publishing lived in or near the Big Apple. 

Gordon Johnson's forte was realism, starting with the illustrations he produced for various magazines in the mid 1950's, such as The American  Magazine, American Weekly, Outdoor Life and Boys' Life. It would seem that his first book commissions, or those that I've been able to discover, adhere from about the mid-1960's and constitute mostly teen titles from publishers like Grosset & Dunlap and Whitman. Though from that point on Johnson did what all "consummate" illustrators did when the great Silver Age of Mass-Market Paperbacks got heralded in, he began producing cover art for nearly every major paperback house in New York City. Along the way he mastered each and every genre that stood before him, the "fantastics" being perhaps his only overlook. He relentlessly kept at it too until 1989, when death came calling for him much too soon at the age of 65.

For this posting, I'm are going to feature Johnson's more modern, contemporary covers, representing action, adventure, drama, and romance. I'll save his many marvelous historicals for a later post.

As you know by now, I always start out by showing the earliest possible cover I have of my featured artist. Here it's Sky Manor by Jennifer Blair, published in paperback by Dell in 1971. Blair is actually Adeline McElfresh, the talented writer of more than fifty medical romances, who apparently wrote gothics too, this one being represented in pink perfection by Gordon Johnson. And while this doesn't constitute a spoiler, McElfresh certainly shocked me with her lascivious plot insinuations, and insertion of not only macabre violence, but grisly murder. Wow, who knew Adeline had all that in her!

"Christina had been warned against going to Skye Manor, against the ominous old house with its locked doors, buried secrets and blood-chilling cries in the night. But Howard was there and she was determined to be with the man she intended to marry, no matter how frightening the rumors. Yet when the rumors suddenly flared into nightmarish reality with one horrible act of violence after another, Christina knew that something inhuman was on the loose-- and that she was trapped by her love in an icy drama of unspeakable terror."

Dawn, one of my friends who is a big horror fan and a former blogger, simultaneously read the same David Morrell novel that I was reading. She hated it, and said it was two hours of her life she could never get back. Picture my incredulity! You see, I think Morrell is one of our best writers, and that particular novel, Creepers, was as good as anything he's written so far, which includes his bestsellers First Blood (aka Rambo), The Totem, and The Brotherhood of the Rose. Okay, granted, maybe the scary atmosphere that started off so incredibly well in Creepers wore off way too soon, and the story moved too quickly into a standard action thriller, but I, like a lot of others including Stephen King, Douglas Preston and Dean Koontz, loved it just the same. Testament (Fawcett Crest, 1975), Morrell's second published novel (First Blood came first), has yet to be cracked open by me, but I did place it in my TBR pile. When I'm done with it you can be sure I won't be passing it on to Dawn.

"The terror begins without warning. The cat suddenly dies of poison. At that moment Rueben Bourne has no inkling of its significance. The bit by bit the full horror of it is unleashed upon him. He knows now that he and his family have become the target of a powerful and paranoid right-wing fanatic---a man who will not rest until Bourne, his wife and children are exterminated! Where can they run? What can they do? How can they save themselves from this madman's obsessive hate?"

Who doesn't like a train station? The anticipation of riding the rails is enough to make you jog if not run to the nearest one. Johnson certainly made his way to one to reference his beautiful young model against it. Of Love and Death and Other Journeys by Isabelle Holland was published by Dell Laurel Leaf 1977.  

"Sixteen year old Meg Grant loves her mother and the Bohemian life they have as European tour guides. Everything is fine until Meg's mother is diagnosed with cancer. Now Meg must meet the father she has never seen and live a life she has never had."

 

Here's another train station by Johnson, and showing its era too; note, not a puffy nylon jacket on anybody. I And My True Love is one of 21 internationally bestselling novels that Helen MacInnes wrote that were centered around espionage, intrigue, and romance. She based her stories in part on her husband's experiences as an MI6 agent working in Great Britain, Europe and the US, and hers as his loving wife. Fawcett Crest republished this particular paperback edition in 1976.

 
"American diplomat Payton Pleydell and his wife Sylvia are the most respected, brilliant couple in Washington. Theirs seems a perfect marriage but Kate Jerold begins to suspect that her cousin's husband is not as devoted as he seems. Then the unexpected arrival of a Czech official threatens to bring the facade crashing down. Even after six years apart, Sylvia has not forgotten Jan Brovic; during the war they had been deeply, secretly in love. But now there is a new war, and former allies have become bitter enemies. Jan is on the other side and his motives may not be pure. Separated by the enmity of nations, Sylvia must decide whether to risk everything to be with the man she loves."

Patty, one my favorite former booksellers, scolded me once for having never read The Eagle Has Landed, Jack Higgins' unconventional novel about a team of German dirty-dozeners trying to kidnap Winston Churchill during World War II. "It's a damn classic!" she insisted.  "Here's the deal, Patty," I replied, trying to sound as cool as one of Higgins' anti-heroes from another, earlier novel (like the one featured above), "I like to eat my bangers with mash and not sauerkraut."

Higgins, of course, went airborne with 1975's The Eagle Has Landed, which led to more than thirty years of additional success for the British author. But I, like some other discriminating readers I know of, prefer his earlier work to his post-Eagle stuff. Slim, violent thrillers like 1966's Midnight Never Comes, here published for the first time in America in 1975 by Fawcett Gold Medal on the heels of Higgins' sudden international success, are more appealing to me than his later, sometimes bloated bestsellers. Johnson scaled heights too with his Midnight cover painting, the first of many he would produce for the British maestro.

"Paul Chavasse had everything a good agent needed. Flair, ingenuity, a superb intelligence, common sense---plus a willingness to kill. Now he was part of the walking wounded. So badly hurt on his last mission they figured he was through. But Chavasse was far from through. A few months of special training and he was ready to take on one of the most dangerous men in the world. Max Donner. A millionaire with his own private army and a plan for stealing Britain's newest secret missile. Paul was ready for Max Donner. But he was not ready for Donner's beautiful young stepdaughter, Asta."

A year or so into Higgins' early-works revival, Fawcett Gold Medal developed a new, bullseye cover design, aimed specifically for all of their remaining Higgins' reprints. It was fitting that Johnson be the one to position the cross-hairs. A Prayer for the Dying was first published in 1973; this reprint was issued in 1975. 

"Martin Fallon was a professional rebel. On the run. Just about everyone wanted him---the Special Branch, Military Intelligence, the I.R.A. Fallon was not a murderer. But now murder was part of his deal with Dandy Jack Meehan to get a passport and enough money to get out of England. The job was a simple one for a sharp-shooter like Fallon. But there were unexpected complications. Two witnesses. A priest. And a beautiful young woman. Would Fallon have to kill them, too?"

Higgins' Toll for the Brave was originally published in the United Kingdom in 1971. Fawcett Gold Medal issued this American paperback edition in 1976. Johnson's cover art gives us a glimpse of Britain's Stonehenge, always an excellent selling point for any story.

"Ellis Jackson. A war veteran whose war was now with himself. Accused of murdering his mistress and his best friend, he was driven to the edge of sanity. Somewhere deep inside him he knew he had not done this terrible thing. He had been set up. Framed. He also knew nobody would believe him. Not unless he could prove his innocence. But first he had to escape..."

Hell Is Too Crowded is one of Higgins' very earliest thrillers, first published in the U.K. in 1962 under his real name, Harry Patterson. Fawcett Gold Medal published this American paperback edition in 1976. Looking at the original painting makes me wonder if Johnson had to ascend a high-rise under construction in order to gain his reference shot, or did he just cobble the whole thing together from stock images?

"The face swimming at him out of the fog. The strange young woman appearing suddenly. The invitation to her flat. The offer of a drink. The drink was the last thing Matt Brady remembered. When he woke, the police were swarming about---and the body of the girl was lying near him on the floor. Of course, the did not believe his story. He was charged with murder and sent to prison for life. There were few prisons strong enough to hold Matt Brady. And Matt knew he had to break out of this one fast. He had to find out the truth behind this bizarre nightmare. Who wanted to frame him? Who wanted him out of the way? All he remembered was a face in the fog, a half-remembered face that was his only link with sanity..."

The Keys of Hell was originally published in the U.K. in 1965 under Higgins' pseudonym Martin Fallon. Fawcett Gold Medal published this first American paperback edition in 1976. This is perhaps my favorite action illustration from Johnson out of all the ones I've seen (more to follow below). I just love the poses.

"Paul Chavasse was looking forward to his holiday when the Chief said, "There's a simple little job I want you to do first." Of course nothing the Chief wanted was either simple of little. It was usually large and lethal. This time Paul's assignment was to get into Albania and put a dangerous double agent out of commission---permanently. What he did not know was that someone had set a trap. For him. Someone who had waited a long time for revenge. Now the indestructible Chavasse, whom no one could out-thing or out-fight, was headed straight for destruction---and Hell..."

Higgins' Wrath of the Lion was originally published in the U.K. in 1964. This reprint from Fawcett Gold Medal with cover art by Johnson was issued in late 1976 or early 1977.

"Neil Mallory---tough, experienced veteran of more wars than he cared to remember---was in a new business now. Which is why he watched so carefully when Anne Grant left the bar followed by two strangers. When he heard her cry out a few minutes later, Mallory knew it was time to rescue her. She was very grateful, in fact, she offered him a job. She did not know then that it was exactly what he was waiting for, that the attack on her was all part of a very dangerous game of intrigue and violence. Nor did she know she was the key to it all..."

Confessional was published in paperback by Signet in 1986 following the usual hardcover treatment. By this time Higgins was by now firmly established as a popular novelist, and so was Johnson, as one of Higgins' very best cover artists. 

"The Russians trained him and planted him deep in the hottest spot in the free world-- Northern Ireland. He had the perfect cover and the perfect plan-- to kill the most beloved man on earth. Too late the Russians changed their minds. He was out of their control. Desperately the IRA tried to head him off. But he was even better than they at the undercover game. So Tony Villiers of British Intelligence had to do what he most hated. He had to have his Agency beg the help of Liam Devlin, former deadly foe and Irish terrorist, and the only one who could stop the ideal assassin before his victim unknowingly welcomed death with open arms..."

Brian Garfield (1939-2018) may not be a household name but he wrote more than seventy books across a variety of genres. His most famous novel is perhaps Death Wish (1972), which was filmed as a vehicle to carry Charles Bronson, and it did, but it could also be Hopscotch (1975), which won the Edgar Award for Best Novel. Hopscotch also was filmed, but perhaps because of the unappealing nature of its lead actor, Walter Matthau, it has become largely forgotten today. This paperback edition of Relentless with Johnson's cover art was published in 1975 (initially in 1973 with a different cover artist), and it has all of Garfield's best attributes: strong plotting, strong characterization, strong pacing and strong suspense.

"His name was Sam Watchman... He was a full-blooded Navajo Indian. He was also a cop. And he had an assignment. A rough one. He had to find and capture an ex-Green Beret officer. A desperate and dangerous man hiding in the blizzard-racked mountains of the great Southwest."

Ian MacAlister was a pseudonym that Marvin Albert (1924-1996) used on four of his perhaps best adventure novels published in the 1970's. The MacAlister name was a sort of anagram of Alistair MacLean, who was perhaps the adventure genre's greatest proponent back in those days. Albert also used the pen-names Anthony Rome, Nick Quarry and Mike Barone while publishing nearly fifty novels between the years 1957 and 1993. His stories, whether they were crime, adventure or western fiction, always seem to feature tough men and women in contention with other tough men and women over dirty money or treasure or whatever. Driscoll's Diamonds is exactly that, and it was first published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1973 with a pretty good cover by an unknown artist. Then, in 1977, it was reprinted by Fawcett, but now it featured a cover by Johnson. 

"It's this simple," Royan told Driscoll. "Either you come out of the water with those diamonds, or Shana dies. Right here. Today."  It was not the kind of ultimatum Driscoll cared for. They were, after all, his diamonds. And Shana was his girl. But Driscoll had no choice. He was unarmed and pitted against the one man in the world who was smarter than he was---Royan had taught him everything he knew. Driscoll headed for the water, for the wreck caught somewhere in the reefs under the sea off the African shore---the drowned plane hiding its treasure of stolen diamonds. But something had triggered itself in Driscoll's mind. There might just be a way out of all this---if Royan was the kind of man he was supposed to be---and Shana was still his girl...."

Strike Force 7 is another excellent adventure novel by Albert published under his pen-name Ian MacAlister. Fawcett Gold Medal issued this in 1974. While I can't be 100 percent certain that this cover is Johnson's, I am leaning heavily in that direction.

"They called him Jarrell. A gunrunner, a mercenary, a soldier of fortune who had spent most of his days on the wrong side of the law. But now someone important needed him. The wife and daughter of American Millionaire Simon Bishop had been kidnapped by Arab revolutionaries led by the infamous Bel Zaara. And Jarrell was tapped for the job of rescue. The women had been spirited away to the hidden caves deep in the wilds of the Atlas Mountains. It would take an army of commandos to get them out. But Jarrell needed only seven---six men and a woman. These seven, Jarrell knew, were going to be his last army. Win or lose, live or die. His last army, and his last operation. He wanted to do it right. A man like Jarrell couldn't miss---or could he?"

Colin Forbes was a pseudonym of British novelist Raymond Harold Sawkins (1923-2006), one of four that he used. But it was as Forbes that Sawkins made his reputation; he wrote 33 novels under that pen-name, 24 of them in a series featuring the ever reliable Tweed, the Deputy Director of the Secret Intelligence Service. (The Stone Leopard, published in 1975 by Fawcett Crest, is a non-series novel). Sawkins is often put in the same context as Alistair MacLean, Jack Higgins, and Frederick Forsyth, and deservedly so, his stories are always taut and entertaining.

"An assassination attempt on the French President, Guy Florian triggers off a savage manhunt for the notorious resistance leader known as the "Leopard." Although the records show the Leopard has been dead for years, Police Prefect Grelle is not convinced. He is very impressed by the strange story of an ex-convict who tells him he has seen the Leopard and that he is someone very high in the government. Before he can say more he is murdered. The team of Soviet killers sent into France to eliminate witnesses to the Leopard's real identity is already at work. Swiftly Grelle begins to close in on them. But each time they elude him. Now he knows something very big and very deadly is about to unfold. Grelle knows, too, he must unmask the Leopard before he destroys France itself..."

 

Year of the Golden Ape is another of Colin Forbes non-series adventure novels, with cover art by Gordon Johnson. It was published by Fawcett Crest in 1975.

"A homemade Atom bomb... A fanatic Arab Sheik straight out of the dark ages... A violent paid killer who enjoys his work... A brilliant English adventurer always on the wrong side of the law and the right side of the money... Arab and European terrorists straight out of tomorrow's headlines, blackmailing the world with a bomb capable of destroying a city---a city like San Francisco..."

My goal is to read all of Alistair MacLean's best adventure novels. I'm at seven so far, with thirteen more to go. That's right, only twenty of his thirty-one novels are considered to be good, or great, the ones written after Breakheart Pass are all mostly crap, or so says almost everyone who's read them. The Golden Rendezvous is one MacLean's early novels, and thus among his very best. It was initially published in the U.K. in 1962, and then republished again and again in paperback on both sides of the Atlantic. This edition, published by Fawcett Gold Medal with Johnson's cover art, is circa 1977 (well maybe earlier).

"A luxury cruise... A missing atomic scientist... A hidden nuclear device... A very rich and beautiful woman... A band of desperate hijackers... A ship of gold. Put them all together with First Officer John Carter, tough, shrewd, resourceful, and you have a fantastic blend of suspense---adventure and international intrigue."

This is the first U.S. paperback edition of Alistair Maclean's Bear Island, published by Fawcett Crest in 1972 (although font wise this is a match with the much later printed Golden Rendezvous), and it may be the first MacLean to have a Johnson cover (his signature is not visible, so I could be wrong, but I don't think I am). It is also the last of his novels to be written in first-person narrative. Bear Island though is one of MacLean's best thrillers, or rather best murder mysteries, because the plot is so multi-layered and inventive that it feels like could've been conceived by Agatha Christie, that is, an Agatha Christie pumped up on steroids.

"October is no time to be aboard ship in the Barents Sea, three hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle. But that's where the cast and crew of Olympus Productions find themselves. And even before they reach their destination, the ship's doctor has his hands full. Three men are violently murdered, and the company's unspoken fears are confirmed: a pathological killer awaits them on the loneliest, most desolate island in the world. Does Bear Island guard a secret more valuable than five lives? Why is there no shooting script for the movie--and why has no one except the director been allowed to see the screenplay? Is the entire company marked for death? Does a mass murderer lurk in its midst, a pathological killer?"

The Secret Ways is also one of MacLean's best novels. This Fawcett Gold Medal paperback edition with Johnson's cover art is probably circa 1978. It was originally published in the U.K. in 1959 under the title The Last Frontier. 

"Winters are silent in Budapest, silent and dark, and behind some door in some ancient street Harold Jennings, the brilliant British scientist, sat rehearsing a speech denouncing his own country. The Communists intended to use Jennings' speech as the propaganda coup of the decade. The British were equally determined that it should never be delivered. Michael Reynolds, Britain's top agent, was given the impossible assignment---enter Hungary, kidnap Dr. Jennings and return him to the free world; and this, Reynolds decided, was roughly like trying to find an invisible needle in a burning haystack."

The Drowner by John D. MacDonald allowed for three artists to do the same cover take. First up was Stan Zuckerberg (seen upper left), representing the first paperback edition by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1963. Next came Barbara Walton (seen upper right), representing the first U.K. hardcover edition published by Robert Hale in 1964. Then Gordon Johnson dove in with FGM's later, circa 1977 printing.

Note: If you haven't read John D. MacDonald, you should. The fact that he had a greater influence on Stephen King than any other writer is all you need to know to get started.

"Lucille Hanson had rid herself of the wrong man---her rich husband who lived casually and loved carelessly. Then she found another man she hoped would be right. She was putting together the pieces of her life---until all of her hopes came to rest at the bottom of a lake where her body was found. It must have been an accident, was what most people said. It might have been suicide, was what others wanted to think. But among her mourners just one person refused to believe it was anything but murder..."

I make no bones about it (if asked, and nobody ever has): I detest the Matt Helm movies that starred Dean Martin. So imagine what it was like for me to try and read one of the novels that those stupid films were based on. That's right-- I didn't get past five pages. But Anthony Boucher certainly had no qualms about Donald Hamilton's 27 book series, nor did John Dickson Carr, who declared Matt Helm to be his favorite secret agent. And Gordon Johnson produced great cover art on at least a dozen Matt Helm paperbacks-- so what was my difficulty? I don't know. I really can't put it into words exactly, it just didn't grab me like I expected it to. Or maybe the images of Dean Martin in a white turtleneck were still poisoning my mind. But I'm willing to give it another shot. One last time for all it's worth. If you insist. Sigh...

This first paperback edition of The Retaliators was published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1976.

"Matt Helm was unexpectedly rich and he didn't like it. The $20,000 that had been deposited in his account was a complete surprise. Very nice. Except Matt knew that someone was setting him up, making it look as though he was a traitor and getting a payoff. Someone who wanted Matt out of business. Suddenly, another secret agent with an unexplained surplus in his bank account was murdered. Matt figured he'd better track down his "benefactors" before they retired him for good."

I don't know who came up with this cover design, but it definitely required Johnson to make some compositional adjustments. This first paperback edition of The Terrorizers was published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1977.

"When they fished him out of the bay and he woke up in a Canadian hospital, he had no idea who he was. The plane crash had wiped his mind clean of the past. Then this gorgeous chick waltzed into his room and told him he was Paul Madden, a photographer, her fiance, which seemed like a pretty good deal. Except when some joker called on the phone and told him he was Matt Helm. Somehow he knew this meant trouble. Bad trouble."

Ah-ha! Now we see how Johnson adjusted. The Silencers was first published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1962. This reprint edition is circa 1977 or 78.

"Matt Helm, the undercover agent with a killer instinct and a weakness for the wrong woman takes a long day's journey into the New Mexico mountains and finds---God help us all---a crumbling, ghost-town church which conceals one of the most ungodly devices ever conceived for man's destruction."

This revolver edition of The Interlopers was published by Fawcett Gold Medal in either 1977 or 78. I believe it may have been reprinted later on with a larger illustration to match the editions seen below. I'm hoping to find a copy of that item to add to my collection too.

"Matt Helm finds out just how fatal blond hair can be when he takes over another man's identity, fiancee, and fate. In this mixed-doubles counter-espionage mission, Helm plays decoy for an assassin's dream... to kill the next President of the United States."

The revolver design went away about as fast as it came, replaced by a previously used, large windowed format. This reprint of Fawcett Gold Medal's original 1964 edition of The Shadowers was published circa 1978 or 79.

"An agent like Matt Helm might be a nice man to live with for a while---but he's not the kind a woman would want to marry. Unless, perhaps, she had to---unless, perhaps, the marriage was part of an ingenious cover. Here the man whose daily bread is violence takes himself the most unlikely bride in the world---just to make sure that death doesn't part them..."

Murderer's Row is one of the slimmest Matt Helm books in the series, adding up to a mere 143 pages. And yet, the title, possibly due to the success of the movie version, is one of the most recognizable in the series. It was first published in 1962 by Fawcett Gold Medal. This reprint is circa 1978 or 79.

"The department is gravely concerned about Helm. He is on a brutal mission, it is true---but his own callousness seems to have reached a point of absolute savagery. He has apparently murdered on of our own agents. Helm is on or near Chesapeake Bay. He is armed and dangerous, and must be located, kept under surveillance, and possibly removed from active service."

So, did Johnson stage his models in the studio, and then superimposed them on the boat? Or did they all go out to the marina for a photo shoot? I would love to be a fly on the wall and see exactly how illustrators accomplished what they accomplished. The Betrayers was published in either 1978 or 79 by Fawcett Gold Medal.

"Far out in the Pacific, among the sunny islands of Hawaii, a dark venomous plot was being engineered by one of our own agents, an angel-faced man called the Monk, who had a special fondness for high explosives. His target was an American troopship with 3,000 U.S. soldiers scheduled to blow sky high---unless Matt Helm could stop him. But first Helm had to trust the beautiful stranger who claimed to be his sister-in-law, and insisted that his former "wife" had just willed him half a million dollars..."

Yet another classic boat ride by Johnson on The Intimidators. Fawcett Gold Medal published this reprint of their original 1974 edition in either 1979 or '80.

"It was a double mission this time. One, to terminate a top-notch enemy agent. Two, to located the missing fiancee of a Texas Millionaire. Somehow they were connected. Matt didn't know how---until a few members of the international set also disappeared near the infamous Bermuda Triangle. Everybody figured they were dead. Then Matt discovered they were alive---and part of a very deadly game."

This is the only strict science fiction cover by Gordon Johnson that I know of. His partial signature can be just glimpsed in the lower left corner. I have another cover image where the man's head is centered higher and it does reveals the entire signature, but I prefer this scan over one I didn't generate. The Stochastic Man by Robert Silverberg was published as a paperback original by Fawcett Gold Medal in August, 1976.

"Lew Nichols' business, at the end of the twentieth century, was stochastic prediction--high-powered guesswork. He was very good at this well-paying, sophisticated and technical species of witchcraft. And he was quite content with the sultry and sensuous Indian beauty he married. Lew Nichols' life was as placid as an electron flow--until a fateful day in March '99 when he met Martin Carvajal. From the first, Lew got strange vibrations from the sullen and eccentric millionaire. "Your computer models," said Carvajal, "will allow you to guess the future. Now I will show you how to control it!"

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Hard to imagine Dr. Frank G. Slaughter (1908-2001) writing a book about demonic possession, but he did, albeit under the guise of a medical novel, his literary specialis. This first paperback edition of Devil's Gamble, featuring one of Johnson's more interesting compositions (one that was perhaps pioneered a decade earlier by Victor Livoti), was published in paperback by Pocket in 1978. 

"This is the story of Lynne Talman, self-proclaimed agent of the devil, who dies in a plane crash. Of Janet Burke, a reporter writing about Lynne, who survives the crash badly disfigured. And of the strange operation that makes Janet an exquisite and desired beauty---only to twist her personality into a tool of demonic destruction!"

This book was originally titled Gram Negative when it was published by Scribner's in 1986 (in the U.K. it was Emergency Ward). Pocket had the good sense to change it to Critical in 1988, and to give it a great cover by Johnson. Massachusetts resident Barbara Weiner, who was an intensive care nurse by profession, wrote just one other novel that I know of, Life Lines, published in paperback by Zebra in 1990.

"Gravely ill with gram negative septicemia, an insidious form of blood poisoning, Jennifer Bartlett-Stafford, daughter of Sprague General Hospital's most influential benefactor, lies at the brink of death. Her life-- and the hospital's survival---is at the heart of a fever-pitched struggle of pride and power, desire and dollars. Dr. Michael Graham is desperate to save the life of his childhood sweetheart---and is risking his promising surgical career. Dr. Donald Fales sees his long-awaited chance to destroy Graham, but to save his lucrative ties to the patient's family he must keep her alive-- or send her somewhere else to die. Jackie O'Neil, the ICU's new head nurse, is battling a tide of life-and-death crises---and a feud rank with medical mistakes and malignant lies. Now, the hospital reels under the shock of a vicious power play, a deadly gamble that's about to take its toll..."

Michael French has written more than twenty titles to date, including award-winning young adult fiction, adult fiction, biographies, screenplays and even self-help books, all while holding down a full-time career in real estate. Club Caribe was his first novel, published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1977, and inspired by an actual trip to a Club Med with his wife and kids. I love the way Johnson has the novel's 'man-of-the-cloth' fighting against his natural urges. Ha!

"Sex, Violence, Terror, and a Luxury Hotel in the West Indies!"

That's one artfully placed palm tree, Mr. Johnson! If case you weren't swingin' back in the sixties, Donald Bain (1935-2017) was the ghost writer of Coffee, Tea or Me, the 1967 bestselling memoir about the escapades of two flight stewardesses. It was all made-up nonsense of course, Bain having created it entirely from whole cloth. Yup, one of the first fake memoirs. The publisher even sent the stewardesses out on tour promoting what everyone assumed was their book. Ha! What dupes we all were. Bain became a virtual writing machine after that: 48 Murder She Wrote novels, 9 comedic novels, 8 adult westerns (as by J. D. Hardin), 13 books released under pseudonyms, 8 under his own name, and 27 mysteries attributed to Margaret Truman. He even wrote an autobiography: Murder HE Wrote, A Successful Writer's Life. Bain's dramatic, sexual romp in the white sand, Club Tropique, was published by Fawcett Gold Medal in 1978.

"Welcome to Club Tropique, where the beautiful and the not-so-beautiful come together for a mad week of sex, sun, fun and fantasy... Club Tropique, where you escape the 9-to-5 life and find the unforgettable (and unmentionable) moments you've always dreamed of... Club Tropique, where sooner or later people find what they're looking for---if they have guts enough to take it..."

Some day I'll read Hot Rain. I swear I will. Johnson's cover art, split so vibrantly by that lightning bolt, is what keeps me swearing. Plus Jack M. Bickham thinks it's "a real nail-biter!" and Bickham knows a thing or two about writing; he was himself a successful author and a longstanding professor of English at the University of Oklahoma. It would appear that Howard N. Portnoy (1946-) wrote just this one novel, labeled as fiction by its 1978 publisher Pocket, but to me it prefaces more like horror.

"First it was a young boy at play. Then a farmer plowing his land. Then a teenage girl, felled on the steps of a church. Soon no one was safe-- not even indoors. Even the telephone wires transmitted lightning death. The Reverend McBride looked to the blood-red skies and saw the vengeful hand of God. But reporter Don Coulter suspected human design. His treacherous search for answers led to a discover even more horribly bizarre than the lightning itself---the deadly Project Hot Rain."

Robert Middlemiss published three adventure novels over a three year span, but nothing else after that. The Parrot Man came first in 1977, followed by The Lofoten Run in 1979, and then The Pelican's Clock in 1981. Johnson produced the cover art on the 'Lofoten' only. Fawcett Gold Medal was Middlemiss's publisher, which should've spurred him on to do more writing, but instead he turned elsewhere, becoming a creative writing instructor, workshop leader and editor-in-chief. Leading instead of greeding---yeah, we can all appreciate that. 

"Hank Undset was a CIA agent with more than a professional interest in the undercover mission he'd been assigned off the coast of Norway. His father had died there. His uncle had been murdered there. And the secret key to the dark furies that tormented his mind lay imprisoned in the blackest reaches of that impenetrable coast. But Hank Undset was also a man in the thrall of savageries beyond his control... a man who'd been specially selected because his enemies weren't the only ones who didn't want him to return alive..."

I scanned this cover knowing it was the work of my man Gordon Johnson, and then resold it back to my local used bookstore. I had no plans to read the book, believing it was just another Breakfast Club derivative. But when I read the plot description in preparation to this posting, I realized this teen novel resembles Friday the 13th more than it does John Hughes's film. Now I want my old copy back! The Grounding of Group 6 by Julian F. Thompson was published in paperback by Avon Flare in 1983.

"Coldbrook Country was the perfect boarding school: expensive, innovative, discreet. So when five entering students were told to hike to a rough campsite deep in the woods as part of orientation, they didn't think to ask questions. It was strange that their leader and advisor, Nat Rittenhouse, was so young. And why had he been so careful to cover their tracks? It wasn't until the next morning that Marigold, Ludi, Sara, Coke, and Sully learned the impossible truth: Nat had been hired by the Coldbrook Country School to make sure Group 6 never came out of the woods alive. And their parents were paying the bill."

Pursuit was one of Michael French's best young adult novels, winner of the California Young Reader Medal. Delacorte Press published it in hardcover in 1983, followed by Dell's Laurel Leaf paperback in 1983, which used the same cover art. That cover art by Johnson is a winner too in my opinion (I'm a pushover for any illustrations involving climbing or hiking), and it's also a painting I would like to see in the real to compare it against the above image, which may be less than ideally reproduced.

"Gordy has no idea of the horror that lies ahead as he and his brother, Martin, hike through the Sierras with their friends Roger and Luke. Gordy knows that Roger is responsible for Martin's accident. Now he has no alternative but to set out alone through the wilderness to search for help. Roger is desperate to silence him. Nobody has ever beaten Roger before. He'll do anything to get his own way--even kill! But Gordy has one last defense that Roger isn't counting on."

 

CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE

Nancy Pelletier (1923-2015) wrote only one novel that I know of, The Rearrangement (titled Happy Families in the U.K.). It was published in paperback by Signet in 1986. Allegedly, Pelletier wrote plays and screenplays too. Mostly though, she explored life as a community college lecturer, then as an assistant and associate professor at Marietta College in Marietta, Ohio, where she eventually became chairman of their Humanities Division. She also taught creative writing to the elderly while serving as vice president of Eve Inc., an organization that helps battered women. Oh sure, it would have been nice to have gotten more novels out of her, but serving your community is always more important than self-servitude.

Does Johnson's cover art suggest an adult Breakfast Club? Yeah, kind of, but thankfully, it's not. John Coyne's family saga, Brothers & Sisters, is actually pretty heavy stuff, heavier than anything in the Breakfast Club. Ambition, obsession, love, betrayal, dark family secrets and murder, it's serious stuff for sure, and kudos to Coyne for writing something other than straight genre horror. Signet published this paperback in 1987.

"Caitlin DeLacey. A beautiful, high-spirited Irish immigrant fiercely determined to make a success of her family, she engineered the lives of her five children mercilessly: Maggie, her youngest daughter, a brilliant foreign correspondent torn by her obsessive hunger for a married diplomat... son Mike the Bishop, tied to the Irish cause by love-- and by terror... the headstrong Cathleen, doomed to pay a price for her forbidden rebellion... famous golf pro Paddy Jack, forced to sell his youth for his mother's dreams... and Emmett, the tortured Vietnam veteran, haunted by private demons that make him a prime suspect in his mother's death..."

This undated and untitled painting is said to have been commissioned by Avon. I've looked in all the usual places for the actual paperback, but so far have found nothing. Still, what better way to end our visit with the consummate illustrator Gordon Johnson than by showing this handsome couple relaxing at their remote, beautifully situated cabin in the woods. We should all be so lucky to find a slice of paradise like this.

[© September, 2022, Jeffersen]